"You have misjudged your friend. She is weak but she loves you. She was afraid of the older girl and said what she does not mean."

-Aslan, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

The afternoon began terribly for Marjorie. She sat on a bench at the train station and realized it was wet because it had been raining earlier that day. She moved to another bench but it didn't make much of a difference now. Somehow Marjorie had a feeling that such things never happened to Lucy.

Why did she feel so angry at Lucy? Lucy hadn't actually done anything wrong. Lucy had thanked her for the books. But not as if she meant it. And Lucy had apologized for that snide comment about Edmund. But that didn't take away the sting.

And Lucy wasn't supposed to make snide comments at all! Usually, Lucy was helpful, kind, cheerful, practically perfect as far as Marjorie was concerned. So what had been wrong with her today? Lucy had seemed more unhappy about parting with her cat than about parting with Marjorie!

Perhaps, Lucy wasn't as perfect as Marjorie had always thought she was. Marjorie had always valued their friendship. That's why she had refused to sit with the popular girls that November day. Since then she had often wondered, did she do the right thing? Had she said yes, would she have been welcome to join their group forever?

Well, even if she had made the wrong choice, it was too late to change anything. With the exception of Susan, the girls hadn't given her so much as a glance since then. They had rejected her. Forever.

The train pulled up to the station with the terrible clatter that always made Marjorie feel a little bit frightened. She had never learned to like trains. She stood up and gathered her bags but just as she took one hesitant step into the train car, a familiar coat brushed against her shoulder. Marjorie followed the sleeve of the coat with her eyes and right up into the face of Anne Featherstone.

Marjorie froze. But Anne had not seen her. She passed Marjorie quickly, grabbed a seat and slipped into it with quick gracefulness.

Marjorie took another step to avoid standing in the doorway and stopped again. What was she to do next? Part of her wanted to rush up to Anne and greet her and perhaps they'd have a lovely talk during the ride. But what if Anne didn't want to talk to her or sit with her? What if she gave her a cold, formal greeting or even worse, ignored her completely? Marjorie couldn't bear to stay in the same train car with someone who ignored her for three hours!

Maybe she should look for a seat as far away from Anne as possible. But as she stood there and tried to decide what to do, Anne glanced up and saw her. Her eyes met Marjorie's, for a moment she seemed to be deciding something, then, she smiled and patted the seat next to her.

Marjorie exhaled and smiled back. Then she hurried to the seat before Anne could change her mind.

"Marjorie Preston! Am I glad to see you! It would have been dreadfully dull to sit alone!"

Marjorie's grin seemed to stretch from one end of the train to the other. This was a more enthusuastic greeting than she had ever hoped for.

"I was thinking the very same thing just now," she confessed.

"So where are you spending the holidays?"

"Home with my father. I mean, we won't actually be at home much. I mean, we'll be visiting places...like museums and things," Marjorie stammered.

"Just you and your father? But what about..." Anne halted. "Well, anyway, you'll have quite a few stories to tell when you come back to school, won't you?"

"Yes," Marjorie said. "Quite a few." Earlier she had looked at her summer rather dismally, but now that she thought about it, perhaps, Anne was right. Perhaps, she was going to enjoy herself.

"Shall we see anything of you next term?"

Marjorie could hardly believe it. They wanted to see more of her? Marjorie had thought that...but of course, they wanted to see more of her! They had invited her to sit with them once, hadn't they? And she had foolishly said no!

Seeing that Marjorie was still trying to form a coherent reply, Anne added, "Or are you still going to be all taken up with that Lucy Pevensie?"

Taken up? Is that how they saw her? As Lucy's adoring little follower? Was that how Lucy saw her?

"Don't know what you mean by 'taken up'," Marjorie protested.

"Oh, yes you do. You were crazy about her last term."

Marjorie felt her face heat up. "No, I wasn't," she snapped, shocked at herself for daring to speak in such a tone. But Anne just smiled at her outburst and nodded encouragingly. She seemed to be waiting for Marjorie to say more. Marjorie babbled on.

"I've got more sense than that. Not a bad little kid in her way. But I was getting pretty tired of her before the end of term."

Anne was amazed. She had been hoping to goad Marjorie into saying something negative about Lucy. It would be funny to watch one silly child criticize another. But she hadn't imagined that spineless Marjorie could speak with such venom.

"Oh, I understand you perfectly, Marjorie. Susan complains about Lucy all the time." This wasn't entirely true. Susan had only complained about Lucy once. But Anne went on. "I suppose the poor child is jealous for the attention she gets at home so she won't let you out of her sight. We must be kind to her."

Marjorie sat wondering how the conversation had gotten to this point. She hadn't wanted to say anything bad about Lucy. She had simply let out the anger she had been feeling all day and somehow in Anne's presence, her words had come out cold and hard. If Lucy ever heard of this...Marjorie felt quite sick at the thought.

"Oh, Anne. You won't tell Lucy what I said, will you?" Marjorie pleaded.

Anne looked shocked at such a suggestion. "Of course not," she said. "Didn't I just say that we must be kind to her?"