CHAPTER XIVAN OLD ENEMY

Ina moment, Billie Bradley forgot her own weariness and the fact that her head ached worse than ever. She ran to the bed and flung herself to her knees beside the sobbing girl.

“Vi! Vi Farrington! What is it, dear?”

Vi gave a sharp exclamation and sat up, trying to dry her eyes on her pocket handkerchief.

“Oh, it’s you! I didn’t mean any one to catch me at this baby trick, Billie, truly I never did. But I’m so wretched.”

“What about?”

Vi eyed her fiercely and accepted the clean handkerchief that Billie thrust into her hands.

“You, for one thing. You have been perfectly horrid, Billie Bradley, with that wild girl of yours and never having even half an eye for the rest of us——”

“Vi, you silly! I never——”

“Yes, you have! Don’t you suppose I know? And then it’s that wretched math. I—I’ve gone and done it again.”

Vi threatened to dissolve in tears and Billie shook her rudely.

“Done what again? Don’t you dare cry——”

“Failed, of course. What did you suppose? Miss Walters called me into the office to-day and she said, oh, B-Billie—I—I can’t tell you!”

“You’ve got to tell me,” returned Billie. “Go on, dear. What did Miss Walters say?”

“Well, she told me if I didn’t do better in my math she would have to write a note home to Dad. Can you imagine Dad getting a note like that, Billie—or Mother? It would just about k-kill them! And I’m so perfectly d-dumb at figures!”

Billie got up and began to walk about the room. She took off her coat and smoothed back her hair while Vi watched her with tear-dimmed eyes.

“B-Billie, aren’t you going to do something?”

“Nothing else, but!” returned Billie cheerfully. “I’m merely clearing the decks for action. Suppose you get out your books and papers and things and we’ll try to find out what’s wrong. I reckon we’ll get to the root of this matter in a jiffy.”

“Oh, B-Billie! When you talk like that I know that everything is going to be all right. If you will only help——”

Billie glanced up briefly into Vi’s tear-stained face.

“You knew I’d help, didn’t you, Vi?”

Vi’s glance wavered, fell.

“I know I’ve been a fool, Billie. But I did think you were sort of side-tracking Laura and me for that wild and woolly Edina Tooker.”

Billie shook her head reproachfully.

“You didn’t really think that, Vi. Not in your heart. Now, let’s get down to business.”

It was so that Laura found them, some time later, heads close together, working out a problem in algebra.

“Say, you two, don’t you know it’s almost time for the supper bell to ring?”

“Don’t bother us!” muttered Vi. “We’ve almost got it. There! There, that’s the right answer, isn’t it, Billie? Did I get it?”

“You did!” Billie’s smile was congratulatory. “And in record time, too. We’re coming on, Vi!”

She glanced up to find Laura’s eyes fixed upon her curiously.

“Billie Bradley, what have you done to Edina? I met her in the hall downstairs. She isn’t the same person at all.”

Billie smiled enigmatically.

“Clothes do make a difference!” she observed.

That was the beginning of the old status between the three chums. It was the beginning of many things, especially for Edina.

Billie’s friendship, her new clothes, and the general belief that her father was rapidly becoming a fabulously rich man, all these things conspired to liftEdina from obscurity to an enviable position among her schoolmates. She was sincerely liked by some, tolerated by many, and toadied to by a few who thought that she might some day become a powerful and colorful influence in the school life of Three Towers Hall.

In other words, as Billie had predicted, Edina was rapidly becoming a personage.

To be sure, there were some who still disliked and distrusted the girl from Oklahoma, decrying her rough language and crude ways. Among this small minority were Rose Belser and Ray Carew, who stood, figuratively speaking, upon the fringe of the crowd, skeptically looking on at this transformation of Edina Tooker.

“No good will come of it, Billie,” Rose said, more than once. “You may tame the lion cub; but underneath, it remains a lion cub just the same. Some day it will begin to scratch and claw. Then—look out!”

About this time an incident occurred that afforded Billie a good deal of amusement and Edina no little satisfaction.

The girls spent much of their recreation time on Lake Molata during the pleasant fall weather, boating and, weather permitting, swimming from the end of the dock.

Billie attempted to initiate Edina into these water sports, much to thenot-too-welldisguised amusement of her fellow students. Edina disliked the water.She could not swim and she was not keen about rowing—that is, she was not keen about it until she found that Billie was.

This is how it came about.

One day while Billie and Edina were rowing in desultory fashion some distance from the dock, they were overhauled by Ray Carew and Rose Belser in a boat, the twin of theirs.

“Give you a race,” called Rose, as she had called many times before when Laura or Vi had been in the boat with Billie. However, Edina was neither Laura nor Vi, a fact of which Rose Belser was well and mischievously aware. Edina rowed with a stroke all her own and possessed a positive genius for entangling her oar with that of her stroke mate.

Still Billie could not refuse the challenge.

“All right, race you to the island!” she returned.

“But, Billie!” cried Edina, aghast, “you oughtn’t to’ve said that. I can’t row!”

“Stop talking!” Billie commanded, her jaw set. “Stop talking and row!”

Such rowing! Edina’s oar did everything but stroke the water. It sat upon the top of it, it splashed spray into the boat, it entangled itself with Billie’s. By the time Ray and Rose had reached the island, Billie’s boat had succeeded in turning its nose about and was headed the other way!

That incident was a lesson to Billie. She told Edina firmly:

“You’ve got to learn to row. That’s all there is to it. The sooner we begin the better.”

“All right,” returned Edina resignedly. “Anything you say.”

This was the beginning of much secret practice for Edina in a secluded cove, screened by much bright-colored foliage from both Three Towers and Boxton Academy.

Came a day when Billie admitted satisfaction in her pupil.

“The next time Rose—or any one else—challenges us to a race, we’ll give it to her.”

Their chance came two days later when Rose and Ray Carew again drew up alongside them and Ray asked laughingly if they cared to have revenge for the other day.

“Like nothing better,” said Billie coolly. “What shall the mark be?”

“The big rock that juts out from the Point—if you can get that far,” proposed Ray.

“We’ll try it,” Billie said calmly.

As the boat moved off to get into position for the start, Ray was heard to murmur:

“Some folks are just plain gluttons for punishment!”

Billie and Edina exchanged smiling glances and Billie leaned over to whisper:

“Remember what I’ve told you. Take it easy at the start and save your breath. Ready?”

“Ready!” returned Edina.

Billie gave the word to go, and they were off, swinging easily over the glassy water. For some distance they maintained the same pace, bow to bow. Then, by degrees, Rose’s boat drew ahead.

“Steady!” cautioned Billie, as Edina’s hand tightened nervously on the oar. “Watch my stroke and time yours with it That’s it! Easy now!”

The other craft was two boat-lengths ahead. Ray shouted a derisive challenge.

“Now!” said Billie. “Keep time with me, Edina. Faster—a little faster. Now then! Let’s show the speed of that good right arm!”

The oars struck the water in perfect unison, poised, struck, poised again, swifter, swifter, increasing that rhythmic stroke.

“Now!” cried Billie. “Put your back into it, Edina!”

With a magnificent final burst of speed, the boat swept through the water, reaching the point well ahead of its rival.

Billie waved exultantly.

“Well,” she jeered happily, “you wanted to give us revenge, didn’t you? And we are nothing if not obliging!”

Rose and Ray were generous in defeat.

“Whatever you have done to Edina, it’s plenty,” Rose admitted. “We other oarsmen will have tospeed up if we intend to stay in the same class with her!”

“At least,” said Billie, with a mischievous glance at her pupil, “we don’t go about in circles any more!”

Despite this signal victory on the lake, Billie was far from satisfied with herself. Rowing was one thing—tennis was quite another. On the courts her old-time skill appeared to have deserted her. She had lost a good deal of her old speed and power. She was slower, and her opponents found it easier to catch her napping.

Even Vi beat her one day, which worried the loyal Vi greatly.

“What’s wrong, Billie? You are absolutely off your form. Aren’t you well?”

“Quite,” replied Billie, and added with a worried frown: “It’s my knee, Vi. Don’t tell anybody, but ever since that awful day when I fell over the cliff, my knee has been acting queerly. Gives out under me when I least expect it. To-day, on the courts, I almost fell. Perhaps you noticed.”

“I’ll say I did. It was so unlike you that I thought maybe you were putting it on—just to give me a chance to win, you know.”

Billie’s brief smile flashed out.

“I’m not quite that generous. Hello—what’s this?”

Billie looked up to see that Amanda Peabody had planted herself straight in the patch.

Billie said coolly:

“Did you want to speak to me, Amanda?”

Amanda’s smile was malicious.

“Not particularly. I just wanted to congratulate you on the fine showing you made against Vi on the courts. From your performance in that last set, I should say that every day, in every way, you are getting better and better.”

“It wasn’t Billie’s fault,” Vi blurted out indignantly. “There’s something the matter with——”

“Vi!” cried Billie sharply. “I asked you to keep quiet about that.”

Amanda’s malicious grin widened until it seemed to stretch from ear to ear.

“You don’t need to be so quiet about it. Everybody at Three Towers knows that there is something the matter with Billie Bradley’s tennis. It isn’t any secret if that’s what you mean.”

Vi started to speak again, but Billie squeezed her arm sharply and drew her past the outrageous girl.

“I challenge you,” Amanda called after them, her voice shrill with triumph. “I challenge you right now to a set, Billie Bradley.”

As Billie continued onward to the Hall without even a backward glance, Amanda’s mocking laughter followed her.

“You’re afraid, Billie Bradley. You’re afraid!”

Once inside the door, Billie turned to Vi. Herhands were clenched so hard that the nails bit into the palms.

“Some day,” she promised vengefully, “I’m going to give that girl such a beating on the courts that she’ll cry for mercy. You mark my words, Vi Farrington!”

“She’ll get something worse than a beating on the courts, if you leave it to me, the horrid, spiteful old thing!” declared Vi furiously.

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