CHAPTER I. – ON THE SANDS

“It’s too perfect a night to stay on shore, girls and boys. Let’s go for a moonlight cruise in the Oriole!” Hal Macy sprang up from the white sands where he had been devotedly lounging at Marjorie Dean’s feet and held out his hands to her.

“Oh, glorious!” Marjorie gaily accepted the proffered hands. She laughed, with the sheer pleasure of youth, as Hal swung her to her feet. “My, what a strong person you are, Hal Macy!” she lightly commented as she freed her hands from Hal’s lingering clasp.

“Glad you think so,” emphasized Hal. He could not help wishing Marjorie were not quite so matter-of-fact.

“I don’t think so,” promptly disagreed Danny Seabrooke. “Macy is a weakling; a mere muscleless infant compared to me.”

“Oh, see here, Danny Seabrooke, you’ll have to eat that. Think I’ll stand for any such talk? Eat it now, or else prove it,” challenged Hal.

“I can prove it,” Danny waved confidently. “Just watch me lift Geraldine from the shifting sands.”

“Yes, just watch him,” drawled Lawrence Armitage. He took up a guitar, temporarily idle on the sands, and began to strum it lightly. His deep blue eyes rested mirthfully on Danny and Jerry.

“Wait a second,” Danny elaborately braced his feet in the sand. “Now, ready! Heave, heave, ho!”

Jerry suddenly let go of his hands and dropped back on the beach. “No, thank you.” She pretended displeasure. “I don’t care for your wonderful assistance.” She directed a scornful glance at her would-be helper.

“You did that on purpose,” accused Danny. “You are a cruel, cruel girl. Suppose I had lost my balance and dug my nose into the sand?”

“Sorry you didn’t,” was the unfeeling reply.

“Squabbling again,” Laurie reached out a helping hand to Jerry and drew her to her feet. Danny looked sadly on.

“Please forgive me and continue to regard me as your friend. That’s all I ask of you,” he pleaded with stony Jerry.

“You talk like a popular song,” she criticized. She broke into smiles when he knelt on the sand before her and contritely offered her his hand.

“Was that a compliment?” Danny grinned hopefully.

“Why should I throw bouquets at you? Can you think of a reason?” Jerry asked him. “I can’t think of one.”

“Neither can I,” Danny agreed, and the squabblers burst into laughter.

“Isn’t the moon wonderful tonight?” Standing beside Hal on the wide strip of gleaming beach Marjorie worshipped the white night. “Leila recites an old Irish poem about moonlight that must have been written for this night. It goes like this:

“The magic of yon sailing moon

Lures my poor heartstrings out of me;

God’s moonshine whitens the lagoon;

The earth’s a silver mystery.”

Hal listened. His mind was centered on Marjorie rather than on the quaint bit of verse she was reciting. In her white lingerie frock, her vividly beautiful face raised toward the pale glory of the drifting moon, her loveliness filled Hal’s boyish heart with worship.

He would have liked to tell her that he thought her far more wonderful than either the silvery moon or the most exquisite bit of Irish verse that had ever been composed. Long friendship with Marjorie warned him against such an avowal. She was so different from most girls about compliments. She did not like to be told that she had done well, while she positively loathed being told she was beautiful. She had a clever way of politely ignoring a compliment, then immediately changing a subject from personal to impersonal which Hal considered maddening.

Since the first week in July when the Deans had arrived at Severn Beach, there to spend a part of the summer, Hal had been trying to decide whether or not he should allow another summer to pass without telling Marjorie of his love for her. On that memorable autumn evening of last year when Constance and Laurie had announced their early approaching marriage Hal had been dejectedly certain that Marjorie had nothing to give him save friendship. He had resolved then never to ask her to marry him unless he should come to believe that she had experienced a change of heart toward him.

Lately, since Marjorie had come to stay at Severn Beach, where the Macys usually spent the summers, Hal had been sorely tempted to break his proud resolution. Constance and Laurie had returned from their winter in Europe and were visiting Hal and Jerry at Cliff House, the apartment hotel in which the Macy family lived. Their perfect happiness made Hal wonder wistfully why it was that Marjorie could not love him even half so fondly as Constance loved Laurie. He had been Marjorie’s faithful cavalier for the same number of years that Laurie had been Constance’s. Now Laurie had won Connie for his wife, while he and Marjorie were still, as she had often said, “just good friends.”

This disheartening thought now flashed through his brain for perhaps the hundredth time that week. The calm friendly glance he forced himself to bend on Marjorie as she finished quoting the verse bore no sign of his disquieting reflections.

“Bully for the Irish!” he exclaimed with deceiving heartiness.

“You’re not a bit under the magic spell of the white moonshine,” she rebuked with a laughing, upward glance at Hal.

“How do you know I’m not?” His tones were teasing, but into his eyes had leaped a sudden purposeful gleam which told a different story. “Moonlight affects different persons in different ways. Wait till we take to the launch. Then I’ll turn moony and sing sentimental songs. I’ll give you a fine imitation of a moonstruck nut. I wouldn’t dare try it on shore. I might be run in for disturbing the peace.”

“Run in for disturbing the peace?” inquired a horrified voice at Marjorie’s elbow. Danny Seabrooke peered apprehensively around Marjorie at Hal. “Ah, I understand.” He grew apologetic. “You weren’t speaking of me. You meant your – well – er – ” Danny drew down his freckled face very sorrowfully. “When did it happen, Macy?”

“It hasn’t happened yet, but it will soon,” Hal promised with cool significance.

“I shan’t be here to see it. I’m going to take a walk up the beach with Geraldine.” Danny hastily fell behind a few steps and took Jerry by a plump arm. “Come along,” he urged. “It’s not safe around here.”

“It’s safe enough for me.” Jerry briskly shook off Danny’s detaining hand. “I’m going out in the Oriole. Hurry up, you sentimental strollers,” she called over one shoulder to Constance and Laurie. They had paused for a moment, hand in hand, and were raptly gazing out to sea. “Come out of lovers’ lane and join the crowd.”

“Have a little more regard for our married dignity, Jeremiah,” Laurie reminded. “Kindly remember that Connie and I came down to the beach this evening solely to look after you four children.”

“Much obliged, but Dan-yell is the only one who needs a guardian of this illustrious bunch.” Jerry bowed ironical thanks.

“All right for you, Jurry-miar Macy. I tried to be pleasant with you. I respectfully called you Geraldine. But no more!” Danny shook a displeased finger at Jerry. “I’m going to walk beside Constance.”

“Poor Connie,” groaned Jerry.

“Fortunate Connie, you mean,” corrected Danny with a vast smile. “Do talk to me, Constance. Forget your husband for five seconds. You look so sympathetic. But you’re not.” Danny fixed an accusing glance on laughing Constance. “You’re laughing at me.”

“Why shouldn’t I laugh at you, Danny Seabrooke? You’re so funny and foolish.”

“Funny and foolish.” Danny cocked his head on one side and considered. “Nope, that’s not sympathy. I’ll have to try again. Let me see. Marjorie might appreciate me.”

With a forward dive he caught Marjorie by one arm and began walking her rapidly up the beach and away from Hal. “Good-night, Mr. Macy,” he flung back over one shoulder.

“Not yet,” Hal cleared the widening space between him and Danny almost at a leap. “Now Dan-yell!” He grabbed Danny by the shoulders; spun him round until he faced down the beach. A vigorous push from Hal’s avenging arms sent Danny careering down the beach at a mad gallop.

“Never touched me!” he sent back defiantly to Hal. He gave an agile sideways bounce, barely managing to dodge Jerry, Laurie and Constance in his headlong flight. “Good-bye. I’m never coming back!” he yelled at the trio.

Within the next three minutes Danny had changed his mind. “Fine night for a run,” was his bland venture as he caught up with the three strollers. “Only I’d rather know beforehand that I was going to take a run. Macy is what I should call dangerous. He ought to be caged.”

“Neither Jerry nor Danny will ever grow up,” was Marjorie’s amused remark as Hal returned to her side.

“I don’t think you’ve grown up much, Marjorie,” Hal burst forth with sudden eager wistfulness. “You look just as you did the first time I ever saw you; only you are even prettier than you were then.”

Hal’s stubborn restraint gave way before the uncontrollable impulse to speak his mind to Marjorie. “You were coming out the gate of Sanford High, and I wondered who you were,” Hal went on boyishly. “I described you to Jerry afterward, and asked all about you. She didn’t know you very well then. I made her promise and double promise that she’d never tell you I quizzed her about you.”

“And she never did,” Marjorie gaily assured. “I never even suspected you two of having had a secret understanding about just me. Jerry is a good secret keeper. I’m glad college hasn’t made me staid and serious. I’ve loved the good times I’ve had at Hamilton as much as I’ve loved the work. Now I’m ready to put my whole heart into work there so as to try to make Hamilton mean as much to other students as it has meant to me.”

Marjorie had purposely hurried away from Hal’s very personal admission. He now brought her back to it with an earnest abruptness which raised a brighter color in her face.

“I wish you’d stay in Sanford and make the old town seem as much to me as it used to,” he said. “I have a standing grudge against Hamilton College. Can’t help having one, even though you and Jerry do think it’s the only place on the map.”

“It’s the only place on the map for us until our work is done, Hal,” she defended. “Once I thought I couldn’t leave General and Captain to go back to Hamilton next fall. I found I was hard-hearted enough to do even that for the sake of my work there. I’m having a gorgeous time at the beach! Still I’m almost impatient for next week to come and bring with it my mid-summer trip to Hamilton. You can understand, I’m sure, Hal, how I feel about the building of the dormitory.”

“Work can’t fill your life, Marjorie,” Hal answered with a tender, unconscious deepening of tone. “See how happy Connie and Laurie are! They love each other. That’s the real meaning of life. Not even music could come between them and love. Could anything be more perfect than their romance? I’ve wished always that it would be so with you and me. I’ve wanted to tell you this for a long time, but I – ”

“I hate to complain of your sister, Macy, but it’s necessary.” Danny Seabrooke bounced into the midst of Hal’s declaration of love.

“I’ll disown you as my brother if you listen to what he says,” Jerry appeared at Danny’s elbow.

“Oh, go away off the beach, both of you!” Hal waved the contesting pair away from him. He wished both Danny and Jerry anywhere but close at hand.

“Shan’t go a step,” defied Jerry. “Never think, Hal Macy, that you can chase me into the Atlantic Ocean. You may walk with Dan-yell, I’ve had enough of him. Go ahead and untie the Oriole. I’m going to monopolize Marvelous Marjorie for a while.” Jerry tucked an arm in one of Marjorie’s.

“Only for about five minutes,” stipulated Hal. He cast a half smiling, half challenging glance at Marjorie. “I want to talk to her myself. Come along, old Seabean,” he motioned Danny.

The two young men ran ahead to untie the motor boat belonging to Hal which was tied up at the Cliff House pier. Marjorie drew a soft little breath of relief. Hal’s significant rush of words had taken her unawares. Until now she had never failed to steer him away from anything approaching sentiment. Tonight, however, she had sensed a certain determined quality in his voice which was not to be denied. Hal did not intend to be kept from saying his say much longer.