"How strange!" dimpled Marjorie. "Oh, there's the bell again! That surely must be Jerry!"

Before Constance was half way downstairs, Jerry was half way up, her broad face beaming, her arms laden with a large, round object, strangely resembling a cake.

"Oh, take it!" she gasped. "My arms are breaking."

Constance coming to her rescue, the two girls soon made haven with Marjorie and a lively chattering began. Frequent alarms at the front door denoted steadily arriving guests and a little past two found Marjorie's strictly informal reception in full swing, with girls tucked into every convenient corner of her room. Her own particular chums, including Ellen Seymour and Esther Lind, were all there. Even Susan and Muriel, who had been busy getting well while she lay ill, were able to be present. Lucy Warner was also among the happy throng, a trifle shy, but with a new look of gentleness in her green eyes and a glad little smile on her somber face.

Mignon appeared, but did not stay to the merry-making. She was full of polite sympathy and apparently bent on doing the agreeable. But in her black eyes lay a curious, furtive expression, which Marjorie mentally decided made her look more than ever like the Evil Genius. After a sojourn of perhaps twenty minutes, during which she walked about restlessly from girl to girl, exchanging commonplaces, she pleaded an engagement and took her leave.

Her presence somewhat of a strain, her departure was not mourned. Now wholly congenial, the party dropped all reserve and became exceedingly hilarious. Despite Mrs. Dean's protests, they had insisted on bringing their own refreshments, and later on Marjorie's pink-and-white house was turned into a veritable picnic ground. Jerry's weighty contribution turned out to be an immense many-layered cake, thickly iced and decorated. "A regular whale of a cake," she styled it, and no one contradicted her. After the luncheon had been eaten to the ceaseless buzz of girlish voices, each trying to out-talk the other, the company proceeded further to amuse the lovely convalescent with various funny little stunts at their command.

"Girls," at last reminded thoughtful Irma, "it is after four o'clock. We mustn't tire Marjorie out. I move we go downstairs to the living room and lift up our voices for her benefit in a good, old-fashioned song.

Then we'll come back, say good-bye and run home."

The wisdom of Irma's proposal conceded, the singers trooped downstairs.

Presently, through the open door, the sound of their clear, young voices came up to her as she lay back listening, a bright smile irradiating her delicate features. It was so beautiful to know that others cared so much about making her happy. She had so many things to be thankful for.

Afterward when all except Jerry and Constance had kissed her good-bye and departed with bubbling good wishes, she said soberly: "Girls, doesn't it make you positively shiver when you think that next year will be our last in Sanford High? After that we'll be scattered. Most of us are going away to college. That means we'll only see each other during vacations. I can't bear to think of it."

"Some of us will still be together," declared Jerry stoutly. "Susan, Muriel and I are going to Hamilton College if you do. You see, you can't lose us."

"I don't wish to lose you." Marjorie patted Jerry's hand. Her brown eyes rested a trifle wistfully on Constance. Marjorie knew, as did Jerry, that Connie intended to go to New York to study grand opera as soon as her high school life was over.

"You are thinking of Connie." Jerry's eyes had followed Marjorie's glance. "She won't be lost to us. Hamilton isn't so very far from New York. But what's the use in worrying when we've some of this year left yet and another year before us? One thing at a time is my motto."

"You are a philosopher, Jeremiah." Marjorie brightened. "'One thing at a time,'" she repeated. "That's the right idea. When I go back to school again, I'm going to try my hardest to make the rest of my junior year a success. I can't say much about my senior year. It's still an undiscovered territory. I'm just going to remember that it's a soldier's first duty to go where he's ordered and ask no questions. When I'm ordered to my senior year, all I can do is salute the colors and forward march!"

"Lead on and we'll follow," a.s.serted Jerry Macy gallantly. "I guess we can hike along and leave a few landmarks on that precious senior territory. When I come into senior estate I shall use nothing but the most elegant English. As I am still a junior I can still say, 'Geraldine, Jerry, Jeremiah, you've got to beat it. It's almost five o'clock.'"

Left together, after Jerry had made extravagantly ridiculous farewells, Constance seated herself beside Marjorie's bed. "Are you tired, Lieutenant?" was her solicitous question.

"Not a bit. I'm going to make Captain let me go downstairs to-morrow.

It's time I was up and doing again. I am away behind in my lessons."

"You'll catch up," comforted Constance. Inwardly she was reflecting that she doubted whether there were any situation with which Marjorie Dean could not catch up. Her feet were set in ways of light that wandered upward to the stars. Though to those who courted darkness it might appear that she sometimes faltered, Constance knew that those same steady feet would carry her unfalteringly through her senior year to the wider life to come.

How Marjorie explored her new senior territory and what landmarks she left behind in pa.s.sing will be told in "Marjorie Dean, High School Senior."

THE END