"I wouldn't risk it if I were you, Linda," Cora persisted.
"Oh, what's the use of talking to you!" exclaimed Linda angrily. "You haven't got enough sense to understand. I wish I hadn't told you a word about it," and she turned her back upon her chum and refused to say another word.
Cora, daring for once to be angry in her turn, left the room, and Linda soon forgot her in gloating over the fright she was plotting for Nan.
The next morning after the eleven o'clock recitation had begun, Linda made a pretext for leaving the room. She slipped down into the basement and then came back to her seat to await developments.
Meanwhile, the well-ordered routine of Lakeview Hall was proceeding as usual. The hands of the great clock in the English recitation room pointed to a quarter of twelve, and sidelong looks were being cast at it in pleasurable anticipation of the noon hour.
Bang!
Suddenly the crash of a loud explosion filled every one with terror. The building trembled to its foundations. Clouds of steam poured up from the basement.
A wild cry rent the air.
"What's that?"
"Sounded like an explosion to me."
"Maybe it's an earthquake."
"Oh, see the smoke."
"The school must be on fire!"
"I'm going to get out of here!"
"Oh, yes, let me out; I don't want to be burnt alive!"
"Fire! Fire! The Hall is on fire!"
In an instant a panic was on. The teachers alone and some of the older girls kept their heads. The younger pupils rushed for the doors in a frenzy of fright.
The English teacher ran to one of the doors of her recitation room and held it fast. But there was another door in the room, and toward this the frightened girls poured in a mad stampede. Just outside was the stairway with several sharp turns, and if the fugitives jammed up on one of the landings it might mean maiming or death for some of them.
Quick as a flash, Nan Sherwood acted. She sprang to the danger door, slammed it shut and put her back against it. The tide surged up against her. The younger girls clawed at her, scratched herhands, did all in their power to force her away from the door. But she held her place with desperation, though her clothes were torn, and her hands were bleeding.
Then through the crowd came Linda Riggs, bowling the smaller girls out of her way, her face as pale as death and her eyes almost bulging out of her head with fright.
"Let me get out, Nan Sherwood!" she screamed, tearing at her with all her might. "Let me out! Let me out! I'll die! I won't stay here to be burned to death! Get away from that door! Let me get out!"
She tore at Nan and struck her in the face. She was a strong girl, and doubly strong now in her rage and fright. But Nan braced herself and still held the door, though her strength was fast ebbing.
Just then help came. Rhoda Hammond and Bess Harley caught hold of Linda and pulled her away. They thrust her into a seat and held her down, while Laura and others of the older girls pacified and soothed the younger ones.
The worst was over. The steam had thinned out and drifted away. The pupils slowly went back to their seats at the command of the teacher and sat there, sobbing and moaning and weak from excitement. But the panic had been quelled.
Now that the crisis had passed, Nan felt her strength leaving her, and she had scarcely enoughleft to get back to her seat. She almost fell into it when at last she reached it.
Just then, Dr. Prescott, who from the moment of the first alarm had been in other parts of the building, helping to quell the excitement, entered the room. She took her stand beside the teacher and held with her a brief conversation in which she learned what had occurred in the room. Then she spoke a few quiet words of assurance, telling the girls that there had not been, and was not now, any danger and warmly commending the bravery and self-control of the teacher and the older girls. She then dismissed them.
A refreshing half-hour in their rooms did the girls a world of good, and when the lunch gong sounded they gathered about the table in something like their normal spirits. It is true that none ate very much, but tongues flew fast in comment and conjecture.
"How could it have happened?" was the many-times-repeated question. Was it the janitor's fault? He must have forgotten to turn off the drafts perhaps, and the accumulated gas had exploded.
"Probably something was wrong with the safety valve," conjectured Rhoda, building better than she knew.
"Well," said Nan, as at last they rose from the table, "I hope they'll find out what did cause it so that it will never happen again."
Naturally, there were no more lessons that afternoon. The girls gathered in groups in the corridors or in each others' rooms excitedly discussing the stirring events of the morning.
Nan lay upon the couch in her room, resting after her exertions, when Grace, who had been telephoning to Walter, came in bursting with news.
"What do you think I heard downstairs!" she cried before she was fairly in the room. "Doctor Beulah thinks that it wasn't an accident at all, but that the whole thing was caused by some one tampering with the boiler."
The girls all spoke at once.
"Oh, that couldn't be!"
"Who'd have any object in doing a thing that might have cost lives?"
"Isn't it awful!"
"Anyway," Grace went on as soon as they gave her a chance to speak, "they say that a heavy cord had been tied to the valve to keep it down and the broken ends of the cord were found hanging from it."
The girls were stupefied with astonishment.
Suddenly Laura started up and walked excitedly about the room.
"There's this much about it!" she exclaimed. "If some one did do it purposely, Doctor Beulah will soon find out when it was done, and why it was done—and who did it, too," she added significantly.
Laura knew by the expression on all the facesthat the same thought that had been in her mind when she spoke those last words was in the minds of the other girls, too.
If two very depressed and frightened girls in another room could have heard them, their spirits would have sunk still lower.
"What did I tell you!" cried Cora wildly. "I begged you not to do it. And what did you make by it? Disgraced yourself and only made Nan Sherwood more popular than ever."
For once, Linda was silent. Cora made the most of her chance to get back at Linda for her high-handed treatment of her. She went on mercilessly:
"I was so ashamed of you," she said. "You made such a show of yourself. I didn't think you could be such a coward."
"Well," whined Linda, "I had more to live for, with all my money, than they had."
"That sounds like you," gibed Cora disgustedly. "Well, I pity you if Doctor Beulah finds out you did it. And she will, you can just depend on that."
In the meantime Bess, with some other girls, visited the basement to look at the wreckage. When she came back she had a queer look on her face. She called Nan to one side.
"See what I found," she said and held out a small handkerchief with a daisy worked in one corner. "It was in the basement, close to the wrecked boiler."
Nan looked at the bit of linen and started. Sheremembered having seen Linda Riggs with such a handkerchief more than once.
"But Linda may have dropped it down there since the explosion," she said, quickly.
"I guess not!" drawled Bess. "This looks like a bit of real evidence to me."
"Oh, Bess—don't say anything—at least not till you are sure."
"I won't. But I'll remember it."
At this moment the gong sounded a summons to the main assembly hall, a summons which the girls obeyed with alacrity.
Knowing as they did that an examination of the steam plant had been going on, and their interest and curiosity quickened by the rumors they had heard, it was not long before every seat was filled and all eyes turned expectantly on Dr. Prescott. She sat there, rather pale, but dignified and well poised.
"What is she going to say?" each girl asked herself. The tension was at its height, the silence could almost be felt, when Dr. Prescott began to speak.
"A thorough examination has shown us," she began, "that the steam plant is very badly damaged, though we hope that it may be possible to repair it in a short time. But the investigation," she went on, "has revealed the almost unbelievable fact that there was no accident, but a deliberate plan or trick. Who conceived it or why, is not yet known, but wewill spare no effort to find the guilty party and bring him or her to punishment. I am very thankful that the injury was confined to the steam plant and that no one was hurt, as might easily have been the case.
"I am very proud of the presence of mind and bravery shown by the teachers and many of the students. Many of the younger girls and all the older ones, with one shameful exception"—she paused, and all eyes were turned on Linda, who sat cowering in her seat—"showed remarkable self-possession, and I take this opportunity to thank them all. I hesitate to mention any names, but I must single out Nan Sherwood, who, by her prompt action and cool courage, contributed in so large a measure to avert the dreadful consequences of a panic."
With these words she dismissed them.
As the girls left the assembly hall they broke out into a Babel of excited comment. Dr. Prescott, crossing the hall on the way to her office, placed her arm over Nan's shoulders and thanked her personally. Nan's heart swelled at the earnest words of praise, for Dr. Prescott's good opinion was highly valued.
"Of course," the doctor added with a whimsical smile, "the three-day sentence is remitted for you and your friends."
She passed on.
"Isn't she just splendid!" exclaimed Grace.
"And how nicely she seemed to manage the whole situation," remarked Rhoda.
"She's a peach!" declared Laura, slangily.
"I should say she is! And so is somebody else I know," agreed Bess, as she drew Nan's arm through hers.
"Whatisthis anyway?" asked Bess. "Greenland or the North Pole?"
"Well, it's Siberia at the very least," laughed Nan, as, wrapped in outdoor coats and furs, the girls entered the recitation room the second morning after the explosion.
School without heat in weather that came close to the zero mark was not very enticing, and it was glad news to all the girls when it was announced that, owing to the injury to the steam plant, which was greater than was at first thought, the school term would end nearly a week ahead of time pending extensive repairs. Those who were going home were directed to begin to pack at once, and those who were not would be provided with quarters in the village.
After hearing this announcement the girls flew upstairs on winged feet.
"An extra week at home! What happiness!" exclaimed Bess, whirling Nan around until they both dropped breathless on the window seat.
"And think of Grace with another week at Palm Beach to look forward to!" cried Nan.
"What luck for her!" said Bess enviously, as she began taking her things from the dresser drawer.
Soon the last trunk was locked and strapped and they were ready to depart.
"Let's run to town for a last visit to Mrs. Bragley," proposed Nan.
Bess gladly acquiesced, and the two girls were off. They were delighted to find Mrs. Bragley sitting up and able to get around a little with a cane. She greeted them gratefully and was profuse in her thanks for all the care they had shown her. And she was intensely interested in their story of the explosion at the school.
"And now," said Nan, after they had chatted for a while, "how about those papers? We are going home sooner than we thought, and if you will give them to me I will show them to Grace Mason's father. He is a very able lawyer and will get to the bottom of this orange grove if any one can."
"That will be fine," was the gratified reply. "The papers are right here. I have been looking them over. Take them if you wish, dear."
Mrs. Bragley took them from the table and handed them to Nan, and the latter tucked them safely away in her bag.
"I may be carrying a fortune away in this bag,"she said jokingly, as she snapped the catch and rose to go.
"I'm afraid they're not worth the paper they're printed on," said the woman dubiously.
"Hope on, hope ever," quoted Bess gaily, as, with a last wave of the hand, she followed Nan out of the door.
They were almost to the school when Bess suddenly asked:
"Do you know that man, Nan? He looks as though he were going to speak to us."
Nan looked up just as a tall thin man approached them. He lifted his hat and said:
"I beg pardon, young ladies, but could you inform me where the Widow Bragley lives?"
Nan pointed out the cottage and the man thanked her and passed on.
"What a peculiar way he had of talking," said Bess, as they resumed their walk.
"I noticed that he talked like a Southerner," replied Nan. "I wonder what business he can have with Mrs. Bragley."
"Hard to tell," said Bess. "I only hope it isn't a bill collector to bother the poor thing." And then the schoolgirls passed on their way.
The stranger soon reached the cottage of Mrs. Bragley. He scanned it carefully and noted its poverty. A contented smile stole over his face as he said to himself:
"I imagine there won't be any trouble in getting what I came for. A little money here will go a long way."
He knocked on the door and Mrs. Ellis opened it.
"Does Mrs. Sarah Bragley live here?" the stranger inquired with an ingratiating smile, which, however, sat rather badly on his somewhat sinister countenance.
"Yes," replied Mrs. Ellis. "But she's not very well and has gone to lie down. Is it anything I can do for you?"
"No, thank you," replied the stranger. "My errand with her is a personal one. I've come all the way from the South to see her on a matter of private business."
"If that's the case, I think she'll see you," replied the nurse, ushering him in and giving him a seat.
She excused herself and went into the bedroom, and in a few minutes Mrs. Bragley appeared, a little curious and considerably flustered by the announcement of a visitor from such a distance.
"My name is Thompson," the visitor said, as he rose and bowed. "I came from Florida to see you on a business matter. I'm sorry to learn that you are not well, and I'd put the matter off, only that I have arrangements made to get back home as soon as possible."
"From Florida?" repeated the old woman. "It can't be that you've come to see me about that orangegrove property there that my husband put all our money into before he died?"
"If you refer to the property at Sunny Slopes," returned the visitor, "you are right. It is just that that I came to see you about."
"Laws me!" ejaculated the widow in some excitement. "And here it was only a little while ago I was saying that I never expected to hear from it. I wrote and wrote and never heard a word from it. I began to think," she went on a little apologetically, "that there might be some fraud or something of that kind about it."
"Oh, nothing like that," the visitor said impressively. "Mr. Pacomb is the soul of honor. I have never known him to do anything that wasn't straight and aboveboard."
"I'm very glad to hear that," said the simple-hearted old woman. "He wrote such beautiful letters to us when he was asking us to put our money into the property that I thought he must be a nice man. I'm very sorry that I ever had an unkind thought about him. I'm so glad to know that things are all right. I need the money so badly. And my poor husband always thought there would be a whole lot of money come from it."
The stranger looked a little embarrassed.
"Quite right, quite right," he said. "There ought to have been a big profit from it. Everybody thought so, and nobody felt more sure of it thanMr. Pacomb himself. He thought so well of it that he put every cent of his own money into it."
"Then he's made a fortune in it, too!" exclaimed the old woman, beaming on her visitor.
The stranger coughed.
"No," he said, "that's the unfortunate thing about it. You see, Mrs. Bragley, the thing didn't turn out as we had hoped and expected. The land was right in the orange belt, and we had every reason to believe that it would yield big results. But for some reason or other it didn't. The ground couldn't have been adapted to it. You never can tell about orange groves."
The poor woman's face fell.
"Then," she said quaveringly, "all my money is gone!"
"Oh, no, not all," the stranger hastened to say. "There is still a little money for you, if you want to sell what interest you have in the property. Of course the property has proved practically worthless. But the man who has a country estate bordering on the property is willing to pay the company a small sum just to round out his estate, and your interest in it we calculate would be about two hundred dollars. In fact," he went on with a burst of generosity, and at the same time taking a roll of bills from his pocket, "Mr. Pacomb would be willing to give you two hundred dollars to settle the matter up at once."
He began to count out the bills, as if the matter had been agreed upon. It was a long time since Mrs. Bragley had seen so much money, and in her straitened circumstances two hundred dollars seemed like a fortune. The visitor had counted on the influence exerted by the sight of the money, and he was not disappointed.
"Well," said Mrs. Bragley, "I suppose it's the best thing I can do, since you say that the land isn't any good for oranges."
"We'll consider it settled then," the man observed, trying to conceal his satisfaction. "Now if you'll get me the papers I'll hand you the money."
A look of dismay came into the woman's face.
"The—the papers!" she stammered. "Why, I haven't got them!"
"You haven't got them?" the man snapped in wonder. "Where are they then?"
"I gave them to a young lady not more than an hour ago," replied Mrs. Bragley. "She had just gone a little before you came."
"Why did you give them to her?" the man asked.
"Some friends of hers are going to Florida and they were going to look up the matter," replied the old lady. "It seems that the father of one of the girls is a lawyer and——"
"A lawyer!" interrupted the man, a look of fear coming into his face. Then by a great effort he regained his self-control.
"Well, Mrs. Bragley," he said, "it's for you to do what you choose in this matter. It's too bad for you to lose this two hundred dollars when you might just as well have it as not. Suppose I see this young lady and tell her that you want the papers back."
"I wish you would," replied the old lady. Then she gave the man Nan's name and told him where she thought he could find her. He scribbled the name and address in a notebook, and a little later hurried away.
"If I don't find that Nan Sherwood and get the papers away from her my name isn't Jacob Pacomb," he muttered to himself.
With all speed he hurried to the Hall, only to learn that Nan had left for the depot. Then he rushed to the station.
"Sorry, but the train left quarter of an hour ago," declared the station master in reply to his question. "There won't be another train for three hours."
On gaining this information the face of Jacob Pacomb became a study. Savagely he bit off the end of a cigar, lit it, and began to puff away furiously.
"That young woman from the school may be a sharp one," he murmured as he strode up and down the little depot platform. "I'll have to use either force or diplomacy in getting those papers from her. I mustn't let her think they are valuable. I wonder what I can do next? It's too bad I promised to go to Chicago to attend that sale. But I can'tafford to miss that." He mused for a moment. "Wonder if I couldn't get Davis and Jensen to do this job for me? They are hanging around doing nothing and would do almost anything for the price of a meal. Yes, I'll see Davis and Jensen and set them on the girl's track."
In the meantime Nan and Bess were being whirled at the rate of fifty miles an hour toward the home where love and open arms awaited them.
Their parents had, of course, been apprised of their coming, and the welcome was the royal one that always greeted them after their long absences from home. Nothing was too good for them.
Several days passed quickly, and then came great news. The first item was a notification from Dr. Prescott that since the steam plant had required far more extensive repairs than at first had seemed necessary, the reopening would be deferred for several weeks beyond the usual time. And following this closely came a letter to each of the girls from Grace Mason. Theymustgo with her to Palm Beach. The "must" was underscored. She would take no denial. They would have such a perfectly gorgeous time if they could only come along. Please, please,please!They simplymust, and that was all there was about it.
Nan and Bess were filled with delight and excitement. But they had to reckon with their parents, who were reluctant to spare their girls after havingthem with them for so short a time. But the girls coaxed and wheedled, as girls will, and the parents finally yielded, as parents will. In the next few days the matter was settled and hurried preparations were begun.
More than once they had to pinch themselves to make sure they were not dreaming. Palm Beach! Land of summer, land of flowers, land of beauty! And they—Nan Sherwood and Bess Harley—were actually going to dwell for a time in that earthly Paradise!
Nan was really going to Palm Beach! She could scarcely realize her good fortune.
Grace had written that some cousins who were to go had disappointed them, so good accommodations were assured to Nan and Bess when they reached Palm Beach.
Nan was up in her bedroom in the evening looking dreamily out of the window and imagining she was already at the famous winter resort when she gave a start.
Two men were slinking around, behind some trees on the opposite side of the street! From time to time they gazed at the house as if looking for somebody.
"The same men! What can it mean?"
Nan breathed the words to herself. She had seen these men before since coming home from school. They had leered at her when on an errand to the drugstore, and one of them had acted as if he wanted to speak to her while she was at the depot asking for a timetable. But a man friend had comeup to greet her and the stranger had slunk away.
Nan's first impulse was to call her father and mother. But then she hesitated. Why worry her parents, and especially her mother, when, after all, it might mean little or nothing?
She looked again. Some men had come up the street. At sight of them the two slinking ones shrank back and presently hurried away.
"I hope I never see them again," said the girl to herself. But this wish was not to be gratified.
Yet the next day Nan gave the strange men hardly a thought. There were so many things to be done in preparation for the great trip.
"It's not like going out to Rose Ranch, where any old thing was good enough to wear," Nan confided to Bess. "We've got to look our best, on Grace's account as well as our own."
"And Walter's," added Bess, and then Nan promptly threw a book at her chum.
A day more, and then came the all-important time for departure.
"Oh, just to think of it! We are really and truly going!"
Nan was seated on an overturned suitcase on the porch of the little "dwelling in amity." Her hands were clasped tightly in front of her to keep her from jumping up and running off madly somewhere, anywhere—just to relieve her tremendous excitement.
Never in her life had it seemed so hard to keep still. Her trunk had gone to the station, her bag was packed, and everything was ready to catch the ten-o'clock train for New York. From there she and Bess were to take the boat, which was to carry them swiftly down the coast to Jacksonville, the gateway to Florida.
Everything was in readiness that is save Momsey. All that separated her from that desirable state was one small and pretty fur hat which Momsey was just now fitting on in front of the mirror in the little sitting-room.
But it did take a long time just to put on one hat, thought Nan with a sigh. Momsey never used to be so slow. Then, unable to bear it a moment longer, she jumped to her feet and peeped in at the door of the little "dwelling in amity."
What she saw made her pause, a smothered exclamation on her lips, her eyes dancing. For Papa Sherwood was there with Momsey and he was looking at her with as much admiration in his eyes as though they had been married only one year, instead of—oh, Nan couldn't remember how many!
"That trip overseas was just what you needed to make a girl of you again, Momsey," Papa Sherwood was saying in a tone that matched his look. "You might be our Nan's older sister. And isn't that a new hat?"
Momsey had started to make him a demure curtseywhen Nan's clear laugh interrupted the tête-à-tête.
"Excuse me," she said, her eyes dancing. "Far be it from me to be in the way of anything—and, Momsey, you do look wonderful in that hat—but you know that train won't wait all day. Oh, Momsey! Papa Sherwood!"—she waltzed in upon them and hugged them gaily—"isn't it perfectly, wonderfully gorgeous?"
"What now, honey?" asked Momsey, as she rearranged the pretty hat which Nan had pushed down unbecomingly over one eye.
"What now?" repeated Nan breathlessly. "What now? Why, Florida—Jacksonville—Palm Beach! No, don't look at me as though I had gone crazy. I'm only raving. Come on, come on, you slow pokes." She half pushed her laughing parents toward the door. "You can carry the suitcase, Papa Sherwood, and I'll carry the hat box. There's only one other bundle, and I'll take that one and Momsey can bring up the rear with the lunch. I wonder what Bess will say when she sees the lunch," she chuckled, as her father carefully locked the door of the little house and put the key in his pocket.
"Well, I think I know what she will say when she tastes it," said her father as all three started down the street toward the more pretentious house where Bess lived. "For Momsey put up the lunch with her own hands—and I saw what went into it."
"Yes, and you might tell her, honey," added Mrs. Sherwood, with a soft laugh, "what hard work I had to keep you from eating all the nuts from the brown bread sandwiches."
"Oh, Momsey, don't," sighed Nan. "You will make me hungry again, and I have just had breakfast. See! There's Bess. Goodness, doesn't she look pretty?"
Both Momsey and Papa Sherwood had to admit that Bess was very pretty indeed in the bright winter sunlight, but each privately thought that their Nan, with her sparkling brown eyes and flushed cheeks, was, in her own way, even prettier than Bess.
"Hello, you folks!" called Bess as she reached them, out of breath from exercise and excitement. "I thought you were never coming. Goodness! what are you carrying two grips for? One is enough for me." Then, without waiting for a reply, she raced on to another question. "And that box! What's in it, Nan?" She gazed suspiciously at Nan's mischievous face. "It looks like a lunch box. It never is!"
"Yes, it ever is," mimicked Nan, in exactly Bess's tone, adding with a laugh: "And Papa Sherwood very nearly ate all the nuts from the sandwiches."
"Nan——" began Mrs. Sherwood reproachfully; but at that moment Mrs. Harley appeared in the doorway and the reproaches were forgotten.
Momsey would not go inside, as the minutes to train time were getting very few, so after a short disappearance Mrs. Harley joined them and they started toward the station together. The two girls, Nan and Bess, lead the way, swinging their bags and talking excitedly.
"I'm almost scared to death," confided Bess, as they turned the corner that led down to the station and the train that was to bear them so soon on their wonderful journey.
"Scared?" asked Nan, her eyes big with wonder. "What are you scared about?"
"Oh, I don't suppose I should call it exactly scared," retracted Bess. "Just sort of excited and—and—nervous. Going all alone you know—and everything."
"This isn't the first time we have traveled alone," said Nan practically. "And we have always come out 'right side up with care.'"
"Oh, Nan, youareso calm," sighed Bess in exasperation. "Won't anything ever get you excited?"
"Excited," repeated Nan, gazing in amazement at her chum. "I'm so excited this very minute that I'm all thrilly inside."
"If you are," said Bess, eyeing her judicially, "nobody would ever know it. That's just the trouble with you," she added plaintively, "you are always hiding things and having secrets from me when youknow very well that no one ought ever to have a secret from her chum."
Nan put an arm about the waist of the girl and laughed.
"You can't quarrel with me, especially this morning, Bess," she said, adding soothingly: "Besides, I haven't had a secret from you in—oh, ever so long. Not since Beautiful Beulah."
For Bess had been very much put out indeed about Nan's secret possession of Beautiful Beulah, the big doll that had formerly helped Nan over many difficulties.
"I know," said Bess, in answer to Nan's declaration. "But that is just the reason why I expect you to start something. You have been 'too good to be true.'"
"Well, you are a silly," said Nan absently, as her eyes wandered down the double line of shining rails to the spot where they disappeared in the distance. "I wonder if that mean old train is going to be late after all."
"No, there it is! There it is, Nan!" cried Bess, suddenly dancing wildly up and down the platform. "Oh, tell the folks to hurry. Mother has my hat box. I never, never could go to Palm Beach without that hat." And she ran back toward the older folks, waving her bag at them frantically while Nan looked after her laughingly.
"I wonder what Bess would do," she thought,without the slightest trace of conceit, "if she didn't have me to anchor her down all the time."
The train steamed into the station just as Momsey and Papa Sherwood and Mrs. Harley, with the excited Elizabeth in the lead, rushed upon the platform.
Nan was very much surprised to find that though she had become used to rather frequent partings with Momsey and Papa Sherwood, this one was not one bit easier than the others had been.
She hugged Papa Sherwood, kissed Momsey a dozen times, in spite of the fact that Bess was tugging at her elbow, and finally stumbled some way up the steps and into the car.
"Goodness! Anybody would think you were going away to stay forever," gasped Bess, as she tried to disengage herself from a tangle of bag and hat box and umbrella. "For goodness' sake, look out, Nan. We are moving." This, because Nan stuck her head far out of the window to get a last look at the dear folks on the platform.
"I know we're moving," sighed Nan, as she turned from the window and began patiently to separate Bess from her belongings and stow the articles away in the wire basket overhead. "I always have a funny feeling as if I were leaving half of me behind every time I say good-bye to Momsey and Papa Sherwood."
"I should think you would be used to it by thistime," said Bess, as she removed her hat and fluffed out her pretty curls. "We certainly can't complain of having to stay too much in one place."
"I should say not!" exclaimed Nan, as she thought of how many wonderful things had happened since that day when she had started out for the great north woods with Uncle Henry. "But, oh, Bess," she added, turning happy eyes upon her chum, "we never went on quite such a wonderful journey as this—not even when we went to Rose Ranch."
"It all comes of having such nice friends," replied Bess, taking out a tiny hand mirror and regarding the tip of her nose critically. "And friends with money," she added significantly.
"Bess! How you talk!" cried the girl from Tillbury, turning a shocked gaze upon her friend. For Nan Sherwood never failed to be shocked at Elizabeth's very evident love of money and what it could buy. "If it were only money we cared for we might have made friends with Linda Riggs, I suppose. I heard her say something about going to Europe next summer, and I shouldn't wonder if she would take Cora Courtney and one or two more of her satellites with her. Perhaps if we had been very good, she might have asked us."
"Well, it would have been fun," said Bess, wickedly enjoying the shocked look that deepened on Nan's face. "Cheer up, Nan," she added with oneof her sudden changes of mood. "You know very well how I hate Linda. However," she continued, "I suppose we really ought to be grateful to her now."
"Grateful?" repeated Nan wonderingly.
"For damaging the heating plant up at school, silly," explained Bess, "and giving us a chance to go to Florida."
Nan could not help laughing at this speech of her chum's, and she turned her chair about to face Bess. Nan did not like riding backward in a train very much herself, but as Bess had declared she "simply couldn't stand it," it was unselfish Nan, as usual, who did the unpleasant thing.
But, the chair turned, as she sank down into its luxurious depth she looked across gravely at her friend.
"I don't see why you say that Linda did that awful thing up at school," she said. "We haven't the slightest proof in the world that she was the guilty one. That handkerchief you found didn't really prove anything."
Bess sniffed as she reached over to open her bag and get out from among its heterogeneous contents a box of sweets she had thoughtfully remembered to slip in before she started.
"Of course we don't know that she did it," she said, opening the box and offering it to Nan. "Butyou know very well there isn't another girl in the school who is mean enough to think of such a thing."
"Y-yes," answered Nan doubtfully, as she pushed the candy over toward its owner. "But on the other hand, I never thought Linda had nerve enough to do anything like that. Why, she might have been dreadfully hurt herself!"
"Of course she didn't know that she was in danger," retorted Bess, with a scornful little toss of her head. "She didn't have brains enough."
"Just the same," said Nan decidedly, "I don't think we ought to accuse her until we have something definite to go on."
"Isn't that just like Nan Sherwood!" cried Bess, regarding her chum with a mixture of fondness and irritation. "Always making excuses for everybody! I suppose if we had caught Linda in the act, you would still say it must have been somebody else."
"Hardly as bad as that," said Nan, with a little laugh, adding, while a cloud passed over her face: "Goodness knows I have more reason than any of the rest of the girls for disliking Linda. She never accused any one but me of stealing. I only hope," she added, "that we don't meet her somewhere on this trip."
"Goodness gracious, Nan!" cried Bess, fairly jumping from her seat in surprise, "you don't expect to meet her, do you?"
"If I did," said Nan ruefully, "I would get right off this train and go back to Tillbury, much as I have counted on this trip. No, honey," she added, laughing at her own extravagance, "there's no need of your getting excited, for I have no idea that we shall meet Linda at Palm Beach. Only she has the most disconcerting way of popping up in places where you least expect her."
"Well, all I have to say," returned Bess, biting fiercely into a fresh chocolate and wishing it were Linda instead, "is that I wish you wouldn't put such uncomfortable ideas into my head. Here I was just about forgetting Linda, and you have to lug her into the limelight again."
Nan laughed merrily and helped herself to another of Bess's chocolates without even so much as a "by your leave."
"Cheer up," she said, with a chuckle, "I've done all the 'lugging' I'm going to for a little while. And in the meantime," she added, her voice thrilling with anticipation, "let's think of something really pleasant—Palm Beach, for instance."
"Now you are talking!" cried Bess approvingly. "I have to pinch myself about every five minutes to realize that I'm really going there. I wonder if it is really as gay as people say it is. That's where all the actresses go, you know. And millionaires and authors——"
"And bald-headed business men and fussy, over-dressedwomen," added Nan demurely, her eyes twinkling at the look of horror that Bess turned upon her.
"Nan, how can you?" Bess burst out, as Nan had fully expected her to do. "Bald-headed men, indeed! Do you suppose I have come all this way just to see a lot of old bald-headed men?"
"You haven't come yet," Nan reminded her, her eyes sparkling. "I didn't sayallthe men were bald-headed," she added, in an attempt to soothe her outraged companion. "But dad says most of them are—especially the millionaires."
"Oh, how—how—dreadful!" stuttered Bess. "Why, all the millionaires I ever saw had beautiful, leonine heads with shaggy manes of thick white hair and strong, clearly cut chins——"
"That's in the movies," Nan interrupted with a chuckle. "Papa Sherwood says that if all the men had hair like the movie heroes they would have to spend all their energy growing it and wouldn't have time to attend to their brains. And then where would their millions be?"
"Well," said Bess, unable to find an answer to this queer question, yet still indignant, nevertheless, "you needn't go to work to spoil all my illusions. I don't believe you have a speck of romance anywhere about you, Nan Sherwood."
"Maybe I haven't," Nan admitted cheerfully, without looking the slightest bit worried about it."But I expect to have lots of fun, just the same. Oh, Bess, look out!"
Bess, who had stood up to pull down the shade, jumped and looked about at Nan wildly.
"What's the matter?" she gasped. "Train on fire?"
"No. But you almost sat on a chocolate," said Nan calmly, as she removed the large and luscious sweet from Bess's seat. Bess stared at her reproachfully and sank back into the chair.
"You might just as well kill me as scare me to death," she said reproachfully.
For a while after that the happy girls forgot to talk and sat staring contentedly out at the flying landscape while the train pounded on heavily over the rails, singing its everlasting "catch 'em up, catch 'em up, catch 'em up."
Then suddenly Bess spoke, taking up the conversation where they had left it.
"If all we are going to find at Palm Beach is bald men and fussy women," she said, "I must say I don't see how we are going to have much fun."
"Oh, don't be such a silly," laughed Nan. "Of course we are going to find something else. There's the ocean and the palm trees. They say the scenery is perfectly gorgeous and the two big hotels wonderful, and there'll be the crowds and crowds of people. And then we shall meet Grace and Walter——"
"And Walter," repeated Bess teasingly, then laughed at the other girl's quick blush.
"Now I know you are silly," said Nan crossly. "You know you are glad Walter is going to be there."
"Of course I am," admitted Bess with suspicious promptness. "Walter is jolly good fun, especially when he has hisBargain Rushwith him. But lately the rest of us girls—even Grace—have to hang on to his coat-tails to keep him from going off alone with you. He doesn't seem to know there's any one else around. Oh, you don't need to look so surprised, Miss Innocence," she added, as Nan regarded her with wide-open eyes. "You know it just as well as the rest of us."
"Oh—oh—I never heard of such a thing!" cried Nan, and her amazement was unfeigned. "I think you are perfectly horrid. Why, Walter has always been lovely to all of us. And as to his going off with me alone—why, that's nonsense, and you know it, Bess Harley!" Nan's amazement was rapidly giving way to indignation. "Walter has never gone off anywhere alone with me, never!"
"I know he hasn't," admitted Bess, with a chuckle. "And for a very good reason. We wouldn't let him."
Nan stared for a minute. Then something surprisingly like tears filled her eyes and she turned quickly to the window.
"I don't think you are nice," she said in a low voice. "If Walter has been any nicer to me than he has to any one else, I surely haven't noticed it. And now you've gone and spoiled everything. I won't want to go anywhere with him now just because I will be afraid you girls are saying silly things. And Walter's such awfully good fun!" The last was very much in the nature of a wail, and Bess's heart, which was never very hard at any time, softened and she slipped over to Nan's chair and put an arm about her chum.
"Move over," she commanded. "It's lucky neither of us is very fat or we couldn't both sit in one chair. That's right," as Nan obediently "moved over" but still kept her face to the window. "Now say you forgive me for being such an old bear. After all, honey," and she patted Nan's shoulder soothingly, "I suppose it isn't your fault if Walter likes you best."
Nan's shoulder moved impatiently.
"But he doesn't," she insisted, staring out of the window. "It isn't so."
"All right," agreed Bess soothingly. But it was lucky Nan could not see the twinkle in her eye. "Have it your own way, Nan. Only stop turning your back to me. It isn't polite. And, oh!" she added, with a little sigh, "I'm hungry."
At this sudden and very unromantic change in the subject Nan laughed. And as laughter and ill-tempernever go hand in hand, it was not long before Nan had forgotten all about Walter—almost.
She produced the lunch box, and for once Bess was too ravenously hungry to protest at the "commonness" of it, and they set to at its delicious contents with a will.
It was eight o'clock when they went into the sleeping car, as they had been unable to secure a berth in Tillbury, and had had to telegraph ahead to have one reserved on a coach which was attached to the train further along the line.
"This is more like it," said Nan, as they entered the sleeping car. "I'll be glad enough to go to bed just as soon as we can see no more of the scenery we are passing."
"Who is to take the upper berth, you or I?" demanded her companion.
"Maybe we had better toss up for it," said Nan.
Just then the girls observed a lady on the opposite side of the aisle telling the colored porter not to fix the upper berth at all, that she and her daughter would both sleep below.
"Let's do that," suggested Nan.
"By all means," answered Bess; and so it was settled.
"Lots o' folks don't use dat dar upper berth," explained the porter as he fixed the lower bed only. "They leaves it up and dat gives 'em so much more room to stand up an' dress an' undress."
"It will just suit us," declared Bess.
Soon the berth was ready and a little later the girls retired.
Being together they had thought to have a good "talk-fest," as Bess called it. But alas! both were so tired out that they fell asleep almost before they knew it. And neither woke up until morning, when they were rolling into New York City.
"Gracious; time to get up!" and Nan lost no time in dressing and Bess followed her example.
The first part of their momentous journey had come to an end.
In her impatience Bess Harley thought she had never known a crowd to move so slowly. Of course all the people on the train were getting out at New York, for the simple reason that the train did not go any farther.
At any other time the girls would have been tremendously pleased about going to New York. But now, with the even more wonderful prospect of Florida looming up, New York appealed to them simply as a means to an end.
"It's that fat man at the end," hissed Bess in Nan's ear. "He's holding up the whole procession. What's he talking about, anyway?"
"Sh-h," whispered Nan. "He may hear you. Are you sure you have everything, honey?" she added, making a mental count of Bess's belongings to make certain that her careless chum had left nothing behind.
"For goodness' sake, Nan Sherwood, I wonder you don't have a record made of that question and then turn it on every five minutes or so," said Bess,whose temper was beginning to be ruffled by the delay. "That's all I hear from morning to night. 'Are you sure you have everything?' I think I'll try it on you and see how you like it."
"Oh, I'd love it," cried Nan, with such fervor that Bess looked at her in surprise. "It's this bag," explained Nan, looking down at her own handsome suitcase. "I'm certain it will be stolen or I'll lose it or something before we can get to Florida."
"Well, it is an expensive suitcase," Bess admitted, as the fat man at the front of the car finished his argument with the conductor and the line of passengers moved slowly on toward the door. "But you never used to lie awake at night worrying about it."
It was Nan's turn to look her amazement.
"It isn't the bag I'm worrying about, and you ought to know that," she said in a low voice. "It's what is in the bag."
"Oh!" said Bess, suddenly remembering, "you mean those papers Mrs. Bragley gave you? Well, I wouldn't worry about them," she added carelessly. "I don't believe they are really worth anything, anyway."
"Oh, hush," Nan begged her as they stepped upon the platform and a man turned to look at them curiously. "Please don't mention any names, Bess. It might make trouble."
"Why, Nan Sherwood, how you talk!" cried Bess,turning to look curiously at her chum. "You might really think those old papers were worth something."
"I believe they are," said Nan seriously, as, with bag clutched tightly in her hand, she started with Bess down the long bustling platform. "Anyway, I want to do my best to help the poor woman. I felt dreadfully sorry for her."
"I feel sorry for everybody who isn't going to Palm Beach," cried Bess gaily, as she looked about her with sparkling eyes. "Oh, Nan, isn't this a lark?"
"You'd better look out," cried Nan sharply, as Bess stepped directly in front of a heaped-up baggage truck that was being trundled heavily down the platform, "or it will be a tragedy instead."
The girls had supposed they had become accustomed to the noise and confusion of a big city during their visit in Chicago, but as they stepped from the great Pennsylvania Station on to the crowded New York street they felt disconcertingly like startled country girls arriving in the city for the first time.
"Goodness! I thought Chicago was awful," whispered Bess in Nan's ear. "But this is worse. What shall we do?"
"That's easy," said Nan, taking command of the situation as usual. "Papa Sherwood told me to take a taxi straight over to the dock and not to speak to any one on the way."
"Well, I think we'll have our choice of taxis," remarked Bess, with a chuckle, as several chauffeurs standing by or sitting in cabs drawn up along the curb espied the well-dressed girls and immediately set up a cry of "Taxi, taxi! Right this way, lady!"
Looking as if she had been used to riding around in taxicabs in strange and noisy cities all her life, Nan walked forward, still clutching the precious bag that held Mrs. Bragley's papers and calmly selected a brilliant yellow cab whose driver opened the door to her respectfully.
Bess followed, all eyes and ears for the noise and confusion of the street. Nan gave instructions to the chauffeur, who touched his cap, slammed the door shut on the girls and sprang to his seat in front.
"I think you are just wonderful, Nan Sherwood," said Bess, when they were gliding swiftly off through the bewildering traffic. "I was frightened to death when all those men started shouting at us at once. I wanted to run back into the station and hide. Butyoudidn't, and of courseIdidn't, and here we are!" She gave an excited little bounce on the seat. "Only," she added reproachfully, "I don't see why you picked out a yellow taxi. You know I hate yellow."
"Goodness! I didn't even notice the color," said Nan, feeling her suitcase with one foot to be sure it was still there. "If you will just tell me whatcolor you like best I'll send a note to the governor and ask him to have them painted that way."
"How sweet of you," mocked Bess, and a moment later grasped her chum's arm in fright. "Did you see that?" she cried, as the driver put on his brakes and they stopped within about two inches of the back of a great lumbering truck. "I'm afraid this driver is going to kill us before ever we can get to the dock."
"Never mind, honey," said Nan soothingly, though she herself had been considerably startled at the close call. "Papa Sherwood says all the drivers are like that in New York, and yet there are very few accidents. We must be near the dock, anyway."
"Isn't that horrid?" cried Bess with one of her quick changes of interest. "Just think, we'll have to go and leave New York before we have really seen anything of it."
Nan shrugged her shoulders helplessly.
"I thought you weren't enjoying your ride," she said, "and here you are bemoaning the fact that it is nearly over. Bess, I give you up."
Bess merely chuckled, and a few minutes later insisted upon stopping the machine while she got out and bought some oranges from a tempting fruit-stand.
"Now," she said, proudly exhibiting her purchase to Nan when the car was once more bumping onward over cobblestones toward the dock, "we sha'n'tstarve on our trip, anyway. Oh, look, Nan; we're there!" she cried, pointing excitedly out of the window. "See that thing over there that looks like something between a cave and a barn with a sign over it? That must be the entrance to one of the docks. Yes, see the people going in? And there's another and another. Oh, oh!"
"For goodness' sake, sit still," commanded Nan. "You're spilling all the oranges."
"My, what a joy killer you are, Nan Sherwood," sighed Bess, as she rebelliously stuffed the bag of oranges into her already over-filled suitcase. "What are a few oranges more or less at a glorious time like this?"
Then the taxicab left the rough pavement and rolled along over the smooth asphalt. On all sides of them were trucks and autos, with here and there a horse-drawn vehicle. The noise was something awful.
"Goodness gracious, how different from the quietness at the Hall!" remarked Bess.
"And how different even from Tillbury," returned Nan.
"What a lot of foreigners here, Nan."
"I guess they come from the ships. The docks are all along here, so I've been told."
"I wouldn't want to come down here after dark and all alone."
"No, I'd not like that myself, Bess."
"Some of those men look like regular Italian brigands."
"Yes, and others look like Russian anarchists."
Suddenly the machine came to a standstill and the man in front looked about at Nan and repeated the instructions she had given him to make sure he had them correctly.
"That's right," answered Nan, nodding. "We must be almost there, aren't we?"
"Yes, Miss," said the man, as he started the car again. "See that dock over yonder? That's it." And he swung the machine about in a semicircle and headed for one of the openings which Bess had described as "something between a cave and a barn."
"Nan, I never felt so funny before," Bess confided to her chum. "I think I am going to faint or something."
"And I think you had better not," said Nan, in alarm. "I have all I can do to carry my own luggage without having you piled on top of it."
"You wouldn't have to carry me," giggled Bess incorrigibly. "I'd ask the good-looking chauffeur to do it."
"How could you ask him anything if you had fainted?" asked Nan, beginning systematically to get her things together. "Hurry up, Bess. I guess this is where we get off. Are you sure——"
"You have everything?" finished the irrepressibleBess with another giggle. "I was just waiting for that. Look out, Nan. You stepped on my toe."
"I know it," said Nan calmly. "I did it on purpose."
Nan seized the opportunity to make good her escape, and Bess, following close upon her heels, whispered dramatically in her ear: "Take care, woman! You shall not again escape me. Next time I will spit thee like a goose."
"All right," said Nan, turning calmly to the driver who was waiting for his fee. "Only wait a minute, will you? I have to pay the fare."