Sure enough, there she was, looking even more severe now that her hat was removed and her sharp features were unrelieved.

"If this isn't fun! I'm sorry for poor Esther at Miss Graham's," said Bobby, looking about her with delight. "Mercy, what do you suppose this is?"

One of the young clerks from the office approached the table, a large cardboard sheet in her hand.

"I'm filling in the diagram," she explained. "You mustn't change your seats without permission. Tell me your names, and I'll put you down in the right spaces."

Betty looked over her shoulder as she wrote down their names. Like the diagram of the seating space of a theatre, the tables and chairs were plainly marked. Betty swiftly calculated that between one hundred and twenty-five and one hundred and fifty girls must be seated in the room. Later she learned that the total enrollment was one hundred and sixty.

Just outside the dining room was a large bulletin board, impossible to ignore or overlook. When they came out from luncheon a notice was posted that Mrs. Eustice would address the school at two o'clock in the assembly hall in the main building. It was now one-thirty.

"Let's go look at the gym," suggested Bobby. "We have time. Oh, how do you do?"—this last was apparently jerked out of her.

"I didn't know you were coming to Shadyside, Bobby," said Ruth Gladys Royal effusively. "Do you know my chum, Ada Nansen? She's from San Francisco."

"Constance Howard is from the West, too—the Presidio," said Bobby.

Gracefully she introduced the others to Ada and Ruth who surveyed them indifferently. The Littell girls they knew were wealthy and had a place in Washington society, but the rest were not yet classified.

"Haven't I seen you before?" Ada languidly questioned Betty. "You're not the little waitress—Oh, how stupid of me! I was thinking of a girl who looked enough like you to be your sister."

Bobby bristled indignantly, but Betty struggled with laughter.

"I remember you," she said clearly. "You had the wrong seat on the train from Oklahoma."

Ada Nansen glanced at her with positive dislike.

"I don't recall," she said icily. "However, I've traveled so much I daresay many incidents slip my mind. Well, Gladys, let's go in and get good seats. I want to hear Mrs. Eustice; they say she is a direct descendant of Richard Carvel."

"We might as well go in, too," said Bobby disconsolately. "She's used up so much time we couldn't do the gym justice."

Promptly at two o'clock, white-haired Mrs. Eustice mounted the platform and tapped a little bell for silence.

The principal was a gracious woman of perhaps fifty. Her snow-white hair was piled high on her head and her dark eyes were bright and keen. Wonderful eyes they were, seeming to gaze straight into the youthful eyes that stared back affectionately or curiously as the case might be. Mrs. Eustice's gown was of black or very dark blue silk, made simply and fitting exquisitely. Straight, soft collar and cuffs of dotted net outlined the neck and wrists, and her single ornament was a tiny watch worn on a black ribbon.

"I wish Ada Nansen would take a good look at her," muttered Bobby.

"I am so glad to welcome you, my girls," began Mrs. Eustice.

Betty thrilled to the magic of that modulated voice, low and yet clear enough to be heard in every corner of the large room. Surely this lovely woman could teach them the secret of cultivated, dignified and happy young womanhood.

The principal spoke to them briefly of her ideals for them, explained the few rigid rules of the school, and asked that all exercise tact and patience for the first week during which the rough edges of new schedules might reasonably be expected to wear off.

"I want to have a little personal talk with each one of you," she concluded. "Your corridor teachers will consult with me and will tell you when you are to come to me. And I hope you are to be very, very happy here with us at Shadyside."

A soft clapping of hands followed this speech, and Mrs. Eustice stepped down from the platform to be instantly surrounded by the girls who had spent other terms at the school.

After the older girls had spoken to the principal, the newcomers began to move forward. They were presented by their corridor teachers, who seemed to possess a special faculty to remember names, and here and there Mrs. Eustice recognized a girl through the association of ideas.

As Miss Lacey swept her girls forward, Ada Nansen and Ruth Gladys Royal happened to head the ranks. Mrs. Eustice put out her hand to Ada, then gazed down at her in evident astonishment.



CHAPTER XII

THE LOST TREASURE

"Diamonds," whispered Betty to Norma Guerin, who seemed depressed. "She wears three diamond rings and one sapphire and a square-cut emerald. And her wrist-watch is platinum set with diamonds."

Mrs. Eustice gazed at the soft little hand she held for a few moments, then released it. She said nothing.

"Ah, your mother wrote me of you," was the principal's greeting to the Littell girls. "You look like her, Louise. And Bobby is much like her father as I remember him."

"This is Betty Gordon," said the loyal Bobby, indicating her chum. "Mother wrote about her, too, didn't she?"

"Indeed she did," assented Mrs. Eustice warmly. "I must have a special talk with Betty soon, for she has an ambitious program before her. And here are Libbie and Frances from the state I remember so affectionately from girlhood visits there."

But it was Norma and Alice Guerin, sensitive Norma and shy Alice, who were welcomed most cordially after all.

"So you are Elsie Guerin's daughters!" said the principal, putting an arm around Norma and holding her hand out to Alice. "My own dear mother taught your mother when she was a little girl with braids like yours. And your dear grandmother used to give the most wonderful parties. People talk about them to this day. It was at her Rose Ball I first met my husband. You must go up the north road some day and see the old Macklin house."

Norma and Alice fairly glowed as they went back to their rooms with the other girls. Ada Nansen had heard, and she was regarding them with evident respect.

Norma and Alice might have been uneasy had they heard Ada's comment when she and Ruth were once more in their own rooms.

"They must have money," argued Ada, "though I never saw such ordinary clothes. Giving balls and parties in the lavish Southern style costs, let me tell you. Probably they have some fine family jewels in that shabby trunk."

"I'll tell you what I think," said Ruth Gladys wisely. "I think the money is all used up. Probably they're here as charity pupils for old friendship's sake."

This speculation was duly stored up in Ada Nansen's mind to be brought out when needed.

After dinner Miss Anderson played for them to dance in the broad hall, but every one was tired from train journeys, and at nine o'clock they voluntarily sought their rooms.

"Get into a kimono and brush your hair in here," hospitably suggested Betty, and Bobby seconded her by flinging the suitcases under the beds. All of the rooms were fitted with pretty day-beds so that a cover quickly transformed them into couches and the bedrooms into sitting rooms.

Four gay-colored kimono-wrapped figures came pattering in presently and curled up comfortably on the beds. Norma and Alice were the last to arrive, and when they did come they mystified their friends by prancing in silently and waltzing gaily about the room.

"Oh, girls!" they chortled when they had tired of this performance, "what do you think?"

"We couldn't help hearing," said Norma deprecatingly.

"Laura Bennett called us in," declared Alice.

"Don't sing a duet," commanded Bobby sternly. "What are you talking about? One at a time. You tell, Norma."

"Laura Bennett called us into her room," obediently recited Norma. "Miss Lacey was talking to Ada and Ruth. You could hear every word without listening—that is without eavesdropping—you know what I mean. Mrs. Eustice must have spoken to Miss Lacey, because she told the girls they would have to send all the trunks home except one apiece. Ada must put all her jewelry in the school safe and at the Christmas holidays she is to take it home and leave it there. Both of them have to wear their hair down or in a knot—you know they have it waved now and done up just like my mother's. And Miss Lacey is to go over their clothes to-morrow and tell 'em what they can keep!"

"I'm glad some one has some sense!" was Bobby's terse comment.

Something in Norma's face told Betty that she would like to speak to her alone, so half an hour later when the girls had dispersed for the night, she made a bent nail file an excuse to go to the Guerins' room.

"I was hoping you'd come, Betty," said Norma gratefully. "We have to put out the lights at ten, don't we? I'll try to talk fast. You see, Alice and I want to tell you something."

A fleecy old-fashioned shawl lay across the bed and Norma flung this about Betty's shoulders.

"Alice's kimono is flannel and so is mine," she explained in answer to the protest. "You never met Grandma Macklin, did you, Betty?"

"No-o, I'm sure I never did," responded Betty thoughtfully. "Does she live with you?"

"Yes. But while you were at the Peabodys she was visiting her half-sister in Georgia," explained Norma. "She is mother's mother, you know."

"What was it Mrs. Eustice said about her?" questioned Betty with interest. "Did she live near here? Was that when your mother went to this school?"

"It was a day school then, you know," put in the laconic Alice.

"Yes, and grandma lived in a perfectly wonderful big house," said Norma. "It must be fully five miles from here. Uncle Goliath, an old colored man, used to drive her over every day and call for her in the afternoon. Mother has always been determined Alice and I should graduate from Shadyside."

"Well then, it's lovely she is to have her wish," commented Betty brightly.

"Oh, goodness, I don't see that we're ever going to have four years," confessed Norma. "If you knew what they've given up at home to send us for this term! And though we wouldn't say anything, mother and grandma worked so hard to get us ready, Alice and I are positively ashamed of our clothes. You see, Betty, I think when you're poor, you ought to go where you'll meet other poor girls. Alice and I ought to have entered the Glenside high school, I think. But when I said something like that to dad he said it would break mother's heart. But if she knew how hard it was to be poor and to have to rub elbows with girls who have everything—"

"I don't think you ought to feel that way," urged Betty. "You have something that no amount of money could buy for you, and no lack can take away—birth and breeding. And the training your mother wants you to have is worth sacrificing other things for. Ever since I heard Mrs. Eustice talk I feel that I know what makes her school really successful."

A soft tap fell on the door.

"Lights go off in ten minutes, girls," said Miss Lacey pleasantly.

"Do you know, Betty," confessed Norma hurriedly, "dad has lost quite a lot of money lately. He's such a dear he never can bear to press payment of a bill and half the county owes him. And a friend got him to invest what he did have in some silly stock that never amounted to a hill of beans, as the farmers say. So it's no wonder the Macklin fortune worries mother whenever she thinks of it; a family like ours could use money so easily."

"Most families are like that," said Betty, with a flash of Uncle Dick's humor. "I didn't like to ask, Norma, but your grandmother must have been wealthy."

"She was," confirmed Norma. "Not fabulously so, of course. But even in those days when lavish hospitality was common Grandma Macklin was famous for the way she ran the estate. She was left a widow when a very young woman, and mother was her only child. Her husband didn't believe women knew very much about money, and he left his fortune mostly in bonds and jewels—the most magnificent diamonds in three counties, grandma says hers were. And she had a rope of emeralds and two strings of exquisitely matched pearls. Besides, there were rose topazes and lovely cameos and oh, goodness, I couldn't repeat the list; Alice and I have been brought up on the story.

"Well, about the time mother had finished school, Grandma Macklin came to the end of her bank account. Several mortgages had been paid her in gold, and she kept this money with the jewelry and a lot of solid silver in a little safe in her room. Foolish, of course, but she says others did it in those days, too. She meant to take the gold and some of the diamonds to her lawyer and get a check which would take her and mother around the world on a luxurious cruise. And the day before she had the appointment with Mr. Davies—"

A soft blackness settled down over the girls like a blanket. The electric lights had gone out!

"Move closer, and I'll finish," whispered Norma.

Betty snuggled up between the two, and shivered a little with excitement.

"The day before she was to drive to Edentown," repeated Norma, "a band of Indians from the reservation in the next state came through on their annual tramping trip and walked in on poor little grandma as she sat at her mahogany secretary turning over her jewels and counting her beautiful shining gold. Every darkey on the place fled in terror, and those rascally Indians simply scooped up everything in sight and locked grandma and mother in the room!"

"Couldn't any one stop them?" demanded Betty eagerly. "Surely a band of Indians could have been easily traced. Didn't any one try?"

"Oh, they tried," admitted Norma. "That's the maddening part. Suppose I told you, Betty, that I know where grandma's inheritance is this minute?"



CHAPTER XIII

THE MYSTERIOUS FOUR

"Well, for mercy's sake!" said Betty in exasperation, "if you know where the property is, why don't you claim it? Why doesn't your mother? Where is it?"

"At the bottom of Indian Chasm," declared Norma calmly.

"Where's that?"

"I don't know exactly," admitted Norma. "It's around here somewhere. You see the Indians streaked for the woods, and mother got out by way of a window and ran to the next estate. The men and boys there armed themselves and took horses and chased the Redskins, and when they were almost up with them the robbers tossed everything down this great canyon in the earth. There was no way to get into it, and though they tried lowering men with ropes, they couldn't find a solitary gold piece. As far as any one knows it is all at the bottom of the chasm now."

"And grandma had to mortgage the house and they couldn't pay the interest and it was sold and all the lovely mahogany furniture," mourned Alice. "And grandma and mother moved to New York and mother taught school and met dad, who was a medical student. And they were married when he graduated, and grandma came to live with 'em."

Betty crept away to her own bed when the story was finished. Bobby was asleep, for which her chum was thankful. Betty wanted to think. Surely there must be a way to recover the Macklin fortune, if it was still down in the big chasm.

"I'll tell Bob and we'll go and find that place. Perhaps he can think of a plan," was Betty's last thought before she went to sleep.

The next few days were very busy ones for every pupil. Ada and Ruth, in tears, submitted to having their wardrobes censored, and thereafter appeared in clothes that were not too striking.

The appointments with Mrs. Eustice materialized, and Betty, after her interview, was conscious of a sincere affection for the woman who seemed to understand girls so thoroughly.

Bobby was "crazy," to quote her own expression, about the gymnasium classes, and Miss Anderson beamed approvingly upon her. Betty, too, was often to be found in the gymnasium after school hours, but Libbie had to be driven to regular exercise. She liked to dance, but unless some one was made responsible for her, she was prone to cut her regular gymnasium period and devote the time to some thrilling novel. When the other girls discovered this they good-naturedly made up a schedule for the week, assigning a different day to every girl whose duty it should be to "seal, sign and deliver" the reluctant Libbie at the gymnasium door at the appointed time.

Mrs. Eustice, rather peculiarly some people thought—Ada Nansen's mother among them—held the theory that school girls should spend a fair proportion of their time in study. She had small patience with the faddist type of school that abhorred "night work" and whose students specialized on "manners" to the neglect of spelling.

"I dislike the term 'finishing school,'" she had once said. "I try to teach my girls that what they learn in school fits them for beginning life."

So from seven to half-past eight every night, except Friday, the pupils at Shadyside were busy with their books. They might study in their rooms, provided their marks for the preceding week were satisfactory, but those who fell below a certain percentage were sentenced to prepare their lessons in the study hall under the eye of a teacher.

The second Friday night of the term the new students were warned by little pink cocked notes to remain in their rooms after dinner until they had been inspected by the "Mysterious Four."

"It's a secret society," Bobby announced the moment she had read her note. "Well, let's go upstairs and prepare to be inspected."

The eight gathered in Betty and Bobby's room, and though they were expecting it, the knock, when it finally did come, made them all jump.

"Come—come in," stammered Betty and Bobby together.

Four veiled figures entered, each carrying something in her hand. They spoke in disguised voices, though as they were upper classmen they were fairly safe from recognition; the new girls were hardly acquainted among themselves and knew few of the older students by name.

"Freshmen," said the tallest figure, "when we enter, rise."

The eight leaped to their feet at a bound.

"Do you wish to become members of the Mysterious Four?" demanded the second figure.

"Oh, yes," chorused the willing victims.

"It is well," chanted the third figure.

"It is well," echoed the fourth.

"I don't," said Libbie calmly.

"Don't what?" questioned the tallest figure, evidently appointed chief spokesman.

"Want to be a member of the Mysterious Four," announced Libbie, who had an obstinate streak in her make-up.

"Unfortunately," the spokesman informed her, "you haven't any choice in the matter; you're elected one already."

While Libbie was thinking up an answer, which considering the finality of that statement, was not an easy matter, the tall draped figure went on to explain to the interested girls that there were two degrees to be undergone before one could be a full fledged member of the Mysterious Four.

"You must take the first degree to-night," they were told. "The second will be several weeks later."

"Are we allowed to ask a question?" asked Betty respectfully.

"Oh, yes. But we may not answer it," was the cheering response.

"Why is the society called the 'Mysterious Four'?" asked Betty "All the freshman class received notes, so the membership must be large; where does the four enter?"

"You'll learn that at the close of your first degree," said the spokesman with firm kindness. "Now you're to remain here for five minutes, and then go down to the study hall. Five minutes, remember."

They departed majestically, and the girls were left to spend their five minutes in discussion of the visit.

"I don't see why I have to belong," grumbled Libbie.

"It will do you good," said Bobby severely. "When I promised Aunt Elizabeth to look after you, I didn't know that meant I would have to risk my head by sleeping under 'Lady Gwendolyn' in two volumes—and fat ones at that"

Libbie had the grace to blush. Bobby, who was fond of books but whose taste ran to "Rules for Basketball" and "How to Gain Health Through Exercise," had put up a small shelf directly over her bed to hold her literary treasures. Libbie, exhausting the space in her tiny corner bookcase had thoughtlessly placed the two heavy volumes of the story Bobby mentioned on top of her cousin's books with the awful result that the shelf broke in the night and spilled the books on the wrathful Bobby.

"Let's go down to the study hall," suggested peace-loving Louise. "The five minutes are up."

Down they trooped, to find a number of girls already there, for the most part looking rather frightened.

At five minute intervals other groups entered, until all the freshman class was assembled.

"I don't care anything about this society," whispered Ada Nansen to Ruth Royal. "I wouldn't give fifty cents for an organization where no discrimination is shown in choosing the members. However, this is Mrs. Eustice's pet scheme, they tell me, and I want to stand well with her. Next year I'm going to get elected to the White Scroll, you see if I don't."

The Mysterious Four came in as the last group of girls were seated and slowly mounted the platform.

"Candidates," announced the leader, "you are summoned here to take your first degree. It is simple, but no shirking is to be permitted. You are to do the one thing that you do best. As your names are called, you will mount the platform and comply. Four minutes is allowed for decision—on the platform."

There was a gasp from the audience, and one could almost see the mental cog wheels of sixty girls going furiously to work.

"Betty," whispered the desperate Bobby, "what can you do best?"

"Ride, I guess," said Betty, recollections of Clover coming to mind.

There was a crashing chord from the piano. One of the veiled figures had seated herself at the instrument and now proceeded to play "appropriate selections" as the candidates performed their turns.

As the clever leader had foreseen, no one relished spending her allotted four minutes for reflection on the platform in full view of the audience, and the majority of the victims made up their minds with a rush.

After they had entered into the spirit of the thing, it was fun, and their shrieks of laughter aroused sympathetic smiles in other rooms. No teachers and no member of the other classes were permitted to enter, but Aunt Nancy, the fat cook, and half a dozen young waitresses peeped in at the door and enjoyed the spectacle hugely.

Betty Gordon obligingly cantered across the platform on a chair and won applause by her realistic interpretation of western riding. Bobby convulsed the room with her imaginary efforts to cut and fit a dress, her mistakes being glaring ones, for Bobby never touched a needle if she could help it. Clever Constance Howard had gone for her ukulele and played it charmingly. Libbie insisted on giving the "balcony scene" from Romeo and Juliet, in which she was supported by the unwilling Frances, who was certainly the stiffest Romeo who ever walked the stage.

"Ada Nansen," called the leader, when the eight chums had made their individual contributions to the program.



CHAPTER XIV

A SATURDAY RACE

Ada had been watching the others with a contempt she made little attempt to conceal. When her name was called she walked to the platform and faced the leader defiantly.

"What can you do best, Ada?" came the familiar question.

Ada smiled patronizingly.

"Spend money," she said briefly.

"Do that," said the young leader calmly.

"How can I spend money here?" demanded Ada angrily. "There's nothing to buy. I call that silly."

"Then you admit you can't spend money?"

"No such thing!" Ada stamped her foot, furious at such stupidity. "I say I can't spend it here where there is nothing to buy. You let me go to Edentown, and I'll show you whether I can spend money or not."

"The order of the first degree of the Mysterious Four is that the candidate must do what she can do best," repeated the veiled figure insistently. "What can you do best?"

"Sing," said Ada sullenly.

"Then do that."

And now the watching girls had what Bobby later admitted was "the surprise of their lives."

The girl at the piano fingered a chord tentatively, then struck into a popular song, an appealing little melody, the words a lyric set to music by a composer with a spark of genius.

"I picked a rose in my garden fair—" sang Ada.

She sang without affectation. Her voice was a charming contralto, evidently partially trained, and promising with coming years to be worth consideration.

"But it withered in a day—" went on the lovely voice.

The girls were absolutely mute. When she had finished the song, and she gave it all, they burst into a spontaneous storm of applause.

Ada barely acknowledged the hand-clapping. Her face had instantly slipped back into the old sullen lines.

"When she can sing like that, shouldn't you think she would be perfectly happy?" sighed Betty. "I'd give anything if I had a voice!"

As a matter of fact Betty had a clear little contralto of her own and she sang as naturally as a bird. But there was no denying that Ada's voice was exceptional.

After the last girl had had her turn the veiled leader mounted the platform and threw back her swathing net.

"She's the president of the senior class, Mabel Waters," whispered a girl near Betty.

"I have the honor to welcome you all as members in good standing of the novice class, first-degree, Mysterious For," announced Miss Waters. "That's all there is to the name, girls—when we decided to form a new society here in school some one asked 'What's it for?' So our organization became the Mysterious F-O-R, and you'll find out as time goes on what the answer is. I might say, though, that happiness and good fellowship and a little spice of sisterliness are what we try to incorporate in the unwritten bylaws. And now I think Aunt Nancy has some cake and ice-cream for us."

Saturday was a busy day for the one hundred and sixty odd girls who were enrolled at Shadyside. Penance and pleasure had a way of marking off the hours. Those who were good were allowed to go twice a month to Edentown, chaperoned by a teacher, for shopping, moving picture treats, and such other simple pleasures as the small city afforded. There were always a number of girls sentenced to "within bounds," which were the spacious school grounds, for minor sins of omission and commission. Bobby Littell was usually among these. She was impulsive and heedless, and got herself into hot water with amazing regularity.

"Bobby," announced Betty, one Saturday morning not long after the initiation into the Mysterious For, "don't you think you could manage to have a good record this coming week? We want to go nutting a week from to-day, and if you have to stay in bounds it will spoil all the fun."

"I'll try my best," promised Bobby solemnly. "I never mean to do a thing, Betty. Trouble is, I think afterward. I did want to go to Edentown to-day, too, but Libbie and Frances have promised to get the wool for my sweater. Want to come down to the gym? I'm going to drill my squad this morning."

In the gymnasium they found Ada Nansen, also in charge of a squad.

"She flunked twice in French and was impudent to Madame," whispered Bobby, who knew all the school gossip. "Mrs. Eustice canceled her Edentown permit."

Ada frankly scowled at the newcomers. She had found the Littell girls slow to overtures of friendship, and they persisted in displaying an annoying fancy for the society of Betty and the Guerin girls, who, for all Ada knew, might be what she described to her mother as "perfect nobodies." So Ada and Ruth Royal gradually formed a circle of their own to which gravitated the more snobbish girls, those who fought, openly or covertly, the rule for simple dressing, and those who found in Ada's characteristics of petty meanness, worship of money, and social aspirations a response to similar urgings of their own natures.

"Well, Bobby, I'm glad to see you and your 'men,'" said Miss Anderson briskly. "I was just saying to Ada that to-day is too beautiful to waste indoors. I want you all to come out on the campus and we'll have a race."

Bobby's squad included Betty—who had refused to leave her chum—the Guerin girls (who refused to go to Edentown because it was almost impossible to avoid spending money for little luxuries and for treats), Constance Howard and Dora Estabrooke, a fat girl who was good-nature itself.

"We'll have to use elimination," said the teacher when she had her pupils out on the green level that was back of the gymnasium and walled in by tall Lombardy poplars planted closely. "Let's see, twelve of you" (for Ada's squad numbered the same). "I think we'll number off first."

The odd numbers in each squad fell out and were matched, and the even numbers were paired similarly. Betty's rival was a near-sighted girl who delayed the next step because Miss Anderson discovered that she was wearing high-heeled shoes.

"I don't care for those flat things," volunteered Violet Canby, as she departed lockerward at Miss Anderson's stern insistence. "I have a very high instep, and they hurt me."

Nevertheless, she had to wear them, and the physical instructor put the others through a rigid inspection, but bloomers and sneakers were all properly donned.

"Now," said Miss Anderson when Violet had returned minus her pumps, "try to remember that it's just like a spelling match, girls; gradually we'll narrow down to the two best runners."

The trial "heats" resulted in leaving Betty, Bobby and Norma of the one squad, and Ada, Ruth and a girl named Edith Harrison, of the other.

Norma was paired with Ruth Royal, and at the signal they got away nicely. Norma was an excellent runner, and she reached the tape fully three yards ahead of Ruth. Something in her glowing, happy face, prompted Ruth to resentment.

"Oh, well," she remarked disdainfully, taking care that her words should carry clearly, "I suppose a farmer's daughter does a good deal of running after cows—they ought to be in training."

Norma flushed scarlet.

"My father is a doctor," she said hotly. "I'm not a farmer's daughter, but I know splendid girls who are—girls too well-bred to say a thing like that."

Ruth walked away—she was out of the finals now—and Norma went back to the starting place. She had not recovered her poise when the time came for her to race Bobby, and that young person won easily only to be outdistanced by Betty.

Rather to the latter's regret, she found herself the opponent of Ada for the deciding race.

"Go it, Betty—beat her!" whispered Bobby, proud of her chum. "She and Ruth Royal have dispositions like vinegar barrels!"

Betty had often raced with Bob, and she ran like a boy herself—head down, elbows held in. She was running that way, against Ada, when something suddenly shunted her off sideways. She fell, landing in a little heap. High and sharp rose the shrill whistle of the starter.

"Are you hurt, Betty?" demanded Miss Anderson, running up to the dazed girl and lifting her to her feet. "Ada Nansen that was absolutely the most unsportsmanlike trick I ever saw. You've lost the race on a foul. Betty was clearly winning when you tripped her."

"I didn't," muttered Ada, but she refused to meet her teacher's eyes.

"I don't want a race on a foul," argued Betty pluckily, for her skinned elbow was smarting madly. "Let's begin over."

She had her way, too, and this time won without interference, though Ada was so furious that Bobby was seriously concerned.

"She looks mad enough to put something in your soup," she told Betty, as they went in to dress and have Betty's elbow attended to. "What is it, Caroline?"

"Two young gentlemen to see you, Miss Bobby and Miss Betty," announced the maid importantly. "They is waiting in the parlor. Mrs. Eustice says you all should go right up."

In the parlor the girls found two slim, uniformed young figures who rose like well-set-up ramrods at their entrance.

"Bob!" ejaculated Betty, her voice betraying her pleasure. "Bob, you look splendid!"

Tommy Tucker glanced hopefully at Bobby.

"Don't I look splendid, too?" he asked.

"You're overshadowed by Bob," said Bobby mischievously. "However, when not compared with him, I dare say you look rather well."



CHAPTER XV

NORMA MAKES REPAIRS

This had to content the Tucker twin who took Bobby's chaffing good-humoredly.

Bob Henderson did indeed look very well. The uniform was most becoming, and though he was studying hard to make up for lack of preparation, his clear eyes and skin and firm muscles told of a wise schedule that included plenty of outdoor exercise.

"We want you girls to come over to a practice game," announced Tommy Tucker presently. "We've got rather jolly rooms, and we thought if you brought Miss Thingumbob along we could have you in for tea and show you the sights. Do you think the powers that be will say yes?"

"Well, I don't know," answered Betty thoughtfully. "I didn't know you Salsette boys had much to do with girls. Of course the whole school goes to the big football games, but asking us to see a practice game is something new. Of course it will be difficult to get an afternoon when every one is free—"

"Every one!" exploded Bob. "Who said anything about every one? We don't want the whole school—just you and Bobby and Louise and Frances and Libbie and the Guerin girls."

"Sure, the same bunch that came up on the train," said Tommy Tucker. "Lead me to Mrs. Eustice and I'll ask her."

"Mrs. Eustice is not in this afternoon," announced an extremely cold and disapproving voice. "Have you permission, young ladies, to see these er—callers?"

It was the elderly teacher whom Tommy had tormented on the train!

For once in his life that young man was thoroughly abashed. He threw Betty an appealing look that asked her to save him.

"Miss Prettyman, may I present my friends?" said the girl with the formality that is subtly flattering to an older woman. "This is Bob Henderson, who came from the West with me and who is really like my brother, since my uncle is his guardian. And this is Tommy Tucker, who lives in Washington."

"How do you do, Robert and Thomas?" said Miss Prettyman austerely. "Did Mrs. Eustice know you had callers?" she persisted, turning to the girls. "She took the last bus to Edentown."

"Yes, she knew. It is all right. Caroline said so," babbled Betty, in frantic terror lest the boys make the mistake of telling Miss Prettyman about the proposed visit.

"What was it you wanted to ask Mrs. Eustice, young man?" the teacher demanded next. "I am her secretary and try to save her work whenever possible. Perhaps I can answer your question."

Behind Miss Prettyman's narrow back Betty signaled wildly.

"Don't tell—hush!" she wig-wagged, laying her finger against her lips.

Tommy stared at her idiotically, his mouth gaping.

"Thank you, but only Mrs. Eustice could really give us an answer," said Bob, coming to the rescue of his stricken chum. "Betty, will you deliver our message and perhaps you can telephone the answer?"

"No Shadyside girl is allowed to telephone Salsette Academy," announced Miss Prettyman, with grim satisfaction.

Betty had not known of this rule, but she realized it was undoubtedly in existence.

"We'll let you know some way," she promised.

Still pursued by Miss Prettyman's icy glare, the wretched boys backed out of the room and the unfortunate Tommy walked into a handsome china jardiniere with disastrous results. There was a sickening crash, a ladylike scream from Miss Prettyman, and Betty heard Bob's voice in a tone of suppressed fury: "You've done it now, you idiot!"

Bobby giggled, of course, but Miss Prettyman, who had followed the boys into the hall ("I think she thought we'd steal something on the way out," Bob confided later to Betty) maintained her poise.

"I'm—I'm awfully sorry," faltered the culprit. "I hope it wasn't very expensive. I'll pay Mrs. Eustice, of course, or buy her another one—"

"That jardiniere happened to be imported from Nippon," remarked Miss Prettyman coldly. "I doubt if it can ever be replaced. It has stood in that exact spot for seven years. But then, naturally, our callers are accustomed to leaving a room gracefully. I'm sure I—"

The agonized Tommy tried to get in a word, failed, and took a step toward the door. His foot caught in the rug, and for one dreadful moment he thought he was doomed to create another scene. As he recovered his balance, Ada Nansen came down the stairs.

"What was that noise we heard a few minutes ago?" she asked sweetly, looking at the boys.

Betty and Bobby, laughing in the doorway of the reception room, the unyielding Miss Prettyman, and the cool and curious Ada swam before Tommy's eyes. Bob retained his presence of mind and, opening the door with one hand and pushing Tommy before him with the other, managed to effect their exit.

"Gosh, Bob, wasn't that awful!" sighed poor Tommy, when they were finally clear of the school portal. "Don't I always have bad luck? How could I know we were going to walk smack into that dame? She remembered us, too."

"She remembered you," said Bob significantly. "And you were within one of asking her to let the girls come over to the game, too! Didn't you know, you poor fish, that she would jump for joy if she could have a chance to turn you down?"

"Well, anyway," replied Tommy more contentedly, "Betty will let us know. She can find a way."

Betty lost no time in putting the invitation before Mrs. Eunice when she returned from her town expedition. The principal knew all about Bob through Mr. Gordon's letters and those from Mrs. Littell, and she knew most of the parents of the other lads Betty mentioned.

"I see no reason, my dear," she said graciously when she heard of the morning's visit, "why you should not go. Get the consent of your chaperone and then settle on the afternoon. How many of you are invited?"

"Seven," answered Betty truthfully. "But I want Constance Howard to go, Mrs. Eustice. The boys didn't know about her. She is Louise's roommate you see, and we eight always do everything together."

"All right, Constance may go, too," acquiesced Mrs. Eustice.

Betty thanked her warmly and danced off to find Bobby. Then they flew to ask Miss Anderson to be their chaperone, a duty that young woman assumed cordially, and before bedtime Betty had written Bob a note to say that they would be over Friday afternoon about half-past four.

Watched a little enviously by the others, the eight piled into the school bus the next Friday afternoon. Miss Anderson tripped down the steps, took her place among them, and they were off.

"Did you see that lovely blouse Ada had on?" Norma Guerin whispered to Betty. "I do wish I could have one like that to wear with my suit."

"You look fifty times prettier than she does," flared Betty loyally. "And you know I've told you to borrow anything of mine whenever you want to."

"I know it," admitted Norma. "But I can't borrow clothes! Silly or not, I just can't seem to! I don't mean to complain all the time, either, but I don't believe mother or granny realized how difficult it was going to be. Alice cried so hard this afternoon when she started to get dressed I thought she'd never get her eyes right again. They look red yet."

Sure enough, Alice's eyes were suspiciously pink about the corners. Betty knew that the Guerin girls were unhappy, not alone because they could not have as many or as pretty frocks as the other girls, but because they were constantly worried about financial affairs at home. They had both been made the confidantes of their parents to a greater degree than is customary in many families, and Betty shrewdly suspected that Norma had kept her father's books for him.

"I wish I could get hold of that treasure, or a part of it," Betty thought. "Isn't it maddening to think of a string of pearls at the bottom of a chasm and the girls to whom it should go struggling along on next to nothing!"

They were half-way around the lake when the motor slowed down and the bus stopped.

"What's the matter, George?" Miss Anderson asked.

"Don't know, Ma'am," answered the driver, a rather sleepy-looking middle-aged man. "Guess I'll have to investigate her."

Scratching his head, he proceeded to "investigate," and at the end of fifteen minutes hazarded an opinion that they were "out of luck."

"Looks like I'll have to go back to the school garage and get 'em to send us a tow," he announced pleasantly.

"We want to go to the Academy!" chorused the girls. "We're late now. Oh, George, can't you fix it?"

"Betty, don't you know anything about cars?" appealed Miss Anderson, who had discovered that Betty was apt to be invaluable in an emergency of any kind.

Betty had to confess that her experience had been confined to horses. The Littell girls had been used to cars all their lives, but like the majority of such fortunates, knew nothing about them beyond the colors suitable for upholstery.

"I've helped my dad with his car," ventured Norma diffidently. "This isn't the same make, but perhaps I can tell what the matter is."

The beautiful, expensive school bus was in fact another type than the shabby, rattly affair Dr. Guerin made spin over the rough country roads. However, Betty remembered at least one night, and she knew her experience had been duplicated by many others, when the noise of the asthmatic little car had been like sweetest music in her ears.

The doctor's daughter took off her plain jacket, rolled back her white cuffs, and bent over the engine. George regarded her respectfully, and Miss Anderson and the girls watched anxiously. If Norma could not send them on their way it meant the trip must be given up.

Norma put her slim hands down among the oily plugs, selected a tool from the kit George held out to her, and did something mysterious to the "innards."

"Start her," she commanded briefly.

Obediently George took the wheel and touched the self-starter. The engine purred contentedly.

"By gum!" cried George inelegantly, "she's done it!"

He produced a towel from the box for Norma, who managed to rub off most of the grease from her hands. She put on her jacket and climbed into her place between Betty and her sister. George proceeded to make up for lost time at a speed that left them breathless.

"Here's the girl who got us here!" said Betty to Bob, when the group of cadets met their bus at the athletic field where several cars were drawn up on the sidelines.

"Then she shall have my fur coat and my best curly chrysanthemum," announced Tommy Tucker gallantly, throwing a handsome raccoon fur coat over Norma's shoulders and presenting her with a magnificent yellow chrysanthemum.



CHAPTER XVI

THE NUTTING PARTY

To the boy's surprise Bobby, who was usually aloof and liked to tease him, squeezed his arm surreptitiously.

"You're a dear!" she told him enthusiastically.

"Girls are a queer lot," the dazed youth confided to Bob, as they went back to their quarters. "Here I handed over my coat to that Norma Guerin and gave her the flower I'd been saving for Bobby, just to pay Bobby back for being so snippy to me over at school. And she calls me a dear and is nicer to me than she's been in months!"

Bob briefly outlined something of the Guerin history, for Betty had told him of the lost treasure in her hurried note, and hinted his belief that the girls had very little money in comparison to Shadyside standards.

"Shucks—money isn't anything!" was Tommy's answer to the recital, with the easy assurance of a person who has never been without a comfortable competence. "They're nice girls, and we'll pass the word that the boys are to show them a good time."

As a result, when after the conclusion of the game, the girls and Miss Anderson were ushered upstairs into the cozy suite of rooms the cadets occupied, Norma and Alice found themselves plied with attentions. Miss Anderson poured the hot chocolate and made friends with the shy Sydney Cooke, who had been dreading this visit all the afternoon. Indeed his chums had threatened to lock him in the clothes closet in order that they might be sure of his attendance.

Winifred Marion Brown, in addition to his ability as a checker player, was a good pianist, and he obligingly played for them to dance. The piano belonged to the Tucker twins. Norma and Alice were "rushed" with partners, and they quite forgot their clothes in the enjoyment of dancing to irresistible music.

Libbie had brought a book of poems for Timothy Derby, who solemnly loaned her one of his in exchange. This odd pair remained impervious to all criticisms, and certainly many of those voiced were frank to the point of painfulness.

"But their natures can not understand the lyric appeal," said Libbie sadly. Her English teacher moaned over her spelling and rejoiced in her themes.

Finally Miss Anderson insisted they must go, and the bouquet of flowers on the tea table was plucked apart to reveal nine little individual bouquets, one for each guest.

"Good-bye, and thank you for a lovely party," said Miss Anderson gaily.

"Do you know?" blurted Teddy Tucker, "you're my idea of a chaperone! Most of 'em are such dubs and kill-joys!"

Which tactful speech proved to be the best Teddy could have made.

A week of small pleasures and hard study followed this "glorious Friday afternoon."

Bobby, for a wonder, remembered her promise of good behavior, and by herculean effort managed to be on the "starred" list for the Saturday set aside for the nutting expedition.

"We'll go after lunch," planned Betty. "Miss Anderson says if we strike off toward the woods at the back of the school we ought to come to a grove of hickory nut trees."

The eight girls, ready for their tramp, came in to lunch attired in heavy wool skirts and stout shoes and carried their sweaters. Ada Nansen glanced complacently at her own suede pumps and silk stockings.

"It's hard to tell which is really the farmer's daughter to-day," she drawled. "Perhaps we all ought to assume that uniform out of kindness."

Ada sat at the table directly behind Norma, and not a girl at either table could possibly miss the significance of her remarks. Their import, it developed, had been plain to Miss Lacey who, on her way to her own table, had overheard. Miss Lacey was a quiet, rather drab little woman, misleading in her effacement of self. She knew more about her pupils than they often suspected.

"Ada," she said quietly, stopping by the girl, "you may leave the table. If you will persist in acting like a naughty little six year old girl, you must be treated as one."

Ada flounced out of her chair and from the room. Her departure created a ripple of curiosity. It was most unusual for a girl to be dismissed from table, and had Ada only known it, she had drawn the attention of the whole school to herself.

Miss Lacey went on to her seat, without a glance at the flushed faces of Norma and Alice.

"Some day," said Bobby furiously, "I'm going to throw a plate at that girl!"

"No, you're not," contradicted Betty. "Then Mrs. Eustice would rise up and send you from the room and you'd feel about half the size Ada does now. For mercy's sake, don't descend to anybody's level—make 'em come up to fight on yours."

They were all glad to get through the meal and find themselves outdoors. It was a perfect autumn day, warm and hazy, and the red and gold of the leaves showed burnished from the hillside. They tramped rather silently at first, and then, as the tense mood wore off, their tongues were loosened and they chattered like magpies.

"Here's a tree!" shouted Louise and Frances, who were in the lead.

When they had picked all the nuts on the ground, Bobby essayed to climb the tree. She made rather sad work of the effort, for a shag-bark hickory is not the easiest tree in the world to climb, and after she had torn her skirt in two places and mended it with safety pins, she gave up the attempt.

"Let's walk further," she suggested. "We'll mark our trail as we go like the Indians."

This idea caught the fancy of the girls, and they marked an elaborate trail, building little mounds at every turn and leaving odd arrangements of stones to mark their passing.

"Come on, I'll race you," shouted Bobby suddenly. "I feel just like exercising."

Betty wondered what she called the scramble through the woods, but she, too, was ready for a run. They set off pellmell, laughing and shouting.

"Look out!" shrieked Betty, stopping so suddenly that Libbie and Louise fell against her. "Look! I almost ran right into it!"

She pointed ahead to where the ground fell away abruptly. A great chasm, like an angry scar, was cut through the earth, and on the side opposite to the girls a steep hill came down in an uncompromising slant.

"What a dandy hill for coasting!" ejaculated Bobby. "Let's come up here this winter. We can steer away from this hole."

"That's no hole," said Norma Guerin, in an odd voice. "That's Indian Chasm. And it's miles long."

Betty stared at her. She had thought Indian Chasm many miles away.

"I didn't realize we had walked so far," said Norma, apparently reading her thoughts. "But I know I am right. Here are the woods and the steep hill, just as grandma has described them a hundred times. This is Indian Chasm."

The girls looked at her curiously. Betty had not told them the story, believing that Alice and Norma should have that sole right. Now Norma rapidly sketched the outlines for them and they listened breathlessly, for surely this true story was more thrilling than any piece of fiction, however highly colored.

"I never heard of anything so romantic!" was Libbie's comment.

To which Bobby retorted with cousinly severity:

"Romantic? Where do you see anything romantic in a band of Indians scalping a peaceful white family?"

"Oh, Bobby!" protested Norma, laughing. "They didn't scalp grandma. They stole everything she had."

"And is all that stuff down there now?" asked Constance Howard, round-eyed. "Perhaps if we look we can see something."

There was a concerted rush to the chasm's edge, and the eight girls plumped down flat on their stomachs, determined to see whatever there was to be seen.

The sides of the earth fell away sharply, down, down. Betty shouted, and the empty echo of her voice came back to her.

"The ground's so shaly and crumbly," she said thoughtfully, "that it would be impossible to let a man down with a rope—the earth would cave in and bury him."

"I think I see a diamond," reported Libbie. "Don't you see something glittering down there?"

"Can't even see the bottom," said Bobby curtly. "Much less a diamond. Oh, girls, to think of those valuables at the bottom of a chasm like this and none of us able to think up a way to get 'em out."

"Well, lots of people have tried," said Alice reasonably. "If grown-up men couldn't salvage 'em for grandma, I guess it's nothing to our discredit that we can't get them."

"We might push Libbie in," suggested Bobby wickedly. "Then she could tell us how deep it is."

This had the effect of sending Libbie scurrying away from the dangerous place, and the others followed her more slowly to resume the search for nuts.

"I wish we could think of a way, Norma, dear," said Betty.

"Oh, I don't care—not so very much," answered Norma bravely. But then she sighed deeply.



CHAPTER XVII

CAUGHT IN THE STORM

The Shadyside gymnasium was equipped with a fine pool, and it was the school's boast that every girl learned to swim during her first term. Perhaps the proximity of the lake and the lure of the small fleet of canoes and rowboats tied up at the wharf had something to do with the success of the swimming classes. No girl who could not swim was permitted on the lake, alone or with a companion.

Betty and her chums awaited their final tests eagerly—so excited the last day or two they could scarcely keep their minds on their books or sit in patience through a recitation—and passed them with flying colors. Constance Howard was an excellent swimmer, and it was the sight of her paddling gracefully about the lake on sunny Saturday afternoons that spurred the seven who could not swim on to greater effort.

"Come on," cried Betty gaily, taking the gymnasium steps two at a time. "Come, girls—this afternoon we go rowing. I've my 'stiffcut,' as Mr. Peabody used to call it, and we've all passed. Oh, it's cloudy!"

She looked at the sky disappointedly. When they had gone into the pool an hour before the sun had been shining brightly, but now the gray clouds were thick overhead and the air was chilly.

"Who cares for the weather?" said Bobby scornfully. "Guess it will take more than a little rain to stop me! I've been crazy to take a row-boat out for three weeks."

"Perhaps it will clear," contributed the optimistic Louise.

But after lunch the sky was still overcast.

"Don't be silly—it won't rain," urged Bobby, as her chums demurred. "Next Saturday it may be too cold. Oh, come on, girls."

Thus incited, they went down to the wharf and made their choice of boats. Norma and Alice wanted to take out a canoe, and they offered to paddle for Libbie, who seemed disinclined to exercise. Betty had wondered once or twice if the girl were ill, for she seemed very nervous, jumped if a door slammed or some one spoke to her suddenly, and in the morning looked as if she had not slept well.

Betty and Bobby selected a flat-bottomed row-boat and for passenger they took Frances, who offered to help row if they became tired.

Louise and Constance chose another canoe.

They headed north, and once out in the center of the lake, paddled and rowed steadily. Betty's rowing experience was limited, but Bobby was proud of her "stroke," and soon taught her chum the secret of handling the oars.

"Ship ahoy!" shouted Bobby presently.

Libbie jumped and looked ahead anxiously.

"It's only the boys," she said dully.

An eight-oared rowing shell shot down to them, and the freckled-faced coxswain, Gilbert Lane, one of the boys the girls had met at Bob and Tommy's "party," grinned cheerfully.

"Where you going?" he asked, resting a friendly hand on the rowboat's rim.

Bobby described an arc with her oar that incidentally showered the questioner with shining water drops.

"We're out for adventure," she answered airily.

"Just got our swimming certificates to-day," volunteered Betty.

Bob flashed her a congratulatory smile.

"Race you to the end of the lake?" suggested Tommy Tucker.

Bobby regarded him with magnificent scorn.

"As if eight of you couldn't beat two!" she said significantly. "I never heard such talk! Why you'd have a walk!" she added.

The boys shouted with laughter.

"You're a poet, Bobby," declared Tommy. "Tennyson had nothing on you—had he, Libbie?"

Libbie turned her dark eyes on him and frowned a little.

"I wasn't listening," she said indifferently.

"Well, anyway, row up to the end of the lake, will you?" suggested Gilbert. "With drill night ahead of us, we want a little brightness to remember the day by."

Canoes, rowboat and shell swept on up the lake, and when the scrubby pines that bordered the narrow peak of the north shore were in sight, Bobby glanced back over her shoulder at Betty.

"You're spattering me," she complained.

"I thinks it's beginning to rain," said Betty mildly, and even as she spoke, Louise called to them:

"Girls, it's beginning to pour!"

A sudden blast of wind struck them, blowing the rain against their backs.

"Keep on rowing!" shouted Bob's voice. "We'll have to land and walk back. You girls can never beat back against this storm. We're almost to the shore now."

A few minutes more and the boats touched shore. The boys were out in an instant and helped the girls to land.

"We'll carry up the boats—don't you think that is best, Tommy?" shouted Bob. "If we carry them up high enough and leave them, they will be perfectly safe."

The wind and the rain made shouting necessary if one's voice were to carry above the storm. The boys lifted the light boats and carried them into the woods, turning them over so that the keels were up.

"Now the question is," said Bob, who seemed by common consent to have been elected leader, "shall we walk along the shore and get drenched, or take a chance of finding our way through the woods?"

To their astonishment, Libbie burst into a fit of hysterical weeping.

"Don't go through the woods," she begged, her teeth chattering. "We'll fall into that awful Indian Chasm."

Bobby's heart reproached her for her thoughtless joke and she put an arm around her cousin.

"Libbie, you never thought I was serious about pushing you into the chasm, did you?" she asked anxiously. "Is that what has been making you act so queerly ever since? I was only fooling."

So, thought Betty, Bobby, too, had noticed Libbie's unnatural behavior.

"Oh, it isn't that," sobbed Libbie. "I can't explain—but if we go through the woods, I'm sure I shall go crazy."

"Well, then, that settles it," said Bob comfortably. "Better to be drowned than to go crazy. Can you turn up your sweater collars, girls? I wish we'd brought some raincoats along."

Splashing and stumbling, they followed Bob down to the shore and began the weary walk that would lead them back to the school. After fifteen minutes' steady walking they came to a dense undergrowth that was impossible to penetrate.

"No use, we'll have to make a cut through the woods," announced Bob. "Up this way and over, ought to bring us out right."

He was so cheerful and patient that the tired, rain-soaked girls could not do otherwise than follow his example. Libbie was crying silently, but the others tramped along cheerfully, singing, at Betty's suggestion, old college and school songs.

"Look here, Bob," said Tommy Tucker in an undertone, "I don't think we're going in the right direction. Don't you say it would be better to take the girls to that deserted cabin we found the other day and leave them there while we explore a bit? They're getting soaked through, and Libbie Littell is fixing to have hysterics. Leave a couple of the boys with 'em, so they won't be afraid, and then we'll locate the right trail and take 'em over it home in a hurry."

This suggestion sounded like good, common-sense to Bob, and he said so.

"Betty could walk ten miles and be all right," he declared proudly, "and I think Bobby is good for a hike, too. But Frances Martin can't see when the rain gets on her glasses, and, as you say, something is the matter with Libbie. So let's make for the cabin, quick."

The Salsette boys had explored the woods pretty thoroughly, and on a recent expedition Bob and his chums had stumbled on an old one-room cabin, buried deep in the woods and evidently unoccupied for years. It was not far from the end of the lake, and toward it they now led the girls, explaining as they went what they intended to do.

"We'll be all right," said Betty at once. "I think if Libbie can sit down and rest she'll feel better, too. And if you all want to go and hunt for the trail, you needn't worry about us."

"Oh, Sydney and I intend to stay," Gilbert Lane assured her quickly. (The boys had settled that among themselves.) "We'll be handy in case any Indians or the like come after you."

Betty gave him a warning glance, for Libbie looked frightened. Surely something was wrong with the girl!

The cabin door was open and the interior was comparatively dry. There was no furniture, but three or four old packing boxes furnished the girls with seats. Bob and five of his friends disappeared, whistling. Gilbert and Sydney were investigating the ramshackle fireplace to see what the prospects were for starting a fire when a shriek from Libbie brought them to their feet.

"A ghost!" cried the girl. "A ghost! Over there in the corner!"

Frances Martin gave a cry, and Betty and Bobby went white. Even Gilbert afterward confessed that his scalp prickled when a figure stepped forward from a narrow closet against the wall.

"Ugh! Howdy!" he grunted, and they saw that he was a very old and very dirty Indian.

"Rain," he said slowly, pointing to the door. "Stop soon now. Go get supper."

He shuffled over the doorsill and at the edge he turned.

"Howdy!" he said, apparently with some vague idea of farewell. "Much rain!"

Petrified, they watched him hobble away through the woods.



CHAPTER XVIII

LIBBIE'S SECRET

Gilbert Lane was the first to recover his voice.

"Well, what do you know about that!" he ejaculated. "The old bird was here all the time."

"Are—are—are there any more of them?" stammered Louise.

"No, that old fellow is the only Indian for miles around," said Gilbert carelessly. "He was left behind, the fellows at school say, when that band stole the Macklin treasure. They had a grudge against him, it seems, and they tripped him and left him with a broken leg. He worked around on different farms for years and now does a day's work often enough to keep him in food. Queer old dick, I guess."

"What makes you girls look so funny?" demanded Sydney. "You're not afraid now, are you? That Indian won't come back—he was more afraid of us than we were of him. I figure out he was asleep when we came in and the noise woke him up. What are you smiling about?"

"My grandmother is Mrs. Marcia Macklin," explained Norma. "And you see it was her gold and silver and jewels the Indians stole. I wonder what he would have said if we had told him?"

"Gee, is that so?" asked Sydney, ignoring the latter half of Norma's sentence. "And is all that stuff down in the chasm yet?"

"As far as we know, it is," said Norma. "And likely to remain there," she added, with a sigh.

Bob and the boys returned in less than half an hour, to announce that they had found the right road and were prepared to pilot the girls expeditiously homeward. Libbie's cheeks were unnaturally flushed and she looked miserable, but she refused to let Bob and Tommy carry her by forming a "chair" with their hands.

"I'm all right," she insisted hoarsely. "I only want to get home."

Knowing the way positively saved much fumbling and time, and soon the familiar buildings of Shadyside loomed up before them. The boys had a long tramp still before them, and if they were not to be late for supper, must walk briskly. They continued on their way, while the girls ran up the steps of the dormitory building.

"There's no use talking, Libbie, you've got to see the infirmary nurse," said Bobby resolutely. "I promised your mother to look after you, and if you're going to be sick you'll at least have the proper care. Wait till we get into some dry things, and I'll take you."

Libbie looked rebellious, but she made no verbal protest, and when they were once more in dry clothes Bobby marched her cousin to the immaculate infirmary. She returned alone, saying that the nurse had detained Libbie for observation over night.

"She thinks she's getting a heavy cold, but it may be more serious," Bobby reported. "Well, anyway, I've done my duty. But romantic people are always forgetting to wear their rubbers."

Betty had just drowsed off to sleep that night, the girls having gone to bed immediately after the study hour, for the afternoon in the wind and rain had made them extraordinarily sleepy, when a soft knock on the door startled her.

She slipped out of bed and ran to the door, opening it carefully so as not to wake Bobby. Miss Morris, the school nurse, and Miss Lacey stood there.

"Elizabeth isn't worse," said Miss Morris hastily, noting Betty's look of alarm. "But she is very restless and wants to see you. Miss Lacey says you may come up. Get your dressing gown and slippers, dear."

Betty obeyed quickly. Libbie was probably lonely, she reflected.

The infirmary consisted of three connecting rooms, fitted with two single beds in each, and Libbie happened to be the only patient. She was sitting up in bed, well wrapped up, when Betty saw her, her eyes unnaturally bright, her cheeks very red.

"Now I'll leave you two girls together for exactly half an hour," said the nurse kindly. After that Elizabeth must go to sleep."

"Is the door shut—shut tight?" demanded Libbie feverishly, grasping Betty's hand with both her hot, dry ones.

"Yes, dear, yes," affirmed Betty soothingly. "What's the matter, Libbie—is your throat sore?"

"Oh, Betty, I'm in such terrible trouble!" gasped Libbie, her eyes overflowing. "I'm so frightened!"

"Tell me about it, dear," soothed Betty. "I'll help you, you know I will. Has it anything to do with school?"

She was totally unprepared for Libbie's next words.

"I have to have some money—a lot of money, Betty. I've spent my last allowance and I can't write home for more because they will ask me why I want it. I've borrowed so much from Louise that I can't ask her again! I ought to pay it back. But I've got to have twenty dollars by to-morrow night."

"What for? What's the matter?" asked Betty, in alarm.

"You'll promise not to tell Bobby?" demanded Libbie intensely. "Promise me you won't tell Bobby? She'd scold so. And Mrs. Eustice would expel me. If you won't tell Bobby or Mrs. Eustice, Betty, I'll tell you."

Betty was now thoroughly aroused. She knew that impulsive novel-reading Libbie went about with her pretty head filled with all sorts of trashy ideas, and she didn't know what lengths she might have gone to. If Mrs. Eustice would expel her, the affair must be serious indeed.

"I'll promise," said Betty rashly. "Tell me everything, Libbie, and if I can I'll help you."

"Well, you remember when we went nutting?" said Libbie. "I carried a bottle with me with—with my name and address written on a slip of paper inside. I read about that in a book. And I said to leave an answer in the same bottle. I—I buried it just at the foot of the hill, before we began to climb. Louise was with me, but she was hunting for specimens for her botany book."

"So that's why you hung back, was it?" said Betty. "I wish to goodness Louise was more interested in what is going on around her. She might have stopped you. Go on—what happened to your silly bottle?"

"I buried it," repeated Libbie, "and two days after I went out and dug it up. And there was an answer in it."

"What did it say?" demanded Betty practically.

"I've got it here—" Libbie reached under her pillow and pulled out a slip of paper.

"It says 'Leave ten dollars in this same place to-night, or Mrs. Eustice shall hear of this.' And, of course," concluded Libbie, "I put ten dollars in the bottle, because whoever found it had the slip with my name on it to show Mrs. Eustice."

Betty studied the paper. The handwriting was a strong backhand, not at all an illiterate hand.

"Oh, dear, what shall I do?" wailed Libbie. "He keeps asking for more, and I won't have any money till the first of the month. I only meant to do like the girl in the book—have a thrilling unknown correspondent. I never knew he would ask for money! Suppose he is a horrid, dirty tramp and he comes and tells Mrs. Eustice he found my note? I should die of shame!"

"I'll have the money ready for you in the morning," said Betty firmly. "I have that much. But, of course, he'll keep demanding more. I do hope, Libbie, that if you ever get out of this mess, you'll be cured of some of your crazy notions!"

"Oh, I will," promised Libbie earnestly. "I will be good, Betty. Only don't tell Bobby."

She was manifestly relieved by her confession, and when Miss Morris came in to send Betty back to her own room, Libbie curled down contentedly for a restful night.

Not so poor Betty. She turned and tossed, wondering how she could get more money for her chum without arousing suspicion.

"What ever made her do a thing like that!" she groaned. "Of all the wild ideas! The twenty will take every cent I have. I must see Bob and borrow from him."

Libbie was much improved in the morning—so well, in fact, that after breakfast in bed she was permitted to dress and go to her room, though strictly forbidden to attend classes or go out of doors. Betty brought her the twenty dollars and when school was in session, the benighted Libbie sped out to her buried bottle and put the money in it, regaining her room without detection.

Two days later there was another demand for money, and two days after that, another. Libbie visited the bottle regularly, afraid to let a day pass lest the blackmailer expose her to the principal. Betty had seen Bob at a football game, and had borrowed fifteen dollars from him. She could not write her uncle, for communication with him was uncertain and her generous allowance came to her regularly through his Philadelphia lawyer.

"He wants twenty-five dollars by to-morrow night!" whispered Libbie, meeting Betty in the hall after her last visit to the buried bottle. "Oh, Betty, what shall we do?"

Both girls had watched patiently and furtively in their spare time in an effort to detect the person who dug up the bottle, but they had never seen any one go near the spot.

As it happened, when Libbie whispered her news to Betty, they were both on their way to recitation with Miss Jessup whose current events class both girls nominally enjoyed. To-day Betty found it impossible to fix her mind on the brisk discussions, and half in a dream heard Libbie flunk dismally.

When next she was conscious of what was going on about her—she had been turning Libbie's troubles over and over in her mind without result—Miss Jessup was speaking to her class about the "association of ideas."

"We won't go very deeply into it this morning," she was saying, "but you'll find even the surface of the subject fascinating."

Then she began a rapid fire of questions to which Betty paid small attention till the sound of Ada Nansen's name aroused her.

"Key, Ada?" asked Miss Jessup.

The answers were supposed to indicate definite ideas.

"Key hole," said Ada promptly.

"Purse?"

"Money."

"Bee?" asked Miss Jessup.

To her surprise and that of the listening class, nine-tenths of whom were forming the word "honey" with their lips, Ada answered without hesitation, "Bottle."

"You must have thought I meant the letter 'B,'" said the teacher lightly, passing on to the next pupil.

Betty heard the dismissal bell with real relief. She cornered Libbie in the hall as the class streamed out and announced a decision.

"I'll have to go see Bob—I'll paddle one of the canoes," she said hurriedly.

"If any one asks for me, say I'm out on the lake."

Betty was now an expert with the paddle, and the trip across the lake was easy of accomplishment. She had the great good fortune to meet Bob returning from a recitation, and though surprised to see her, he knew she must have come by boat or canoe. The boys had gone the next day and brought back the canoes from the woods where they had placed them during the storm.

"I'm ever so sorry, Bob," said Betty earnestly, "But—could you lend me twenty-five dollars?"

Bob whistled.

"I could," he admitted cautiously. "What's it for, Betsey?"

"That," said Betty, "is a secret."

Bob glanced at her sharply. His chin hardened.

"Come down here where we won't be interrupted," he said, leading the way to the wharf. "You'll have to give me a good reason for wanting the money, Betty."



CHAPTER XIX

BOB'S SOLUTION

"If you wanted twenty-five dollars and I had it," said Betty persuasively, "I'd give it to you without asking a solitary question."

Rob's lips twitched.

"But, Betty—" he began. Then—"Oh, do play fair," he urged. "You're younger than I am. Uncle Dick expects me to look after you. Goodness knows I don't want to pry into your affairs, but when you borrow fifteen dollars and then want twenty-five the same week, what's a fellow to think? If some one is borrowing from you, it's time to call a halt; you're not fair to yourself."

Betty looked startled. How could Bob possibly guess so near the truth? She began to think that the better part of wisdom was to confide in this keen young man.

"Come on, Betty, tell me what you want it for, and you shall have twice twenty-five," said Bob earnestly. "I've most of my allowance in the school bank. It's all yours, if you'll let me have an inkling of the reason you need money."

"Well," said Betty, slowly, "I didn't promise I wouldn't tell—only that I wouldn't tell Bobby or Mrs. Eustice. It's Libbie who has to have the money."

She sketched Libbie's story for him rapidly, Bob listening in silence. At the end he asked a single question.

"Have you any of those notes asking for money?"

"Here's one." Betty thrust her hand into the pocket of her sweater and pulled out the crumpled paper that Libbie had shaken out of the bottle that morning.

"Were they all written on this same kind of paper?" asked Bob, reading the note.

"Ye-s, that is, I think so," hesitated Betty. "I really haven't noticed. Why?"

"Because I don't think any man wrote this," announced Bob confidently. "I think some girl at school has done it, either as a joke or to torment Libbie."

"But it's grown-up writing," protested Betty. "Though, come to think of it, we don't know any of the girls' handwriting," she added thoughtfully.

"What girl would be likely to do it?" asked Bob. "Can you recall a practical joker? This is copy book paper torn from an ordinary theme book. Yes, I'll bet a cookie a girl wrote it."

"Ada Nansen or Ruth Gladys Royal might do it to plague Libbie," said Betty slowly. "They don't like any of our crowd, and Libbie is so good at French she turns Ada green with envy. The more I think of it, the surer I am it is Ada. Ruth doesn't dislike any one actively enough to exert herself."

"Ada Nansen?" repeated Bob. "Isn't she that girl we saw on the train and who plumped herself down in my seat? I thought so—I remember you told me. Well, from the sidelight I have on her character, I believe she is the one at the bottom of this. That will explain, too, why you never catch any one digging up the bottle—she knows exactly when you are busy and when you are not."

"Bottle!" said Betty explosively, to Bob's amazement. "Oh, Bob! this morning Miss Jessup was talking to us about association of ideas, and she asked Ada what bee meant to her. We thought she'd say 'honey,' of course, but she said 'bottle.' Doesn't that show—"

"I should say it did!" Bob's voice was eager. "She took it for the letter 'B' and bottle was in her mind. You may depend upon it, that girl is at the back of all this fuss! Gee, when I've nothing else to do, I'm going to study up on this association of ideas stuff."

"You don't need it—you can get at things without a bit of trouble," Betty assured him affectionately.

"How will you go about pinning down Ada?" Bob asked anxiously.

"I'll cut out Latin to-morrow afternoon when she has a study period," planned Betty. "She'll think Libbie is reciting, and she'll not think of me at all, and I'll slip out and watch to see if she goes near the bottle. But what can I do if she does prove to be the right one? She'll tell Mrs. Eustice, and poor Libbie will be in a peck of trouble. I really think Mrs. Eustice would send her home if she knew."

"And serve Libbie right for being such an idiot!" pronounced Bob severely. "However, I think she has been pretty thoroughly punished through fear. I only wish you'd told me this before, Betty, because I know exactly how you can deal with Ada."

"You do? Oh, Bob, what should I ever do without you!" cried Betty, forgetting that a few moments before she had berated him for his insistence. "Tell me, quick."

"Well, a crowd of us fellows happened to be over in Edentown last Friday night, and we saw Ada and Ruth at the movies," said Bob. "They didn't see us, for we sat back. They were the only girls from Shadyside, and Tommy and I decided they had sneaked out after dinner and walked all that distance. Now threatening isn't a very nice performance, Betty, but sometimes you have to meet like with like. I think, if when you see Ada digging up the bottle, you go to her and say that unless she returns the money and Libbie's first note to you and promises to let the matter drop—forever—you will expose her Edentown trip to Mrs. Eustice, she will listen to reason."

"So do I," agreed Betty. "I don't think she has touched the money—she has plenty. But I must have the note so that Libbie can destroy it. Mrs. Eustice never lets us go to town at night, and I'm sure Ada and Ruth had to go down the fire-escape. Goodness, didn't they take a chance of being discovered!"

"Well, as I've already missed half an algebra recitation, and you know you have no business over here at this time of day, I move we begin our penance," suggested Bob. "Paddle home, Betsey, and if our hunch turns out wrong, we'll tackle another one."

"Oh, it won't—I'm sure you're right," said Betty gratefully. "Thank you ever so much, Bob. And the next time I'll tell you everything at the very first."

"Don't let me hear of another time," Bob called after her, with mock severity.

"Well, I never!" gasped Libbie, astonished, when Betty told her of Bob's suspicions. "Oh, Betty, wouldn't it be wonderful if it should be true!"

"I'm going to cut Latin this afternoon and find out," said Betty vigorously. "If Miss Sharpe asks for me, you don't know where I am; she never does anything but give you double lines to translate."

Betty knew that Ada had a study period, which she usually spent in her room, directly after lunch.

Directly after she left the dining room that noon Betty sped away to the foot of the hill. There were several stubby bushes about half-filled with wind-blown leaves and old rubbish and affording an excellent screen. Betty crouched down behind one of these.

She had not long to wait. Ada, in her beautiful mink furs, which she clung to persistently, though the fall weather so far had been very mild, was presently seen coming across the grass. She walked straight to the spot where the bottle was buried, and, stooping down, brushed away the leaves and dirt. She lifted the bottle.

"Pshaw, it's empty!" she said aloud.

"Yes, it's empty," echoed Betty, stepping out from behind the bush. "And you are to give the money back to me, and Libbie's note with it."

"Is that so?" said Ada contemptuously. "I have something to say about that. I intend to see that that note reaches the proper person—Mrs. Eustice."

Betty took a step nearer, her dark eyes blazing.

"I can play the kind of game you play—if I must," she said in a curiously repressed tone. "What about the trip you and Ruth Gladys made to Edentown last Friday night?"

Ada glared at her.

"Were you there? How did you know?" she stammered jerkily. "If you were up to the same trick, you'll look nice tattle-telling on us, won't you?"

"I wasn't there, but I have witnesses whom I can summon to say you were," declared Betty, wishing her voice did not tremble with nervousness. "You were the only girls from Shadyside, and you must have climbed down the fire—"

Ada raised her hand that held the bottle.

"You—you tell-tale!" she screamed threateningly.

Betty flung up her arm to knock the bottle aside, missed Ada's hand and hit her shoulder. Ada went down, Betty on top of her.

"Girls! For mercy's sake!" Miss Anderson stood beside them, scandalized. "Betty, get up. Ada, what are you thinking of? I saw you from the gym windows. You'll have the whole school out here presently. Betty, I thought you had Latin at this period?"

"I have," admitted Betty, so meekly that Miss Anderson looked away lest she laugh. "Only I had to see Ada."

"I don't know what you were quarreling about," said Miss Anderson, with characteristic frankness. "But I do know that both of you are old enough to know better than to revert to small-boy tactics. You've a hole in your stocking, Betty, that would do credit to a little brother."

"I ripped it on that stone," said Betty regretfully.

Ada stood sullenly, unconscious of two dead leaves hanging to her hat which completely destroyed her usual effect of studied elegance.

"Go on in, Betty," said the physical culture teacher, who labored under no delusions about the duties of a peacemaker. To tell the truth, she did not believe in forced reconciliation. "Ada will come with me."

"Ada has something I want," said Betty stubbornly. "She has to promise to give it to me first."

Ada looked at the resolute little figure facing her. Betty, she knew, was capable of doing exactly what she had said. Mrs. Eustice had no more rigid rule than the one against going to town, day or night, without permission. Ada gave in.

"I'll leave it in your room before dinner—you didn't think I carried it with me, did you?" she snapped.

"Both?" said Betty significantly, meaning the note and the money.

"Everything!" cried the exasperated Ada, on the verge of angry tears.

"Then you have my promise never to say a word," Betty assured her blithely.

"Do you want this bottle?" Miss Anderson called after her, as she started for the school.

Miss Anderson had been studying both girls as she waited quietly.

Now Betty turned, smiled radiantly, and took the bottle the teacher held out to her. With careful aim, worthy of Bob's training, she fixed her eye on a handy rock, hurled the bottle with all her strength, and had the satisfaction of seeing it dashed into a thousand fragments as it struck the target squarely.

Then she trotted sedately on to her delayed recitation, and Miss Anderson and the scowling Ada followed more slowly.

Just before dinner that night there came a knock on Betty's door, and Virgie Smith, one of Ada's friends, thrust a package at Bobby, who had answered the tap.

Betty managed to turn aside her chum's curiosity and to get away to Libbie and give her the note. They burned it in the flame of a candle, and counted the money. It was all there, folded just as Libbie had placed it in the bottle. Evidently Ada had never carried it.

Libbie paid Louise the money she had borrowed of her and gave Betty the amount she owed her, most of which was Bob's.

"Now do try to be more sensible, Libbie," pleaded Betty, turning to go back to Bobby. "When you want to do something romantic think twice and count a hundred."

"I will!" promised Libbie fervently. "I'll never be so silly again, Betty."

But dear me, she was, a hundred times! But in a different way each time. Libbie would be Libbie to the end of the chapter.

Betty, rushing back to brush her hair for dinner, heard a sound suspiciously like a sob as she passed Norma Guerin's door. It was unlatched, and as no one answered when she tapped Betty gently pushed it open and stepped into the room.

Norma lay on her bed crying as though her heart would break, and Alice, looking very forlorn and solemn, was holding a letter in her hand.