CHAPTER III – THE INTRUDER

“I wonder – ” Jerry stopped, a displeased pucker between her brows.

“You are not the only one.” Leila shrugged her shoulders. “I do not like the sound of ‘four from Alston Terrace.’ There might be one of the four not quite to our taste.”

“You mean Miss Walbert, don’t you?” Jerry questioned frankly.

“I do. She has been aching to get into Wayland Hall. Vera and I were told that last year. And what is to prevent her? I doubt if Miss Remson knows of her friendship with the departed but not regretted Sans,” Leila argued.

“She must have noticed her last year when she same to see Miss Cairns. I met her in the halls more than once,” Muriel said quickly.

“Miss Remson would pay no special attention to visitors from other campus houses. The maid would admit them to the Hall,” returned Leila. “Don’t you know, Miss Remson is famous here at Hamilton for minding her own affairs? She never interferes with the girls in such matters so long as they keep within bounds.”

“What’s the use in borrowing trouble,” interposed Marjorie cheerfully. “Miss Walbert may not be one of the four students from Alston Terrace to register here. Even if she should be, why need we care one way or the other? When Miss Remson first mentioned it, I thought of her too. We all did, I guess.”

“And why?” Leila turned quickly to Marjorie. “Because we all know her for what she is, a snob and a deceitful little peacock. In my old age and dignity I longed for peace – but not with that trouble-maker in the house. You remember – Jerry and I both took a rooted dislike to her the first time we set eyes on her at the station. I never found reason to change my opinion other.” Leila spoke with decided warmth.

“Nor I,” echoed Jerry. “I’m going to tell Miss Remson, if she reads off Miss Walbert’s name, precisely what she may expect from her. Phyllis Moore said she made so much trouble for the freshies as president of their class that if it hadn’t been so near the end of the year they would have appointed a committee to tell her where she got off at.”

Before more could be said on the subject of the disagreeable Miss Walbert the manager was among them again, register in hand. The five girls watched her in canny silence as she opened the familiar black book and let her index finger travel down the page of registrations.

“You asked about the students from Alston Terrace, Leila. They are Miss Schultz, Miss Kane, Miss Mead and Miss Walbert. Are any of these friends of yours?” Miss Remson glanced up from the page.

“No. Three of them I do not know. One I do not wish to know.” Leila’s bright blue eyes met the manager’s squarely.

“Which is the one you do not wish to know, Leila? I ask you the question because I know your fairness of mind. If you do not care to know this student you must have good reason for your attitude toward her. Will you be frank with me?”

“None of us like Miss Walbert,” Leila said slowly, after a brief pause during which she mentally framed what she wished to say. “We don’t wish to keep her out of the Hall. We only wish you to know that she is a trouble-maker. She was a friend of Leslie Cairns. It is seldom you hear me speak against anyone, Miss Remson,” Leila continued. “Knowing what you had to endure from the Sans, I feel free to warn you against this girl. She may never justify my warning. Still you have the truth about her.”

Leila had not spoken from characteristic Irish impulse alone. A sense of practical friendly duty toward Miss Remson had also prompted her bold stand. The manager quite understood this.

“Thank you, Leila,” she said gravely. “You understand my position here. I am not a boarding-house keeper who must have references. I am supposed to take these students changing from another campus house to Wayland Hall on faith. Now I recall why Miss Walbert’s face seemed so familiar. I must have noticed her last year during her calls here on Miss Cairns, then paid no further attention to her. It is most unfortunate. Had I known of her friendship with Miss Cairns, I should have refused her application. She would have considered me prejudiced, but I should not have cared. She applied for a single. I had none to give her. She is to room with Miss Schultz.”

“I’m sorry for Miss Schultz,” commented irrepressible Jerry.

“You needn’t be,” laughed Marjorie. “She is independent enough to look out for herself. She is often in the Chemical Laboratory when I am. She is a dig of the first water and a very brilliant student. She won’t bother her head about Miss Walbert.”

“It is to be hoped her influence may prove beneficial,” remarked the manager dryly. “I am very certain that I want no repetitions of the noisy quarrel which took place in Miss Cairns’ room one evening last winter. Luckily Miss Walbert will have no one to aid and abet her in making mischief, as would be the case if Miss Cairns and that group of girls were still here. I will read you the other names.”

Her listeners were not sorry to close the subject. With relief they riveted their attention on the list of names read out to them. When it came to the two students from Acasia House they received another shock. Miss Remson named Alida Burton and Lola Elster.

The manager’s eyes on her book, she did not see the significant glances which flashed back and forth at this news. None of her hearers made open comment on either name. While they did not approve of either Lola Elster or Alida Burton they had seen little of them since their freshman year.

Later, on the way to their rooms, Marjorie expressed herself as wondering whether, after all, they should have mentioned to Miss Remson the former intimacy of both girls with the Sans.

“I hated to say anything more.” Leila thus explained her silence on that point. “Those two are very chummy. They troubled no one last year. I heard Leslie Cairns was very sore at their desertion of her standard.”

“I’ll mention the fact to Miss Remson some day when it comes just right. I think she ought to know it,” was Jerry’s view.

“Wait until Vera comes. She will break the news to Miss Remson in that nice soft little way of hers which never holds a bit of malice. I am hoping she will appear tomorrow. Not since I left her in New York in June have I set eyes on her. Her father spirited her away to visit an aunt in Idaho. It’s our Midget who will come back a wild and woolly Westerner. Can you not see her in a cowboy hat with a brace of revolvers at her belt?” Leila humorously painted.

The idea of dainty, diminutive Vera in any such garb was provocative of laughter.

“Doesn’t it make you sick to think that Walbert snip is coming to the Hall to live?” Jerry vented her supreme disgust the moment she and Marjorie were behind their door.

“I haven’t stopped to think much about it,” Marjorie confessed.

“Well, think about it now, then. I never adored the Sans, but I can’t stand her. She will stir up a fuss here if she has half a chance. She is as much of a fusser as Rowena Quarrelena Fightena Scrapena used to be. I’m positively, heartily and completely disgusted over such bad news.” Jerry’s tone was half joking, half serious. “I was looking for pleasant sailing and no snags.”

“Our best plan is to pay no attention to her,” Marjorie placidly returned. “It is her fault that none of us are on speaking terms with her. She began cutting us the same day we tried to help her at the station.”

“And that lets us out,” decreed Jerry slangily. “As seniors we can look down on her with a cold and unpitying eye. Something like this.” Jerry drew herself up and stared at Marjorie with icy fixity.

“Br-r-r! Don’t try that on me again unless I have my fur coat handy,” was Marjorie’s joking reception of that freezing stare. “Excuse me for changing the subject, but let us go over to Silverton Hall after dinner this evening. I’d like to see who’s back.”

“De-lighted. We won’t eat much dinner after those sandwiches. We could cut out dinner tonight and start for Silverton Hall early. We’d then be hungry enough on the way home to stop at Baretti’s. Miss Remson won’t feel hurt if we aren’t here for dinner. We had tea with her. Besides, she knows how it is when one first comes back to college.”

“Oh, she won’t mind,” Marjorie assured confidently. “We’d better tell the others right away. You go and see Lucy. I’ll tell Leila and Muriel.”

“As soon as I put away this stuff from my suitcase,” Jerry promised. Her suitcase on the floor beside her couch, she had strewed the contents from one end of the bed to the other. “I suppose,” she began afresh, as she gathered up her toilet set and moved with it toward her chiffonier, “that I ought to – ”

The speech remained unfinished. Suddenly and without warning the door opened. A young woman in an automobile dust coat and cap walked serenely in. At sight of the two startled occupants of the room she set her leather traveling bag down with a sharp, “Well; may I ask what you two girls are doing in my room?” The newcomer was Elizabeth Walbert.

CHAPTER IV – A BIT OF NEWS

“Your room? Since when?” Jerry had forgotten all about the icy stare with which she intended to freeze this very person. She was gazing at the intruder with belligerence, not hauteur. Her tone conveyed an ominous chill to the too-sure claimant.

“I don’t understand you,” she returned with a slight toss of her head. “I only know that I was assigned to this room by Miss Remson.”

“Did she come to the door of this room with you?” inquired Jerry bluntly.

“Certainly not. She assigned me to Room 16. You two have evidently made a mistake. I know I haven’t.” Another toss of the head, more disagreeably pronounced. “I didn’t need her or a maid to show me. I know this house.”

“The number of this room is 15. Miss Macy and I have had it for three years,” Marjorie broke in evenly. “You will find 16 across the hall. The numbers on this side of the hall are odd; on the other, even.”

“Oh!” The arrogant claimant turned poppy-red. Plainly in the wrong, Marjorie’s civil, utterly dispassionate information fell upon her ears as a merited rebuke. “I was told – ” she began feebly. “I am sure the number over this door looks like 16. This is the room I wanted. I beg your pardon. Still I don’t understand – ”

In spite of the grudging apology she appeared only half convinced. Marjorie merely inclined her head without speaking. Jerry was silent from sheer disgust. The battery of two pairs of eyes full upon her proved too much for the intruder. She made a rather hurried exit, closing the door behind her with enough force to indicate a rise of temper.

“Blunderhead!” pronounced Jerry contemptuously. “I understand now why she can’t be taught to drive her car with safety to the public. She is really stupid underneath her trickiness.”

“Too bad she didn’t look before she leaped.” A quiet little smile dimpled the corners of Marjorie’s red lips. She had been merely amused at the incident.

“She must have felt foolish,” Jerry declared. “That’s what we might call ‘Skirmish, Number One.’ I daresay we’ll have more of them with her Walbertship before we receive our diplomas and hike for Sanford.”

“Not if I can help it,” vowed Marjorie, still smiling. This time it was at Jerry’s funny way of phrasing her opinions.

“Oh, I forgot. I was going to tell Lucy about going to Silverton Hall. I’ll put the rest of these things away when I come back. As long as I am to tell her, I might as well see Leila and Muriel. You go ahead and finish unpacking your suitcase.”

Jerry left the room on her errand. She presently returned with all three girls. The start for Silverton Hall was promptly made, the five friends strolling bareheaded across the campus.

Marjorie thought she had never seen her “second friend,” as she liked to term the campus, looking more verdantly beautiful. A fairly rainy summer had left the short, thick grass peculiarly vivid in its greenness. The leaves of every decorative shrub and tree seemed greener than of yore. It was as though the life of the free emerald spread was rising, not waning, with the approach of autumn.

Arrived at Silverton Hall, disappointment awaited them. Not one of their particular friends had returned. Half a dozen seniors grouped in girlishly picturesque attitudes on the veranda welcomed the callers with warmth. Leila, in particular, was hailed with delight. Her great popularity with the Silvertonites made her return as a post graduate a matter of rejoicing.

Place was made for the visitors on the veranda and the steady hum of voices soon proclaimed an enthusiastic exchange of campus news. It was earlier than the Wayland Hall girls had thought. They therefore declined a pressing invitation to stay to dinner at Silverton Hall, and, after half an hour’s stay, got under way again.

“Where to?” asked Jerry, as they left the premises of Silverton Hall. “Fortune isn’t with us tonight. We are wandering about almost as aimlessly as on the evening we landed here as freshies. Leila, excepted, of course. She was a soph then.”

“And very well I remember that evening,” rejoined Leila. “When I saw you Sanfordites come into Baretti’s I looked at Marjorie and planned the Beauty contest.”

“Yes; and inveigled me into joining the line that night when I had intended to keep out of it,” reproached Marjorie. “I was really cross with you for about two minutes, Leila Greatheart.”

“’Tis a long day away since then,” Leila lightly assured.

“I asked where we were going, but no one saw fit to answer me,” complained Jerry. “I’m not hungry enough yet for Baretti’s.”

“Let’s stop and find out,” proposed Muriel. “Only lunatics keep on going without knowing for what point they’re bound.”

“We might go over to Acasia House and see if Barbara Severn has come back,” proposed Marjorie.

“I’d propose going over to Wenderblatts’ to see Kathie and Lillian, but I haven’t called Kathie on the ’phone yet. One doesn’t like to descend on a private family unannounced,” Lucy the proper said regretfully.

“Oh, make it Acasia House,” Jerry voiced, with a touch of impatience. “If Barbara hasn’t come back we may see someone else we know. Either we are especially early at Hamilton this year, or else everybody else is late. No one’s home! Boo, hoo!” Jerry burst into a dismal wail.

“I refuse to go another step until you stop that awful noise,” balked Muriel. “We all feel very sad, Jeremiah, over the absence of our various friends, but we try to control our sorrow. Try and do likewise.”

“It is ice cream we will be after buying you at the nice Italian man’s, if you will stop roaring,” wheedled Leila, adopting a decided brogue.

“I believe the rules of Hamilton forbid unseemly noise on the campus.” Lucy fixed a severe eye on Jerry.

Jesting in this fashion the quintette had again taken up their walk, this time headed for Acasia House.

“We started out too early to make our calls,” commented Marjorie. “The Acasia House girls will probably be at dinner. It is only half-past six now.”

“We’ll only stop a few minutes there. By the time we have walked that far we may be hungry enough for a bang-up dinner at Baretti’s,” Jerry expressed this hope. “Nothing like hiking around the campus by way of celebrating our return to the knowledge shop.”

Acasia House, however, did not yield the winsome presence of Barbara Severn. “Not back yet,” was their second disappointment that evening. As Marjorie had surmised, such of the students who had returned were at dinner. The callers mounted the front steps to a deserted veranda. More, it was a maid, who, in answer to Marjorie’s ringing of the doorbell, furnished the information regarding the still absent Barbara.

“Balked all around!” Jerry dramatically struck her hand to her forehead as the party descended the steps. They had decided not to try getting acquainted with the freshmen of Acasia House that evening. They preferred waiting for Barbara’s return.

“Grant Giuseppe hasn’t shut up shop and gone on a vacation,” grumbled Leila. “’Tis my Irish bones that ache from so much weary wandering.

 
“Oh, it’s up the hill I had gone me fast,
Till my feet were stoned and sore;
And down the dale I hurried last
To find but the bolted door.”
 

She had broken into one of the curious wailing Celtic chants which were the girls’ delight.

“Do sing the rest of it, Leila,” begged Muriel, as the Irish girl stopped laughingly after the fourth line.

“Not now, I should only wail you to tears,” she declared.

“Truly, Leila, I don’t know a Hamilton girl I would have missed so much as you,” Marjorie said convincingly, passing her arm across Leila’s shoulders. “I am so glad you came back!”

“I’m thinking I had fine sense,” solemnly agreed Leila. “And I shall be treating you all at Giuseppe’s this evening to celebrate my own smartness.”

Thus adroitly she had taken the dinner upon herself. It was usually a matter for animated discussion as to which one of them should stand treat. A chorus of dissent arose as it was, but her further wily and broad Irish reminder, “Will yez be quiet? Think af me dignity as a P. G!” won her the privilege.

Signor Baretti’s welcome of his favorite patrons was given with true Latin sincerity. He had not forgotten the serenading party of the previous year and asked anxiously for Phyllis and her orchestra.

“They come back this year, those who play and sing for me so nice?” he queried. “Many are the graduates each June. Then I don’t see more. Always I know those – what you call the fraish – fraish – mens. Only these are not the mens at all, but the girls. Why you call these – mens?”

The Italian’s evident puzzlement over this point evoked amused laughter in which he good-naturedly joined. He showed childish gratification, however, at Marjorie’s simple explanation of the term.

“Never before have I understand,” he confessed. “Now I must ask something more. You know those girls I have not like who come here? Every one know, I don’t like.” He made a sweeping gesture. “They don’t come here for, oh, long time before college close. Somebody say they are made to go away because they don’t do well. You tell me. That is the truth?”

For a moment no one spoke. The blunt innocence of the inquiry was not to be doubted, however. The odd little proprietor’s question must be answered.

“They were expelled from college, Signor Baretti,” Marjorie made grave reply. “You heard the truth.”

“That mean, they can’t come back more?” persisted the Italian.

“Yes.” Again it was Marjorie who answered him.

“Ah-h-h!” The ejaculation contained a note of triumph. “So I think. But one, the one these girls I most don’t like she walk in this place one day las’ week. This day she is friendly; never before. She say she come back early. I know better.” He placed his finger to his eye, a significant Latin gesture, meaning that he was not to be deceived. “She think I don’t know. This one is Miss Car-rins.”