The next morning Betty awoke to the sound of the telephone ringing imperatively in the hall. She got up, dragged the instrument from its stand and spoke drowsily into the receiver.
"Hello—who—why, Grace, how did you happen to wake up?—Why, Grace, what is the matter, dear?—You have heard what?—Will is wounded?—Oh, Honey, how awful! Is it serious?—Never mind, don't try to tell me about it now. I'll get dressed just as fast as I can and come right over—Yes, yes, in about five minutes."
Mechanically Betty replaced the receiver on the hook and hurried back into her room. Then swiftly she began to dress.
Will! Dear old Will was wounded! That had been about all she had been able to gather from Grace's sobbing message—but that was enough. He was the first of the boys to fall out there in the trenches, and who knew but what Allen might be the next!
And here only yesterday they had been sohappy, as happy as they could be with that shadow always hanging over them. This was the day, too—the incongruous thought struck Betty as she hastily pulled on her clothing—the day they had set for their trip to Bluff Point. Well, of course, it was all off now. Who wanted to go anyway?
These thoughts and many more raced through Betty's head as she put the finishing touches to her toilet and crushed a garden hat on her pretty soft hair. She was a very attractive picture as she ran down the stairs, but she neither knew it nor cared.
"Why, Betty dear, what is the meaning of the hat?" her mother inquired, smiling as her young daughter burst into the dining room. "You don't need it to eat breakfast in, you know. Who called on the 'phone?"
"I'm not going to eat breakfast, at least not right away. But there, of course, you don't know," answering her mother's look of surprise. "Grace called up and, oh, Mother, poor Will has been wounded! I don't want to c-cry," her chin quivered and she turned away for a moment to get control of the lump in her throat.
"I know, dear," said her mother, putting an understanding arm about her, "and so I'm not going to offer very much sympathy—just now. Were you going over to see Grace, poor child?"
Betty squeezed her mother's hand gratefully and nodded.
"I'll be back in a little while," she said finally, getting the better of that annoying lump. "I just want to find out all about it and give Grace my sympathy."
And the Little Captain found poor Grace in need of all the sympathy she could possibly give her. She was sitting in the darkest corner of the library, all crumpled up in a big chair, her eyes red with weeping and a damp ball of handkerchief clutched tightly in one hand.
At sight of Betty running toward her, she began to sob again, the tears running down her face unnoticed.
"Betty, Betty, I knew you'd come," she cried, as Betty knelt beside her and put two loving arms about her. "I'm so m-miserable I just don't want to live at all."
"But, Honey, it isn't nearly as bad as it might be," said Betty, trying to sooth while wanting desperately to know herself just how bad it was. "You said he was only wounded, didn't you?"
"That's what the telegram said," Grace answered, wiping her eyes drearily. "But how do we know but what he may be dead by this time?"
"We don't know, of course," returned Betty, recovering a little of her optimism while she unostentatiously handed Grace a fresh handkerchief, "but the chances are against it."
"But perhaps they said he was just wounded to l-let us down easy," cried Grace, evidently convinced that there was no bright side to look upon.
"The Government doesn't do that; it hasn't time," argued Betty. "It always lets you know the worst at once."
A gleam of hope came into Grace's eyes.
"Then you think there's a chance?" she queried, sitting up straight and beginning to look a little more interested in life. "Do you think he may get well?"
"Why, of course," said Betty, adding reasonably: "If you would tell me just what the telegram said, I'd have more to go on."
"That's all it said—what I told you," replied Grace, relaxing wearily. "Just said that he was wounded—nothing more. Dad is writing to Washington to try to get more news. Of course, he has a great deal of influence, being a lawyer with a good many friends in Washington, and he may be able to find out something. I don't know."
"Here come Mollie and Amy," said Betty, glancing through the window. "I guess," she added thoughtfully, "Amy probably feels pretty bad too."
"But she's not his sister," cried Grace, with asudden flare-up of jealousy that made Betty smile in spite of her heartache. She could not help wondering how Grace would have taken it if it had been Roy instead of Will who had been wounded.
But Grace's little fit of jealousy did not last long at sight of Amy's drawn, white face and the traces of tears in her eyes. Instead, she opened her arms to this other girl who was not Will's sister, yet loved him too, and for a moment they cried on each others shoulders.
Meanwhile Betty and Mollie wandered over to the window and stood looking thoughtfully out upon the lawn and not seeing any of it.
"Goodness!" said Mollie after a moment, shrugging her shoulders a little impatiently, "of course, it's terrible to have Will wounded, and I can imagine Grace being all cut up about it, but she—and Amy too—act as if he were dead."
"I know," said Betty softly, then added, looking a little quizzically at Mollie; "But you know I don't blame them so much when I try putting myself in their place. Of course we love Will, but suppose it had been Allen, for instance, or Frank."
Mollie started and uttered a little cry of protest.
"Oh, but that would be different," she said weakly, then catching Betty's eye, added soberly: "I see what you mean, of course. I suppose Iwould act just the same, under different circumstances."
However, having had their cry out and feeling better and much more cheerful in consequence, Grace and Amy called to them and they crossed the room quickly.
"We've decided," said Amy then, "that, since we can't find out any more until Mr. Ford hears from Washington, we might as well make the best of it."
"And we want to talk about our trip," Grace added.
"Our trip?" echoed Mollie. "Why I thought of course we would give that up."
"I did too," explained Grace. "But when I spoke of it to Dad, he said we were to do nothing of the kind. He said we couldn't do poor Will"—in spite of all her resolution her voice broke on the name—"any good by staying at home and moping, and that he would let us know as soon as he had any authentic word from Washington. And he insists on mother's going too."
And so it happened that a few hours later a very sober group of Outdoor Girls started on what should have been a joyful trip, with heavy hearts and gloomy foreboding. Even the new racer did not serve to liven the party.
The only time they laughed was when theyfound Dodo and Paul, the incorrigible twins, hidden away under some raincoats in Mollie's car.
"Oh, but we want to go 'long," Dodo protested vehemently when discovered.
"We just got to go 'long," Paul had added.
"No, you mustn't 'got to,'" Mollie contradicted them, while the others looked on amused. "Come, Dodo, honey, be a good girl for sister and come down. You too, Paul. We're in an awful hurry."
"But we not goin' to come down," Dodo insisted.
"'Less," Paul added diplomatically, "we get tandies."
"Lots of tandies," Dodo supplemented.
"Here, take these," Grace offered, holding out a box of sweets which, despite all her trouble, she had not forgotten.
"Don't give them the box—just take out a few," Mollie suggested, but Grace insisted, while her face clouded again.
"I don't want them, anyway. I don't know why I took them. Habit, I suppose."
However, hope and optimism did not consent to be kept long in the background on such a day as this when the sun shone its brightest and the birds sang their hardest and the very wind seemed to be whispering of happier times to come.
"Well," sighed Amy at last, for she and Mrs.Ford were riding in Mollie's car, while Grace was with Betty in the racer, "it's plain to be seen that nature at least doesn't know that anything horrible or cruel is happening 'over there.' I don't think I ever saw a more wonderful day."
"Maybe it is a good omen," said Mollie, quick to seize her opportunity. "I feel it in my bones that it won't be long before we will hear good news of Will—and you know my prophetic bones never lie."
"I don't know anything of the sort," protested Amy, although the remark brought a reluctant smile to her lips. "I've known those same prophetic bones to slip up before this."
"Which reminds me," Mollie cried, apropos of nothing in particular, "that if we don't put on more speed we'll not reach our destination before dark. I wonder why Betty doesn't hurry," for Betty and Grace in the speedy little racer were taking the lead.
She signaled the latter with three long and three short toots of the horn. A moment later the racer slowed down and Betty turned around to see what was wanted.
"You're too slow," cried Mollie. "If you don't go a little faster, we'll have to run over you."
"Oh-ho, look who's talking!" gibed the Little Captain, adding wickedly: "We were afraid tospeed up for fear of leaving you too far behind."
"Now I know we'll have to run over you," cried Mollie fiercely. "Toot, toot—out of my way!"
But Betty evidently had no intention of getting out of anybody's way, for with a challenging blast of her horn she put the little car at high and it sprang forward gleefully.
Behind her, Mollie's car, like a big cat after a mouse, gave exultant chase, fairly eating up the road. And yet Betty maintained the distance between them—even drew away a little.
"Goodness," cried Mollie suddenly, her eyes sparkling, "I may be mistaken, but I think she wants a race!"
Then began some fun that was novel and exciting even to the Outdoor Girls, who thought they had tried just about every sport there was.
Mollie bent her straight little back over the steering wheel, gave her more power and the big car fairly flew ahead, lessening perceptibly the distance between it and the racer.
However, Betty, looking behind, seemed not in the least concerned. On the contrary, she waved her hand joyously as she recognized Mollie had taken her challenge. Then she too bent over the wheel with her eyes glued to the flying ribbon of road ahead.
"Betty, Betty, stop it!" cried Grace, holding frantically to her hat and the side of the car. "Suppose we should m-meet somebody—a wagon or a m-machine."
"So much the worse for it," retorted Betty gayly. "You keep your eye on Mollie, Gracie dear, and tell me whether she's gaining—that's a good girl."
"If you think I'm going to help you break our necks—" Grace sputtered, but Betty cut her short.
"Well, if you don't I will have to look for myself," she said, adding maliciously: "And then we will have a smash-up!"
Grace groaned and looked behind her.
"They're gaining," she cried, and then all at once the spirit of the thing caught her—the contest of speed was getting into her blood. "Oh, Betty, don't let 'em," she almost screamed, above the noise of the motor and the rushing wind. "They're not more than fifty feet behind now!"
Betty gave her a swift look, smiled to herself, and once more fixed her dancing eyes on the road ahead.
"All right," she crowed. "Just watch me run away from them. I wouldn't have had the heart," she added with a chuckle, "if Mollie hadn't brought it all on herself."
"But they're still gaining," insisted Grace nervously, trying to look behind, ahead, keep her seat, hat, and dignity all at the same time. "Look, Betty, they're only about thirty feet behind!"
"That's near enough," Betty decided, and leaning over suddenly, did something to the car that Grace never quite understood. Anyway, it had the desired effect. The little racer fairly leapt forward and, like a horse that has been given hishead for the first time, took the bit between its teeth and bolted.
Behind them Mollie looked her amazement. She was getting every bit of speed out of her machine of which it was capable, and then, just as victory was within sight, Betty was doing an inconceivable, unbelievable thing—she was winning the race!
Mrs. Ford and Amy had been enjoying the race tremendously, but now they leaned forward in surprise.
"Goodness, she's beating us," cried Amy.
"No!" snapped Mollie sarcastically. "Who would have supposed it?"
"Perhaps it is because Betty's car is so much lighter," suggested Mrs. Ford consolingly. "We have all the luggage and wraps, too."
"Oh, that wouldn't make so much difference," denied Mollie, who was too good a sportsman to make excuses for herself. "Betty's racer has the speed, that's all."
"Well, they're just about out of sight now," said Amy, leaning back resignedly. "I only hope Betty doesn't run into anything and have a smash-up. She hasn't driven a car as much as you, Mollie."
"Oh, Betty'll take care of herself," said Mollie, though she was slightly mollified by this tribute toher superior experience, if not superior speed. "I guess," she added, after a moment's reflection, "I'd better sell this old car and get a racer too."
Mrs. Ford laughed softly, the first time she had laughed or thought of laughing since receiving the news of Will's being wounded.
"Don't go back on an old friend for its first offence, Mollie," she chided, adding diplomatically: "A racing car is just fine for speed, but I think your automobile is much more sociable and comfy."
"Well, I'm glad there's something nice about it," said Mollie, for she had not yet recovered from her surprise and chagrin. "I hope," she added, as a sudden thought struck her, "that Betty doesn't get too far ahead. I don't know this part of the country very well and Betty has the map."
"That will be the next thing," said Amy, with a sigh, and Mollie looked at her sharply.
"What?" she demanded.
"Why, that we'll get lost," Amy explained. "Wasn't that what you meant?"
"Oh, I hope not," said Mrs. Ford, a little anxiously. "Perhaps we'll be able to see them when we round this curve, Mollie."
But they rounded several curves, and still no sign of Betty's car. Then happened what Mollie had secretly been fearing would happen. Theycame to a crossroads and a sudden stop at one and the same moment.
"Now, what?" queried Amy, in the tone of resignation that never failed to rub Mollie the wrong way. "Something the matter with the engine?"
"No, the engine's all right," snapped Mollie, adding, irritably: "But everything else is all wrong."
"What, for instance?" queried Mrs. Ford soothingly. She knew that the first defeat Mollie had ever experienced would be bound to rankle and was prepared to make allowances. "If the engine is all right, why don't we go on?"
"Which way?" queried Mollie, spreading out her arms with a hopeless gesture. "There are two roads, one looks as good as the other, and we haven't the slightest idea in the world which to take."
"Oh!" gasped Amy.
Mrs. Ford gave a low whistle as she saw the fix they were in.
"Then if Betty doesn't realize our predicament and come back pretty soon, we'll either have to stay here indefinitely, or go back the way we came, is that it?"
"Yes," nodded Mollie, adding truthfully and more than a little anxiously: "Only I'm not quitesure I know just how we came. As I said, this is unfamiliar country to me."
Amy groaned.
"Then we shall be lost for fair," she said. "Oh, why did Betty do such a foolish thing?"
Mollie was about to retort when a cloud of dust in the distance and a faint chug-chug made her swallow her words.
"What's that?" she cried. "It sounds like a motor. I wonder—"
"Yes, it is!" cried Amy, straining her eyes to see through the cloud of dust. "It's only a little car, and it's coming at about ninety miles an hour."
At this reference to Betty's speed, Mollie winced a little but gave a relieved sigh nevertheless. For by this time the car was near enough to be identified beyond doubt. It was a racer, and there was a girl at the wheel.
A few moments later Betty herself, with a grin, hailed them.
"Hello," she cried, adding as the car slowed to a standstill: "This time the joke's on us. We were so busy running away from you that we took the wrong road. This one ends about two miles up in somebody's farm."
"It's lucky something stopped you," said Mollie dryly, adding as she cocked one eye at the sun:"Well, let's be getting along. We'll have to hurry and make up for lost time."
"Do you still want to get ahead of us?" asked Betty, as a moment later she swung her car into the right road. "Because if you do—"
"Go on," cried Mollie, exasperated, yet beginning to laugh, for after all Mollie was a good loser. "Some way or other I'll get even with you, Betty Nelson. Meanwhile hustle!"
And Betty hustled, with Mollie keeping just far enough behind to avoid the cloud of dust the little car threw up. For an hour more the motors purred rhythmically, eating up mile after mile, until finally the girls were compelled by ravenous and healthyappetitesto stop for lunch.
They had brought two big hampers, packed full with sandwiches, fruit and cake and also something to drink, and after the long ride in the open the very thought of these delicacies brought, as Grace said, "the tears of longing to their eyes."
As Mrs. Ford handed one of the baskets over the seat to Mollie in front, Betty and Grace tumbled out of their car and came running toward them.
"Are you going to get out and eat, in romantic fashion, by the wayside?" queried Grace, eyeing a pile of sandwiches hungrily. "Or are you goingto sit in state in the car and let us occupy the running board?"
"We'll give you one of the hampers," offered Mrs. Ford, but Mollie gasped in dismay.
"Oh, please don't," she begged. "Don't you see—there are only two of them to our three. And you want to give them half the lunch!"
They laughed at her, and Betty offered a solution.
"Far be it from us to rob you, Honey," she said soothingly. "We'll sit right here on this rock—"
"Oh, goodness! who cares where we sit as long as we get something," groaned Grace. "Mollie, I'm dying."
"Well as long as you die out there it's all right," retorted Mollie unfeelingly. Nevertheless, she handed the sufferer a ham sandwich and a hard boiled egg, which the latter came as near to grabbing as her good breeding would permit.
However, when they had finished the lunch, burned up what odds and ends remained, and had once more started on their way, they found that the shadow of unhappiness which the excitement of the race had almost banished, was returning again.
In front with Betty, Grace sighed so dolefully that the Little Captain looked at her inquiringly,an action which almost brought about a collision with a tree by the wayside.
"Betty, what are you doing?"
"Trying to kill us," replied Betty serenely. "And if you give any more sighs like that, I'll do it."
"I didn't know I sighed," said Grace gloomily. "But it wouldn't be any wonder if I did. I feel as if I were made up of them—sighs, I mean."
Betty was silent a moment, then she asked suddenly:
"When does your father expect to hear from Washington?"
"Not before the end of the week, anyway. And by that time," Grace paused to control the trembling of her lips, "nobody knows what may have happened. For all we know Will may be—dead."
"Well, we've been making pretty good speed for the last three hours," said Mollie, taking first one hand, then the other, from the steering wheel and stretching her cramped fingers experimentally. "Now if nothing else happens—"
The sound of an explosion cut short the rest of the sentence, and she put on the brakes, at the same time tooting a signal to Betty. The latter stopped her car and came running back to see what had happened.
"Tire," said Mollie laconically, forestalling the inevitable questions. "I knew our luck had been too good to be true. Well," with the air of a martyracceptingthe inevitable, "I suppose there's nothing to do but get busy and fix it, though, of course, this spoils our chances of getting to Bensington to-night," Bensington being the town midway between Deepdale and Bluff Point where they had planned to spend the night. It was also the only town for miles around that boasted a hotel.
"Oh, I don't know," said Betty in reply to Mollie's gloomy prediction. "It won't be the first time we've accomplished the impossible."
"But it will soon be dark."
"Goodness! it won't be dark for hours and hours," Betty laughed at her. "And this oughtn't to take us more than half an hour at the longest. Come on now, let's get busy."
Thus inspired, the girls "got busy," but they were tired with the long drive and everything seemed to go wrong. Their usually skillful fingers fumbled, the tire was "too big or too little or something," to quote Amy, and at the end of a quarter of an hour's useless struggle their tempers were worn to a frazzle and they were ready to cry.
"Well, I never had anything act like that before," cried Mollie irritably. "I'd like to give the person that wrote about the 'depravity of inanimate things' a medal. The old tire's got a mean disposition, that's all."
"Well, it isn't the only one," Grace was beginning, when Mollie turned and glared at her.
"If you mean me—"
"I meant all of us," Grace explained. "As long as we have been going together, this is the first time I can remember when all of us have been in the doleful dumps at once."
This brought a reluctant smile even to Mollie's gloomy countenance, and Betty laughed merrily.
"Perhaps it's just as well," said the Little Captain, adding with a chuckle: "It's the same way with onions—if everybody eats 'em, no one can notice the unpleasantness in the other fellow."
This brought a real laugh, and Mollie said fondly:
"I always knew you were a 'philosophiker,' Betty, dear. But," she added, vindictively kicking the tire that lay at her feet, "all the philosophy in the world won't put this tire on for us. And we can't very well get to Bensington on three wheels and a rim."
"No!" cried Grace, sarcastically. "Who would have guessed it?"
Mollie started to retort, but the threatened resumption of hostilities was cut short by the sound of a motor in the distance.
"Hark!" cried Mollie, a dramatic hand raised to a listening ear. "Do I hear the approach of an angel?"
"If you do, he has a pretty earthly means of transportation," laughed Betty. "To me, it sounds like a machine or a motorcycle."
"How can you?" cried Mollie, still dramatically poised. "It is an angel, I tell you, come to help us out of our predicament."
"It is a motorcycle," cried Amy excitedly. "The engine is making too much noise for an automobile."
"Well," suggested Mrs. Ford quietly, "whoever it is, I think it might be a good idea to get out of the middle of the road."
"But if we do," Grace protested, "he'll go right past us."
"And if we don't we'll get run over," added Mrs. Ford.
The girls looked at each other helplessly.
"I tell you," cried Betty suddenly, her eyes sparkling with a new idea. "Give me that old red rag we use for a duster, Mollie, and I'll go and signal your angel."
"Betty, you'll do no such thing," cried Amy, shocked, while Mollie dug under the seat for the improvised signal flag. "Think of signaling a strange man!"
"But you forget he's an angel in disguise," laughed Betty, snatching the dust cloth Mollie held out to her. "Anyway," she added, over her shoulder, "desperate cases require desperate remedies," and was off round the turn of the road.
There wasn't much time to spare either, for when she had clambered up on a rock by the side of the road, the motorcyclist was only a few hundred feet away.
At the unexpected sight of a red rag wildly waved by a very graceful little figure in a gray traveling suit, he looked surprised but promptly put on his brakes. He leapt from his machine and came running toward her while Betty descended from her perch just in time to meet him at the foot of the rock.
"Is there anything the matter?" he asked, in a nice voice that Betty immediately liked. In fact, she liked nearly everything about him, from his sunburned face and merry blue eyes to his trim leather boots and puttees. So she gave him a friendly little smile that showed all her dimples, much to his secret admiration.
"Why, yes, there is," she answered, adding with a chuckle: "If there hadn't been, I shouldn't have been perched on that old rock, waving a ridiculous red dust rag!"
Then, as they made their way around the turn in the road toward the car where Mrs. Ford and the girls were waiting for them, she explained the situation, adding with another smile: "You see, I had to stop you some way, so I chose the very first method I could think of."
"It certainly was effective," he answered, smiling.
Then after mutual introductions, by which the girls learned that their new friend's name wasJoe Barnes and that he had been on his way to Deeming, a village about five miles away when Betty's red flag had brought him to so sudden a stop, the youth went to work with a will at the tire while the girls alternately watched him and helped by handing him the tools he needed.
In what seemed no time at all to the girls he had finished his task and had pulled out a handkerchief and was wiping his begrimed hands with it.
"My, you did do that in a hurry!" sighed Mollie, patting the new tire happily. "You did in fifteen minutes what five of us couldn't do in half an hour."
"You were probably tired," he answered, glancing at the car, which gave unmistakable evidence of the many miles they had come that day. "Are you, have you—" he hesitated, evidently not knowing whether his question would be taken in good part or not. "Are you going very much farther?"
"Only about a hundred miles," laughed Betty, then added in answer to his startled glance: "Not to-night, though. We are just going as far as Bensington."
"But Bensington is about fifteen miles away," he protested, adding as he glanced up at a lowering gray cloud overhead: "And if I know anything about weather signs, you will have to use some speed to get there before the storm."
"The storm!" they cried simultaneously, following his glance, while Mollie added petulantly:
"Goodness, haven't we had enough troubles for one day without getting a drenching into the bargain?"
"But we haven't got the drenching yet," Mrs. Ford reminded her, adding, with a cordial smile as she held out her hand to Joe Barnes: "We don't know how to thank you Mr. Barnes, for taking all this trouble for us."
"Please don't," he begged, flashing his nice smile upon them. "I am only too glad to have been of assistance. And now, if I might suggest—"
Another glance at the ominous cloud which had grown bigger and blacker even in these few minutes, sent the girls scrambling unceremoniously to their seats while Joe Barnes lifted his hat and stood waiting for them to start. Once his eyes rested upon Betty, and there was so much undisguised admiration in them that she flushed prettily and threw in the clutch with a jerk that was not at all skillful.
"Good-bye," they called, and "good-bye," he answered, as the two cars sprang forward in a cloud of dust. Not until they were out of sightdid Joe Barnes turn away and retrace his steps toward his deserted motorcycle.
"Joe, my boy," he communed with himself, shaking his head over the memory of Betty's dimples, "that little Miss Nelson is one girl in a million. I wonder now," slowly mounting his machine and looking reflectively at the road in front of it, "why I didn't ask if I might call." Then the absurdity of the idea made him laugh at himself. "What nonsense to think of taking advantage of an accident—Where was it they said they were stopping for the night? Oh, yes, Bensington. Well, he might go there and take a chance on seeing them—her. Fate might even be kind to him and burst some more tires!" Then he laughed at himself again and started his motor.
Meanwhile Grace, who had noticed Joe Barnes' expressive glance in Betty's direction and the latter's subsequent confusion, commented upon the coincidence.
"Goodness, Betty," she drawled lightly, "I always knew you were a heart breaker, but I never saw you make a conquest in so short a time. Half an hour and—poof—it's all over but the shouting."
Betty gave an annoyed little laugh.
"Don't be foolish, Gracie," she commandedadding reflectively as she skillfully avoided a rock in the road: "He was awfully nice looking though, and pleasant."
"Of course!"
"But I couldn't help wondering," Betty went on, as though talking to herself, "why he was here at all when his country needs him."
"Um—yes, that was rather strange," mused Grace. "One isn't used to seeing a young, good-looking and apparently healthy boy on this side of the water these days, unless he's in khaki. I wonder if our knight by the wayside is by any chance one of those insects we term—"
"Slackers?" finished Betty, adding in quick defense: "No, I'm quite sure he isn't that kind. You know we have had a good chance to study both types, and he doesn't look like a slacker."
"Granted," agreed Grace, adding with a quick change of mood: "Just the same, it makes me feel desperate to see any young fellow running at his own free will about the country, evidently enjoying life, while our boys are giving up everything—"
"But, if Joe Barnes isn't a slacker," Betty reminded her gently, "he is probably passionately envying our boys the right to 'give up everything'."
"Perhaps," replied Grace, eyes fixed moodilyupon the flying landscape. "But when I think of Will—"
For a long time there was silence. Then Betty gave a little start and regarded with disfavor a big drop that rested on the third finger of her right hand. She immediately resigned the guidance of the car to her left hand while she held up the right for Grace's inspection.
"What's the matter with it?" queried the latter, who had been engrossed in her not too happy meditations.
"Rain," cried Betty succinctly, adding with a whimsical little smile: "I don't know whether Joe Barnes is a slacker or not, but I do know he's a good prophet. We surely shall have to put on some speed if we want to reach Bensington before the storm!"
"You don't mean it's raining!" cried Grace, holding out a hand to see for herself. "Oh, dear, and we have several miles to go before we even reach the outskirts of Bensington. What shall we do now?"
"I don't know," answered Betty, while a worried frown wrinkled her pretty forehead. "I don't know just how far out we are. Oh, there's a signboard. What does it say, Gracie? You can read it better than I."
"Ten miles to Bensington," Grace read, leaning far out of the car. "Oh Betty, we can't possibly make it! Listen to that!"
"That" was an ominous rumble of thunder, and Betty's pretty forehead puckered still more.
"Well, we can at least put the top up," she said practically. "That will keep the worst of it off anyway, and if we hurry we may have a chance of beating it yet."
Betty brought the car to a stop, jumped out on the road with Grace at her heels, and waited forMollie to come up. They had not long to wait for a moment later Mollie stopped her car with a grinding of brakes and came running up to her chums.
"I was wondering how long you were going to ignore the warnings of nature," she said, with a little grimace. "That cloud has been growing with horrible rapidity for the last five minutes. What are your plans, Captain?" and she favored Betty with a true military salute.
"I wish I had some," said the latter, cocking a still more anxious eye at the threatening cloud. "And all I've been able to think of so far is the very original idea of putting up the top."
"And side curtains," supplemented Mollie, with a chuckle. "Strange as it may seem, even I have been favored with that inspiration."
"Well, let's get busy," suggested Amy, with practical, though slangy, emphasis. "We're apt to get drowned while we stand here talking."
It was easy to see by the way they went to work that the girls agreed with her. Even Mrs. Ford gave willing, though inexperienced, aid, and in a very short time they had lifted the tops, adjusted the side curtains and made all snug for the expected downpour.
Nor did they have very much time to spare. While they had been working, the thunder hadgrown louder and more insistent and now the rain began to fall in earnest.
"Duck!" cried Betty inelegantly, and they ran for shelter.
"Well," said Betty, as she pressed the self-starter and the engine purred evenly, "it's bad, but it might be a good deal worse. We can't get wet unless it's an unusually heavy downpour."
"Oh, it isn't getting wet that bothers me so much," said Grace, and Betty looked at her in surprise. "It's the roads," she added by way of explanation. "I've heard Aunt Mary say that they have terribly heavy storms in this part of the country, and sometimes in half an hour the roads get almost impassable. Many a machine has been known to sink three or four inches in mud, and sometimes they get in so deep they have to be hauled out."
"What a cheerful prospect!" cried Betty, dismayed, adding, as the rain beat against the windshield in steady, driving sheets: "Especially as this storm bids fair to be a record breaker. Look how muddy the roads are already."
"And we haven't passed more than two or three wagons all the way out," wailed Grace. "And they didn't look strong enough to pull a toy machine out. Oh, Betty, look out!"
The admonition was occasioned by a seeminglysudden wild desire on the part of the car to stand on two wheels while it waved the other two spinningly in the air.
Betty, though undeniably frightened, succeeded in persuading the erring wheels to the muddy road again. Then she slackened her speed and began to laugh hysterically.
"I don't see anything to laugh about," protested Grace, still breathless with apprehension.
"Neither do I," admitted Betty, adding whimsically. "But I had either to laugh or cry, so I decided to laugh. After all, you must admit, it was a wonderful skid."
"The best of its kind," admitted Grace dryly. "But please don't try it again, Honey, it has a wearing effect on my nerves!"
They were silent for a while after that, while Betty regarded the increasingly muddy road ahead of her with anxious eyes. She had been forced to slacken her speed more and more until now they were barely crawling along.
"I'm afraid we're in an awfully tight fix," she said at last. "We're just plowing through this mud, and if it's hard on us, what must it be for Mollie, whose car is twice as heavy as this. Look behind, will you, Gracie, and see how she's coming along?"
"She is just coming, and that's all," reportedGrace, after a prolonged scrutiny through the rain-glazed window. "Goodness, we've been out in storms before, but I never saw anything like this. And listen to that thunder—o-oh!"
A terrific clap of thunder caused Grace to clap her hands over her ears with a little moan, while even steady-nerved Betty jumped in her seat and took a tighter grip of the steering wheel.
"Oh, what shall we do!" cried Grace, for she hated a thunderstorm worse than she hated anything else on earth. "We can't go on this way, Betty. We're likely to get struck any moment."
"Well, I don't see that we'll be any less likely to get struck if we stand still," retorted Betty, a little sharply, for the situation was becoming wearing, to say the least. "If you can suggest any way that we can get out of this fix—" the sentence was cut short by a still louder and more terrifying clap of thunder.
Grace huddled in her seat, miserably trying not to die of fright.
"Is Mollie still following us?" asked Betty, after an interval of weird flashes, crashing thunder, and rain beating relentlessly against the glass in front and turning the road to a sea of mud. "If she should get stuck I don't know what we would do."
"Yes, she's still struggling," replied Grace."But it's getting so dark I can't more than just make out the lines of the car. Oh, Betty, don't you suppose we must be pretty close to Bensington?"
"No, I don't," Betty replied wearily. "You see how we've been traveling—not more than a snail's pace, and it won't be very long before we shall have to stop altogether. I'm surprised that Mollie has been able to keep going so long. You will have to keep your eye on her all the time, now, Grace, since it is getting so dark. We don't want to lose her."
"But," Grace suggested hesitantly, "I don't see that we could do them very much good by staying here with them, if they do get stuck. Wouldn't it be better to go on and try to make Bensington? Then we could send help back to them."
"I've thought of that," said Betty simply, "and it would work all right provided we did manage to reach Bensington. But the probability is that we would be forced to stop a little further on, and I must say I don't exactly enjoy the prospect of spending the night alone on this deserted road."
Grace shivered, but answered with a nervous little laugh: "I don't know but what we would be safe enough at that. If we can't get through, probably nobody else could."
"Just the same," said Betty decidedly, "I think I would rather cling to the old theory that there is safety in numbers. Besides, probably your mother would rather decide that for us. Are they still coming, Grace?"
"Goodness, you remind me of Bluebeard's wife," Grace laughed hysterically. "I thought you were going to say, 'Sister Anne, Sister Anne, do you see a man'?"
"Well, I see something better than a man," cried Betty suddenly, straining her eyes through the darkness and the streaming windshield. "Grace honey, do my eyes deceive me, or is that a light?"
"A light!" cried Grace excitedly. "Oh, Betty, where—wait—yes, I see it! It is a light! And there's another! Two lighted windows! Betty, honey, we're saved!"
"It's a house!" cried Betty jubilantly, while the hand that held the steering wheel shook with relief. "You darling, wonderful house. Gracie, dear, I think it showed on the horizon just in the nick of time. Look behind once more."
"Yes, they're still coming. Oh, if they only don't get stuck in front of the door!"
"Don't be a goose, Gracie," chided Betty, feeling in hilarious spirits now that the end of their trouble was in sight. "You ought to get downon your knees in thankfulness that there is a front door to get stuck in front of!"
"Oh, is that so?" mocked Grace, her own spirits reviving at the prospect of relief. "Well, I'm thankful enough, but I certainly don't intend to get down on my knees about it. There isn't room in here and you can see it's too muddy outside!"
Two minutes later Betty swung the little car from the, by this time, almost impassable road on to a gloriously graveled driveway that led up to the hospitably lighted house.
"Now, if whoever lives here will only let us in," she sighed, as she stopped the car and glanced behind to be sure Mollie was following them, "we'll have nothing left to ask for."
"Except something to eat," amended Grace hungrily. "I thought I had eaten enough lunch to last me a week, but I see I'm muchly mistaken. What shall we do, Betty?" as the latter started to open the curtain and closed it quickly again as the rain beat in upon them. "We are apt to get soaked just running that little distance to the porch."
"And the umbrellas are all wrapped up in the back of Mollie's car," lamented Betty, then added, with sudden decision: "I guess unless we want to sit here all night we'd better chance it. I for oneam so hungry I'd be willing to brave more than a rain for the sake of something to eat."
"I'd say so!" groaned Grace, again reminded of her own state of starvation. "You get out your side Betty and I'll get out mine and we'll make a quick dash for it."