Was there envy in the glances?
Now and then an ominous “good-bye” intruded upon the pleasant dream Arden was living in, until, as though she were slowly awakening, she realized that the party was over.
The boys and girls of Arden’s little group were gathered in a corner near the ballroom door. Like overlapping broadcasts of sound, the farewells and thank-yous crossed and crisscrossed among them.
“I want to say good-bye to Sim.”
Ed Anderson’s smiling request caused them all suddenly to stop talking and look at one another.
“Where is she?” Dick Randall asked. “I haven’t seen her for a long time.”
“I don’t know. She should be somewhere around here. We must find her quickly. We have scarcely time to dress and catch the eight-thirty train back to Cedar Ridge!” Arden exclaimed.
“She knew we were to meet her here when the dance was over,” Terry said petulantly. “Come, Arden, let’s go look for her! We have to hurry.”
Like the reflection of a cloud in a pool of water, a shadow passed over the face of Arden Blake as Terry spoke to her. But she acted quickly.
“I’m sorry we must go so soon,” Arden said to the somewhat puzzled boys. “But if we miss that train we’ll probably be campused. I’m sure Sim has some good excuse for her absence, but we’d better find her and learn what it is. I’ll have to say good-bye for her. I really don’t know what to think.”
“It’s all right,” Dick Randall remarked. “You and Terry go along. Perhaps Sim is upstairs waiting for you.”
“She doesn’t usually do things like this. But I suppose we really should go up,” Arden agreed. “We haven’t much time.”
Saying good-bye again, Terry and Arden left the group of boys and walked toward the elevator. But when they reached the room, high up in the large hotel, Sim’s bag was closed and packed, as Terry discovered, on the middle of the bed. And she exclaimed:
“She isn’t here, Arden! We must phone Mary Todd’s room.”
“I’ll do it,” Arden promptly offered. “She may be down there talking things over.” She hurried to the instrument.
But Mary Todd hadn’t seen Sim since early afternoon!
“Don’t say anything to anyone, will you, Mary?” Arden pleaded. “I don’t want Mrs. Malvern to know yet.”
“Of course not!” Mary answered. “But Sim will turn up. Don’t worry! ’Bye!” and she hung up.
“She isn’t there, either,” said Arden, turning to Terry. “What’s the next move?”
Terry considered. “Well, this is a pretty big place. Sim may be—”
The telephone jingled shrilly. Both girls sprang to answer, but Terry got there first.
“Yes, Mrs. Malvern,” she said sweetly. “We’re all ready, and we’ll be in the lobby in a few minutes. Yes. Good-bye!”
Quickly she turned from the telephone.
“Oh, what shall we do? Mrs. Malvern will see that Sim isn’t with us! Think of something, Arden! Quick!”
“We’ll have to go down, anyhow,” said Arden, pulling her dress over her head. “Maybe, in the crowd, she won’t notice that Sim is missing. Hurry, Terry, and change your dress.”
“I am hurrying. I’m as nearly ready as you are. We mustn’t show we are excited. She really could be—lots of places.”
“Whatever possessed Sim to do a thing like this?” Arden was struggling with her garments.
“She’s probably got some idea into her head. Unless she’s been kidnaped and is being held for a ransom!”
Both girls stopped their dressing, suddenly frightened, Terry no less, though she had spoken the words. They had been spoken jokingly, but the possibility of such a terrible happening was not pleasant to consider.
“Oh, Terry! Do you think we better tell Mrs. Malvern after all? The police——”
“No! No! I was only joking. I have a lot of confidence in Sim. She can take care of herself. She knows people in New York. If she isn’t in the lobby when we get there, we’ll have to decide what to do then.” Terry was putting on her hat.
“I’m ready. I’ll take her bag and mine. You shut the door.”
Arden swept a last glance around the room. She stepped into the corridor, followed by Terry, who pulled the door shut. They both quickly looked down the long hall. It was empty.
“Hurry, Arden, into the elevator, before someone sees there are only two of us when there should be three!”
By the greatest of good luck the elevator came quickly in answer to their ring. It was almost filled with chattering girls, and when it reached the ground floor it was impossible to see who got off.
The girls for Cedar Ridge were assembled in the magnificent lobby; a happy, chattering, laughing group. Terry and Arden, in unspoken agreement, worked themselves gradually as near to the center of the throng as they could, hoping Mrs. Malvern’s gimlet eyes would not note the absence of Sim.
“Come, girls, get together!” The chaperon was herding them toward the door leading to the waiting cabs. “Tell the driver to take you to Thirty-third Street tube station and there take a train for Hoboken. When you get there, ask at the information desk which is the next train for Cedar Ridge, and don’t forget to sign in as soon as you get back. That is important. We shall have to separate from now on.”
So far so good. Terry and Arden guiltily got into a gaudy taxi with three other girls. The two were thinking so much about Sim; wondering if, should they go on thinking, some subconscious influence would not cause someone to ask about her. The only thing to do was to talk to the other girls about the dance to keep their thoughts occupied with that subject.
“Did they make any money, do you know?” Arden asked a strange girl, one of the three riding with her and Terry.
“They cleared expenses, but I heard they only have a few dollars over.”
“It was a nice party, anyhow,” Terry put in, looking anxiously out of the window. “The music was grand!”
And that ended the half-hearted attempt at conversation. Both Arden and Terry had too much on their minds to do much talking. The other girls were intimately whispering among themselves. They seemed to give no thought to the missing Sim, nor to the fact that Arden and Terry had been two of a trio, inseparable, but were now only a duet.
Their problem was a difficult one.
Where was Sim?
If she was not waiting at the tube station or in Hoboken, what should they do? How could they get back to Cedar Ridge without Mrs. Malvern or someone with inquisitive authority finding out about the missing girl?
Arden privately decided, if they did not find Sim at either station, to tell Mrs. Malvern at the first opportunity.
Terry, whose thoughts were following the same line as were Arden’s, decided, if they reached Cedar Ridge and found no trace of Sim, that it would be best at once to telephone from college to the parents of the missing girl and ask for advice.
There was a milling throng on the platform of the Thirty-third Street tube station on one side of which trains left for Jersey City and Newark, and on the other side for Hoboken and thence to Cedar Ridge. As well as they could, Terry and Arden peered through the crowd for Sim. But she was not to be seen, and the hope thermometer in their hearts went nearer the zero mark.
The train was crowded, and it was almost impossible for Arden and Terry to converse above the noise. It didn’t matter. They had nothing of interest to talk about, now. They looked anxiously at each other. Were they deserting Sim? Or rather, were they not showing real confidence in her? She must be safe! The excitement of the travel was helping to cheer her chums.
When Hoboken terminus was reached and the crowds poured out as they had flowed in, once more the two sought anxiously among the many faces. But though there were scores of their fellow students hurrying to catch the next Cedar Ridge train, Sim was not among them.
“She may be on the platform waiting for us,” suggested Terry with a hope she did not feel.
“Maybe,” Arden murmured prayerfully.
They almost stumbled up the concrete steps in their haste. The ramp, from the iron gates of which departed many trains for many places, was another place of milling crowds outside the station. A man in a portable information booth was answering questions in a very patient manner.
By listening, without asking, Terry and Arden learned from which track their train departed and the time. They had a few precious minutes left.
“Let’s look around out here and then go inside,” proposed Terry, who was lugging along Sim’s bag with her own.
“She isn’t here,” Arden sighed, after a search. “Let’s go inside the station.”
There they looked about the big vaulted room: ticket offices on one side, a rank of telephone booths on another, a buffet restaurant, a magazine stand, a large candy booth. All of these spots were eagerly scanned without result.
Apparently just to say “hello” to friends, Terry and Arden went from one group of waiting girls to another, glimpsing the pretty, animated faces, but Sim’s was not among them. It seemed hopeless.
Now, really frightened, Arden and Terry clung together as the stentorian voice announced their train in long-drawn accents.
“We’ll have to go!” murmured Terry desperately.
“Yes. We can’t wait any longer. But she may be in the train.” It was a sort of last hope for Arden.
“We can look, if it isn’t too crowded,” Terry suggested.
But it was. In all the coaches, for most of the college girls had caught this train back, were repeated the same scenes, the same talk and laughter that had marked the going trip. The seekers could not locate Sim in the coach where they were crowded, and they did not dare pass from one car to another as the train quickly gathered speed after leaving Hoboken.
The ride back was almost a nightmare for Terry and Arden, and when the train pulled into the Morrisville station, which was the college stop, they were pale and more worried than ever.
“Maybe she is already here,” breathed Terry, as they alighted. It was a brave attempt to brighten the situation.
“Maybe. Let’s hurry and see if she has signed in.” Arden was only too glad to seize on Terry’s suggestion.
They almost ran along the path from the station to the college. Terry still insisted on clinging to Sim’s bag, though Arden wanted to do her share of carrying it. Then up those back-breaking stairs and into the big recreation room where the registry book was kept for this occasion.
Signing their own names, the two frightened freshmen scanned the pages for Sim’s.
“No, Arden, she hasn’t come in.” Terry turned sadly from the book.
“I left a space between your name and mine,” Arden said, “so in case Sim comes in later she can slip hers in without being caught. Hurry, Terry, let’s get to our room so we can talk this out and decide upon—something.”
Miles away from Cedar Ridge, Sim Westover idly turned the pages of a movie magazine. She was quite pleased with herself as she sat in a commuters’ train, speeding toward Larchmont. It was dark now, and as Sim looked from the window her face was reflected in the glass as in a dull mirror. Just a hint of a shiny nose, but it was enough to cause her to open her envelope bag and search for her compact.
But what were those white envelopes?
Surely she hadn’t forgotten to leave that carefully composed note for the dean—and the one to Arden and Terry!
Yes, she had forgotten!
“My word! They’ll be worried to death!” Sim whispered in a gasp of dismay. “What a stupid thing to do! Write notes explaining everything and then take them with me!”
Sim settled herself deeper into the soft green plush of the seat and looked helplessly at the envelopes bearing the imposing red and gold seal of the Chancellor Hotel. She could imagine Terry and Arden dashing madly about asking everywhere for her. And she had intended to leave the note right where they would see it—on the bed near her packed bag.
“Oh,” mused Sim, “if only they don’t do anything rash, such as notifying the police or phoning to my folks!”
The adventure she had planned to be such a fine thing was fast losing its savor.
Suppose her father was not in Larchmont, after all? But he must be. In his last letter to Sim he had mentioned, casually, this trip which was a reason why he couldn’t be in New York to greet her at the tea dance. He would be in Larchmont.
It had seemed such a fine idea, when Sim learned the sophomores had not made the amount of money necessary even to start the repairs on the swimming pool, just to go to her father and ask him for it. It would be such a fine thing for the college, and Sim really must do some swimming. She felt that she was entitled to it after coming to Cedar Ridge, having seen the pictures of the pool in the prospectus.
The others were dancing as Sim’s grand idea was engendered within her, and it seemed too bad to interrupt them. Besides, Arden would, very probably, try to stop her. The simplest thing would be just to write the notes, explaining, and go ahead.
The desk clerk at the hotel told her, when she asked, that she had fifteen minutes to get a train for Larchmont from the Grand Central Station. Sim was so glad she had remembered her father had written he was to be there for the week-end at the Newman home—planning another large branch store for business expansion.
“Oh, dear! What a fix to be in! I suppose I’ll be expelled! Mother will feel terribly bad, and Dad——Oh, dear!” Sim sighed aloud.
But there was nothing she could do now. There were the forgotten letters which would have made everything all right. She had hurried up to the room, slipping away from the dance, had written the notes, put them in her bag, and changed her dress. She intended leaving them just before going out of the room. But a glance at the electric clock showed her there was little time to catch a taxi for the Grand Central in time to make the train, and in her haste——
The train ran along smoothly. The clickety-click of the wheels over the rail joints mocked Sim with their ever recurring:
“Forgot! Forgot! Forgot!”
She grew more upset and worried. She pulled back her coat sleeve and glanced at her wrist watch.
Nine o’clock!
By this time the girls would be taking the train for Morrisville. What had they done about her disappearance? Sim hated to think about it. This was, indeed, the deepest hole she had ever been in.
The conductor opened the door and shouted:
“Larch-mont!Larch-mont! All out for LARCH-MONT!”
Sim gathered her things together and prepared to leave.
As she alighted from the train, the thought came to her that she must at once go in the station and telephone Arden. But another glance at her watch caused her to hesitate. Arden and Sim might not be in Cedar Ridge yet. So she decided to wait until she reached the house of her father’s friend and to telephone from there.
She approached a taxi and gave the address to the driver. The ride was not long, and soon was on the steps waiting to be admitted at the Newman house.
It was Mr. Newman himself who opened the door.
“Why, Sim Westover!” he exclaimed. “What are you doing here? We thought you were safely in bed at Cedar Ridge. But come in! Take off your things!”
“Good-evening, Mr. Newman,” Sim said quickly. “I should be at Cedar Ridge, but something very important came up, and I decided, in a hurry, to come up here to see Dad. I was in New York at a dance. Dad is here, isn’t he?”
“Why, no, Sim, he isn’t. He telephoned me, late this afternoon, that he couldn’t make it after all. Is anything the matter?”
Sim’s face was a study in many expressions as she faintly replied:
“Yes, I guess there is—now. Everything would have been all right if I hadn’t been so forgetful!” Sim was close to tears, and the sight of her mother’s dear college friend (both ladies had graduated at Cedar Ridge) caused Sim almost to break down.
“Come in, Sim!” greeted Mrs. Newman, sensing, as she hastened into the hall, that something was wrong. “Have you had anything to eat? I thought not. Come into the dining room. Marie can get you some tea and sandwiches, at least. Then you can tell us all about it while you eat, and you’ll feel better. It isn’t serious, is it?” This last prompted by a look at Sim’s face.
“Well, it isn’t going to be very pleasant, I’m afraid.” On the way to and in the dining room, while a hasty lunch was made ready, Sim blurted out the whole story.
“And so you see,” she finished, “I must get word to Arden or Terry as quickly as possible, and it must be managed so that I’m not found out as missing or I shall probably be expelled. I’m away without leave. I must get back tonight.”
“Go back tonight? Impossible, my dear! Can’t you stay with us until morning?”
“I think not. If I can slip back all may yet be well. But if I have to explain to the dean——No, it couldn’t be done. There must be a train back tonight, isn’t there?”
She turned questioning eyes on Mr. Newman.
He looked at some time-tables, of which he had several in his smoking room, and announced:
“You’d never get back until late—very late—by train. But if you feel you must be back in college before morning——”
“I do. Oh, yes, I do, Mr. Newman!”
“Then the only thing is for me to drive you there. We can make good time at night. I know the roads.”
“Oh, Mr. Newman! I couldn’t dream of——”
“Tut, tut, Sim! It’s the only way. I don’t mind. It will be a little diversion for me. I’ll have the chauffeur get the car out now. He can do the driving. I’ll sit and talk to you, and the way won’t seem so long.”
“Oh, Mr. Newman, you’re wonderful! Now I must phone Arden at once to be watching for me. Luckily our room is on the front of the dorm. How long do you think it will take?” Sim, getting up from the table, at the session of which she had much improved in spirits, was planning rapidly now. Perhaps all would yet be well.
“About three hours, I should say,” Mr. Newman answered. “It will be slow going from here until we get into New Jersey, and then we can make time. You ought to be backatcollege around midnight, though whether you can getin——”
“That’s why I must phone Arden or Terry. Oh, what a lot of trouble I’m causing!” Sim’s eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them back.
“There, now, my dear, never mind!” soothed Mrs. Newman. “We’ll help you all we can.”
“That’s the kind of people they are,” Sim told Arden, later. “They haven’t forgotten what it is to be young.”
It took some little time to get a telephone connection through to Cedar Ridge, and Sim lived years in moments, she thought, while waiting for Arden to come to the phone. Finally the voice came to her.
“Hello, Arden? Yes, I’m all right. I’m up at Larchmont with friends of Dad’s. Did they find out about me? No? Good! Listen! Here’s my plan. I’ll tell you all how it happened later. Someone might hear us if I talked too long now. I’m driving back—yes, driving. I’ll get there about midnight. Don’t fall asleep. When we get to the entrance—the outside gate, I mean—we’ll toot the horn three times. You and Terry slip down and let me in. Do you understand? Fine! I’m leaving right away. Good-bye, darling! I’ll explain everything later. I’m quite all right, and nothing has happened. Good-bye!”
She hung up and turned to her friends, murmuring:
“That’s over, thank goodness!”
“Well, let’s get going, Sim!” Mr. Newman was now almost as much excited as was Sim herself.
“Try to sleep on the way out, Sim dear,” advised Mrs. Newman. “I’m having robes and a soft cushion put in the car. You can snuggle up in a corner of the sedan.”
“I thought she was going to talk to me!” chuckled Mr. Newman.
“Of course I will—if I can find anything to talk about.”
“No, you mustn’t,” decided his wife. “Sim must try to get some sleep. You will, won’t you, my dear?”
“Yes, I will. Luckily tomorrow will be Sunday, and I can sleep late in my room—if I get there. Thank you both—so much! I’ll never forget this—never!”
Sim put her arms about Mrs. Newman’s neck and kissed her affectionately.
“Oh, my poor dear! I know just how you feel. You meant it all for the best, and there is really no harm done.”
“Not yet,” said Sim a trifle grimly as she followed Mr. Newman out to the big sedan that was waiting, with the chauffeur at the door, on the drive.
Arden’s slippered feet pad-padded up the dark stairs like small, softened trip-hammers as she hurried away from the telephone to inform Terry of the good news that Sim was safe and on her way.
She pushed open the door of 513 and shut it quickly behind her, panting and excited from her swift upward flight.
“Terry! Terry!” she began breathlessly. “It was Sim—on the phone. I talked to her!”
“Oh—good! Is she—all right?”
“Yes. She didn’t have time to talk much. She was ’way up in Larchmont. Said she’d explain everything later. She is coming back around midnight, and she wants us to watch for her and let her in.”
“What was she doing in Larchmont?” the practical Terry wanted to know.
“I can’t guess,” replied Arden. “We’ll have to wait until we see her. She said she was all right and nothing had happened. I can hardly wait until she gets here.”
“Midnight,” murmured Terry. “We’ll have to stand our turns at watch as they do aboard ships. Now that I know Sim is safe, I’m suddenly very sleepy. How is she coming—train?”
“No. She’s driving. We’ll have to listen for a car. She thought she’d better walk in from the entrance instead of having the car drive right up, so no one would hear. They’ll toot the horn so we’ll know.” Arden went to the window and gazed at the black scene below.
“It’s absolutely dark out,” she continued. “I hope we’ll be able to see the lights of the car as it comes up the road. We’d better get undressed in case anyone comes in.”
“All right,” Terry agreed. “I’ll take the first watch. Let’s make them an hour each. You sleep until I call you. I’ll sit here on the window seat. If I go to sleep I’ll probably fall off, and that will wake me up.”
Quickly they got into their pajamas. Terry put on a robe and slippers and curled herself on the window seat.
“I never remember a blacker or stiller night,” she remarked. “I’m glad Sim isn’t alone. She’s with friends of her father’s.”
“Do you suppose we can let her in all right? What if we can’t get the door open?” Arden asked nervously.
“I’ll think that possibility out while I’m on watch. You go to sleep as quickly as you can. Don’t worry so much, Arden. You’ll be gray by morning!”
“I’ll be exhausted by morning, anyhow. However, toodle-oo—sailor, beware, and all that sort of thing! I’m going to try to get some rest.”
There was not a sound in the room for at least five minutes when Terry suddenly flung a tennis ball with a thudding crash at a marauding mouse. The ball, one of a supply of such ammunition kept in readiness for just this contingency, bounced a few times and rolled under a bed as the mouse, with a protesting squeak, darted back into a hole beneath the baseboard.
The college had settled for the night. The appearance of the mouse was one proof of this.
Terry tried not to be too comfortable and kept shifting her position on the window seat. It was getting cold, so she pulled a blanket off her bed and wrapped it around her. The next thing she remembered someone was shaking her to wakefulness. It was Arden.
“Fine sailor you are! You were sound asleep! Sim might be trying to get in. You get in bed, Terry. I’ll watch.”
“No,” sleepily.
“Yes,” firmly.
“Oh—all right, Captain. Let’s see how you make out. Anyhow, she can’t be here yet—it’s too early.”
Terry rolled herself into the bed, and Arden took her place on the uncomfortable window seat. After a few minutes there she leaned forward and pressed the side of her face to the cold, dark glass in order to look as far as possible to the east, the direction from which the traveling car would come. But the highway beyond the college grounds showed no blinking lights, so Arden drew her knees up to her chin under her robe and stared moodily out into the night.
What was going to come of all this, she wondered?
What might happen if Sim were caught was too disheartening to think of, so Arden tried to piece together the events of the afternoon in a brave effort to keep awake.
The whole affair had so many missing links, though. It was just Sim’s usual good luck that she was not missed by Mrs. Malvern when the girls returned to school.
“Oh, dear!” sighed Arden at the thought of how she and Terry would have been put to it to explain. But they had not been obliged to do any explaining—so far.
The mouse, grown bolder in the silent darkness, was conducting a rustling, rattling search among some papers on a desk for tasty crumbs. Arden got up quietly and reached for another tennis ball. As she stood up she looked once more toward the highway and waited in strained tenseness.
Yes, she was sure of it. Far down the road a light bounced about as a speeding car neared the college.
“Terry! Terry!” Arden whispered. “I think they’re coming! Wake up!”
Terry was up in an instant and glided over to the window.
“It’s a car, sure enough. But we’d better make certain before we start down. Keep watch while I fasten the belt of my robe.”
“I will,” whispered Arden.
“Is it stopping at the far gate?”
“No, it’s going on. Oh, no, it isn’t, either. It hasn’t passed the gate. It must be Sim! We’ll give her a few seconds to get out and walk up the drive. I hope she knows enough to stay on the grass and not on that crunchy gravel.”
“Trust Sim for that,” murmured Terry. “Now I’m ready. But give Sim time to get to the door. We don’t want to wait down in the dark lower hall any longer than we have to.”
“No. Come on! And don’t use your flashlight unless you have to.”
Cautiously Arden opened the door and, followed by Terry, stepped out into the dark corridor which seemed to stretch for miles and miles the length of the building, disappearing into blackness at the end. At the top of the first flight of stairs leading down from the floor of the 513 room was a small light bulb doing its little best to dispel the gloom.
Holding hands, Arden and Terry tiptoed down the first flight. Arden’s free hand slid noiselessly along the polished banister rail. Now and then the stairs creaked and snapped with what seemed to be the noise of a gun.
They stopped to rest at the first landing, not so much from physical weariness as from the nervous strain. On the first and several other landings was a large window facing the distant orchard. The orchard was now only a black blur but Arden and Terry thought they could see the gnarled trees beneath which they, with Sim, had been so frightened on the occasion of the hazing.
“I wouldn’t go down there now for anything!” whispered Terry.
“Down where? Do you mean to let Sim in?”
“No, I mean that awful orchard. What do you suppose is in there, Arden?”
“I wish I knew. No, I don’t. Let’s don’t talk about it now.”
“The subject isn’t very heartening in the present circumstances,” agreed Terry in queer little gulps.
They tiptoed down to the next floor. Every now and then they halted, trembling, waiting for some door to open and lead to their discovery. But the other students must, indeed have been sleeping the sleep of the just, for Arden and Terry eventually reached the lower entrance hall without mishap.
The ground glass of the heavy front doors showed a little lighter than the surrounding wooden frames. Arden was there, fumbling with the old-fashioned key. Terry was watching apprehensively.
Suddenly two dark figures were outlined on the glass of the door. One was that of Sim!
“I’ll have it open in a moment, Sim!” Arden panted, working desperately with the key. “It’s turning now!”
“And none too soon!” whispered Terry. “Oh, I’m so frightened!”
The lock clicked. Arden turned the knob and pulled the heavy door inward, just far enough to admit Sim, who slithered in with the speed of a wind-blown leaf. Thrusting her gloved hand out through the opening crack she had slid through, while Arden braced herself to prevent the portal from swinging too far back, Sim waved to someone unseen and hoarsely whispered:
“Good-night, Mr. Newman! I’m all right now. Thank you a thousand times! I’ll write to Mrs. Newman. Good-bye!”
With all Arden’s care she could not hold the heavy door firmly enough to prevent a deep though not loud banging sound as it closed.
“Arden!” gasped Terry.
“I couldn’t help it. Quick! Help me turn this key back. It’s so stiff!” Terry gave her aid. Then the two turned to the midnight entrant in the dark precincts of Cedar Ridge.
“Sim!” whispered Arden, flinging her arms about her chum.
“Oh, Arden!” returned the wanderer.
“Come on, you two!” Terry interrupted. “We’re not safe yet. Take off your shoes, Sim, you bad girl!”
Sim bent down to comply with this cautionary advice, but suddenly stood crouched, frozen with dismay. That noise could be from only one cause.
Someone was coming down the stairs!
Even as the three frightened freshmen realized this, a white face was outlined by a gleaming electric torch on the landing above them. A voice, high-pitched in anger, floated down to them.
“What is the meaning of this?”
It was the dean looking like Lady Macbeth, holding an electric candle above and in front of her, so that the gleam made curious shadows on her stern face. And above all other possible colors she was wearing a cerise robe! Perhaps deans were secretly like that.
“Go to your room at once and report to me in the morning!”
Lady Authority turned with all her dignity and swept away, while the girls, with consternation knocking at their hearts, crept up the stairs to the harbor of their room.
While Sim, in the room the three girls shared, undressed with weary slowness, Terry and Arden sat like youthful inquisitors and shot question after question at her until the whole foolish episode was at last laid bare before them.
“Sim, you must have had a touch of the sun, or something, to do what you did,” Arden said spiritedly.
“It’s all over now, Arden—there’s no use crying over the straw that broke the camel’s back or the spilled milk that got in the eye of the needle in the haystack, or something,” Terry remarked soothingly.
“Thanks,” murmured Sim. And then, with sudden energy: “But, oh, girls! I forgot to tell you the most exciting part! We came in as far as we could on the back road—you know, where it circles the college grounds near the orchard and finally comes out at the main highway?” She looked questioningly at her hearers.
“Yes, we know,” said Arden, and Terry nodded, adding:
“Let’s hear it all.”
“Well, I thought,” went on Sim, “that we had better stop for a minute to see if there were any lights in this dorm before we went any farther. So we did, but I didn’t notice just where we were, as I was looking so hard toward where I knew you two would be, and on the watch for me, I hoped.”
“As we were,” said Arden.
“Yes. Thanks a lot. But listen to this.” By Sim’s manner Terry and Arden knew something startling was to be told—something so startling that, for the moment, it drove from their minds the thought of having been caught by the stern dean.
“Suddenly,” said Sim, “away down at the far end of the orchard, I saw a light bobbing about!”
“Ye gods, Sim! Did Mr. Newman see it? What was it?” demanded Arden excitedly.
“He saw it, and so did the chauffeur, for he said something about why someone should be out in a gloomy old orchard at that time of night with a lantern. I was frozen with horror!” Sim was enjoying herself and watching the eyes of the girls widen with surprise.
“Well, go on!” whispered Terry. “What did you do?”
“We didn’t say a word—just sat there in the car and watched the light coming closer. I felt sure it was someone looking for me.”
“For you?” gasped Arden.
“Well, I mean trying to find out who was coming back to college so late, against the rules—afraid they’d find me out, you know.”
“Oh, yes,” Terry murmured.
“Pretty soon,” resumed Sim, “we said that it was someone carrying a lantern—holding it down low so it was only shining on the ground.”
“Don’t stop, Sim—tell us who it was!” Terry begged.
“I don’t know who it was. He didn’t pass very close, and from the way he was carrying the lantern I could only see his legs and part of one hand, but—” Sim paused dramatically—“he seemed like a young man.”
“Did he see you?” Arden blurted out.
“Perhaps; though if he did, he didn’t seem to care. He went stumbling on his way toward Bordmust. Then I came out of my daze and told Mr. Newman we’d better be getting on our way. Of course, he thought it queer that a man should be out that hour of night near a girls’ school, but I passed it off by saying it was the watchman on his rounds. But, girls, it wasn’t, though even the little I could see made me feel he belonged around here. But, here’s a question, a hard one, really: What do you suppose he was doing in the orchard after midnight?”
“I can’t imagine. It’s all very queer. And,” went on Arden, “I hope it just stays merely queer. But now, to be practical—much as I know you hate to be that way, Sim—I think we had all better get some sleep. We’ll have to see Tiddy in the morning, and we had better have our wits about us when we do.” Arden yawned. The conference was ended. The girls got into bed. The light was extinguished. Silence settled over the room.
Terry, as usual, lost no time in getting to sleep. Sim, utterly exhausted, was sighing heavily as she burrowed under the blankets.
But Arden was never more wakeful. All the various adventures the girls had shared in the past were as clear in her mind as though she were watching a motion-picture film of them. She tossed and turned. Through the gloom Arden fancied she could see again the face of the man described in the reward placard in the post office.
Arden was still certain that, somewhere, she had seen that face before. The fright she and her chums had in the orchard, was, in some way, linked with the lantern man Sim had seen that night. Then, intruding upon that situation, it was borne to Arden that the swimming pool was in as hopeless a shape as on their arrival at Cedar Ridge.
What would Sim do now?
And what would happen at the morning interview with Miss Tidbury Anklon, the severe dean? Arden was desperate. She would never get to sleep at this rate. As quietly as she could, she arose, went to her bureau, and managed, by feeling, to find the bottle of aspirin tablets. She swallowed one, taking a few sips of unpleasantly tepid water from the glass at her bed-side table, and tried to compose herself again. She noticed that Sim and Terry were breathing like tired, sleeping children.
Arden lay flat on her back, as she had read somewhere this was a good thing to do when one could not get to sleep. Closing her eyes tightly, she began to count:
“One! Two! Three!”
Suddenly the white woolly sheep leaping gayly over a black fence became huge red apples rolling toward her as she was stretched helpless on the ground. She put up her arms to ward them off, but to no avail. Soon she was covered completely by an immense pile of the fruit. Her voice, as she sought to cry for help to Terry and Sim, would not sound. She tried in vain to crawl out from beneath the heap of red apples as hard as stones.
“Arden! Arden! You’re dreaming! Wake up!”
Sim was shaking her gently. Slowly Arden returned to consciousness. She raised herself on one elbow and stared dazedly about the dim room.
“Sim—I’ve had such a horrid dream!” Arden took a deep breath and sat up. “Oh, dear, it’s almost morning!”
She had, in truth, slept nearly the night through. A gray dawn, shot with glints of the rising sun, pressed against the window.
“In a few hours we’ll be in Tiddy’s office,” Arden sighed. “I wish it was all over!”
Sim had nothing to say to this. She reached over and tugged at the blankets covering the still slumbering Terry, saying:
“You might as well wake up, too. It’s morning.”
Terry grunted sleepily. “What? Oh—it’s you, Sim. I remember. Today’s the day. What time is it?”
“Seven-thirty,” supplied Arden, looking at her watch. “Let’s get dressed and have it over with. We can see Tiddy in an hour.”
Yawning and stretching, the girls dressed and started down for breakfast.