"I don't know. Wait a week or two and see what she does, then I can tell better. You've got to show me. I mean, I must be convinced." Jerry wrinkled her nose at Marjorie and giggled. Her ruffled good humor was smoothing itself down.

"That means, you _will_ help her," was Marjorie's fond translation.

"Constance is willing, too. I am sure of Irma and Harriet, but Susan and Muriel are doubtful. Still, I think I can win them over if I tell them that you are with me in our plan."

"There's just this much about it, Marjorie." Jerry spoke with unusual seriousness. "Mignon will have to play fair or I'll drop her with a bang. Just like that. The first time I find her trying any of her deceitful tricks will be the last with me. Remember, I mean what I say.

If anything like that happens, don't ask me to overlook it, for I won't.

Not even to please you, and I'd rather please _you_ than anybody else I know."

"I'll remember," laughed Marjorie. She was not greatly impressed by Jerry's declaration. The stout girl was apt to take a contrary stand, merely for the sake of variety. She had expected that Jerry would scold roundly, then give in with a final threatening grumble.

Susan and Muriel she found even harder to convince of Mignon's repentance than Jerry. Muriel was especially obstinate. "I'll speak to Mignon," she stipulated, "but I won't ask her to my house or go any place with her. Now that we've made over five hundred dollars out of the operetta for the library, you know we've been talking about getting up a club. Of course, she'll want to be in it. But she sha'n't."

"Then there's no use in trying to help her," said Marjorie calmly, "if we don't include her in our work and our good times."

"That's precisely what you said last year," retorted Muriel. "You invited her to your party and she nearly broke it up. After that I wonder that you can even dream of trusting her. I've known her longer than you, Marjorie. When we all went to grammar school together she was always the disturber. She used to fight with us and then come sliding around to make up. She'd promise to be good, but she never kept her word for long.

"Once she behaved pretty well for three months and we began to like her a little. Then one day some of us went to the woods on a picnic. We took our luncheon and spread a tablecloth on the gra.s.s. When we had all the eats spread out on the tablecloth and sat down around it, Mignon got mad because Susan said something to me that made me laugh. We happened to look at her, but we weren't talking about her. She thought so, though.

She began sputtering at us like a firecracker. The more we all tried to calm her the madder she got. Before we could stop her she caught the tablecloth in both hands and gave it a hard jerk. You can imagine what happened! All our nice eats were jumbled together into the gra.s.s. The ants got into them and we had to throw nearly everything away. She didn't stop to help pick up things. She rushed off home and none of us spoke to her for the rest of the year. That's why I can't believe in her repentance. Sooner or later she's bound to upset things again, just as she did that time."

Marjorie could not resist laughing a little at Muriel's tragic tale of a woodland disaster. "I can't blame you for feeling as you do," she said, "but I must keep my word to her father. It means so much to him. Being in the operetta has given her a little start. Perhaps she's begun to see that it pays to do well. She knows now how it feels to be treated badly.

It must remind her of some of the mean things she's done. If she's ever going to change, the time has come. But if no one believes in her, then she'll get discouraged and be worse than ever. Connie is willing to help. I'd be ashamed to refuse after that. Even Jerry says she'll consider it."

"Connie is a perfect angel, and Jerry is a goose," declared Muriel, flushing rather guiltily. It was difficult to continue to combat Marjorie's plan in the face of Constance's n.o.bility of spirit. Constance had been the chief sufferer at Mignon's hands. Reminded of this, Muriel weakened. "I suppose I ought to get in line with Connie," she admitted.

"I'd feel pretty small if I didn't. I can't afford to let Jerry beat me, either."

Muriel's objections thus overruled, Susan proved less hard to convince.

Once more the reform party banded itself together to the performance of good works. Smarting from the effects of Rowena's cowardly spite, Mignon was quite willing to be taken up again by so important a set of girls as that to which Marjorie belonged. It pleased her not a little to know that she had gained a foothold that Rowena could never hope to win.

Then, too, her father had taken a hand in her affairs. He had sternly informed her that she must about-face and do better. Relief at being plucked from a disagreeable situation, rather than grat.i.tude toward her preservers, had predominated her feelings on the eventful night at Riverview. Fear of her father's threat to send her away to a convent school if she did not show rapid signs of improvement made her pause.

Returning from his business trip, Mr. La Salle had interviewed first William, the chauffeur, then Mignon. From an indulgent parent he became suddenly transformed into a stern inquisitor, before whose wrath Mignon broke down and haltingly confessed the truth. As a result he had forbidden her further acquaintance with Rowena. Reminded afresh of his parental duty, he had pondered long, then through the kindly offices of Mr. Dean, arranged the meeting with Marjorie. Thus Mignon's affairs had been readjusted and she had been forced to agree to follow the line of good conduct he had stretched for her.

It was a distinct relief, however, to Marjorie and her friends to find that Mignon was content to be merely on equitable terms. She did not try to force herself upon them, though she received whatever advances they made with an amiability quite unusual to her. They were immensely amused, however, at her frigid ignoring of Rowena Farnham. Her revenge consummated, Rowena decided to re-a.s.sume her sway over her unwilling follower. Mignon fiercely declined to be reinstated and the two held a battle royal in which words became sharpest arrows. Later, Rowena was plunged into fresh rage by the news that Mignon had been taken up by the very girls she had over and over again disparaged.

Determined not to be beaten, she continued to waylay Mignon as she went to and from school. Changing her bullying tactics, she next tried coaxing. But Mignon maintained her air of virtuous frigidity and took an especial delight in snubbing the girl she had once feared. It also gave her infinite pleasure to paint Rowena in exceedingly dark colors to whomever would listen to her grievances. Much of this came in round-about fashion to the reformers. They disapproved of it intensely, but held their peace rather than undo the little good they hoped they had already accomplished.

Among her schoolmates the account of Mignon's near misfortune was received with varying degrees of interest. A few were sympathetically disposed; others merely laughed. Rowena, however, lost caste. Neither her costly clothes, her caustic wit nor her impudently fascinating personality could cover the fact that she had done a treacherous and contemptible deed. The fact that she had left a young girl stranded at midnight in a strange town did not add to her doubtful popularity. Quick to discover this state of affairs, she realized that she had gone a step too far. There was only one way in which she might redeem herself and that lay in the direction of basket ball.

February was speedily living out his short, changeable life. The third of the four games between the soph.o.m.ore-junior teams was to be played on the last Sat.u.r.day afternoon of the month, which fell on the twenty-seventh. Thus far each side had won a game. Rowena decreed that the two games yet to be played should go to the soph.o.m.ores. She would play as she had never played before. Nothing should stand in her way.

She would lead the soph.o.m.ores on to glory and the acclamation of her cla.s.s would cleanse her blurred escutcheon. Once she had re-established her power she would make Mignon sorry.

Fortunately for her plans, the members of her team had showed no great amount of prejudice against her since the affair of the operetta. They treated her cordially enough during practice and applauded her clever playing. Shrewd to a degree, she divined instantly that they cherished no special regard for her. They were simply using her as a means to the end. Knowing her value as a player, they were egging her on to do well because of their hope of victory in the next two games. She did not doubt that when the season was over there would be a general falling-off in their cordiality unless she so greatly distinguished herself as to win their ungrudging admiration.

Alas for her dream of power, when the third game came off between the two teams, it was the juniors who carried off the palm with a score of 26-14 in their favor. What galled her most was the remarkably brilliant playing of Marjorie Dean. If there lingered a doubt in the mind of Miss Davis regarding Marjorie's ability to play basket ball, her work on the floor that Sat.u.r.day afternoon must have completely discounted that doubt. What Miss Davis thought when, from the gallery, she watched the clever playing of the girl she had endeavored to dismiss from the team, was something which was recorded only on her own brain. It was noted by several pairs of watchful eyes that she did not applaud the victors. She had not forgiven them for the difficulties into which they had plunged her on that fateful afternoon.

Losing the game to the enemy made matters distinctly mortifying for Rowena. Among themselves, her team-mates gloomily conceded that they had over-rated her as a player. Though they made some effort to conceal their resentment, their cordiality became less apparent. This second defeat precluded all hope of doing more than tieing the score in the one game still to be played. They needed Rowena's help to bring about that result. Therefore, they dared not express themselves openly. It may be recorded here that the ideals of the four soph.o.m.ore players were no higher than those of Rowena. Their att.i.tude toward her was glaringly selfish and they were possessed of little loyalty.

The final game was set for the thirteenth of March. Doggedly bent on escaping a whitewashing, the soph.o.m.ores devoted themselves to zealous practice. So insistently frequent were their demands for the use of the gymnasium that the junior team were obliged to make equally insistent protest against their encroachment.

"I am really glad that this next game is to be the last," remarked Marjorie to her teammates one afternoon as they were preparing to leave the dressing room after practice. "Basket ball hasn't seemed the same old game this year. Perhaps I'm outgrowing my liking for it, but really we've had so much trouble about it that I long for victory and peace."

"It's not the game," contested Muriel. "It's those sophs with Rowena Farnham leading them on. Why, even when Mignon was continually fussing with us we never had any trouble about getting the gym for practice. Oh, well, one week from to-morrow will tell the story. If we win it will be a three to one victory. We can't lose now. All the sophs can do is to tie the score."

"Where were our subs to-day?" demanded Daisy Griggs. "I didn't see either of them."

"Harriet couldn't stay for practice. She was going to a tea with her mother," informed Susan. "I don't know where Lucy Warner was. I didn't see her in school, either."

"She must be sick. She hasn't been in school for almost a week,"

commented Muriel. "She is the queerest-acting girl. You'd think to look at her that she hated herself and everybody. She makes me think of a picture of an anarchist I once saw in a newspaper. When she does come to practice she just sits with her chin in her hands and glowers. I can't understand how she ever happened to come out of her grouch long enough to make the team."

"She's awfully distant," agreed Marjorie dispiritedly. "I have tried to be nice to her, but it's no use. My, how the wind howls! Listen." Going to the window of the dressing room, she peered out. "It's a dreadful day. The walks are solid sheets of ice. The wind blew so hard I could scarcely keep on my feet this noon."

"I fell down twice," giggled Susan Atwell. "It didn't hurt me much. I sc.r.a.ped one hand on a piece of sharp ice, but I'm still alive."

"Be careful going down the steps," warned Daisy Griggs, ever a youthful calamity howler.

"Don't croak, Daisy. If you keep on someone will take a tumble just because you mentioned it," laughed Muriel. "We can't afford that with the game so near."

Dressed at last, their paraphernalia carefully stowed away, the team trooped from the gymnasium and on to their locker room. "I wish I had worn my fur coat," lamented Muriel. "I'll surely freeze in my tracks.

Are you ready, girls? Do hurry. I am anxious to face the wind and get it over with. I think I'll take the car home."

"Ugh!" shuddered Susan. Issuing from the high school building a blast of piercing air struck her full in the face. "We'll be blown away before we get down the steps."

"Oh, come along, Susie," urged Muriel laughingly. "Don't mind a little thing like that. Look at me. Here goes." Muriel valiantly essayed the first icy step. A fresh gust of wind a.s.sailing her, the hand holding her m.u.f.f sought her face to protect it.

How it happened no one quite knew. A concerted scream went up from four throats as Muriel suddenly left her feet to go b.u.mping and sliding down the long flight of ice-bound steps. She struck the walk in a heap and lay still.

"Muriel!" Forgetting the peril of the steps, Marjorie took them heedlessly, but safely. A faint moan issued from Muriel's lips as she knelt beside her. Muriel moaned again, but tried to raise herself to a sitting posture. She fell back with a fresh groan.

"Where are you hurt?" Marjorie slipped a supporting arm under her. By this time the others had safely made the descent and were gathered about the two.

"It's my right shoulder and arm. I'm afraid my arm is broken," gasped Muriel, her face white with pain.

"Let me see." Marjorie tenderly felt of the injured member. "Do I hurt you much?" she quavered solicitously.

"Not-much. I guess it's-not-broken. It's my shoulder that hurts most."

Several persons had now gathered to the scene. A man driving past in an automobile halted his car. Leaping from the machine he ran to the scene.

"Someone hurt?" was his crisp question. "Can I be of service?"

"Oh, if you would." Marjorie's face brightened. "Miss Harding fell down those steps. She's badly hurt."

"Where does she live? I'll take her home," offered the kindly motorist.

Lifting Muriel in his arms he carried her to the car and gently deposited her in its tonneau. "Perhaps you'd better come with her," he suggested.

"Thank you, I will. Good-bye, girls. Go on over to my house and wait for me. I'll be there in a little while." Lifting her hand to the three frightened girls, who had advanced upon the machine with sundry other curious pedestrians, Marjorie gave Muriel's rescuer the Hardings'

address, climbed into the car and slammed the door shut.

"Poor Muriel," wailed Daisy Griggs, as the car rolled away. "I told her to be careful. I hope she isn't hurt much. And the game next week!"