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diff --git a/14136-0.txt b/14136-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f1e6a65 --- /dev/null +++ b/14136-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5677 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14136 *** + +THE OUTDOOR GIRLS AT THE HOSTESS HOUSE + +Or, Doing Their Best for the Soldiers + +by + +LAURA LEE HOPE + +Author of _The Outdoor Girls of Deepdale_, _The Moving Picture Girls_, +_The Bobbsey Twins_, _Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue_, _Six Little +Bunkers at Grandma Bell's_, etc. + +Illustrated + +New York +Grosset & Dunlap +Publishers + + + + + + + + * * * * * + + +BOOKS FOR GIRLS + +BY LAURA LEE HOPE + + +12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. + + +THE OUTDOOR GIRLS SERIES + + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS OF DEEPDALE + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS AT RAINBOW LAKE + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS IN A MOTOR CAR + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS IN A WINTER CAMP + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS IN FLORIDA + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS AT OCEAN VIEW + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS ON PINE ISLAND + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS IN ARMY SERVICE + THE OUTDOOR GIRLS AT THE HOSTESS HOUSE + + + +THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS SERIES + + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS AT OAK FARM + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS SNOWBOUND + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS UNDER THE PALMS + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS AT ROCKY RANCH + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS AT SEA + THE MOVING PICTURE GIRLS IN WAR PLAYS + + + +THE BOBBSEY TWINS SERIES +(Twelve Titles) + + + +THE BUNNY BROWN SERIES +(Eight Titles) + + + +SIX LITTLE BUNKERS SERIES +(Five Titles) + + + +Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, New York + + * * * * * + + + + +THE OUTDOOR GIRLS AT THE HOSTESS HOUSE + +CONTENTS + + CHAPTER + I HERO WORSHIP + II THE ACCIDENT + III THE SHADOW OF MYSTERY + IV MRS. SANDERSON'S STORY + V FUN AND SOLDIERS + VI PLANNING CAPTURE + VII A LARK IN THE OPEN + VIII ENTER SERGEANT MULLINS + IX THE BAYONET DRILL + X ALARMING SYMPTOMS + XI POLITE KIDNAPPERS + XII WHERE LOVE IS DEAF + XIII THE COPPERHEAD + XIV THE REINS TIGHTEN + XV THE FATEFUL DAY + XVI SPARRING FOR TIME + XVII TEARS AND PATRIOTISM + XVIII AFTER THE BOYS LEFT + XIX REAL TRAGEDY + XX THE MOTORCYCLIST AGAIN + XXI THE CHASE + XXII STARTLING DEVELOPMENTS + XXIII THE MIRACLE + XXIV MYSTERY EXPLAINED + XXV TO "CARRY ON" + + + + + +CHAPTER I + +HERO WORSHIP + + +"Oh, Mollie, please be careful!" + +The big car skidded perilously around a sharp curve and chug-chugged +merrily down the road. + +"Goodness, I've been careful so long I'm afraid it will grow on me," +Mollie Billette, sometimes known as "Billy," retorted, a determined set to +her pretty chin. "Someway, I've got to get it out of my system." + +The automobile, a big seven-passenger car, belonged to Mollie, and the +four Outdoor Girls, having secured a half-holiday from their work at the +Hostess House, were out for recreation. + +As may have been gathered, Mollie was driving. Amy Blackwell, fearful of +an accident, was in the seat beside her, while Grace Ford and Betty +Nelson, their beloved Little Captain, occupied the tonneau and amused +themselves by laughing at Amy's fears. + +"Well, but you needn't take it out on us," Amy said in reply to Mollie's +assertion. "If you're going to take many more of those two-wheel turns, +I'm going to get out and walk. Oh, Mol-lie!" The speech ended in a wail, +as Mollie wickedly rounded another curve, jolting Amy half out of her +seat. + +"I don't know but what I agree with Amy," drawled Grace, from the tonneau, +helping herself to a chocolate, upon which Betty's eye had just rested +longingly. "I've been bumped around so much I can't tell whether I'm a +girl or a scrambled egg. Now, look what you did!" A sudden lurch of the +big car had sent the box of chocolates to the floor, where its contents +rolled about aggravatingly at their feet. "Come back here, Mollie +Billette, and pick them up. That's the least--" + +The rest of the sentence was never uttered, for Mollie brought the car to +so sudden a stop that Grace and Betty both lurched forward and narrowly +escaped bumping their noses on the back of the seat in front of them. + +"Sure," said the reckless driver, turning her bright black eyes +expectantly upon them. "Will you promise to give me all I pick up?" + +"All you--" Grace was beginning, striving desperately to recover her +breath and her dignity at the same time, the accomplishment of which feat +was decidedly retarded by growing indignation. "Goodness, I never heard +such a--" + +"Very well," returned Mollie, and, without deigning to parley further, +turned determinedly to the wheel. "That's all I wanted to know--" + +"Just a minute, Mollie, dearest," Betty's laughing voice broke in. "You +know I'm not worrying about the chocolates at all, but I'm not +particularly anxious to spoil my perfectly good shoes with crushed +chocolate or, on the other hand, frump my perfectly good nose in a vain +attempt to pick them--" + +"Which, candy or shoes?" Mollie broke in impishly. + +"Candy," answered Betty soberly. "As I was saying, neither of these +alternatives appeal to me, so, with your kind permission, I would beg you +to hold your horses--" + +"As the vulgar herd would say," again murmured Mollie. + +"Exactly--as the vulgar herd would say," agreed Betty, dimpling adorably, +"--until we have a chance to collect the scattered sweets." + +"You win," Mollie capitulated, speaking in a tone reserved for the "Little +Captain." "Only please make Grace hurry or the afternoon will be over +before she begins." + +"Goodness, listen to it--" Grace was beginning, straightening indignantly +from her stooping posture and preparing once more to enter the fray. "When +it's all her fault, anyway--" But Betty upset both speech and dignity by +unceremoniously pulling her down again. + +"Come on! Hurry, Gracie!" she commanded. "And don't overlook any, because +there's nothing so messy as a chocolate--" + +"As if there were any chance of Grace's overlooking a chocolate!" scoffed +Mollie. "Why, all she has to do is whistle to 'em and they come rolling up +obediently." + +"Goodness, who'd want them anyway, after they've rolled around and picked +up all the dust and millions of germs from the bottom of the car?" +grumbled Grace, cross at having to exert herself to even so small an +extent. Grace, as my old readers doubtless remember, had been born with an +ease-loving disposition that not even close association with the other +Outdoor Girls had served to change. Perhaps, as Mollie had once remarked, +that was why the girls were so fond of her--because she was "so +different." + +"Well, if you don't want 'em," Mollie replied practically, "why didn't you +agree to my proposition? I promised to eat them for you, germs and all, +and all I got for my sacrifice was one withering glance--" + +"At that you're lucky," Grace retorted, straightening up from a spirited +chase of the last elusive chocolate, red of face and fierce of eye. "Some +time I'll come to the end of my patience, and then, Mollie Billette, you'd +better look out." + +"My!" chuckled Betty, "isn't she fierce? Never mind, honey, Roy will give +you another box, if you ask him very prettily." + +"Goodness, if he can't do it without being asked," retorted Grace crossly, +"he can keep his old candies." + +"If I thought you meant that, I'd say you ought to be ashamed of +yourself," put in Amy, with unaccustomed spirit, as Mollie threw in the +clutch and the big car started off again. "Anybody that had been as good +to you as Roy has been--" + +"Well, I don't know that you've been particularly neglected," retorted +Grace, meaningly, while Amy reddened. "I never thought that Will could be +such a perfect Romeo." + +"Oh, dear," murmured Betty protestingly. "Can't we have just one good +time, without bringing the boys into it?" + +"Now, see who's talking," chuckled Mollie delightedly, changing into high +and driving with wild, care-free recklessness along the smooth road. "Oh, +Betty darling, much as I love you, there do come times when you make me +laugh." + +"Well, it's good to know I'm bringing happiness into some dark life," +retorted Betty good-naturedly. "At least I have not lived in vain." + +"And they were just mad," Mollie continued, as though talking to herself, +"when they found we were going off this afternoon without them." + +"Yes, and isn't it funny?" agreed Grace lazily. "They think they're so +important." + +"Well, they are," announced Amy suddenly, and even Mollie turned an amazed +eye upon her. + +"I think they're the most important people in the world," Amy continued +stoutly. "I guess if we were going to give up our lives for somebody else +we might think we were important, too." + +"Oh, I didn't mean that way," Mollie returned, her eyes once more turning +to the ribbon of road ahead while the girls' bright faces sobered +thoughtfully. "Because when it comes to a thing like giving up their +lives--well, I think they're the bravest--" Her voice broke, and in an +effort to hide her emotion she nearly sent the car over the side of the +road and into a six-foot ditch. + +"Brave," repeated Betty, turning her eyes to the far horizon to hide the +mist that suddenly gathered in them. "I don't think that's any word for +our boys at all--" + +"They don't seem to realize what they're going into," Amy broke in +eagerly. "Or, if they do, they won't talk about it, or let any one else--" + +"Oh, I guess it isn't that they don't realize it," Grace interrupted +thoughtfully. "You know my father always used to say that a man who never +knew what it was to be afraid wasn't really brave at all. He said it was +the man who was scared to death in his heart, that gritted his teeth and +went ahead and faced things anyway, that deserves all the credit." + +"I presume that's right," said the Little Captain, leaning forward +earnestly. "I don't suppose there is any one in the world who really +enjoys the thought of losing an arm or a leg, or being broken in health +for the rest of his life. I think what our boys are doing is just to take +the fear of that with a smile and go ahead gayly to face whatever may +come. Brave--" Her voice trailed off, and for a long time there was +silence while the big car hummed rhythmically along the road and the miles +swept by uncounted. + +"Of course, there are lots of people," Betty resumed after a while, "who +say the boys just enlisted for the love of adventure, the love of a good +fight, and I suppose that had something to do with it." + +"Of course it had," Mollie agreed. "And that's one thing that makes it +harder for us who have to stay at home and can't have any of the thrill +and excitement that helps to carry the boys through. But it's only one of +a dozen reasons, after all." + +"I wish we knew when they were going," said Grace, irrelevantly. "The +suspense is worse than anything else. It's like cutting a dog's tail off +an inch at a time." + +"Goodness, isn't she complimentary?" flung back Mollie, laughing. "You can +compare yourself to a four-footed dog, Grace, but please leave me out of +it." + +"Did you ever hear of a two-footed dog?" Grace retorted. + +"To change the subject," Betty interposed hastily, seeking to avoid a +storm. "Don't you think it's almost time to be turning back? We've gone +farther than--Oh, Mollie! Girls! Look!" + +They had rounded a curve in the road at their usual breakneck speed, and +Mollie stopped the car with a jolt that very nearly sent its occupants +flying into the roadway. + +Before them, not twenty yards away, a little figure in black lay huddled +in the road while the motorcyclist who had caused the accident, sped by +the girls, exhaust open and head lowered. + +Dazedly they gazed after machine and rider for a minute till they +disappeared round a turn in the road. Then, with a cry of dismay, Betty +tumbled out of the car, followed by the other girls. + +The prostrate figure in the road lay very, very still. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +THE ACCIDENT + + +"Betty, is she dead?" + +"Oh, I hope not," said Betty, white-faced and pitying, as she bent over +the little old woman. "That man ought to be hung! I'll loosen her collar. +And, Grace, see if you can find some water. Hurry, dear." + +And while the girls are ministering to the poor little victim of the +accident, the opportunity will be taken to tell new readers something +about the Outdoor Girls and their activities and adventures in other +volumes of this series. + +Betty Nelson, gay and fun-loving, possessed the natural gift of leadership +which had earned for her the title of "Little Captain." The girls adored +her and followed her unquestioningly wherever she led. + +Grace Ford was a graceful, tall, pretty girl with a decided and insatiable +fondness for chocolate candy. At the outbreak of the war, or rather, at +the time of America's entry into the war, her brother Will had caused her +great unhappiness by his failure to enlist with the other boys of her +acquaintance. The mystery had been satisfactorily explained later, +however, and when this story opens, Will was on his way to make a splendid +soldier in America's army of democracy. + +There was a bit of French blood in Mollie Billette, or "Billy," as the +girls sometimes called her. Bright black eyes which could, upon occasion, +snap fire and a rather unruly temper attested to this French ancestry. + +The last one of the quartette was Amy Blackford, quiet and retiring, but +given to occasional outbursts which never failed to surprise and delight +the girls. The mystery which at one time had surrounded her origin had +been cleared up some years before by the finding of Henry Blackford, her +long-lost brother. + +How the girls formed a camping and tramp club and the fun they had on +their interesting and adventurous tour, has been told in the first volume +of the series, entitled "The Outdoor Girls of Deepdale." + +After this the girls had many adventures, first at Rainbow Lake, to which +they went on another tour, this time in an automobile. From there they +went to a winter camp where they had many varied and exciting experiences +on skates and iceboats. Then followed a glorious trip to Florida, where +the girls braved many dangers and took thrilling trips into the wilds of +the interior. + +Their next adventure took them to Ocean View and centered about a +mysterious box they found in the sand. + +Then followed that glorious trip to Pine Island. An aunt of Mollie +Billette had turned her bungalow over to the Outdoor Girls for the summer. +During their strenuous adventures the girls had made many friends among +the boys and young men of Deepdale, and four of these had asked and been +granted permission by the girls to accompany them to Pine Island and pitch +their camp in the woods near by. + +One of the young men was Allen Washburn, a rising young lawyer and a great +admirer of Betty. Another was Will Ford, Grace's brother, and a third was +his high school chum, Frank Haley. The fourth, Roy Anderson, had been +drawn into the circle chiefly through his admiration for Grace. + +During that eventful summer on Pine Island the young people had +accidentally discovered a gypsy cave, concealed by underbrush, and had +succeeded not only in rounding up the band of gypsies but in recovering +several valuable articles that had been stolen from the girls. + +Their last adventure, related in the volume directly preceding this one, +and entitled "Outdoor Girls in Army Service," found the girls and boys +again at Pine Island, but under very much altered conditions. America had +entered the great World War and all the boys but Will Ford had +volunteered. Later, the boys were called to Camp Liberty, some distance +from Deepdale, and the girls conceived the plan of opening a Hostess House +for the benefit of the relatives and friends of the boys. The plan worked +out very satisfactorily. + +While still at Pine Island the girls and boys had come upon a suspicious +looking man in the woods. Upon finding himself discovered the man had made +his escape, but in his hurry had dropped a letter which the girls found to +their disgust was written in code. They decided that the man must have +been a German spy. + +At Camp Liberty the girls succeeded in rounding up the spy, and found, to +their surprise, that Will Ford, who was in the Secret Service, had been +engaged all that time in tracking him to earth. Will, having accomplished +his mission, immediately enlisted. + +Now, at the time this story opens, the girls were still at the Hostess +House and looking forward apprehensively to the time, now imminent, when +the boys would be ordered across the sea to fight for the country they +loved. + +"I'll go with Grace," volunteered Amy, in answer to Betty's request for +water. "I don't suppose we can find any, but we'll try." + +The two girls hurried off, leaving Mollie and Betty to loosen the woman's +collar and rub her cold hands. + +"Betty, Betty, is she dead?" Mollie was crying for perhaps the hundredth +time, when the woman herself answered the question by opening her eyes and +looking vacantly about her. + +"Who--are--you?" she queried faintly, struggling to rise. + +"Oh, please don't try to get up just yet," Betty pleaded, looking very +sweet and charming in her solicitude. "I don't think you're strong +enough--" + +But the woman seemed of a different mind, and made such a desperate effort +to raise herself that Betty had no alternative but to help her to her +feet. + +The girls supported the unsteady little figure while the dim old eyes +roved questioningly about. + +"I--got--hurt!" she gasped, and then quite suddenly fainted again. + +"Oh, Betty!" moaned Mollie, her face white with pity. "She's hurt worse, +much worse, than we thought she was! Oh, what shall we do?" + +"There's only one thing to do," replied Betty, trying to hide the tremor +in her voice. "We'll have to get her to the hospital, and in a hurry." + +"But Grace and Amy!" gasped Mollie. "We can't go without them." + +"We can at least get her into the car," Betty said, indicating the limp +little figure in the roadway. "You take her feet, Mollie, and I'll take +her head. We haven't spent all our lives outdoors for nothing." + +Between them they succeeded in carrying their burden to the car and +settled her gently in the tonneau. + +"Oh, if Grace and Amy would only come!" Mollie was crying distractedly +when the girls themselves burst through the underbrush, crying +despairingly that they had not been able to find water, that there was not +a house anywhere for miles around. + +But Betty cut their lamentations short and hurried them into the car. + +"But where do I come in?" gasped Grace, as Betty dropped into the back +seat beside the little old woman and took the poor unconscious head in her +arms. + +"Oh, anywhere," answered Betty indifferently, her mind on one object only. +"On the floor or on the roof or anywhere, only hurry. Now, Mollie dear, +drive as you never drove before." + +Mollie obediently threw in the clutch, and the heavy car shot forward, +throwing Grace to a seat on the floor where she fell with more haste than +dignity. + +Nobody noticed her, however, and even a growing bump on her forehead +received scant attention. All were too intent upon the matter at hand. + +At this spot the road was very narrow and on each side sloped down sharply +about ten or twelve feet to the level of the fields. It seemed almost an +impossibility to turn the car in that narrow space without precipitating +it down either one or the other of the steep banks. + +After many fruitless attempts and barely escaped tragedies, however, +Mollie finally succeeded, and the car was sent flying down the white +stretch of road that led to Camp Liberty and the hospital. + +"Oh, I hope we'll get there in time," Amy murmured over and over again, +and kept looking at the pathetic little victim. "Is she still breathing, +Betty? Are you sure?" + +To this Betty always nodded in the affirmative, her little mouth grimly +set, her eyes fixed steadily ahead, as though she would draw their +destination nearer to them by the very force of her desire. + +"I wonder," Mollie flung back at them from between clenched teeth, "what +that motorcyclist looked like. I'd like to meet him again--with a firing +squad." + +"Why I saw him," came Grace's muffled voice from the floor of the car. + +"So did I," added Amy. + +"So you would recognize him again?" Mollie demanded eagerly, swerving the +car perilously near the edge of the road. + +"Are you sure?" added Betty, taking her eyes from the far horizon and +regarding Grace intently. + +Both girls nodded vigorously. + +"His head was down, of course," Amy continued, "but I'd know his face in a +minute if I saw it again. Eyes close together, long nose--" + +"And a little mustache," Grace finished eagerly. "The kind Percy Falconer +used to wear and we girls called an eyebrow on his lip." + +"He must have been a thing of beauty," commented Mollie. + +"He had the meanest kind of face," said Amy, with a little shudder. "The +kind you wouldn't like to meet on a dark night." + +"I should have judged as much from your description," said Betty dryly. +"There's one good thing about him--we ought to be able to recognize him +easily." + +"You talk as though you expected to meet him again," said Amy, looking at +her curiously. + +"I do," answered Betty determinedly. "Some time we're going to find that +fellow and make him pay for what he's done. Think of it!" she added, +turning upon them suddenly while her eyes flashed fire. "To run down a +helpless old woman in the road and then not even stop to find out whether +you've killed her or not! We'll find him if we have to search the country +for fifty miles around!" + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE SHADOW OF MYSTERY + + +The girls never forgot that mad ride to Camp Liberty. Mile after mile sped +by on wings, and it was not till they were on the outskirts of the town +itself that the victim of the accident showed signs of returning +consciousness. + +Then she sighed, moved her head a little restlessly on Betty's shoulder, +and opened her eyes. + +"Oh, dear," she said, faintly but so abruptly that Betty and Grace +started. "I knew I'd have--to do it--some day!" + +When the girls came to know her better they no longer wondered at her +quaint and unexpected sayings. But at the moment this queer statement, +coming as it did from one who they thought must be hovering at death's +door, rather startled them. + +"Wh--what?" stammered Betty, bewildered, while the others stared with wide +eyes. "What did you say?" + +"I said," replied the surprising old woman, in a stronger voice, trying +unsteadily to straighten herself in the seat and raising trembling hands +to her rather dilapidated old hat, "that I was sure to come to it some +day. There's a fate in such things." + +The girls looked at each other uncertainly, and into the minds of each +flashed the startled suspicion that perhaps the poor old soul was mentally +defective. Or, maybe, the accident-- + +The woman seemed to sense something of their bewilderment, and into her +eyes, still bright in spite of her age and what she had just gone through, +there came a twinkle--yes, a real twinkle. + +"No, I'm not crazy," she assured them, regaining her strength with amazing +quickness. "You see, it seemed kind o' funny to me after all these years +o' swearin' that I'd never ride in one o' these gasoline cars to find +myself in one after all,--and at my time o' life." + +The girls gasped with relief, but still had the strange feeling of one who +has been speeding over the water with all sails set and suddenly finds +herself in the midst of a dead calm. + +"B-but," stammered Amy, voicing the general sentiment, "we thought--were +afraid--you were hurt badly--" + +"Guess maybe I'd have thought so, too, if I'd had the chance," responded +the surprising old lady ruefully. "Pretty well mussed up, I guess, and +stunned. Shouldn't wonder if I found a heap o' bruises around me +somewhere--but no bones broke. You see," she added, as though imparting a +great secret, "the Sandersons' bones jest never was made to break. Now, +there was our cousins--the Petersons--they was different. One o' that +family wouldn't dare waggle his finger too hard for fear it would bust on +him. You see, they was just naturally made that way. My son, Willie," here +the brave voice lowered a trifle and tears rose to the bright old eyes, +"he used to call them in fun--always jokin', that boy was--the Break-bone +Petersons." + +"But are you sure you aren't hurt?" Betty insisted, still with that +curious feeling of having the wind taken out of her sails. "You see," she +added hastily, as the twinkle returned to the old woman's eyes, "we were +going to take you to the hospital, but if you are really sure there are no +bones broken, I think you would like the Hostess House better." + +"Hostess House?" repeated the old woman, her eyes widening with interest. +"Yes, I've heard a lot about those places. That's where the sweethearts +and mothers and wives of the soldier boys go, isn't it--to meet them--?" + +"Yes," Betty responded eagerly. "You see, that's what we are doing, +helping to make them feel at home. That's why we want you to come with us +now and stay there until you feel better." + +"But I'm not a mother, or a wife, or a sweetheart of any of those boys," +objected the little old woman, while the same cloud swept over her face, +leaving it wrinkled and old. "I--I might have been--if--if--Willie--" + +"But that doesn't make any difference," Grace assured her, speaking for +the first time and laying a white, soft hand over the knotted, wrinkled +one. "We want you to stay with us and rest while we try to find the man +who ran you down." + +"Oh, him!" cried the old woman scornfully, all the time patting Grace's +hand with gentle fingers. "There's no use wastin' time lookin' for him. +He'll make pretty sure that he won't be seen round these parts again--not +for some time, anyway. But you're dear, sweet little ladies," she added, +looking from Betty, whose arm still rested about her shoulders to Grace's +hand in hers and from them to the two girls in front. "You're awfully +sweet little ladies," she repeated, while the quick tears rose to her +eyes. "I don't see why you're bein' so kind to me--" + +"But we just love to do anything we can," broke in Betty quickly, for the +Outdoor Girls never liked to be thanked. "And we'd like so much to have +you see our Hostess House. That is, if you'd care to," she added, suddenly +remembering that the old woman might not be so helpless and alone as she +had seemed--might have made some other plans. But the latter quickly +reassured her. + +"Oh, I would like to, more than anything else in the world," she replied +eagerly, then, realizing that her fervor might astonish the girls, added +with a little forced laugh. "You see, it's a weakness o' mine. Maybe it's +because I'm getting old--but, the soldier boys--I can't seem to see enough +o' them--" + +"I don't think it's got anything to do with getting old," Mollie broke in +irrepressibly, "because I feel just that way about it myself. The more I +see, the more I want to see." + +The woman's eyes twinkled again. She was about to make some sort of +comment, but at that moment Mollie swung the car into the street leading +to the Hostess House, and the girls gave a little surprised exclamation at +finding themselves so nearly there. + +A few minutes later they were ushering their shabby little guest into the +comfortable alcove off the main reception room and settling her +solicitously in one of the cushion-filled window seats. + +It was astonishing to see how quickly their patient had recovered from the +accident. She seemed a little weak and unsteady as they helped her from +the car, but going up the steps to the Hostess House she resolutely +refused all assistance and mounted the porch alone. + +"Isn't she a darling?" Mollie had whispered to Grace as they brought up +the rear. "Did you ever see anybody of her age so full of life and +independence?" + +And it was that same sturdy independence and humor that endeared her to +the girls in the days that followed and made them willing to do anything +in their power to help her. + +There was some discussion at first as to where they could put their +unexpected guest, for all the rooms were full and a couple of unused +emergency cots seemed to be all the extra accommodations they could find. + +"I have it," cried Betty at last, with one of her inspirations. "Grace and +I will give up our room and bunk in with Amy and Mollie. That's where the +two extra cots will come in good." + +The idea was applauded enthusiastically, and it took only a short time of +scurrying about to put it into action. + +"But one thing we must remember," Betty cautioned the others, as they +surveyed their work with satisfaction. "We mustn't let our old lady guess +a word of what we've been doing." + +"Oh, no, we mustn't," agreed Amy in alarm. "She'd be just as apt as +anything to put on her hat and leave us without a word." + +"You know, it is going to be rather close quarters," sighed Grace, as they +turned to leave the room. "We won't be able to move without falling over +somebody's feet." + +"You needn't look at mine," Mollie retorted with spirit. "Why is it that +whenever you make a disparaging remark you never fail to look at me?" + +"That's easy," Grace returned with a twinkle. "All you have to do is to +look in your mirror--" + +"Oh dear, and I suggested it," mourned Betty, as they descended the stairs +arm in arm. "We'll have to give them the cots, Amy; it would be murderous +to let those two sleep together." + +"Ah, 'tis a deep, dark plot," cried Mollie, staggering dramatically and +almost falling downstairs. "I see it all--they get the bed while we, poor +wretches that we are, toss our uneasy bones upon the cot--" + +Amy screamed and Grace covered her ears. + +"Goodness, what do you think this is--a ghost's retreat?" demanded the +latter, while Betty chuckled joyfully. "'Toss our uneasy bones,' indeed!" + +"Does sound kind of grizzly, doesn't it?" Mollie admitted. "Just the same, +I wager that's what Betty intended." + +"Mollie, you wrong me!" cried Betty in dismay. "I was simply trying to +avoid a tragedy. But, if you're going to toss bones, anyway, you might as +well do it in comfort; so--" + +"Oh, you goose," cried Mollie affectionately, and in this manner they +entered the den where Mrs. Watson was entertaining, or being entertained +by, the little old woman. + +The girls immediately took possession of the latter and joyfully escorted +her to the upper floor to look over her new quarters. + +"My, isn't this fine!" exclaimed the guest, her face lighting up happily. +"A beautiful big bed and three fine windows to see the soldier boys from. +Are you sure," she added, glancing from one to the other of the four eager +faces suspiciously, "that I'm not putting you out? Because, if I am--" + +"Why of course you're not," Betty fibbed stoutly, adding, with a swift +change of subject: "But I'm sure now that you would like to rest. Look," +she added, with quick solicitude, as she saw how white the old lady had +become, "your hands are trembling--" + +"No, no, no," disclaimed the little old woman impatiently, as she gazed +with set face out of the window that faced upon the parade. "I'm a little +cold. And--that boy--" She pointed with quivering finger at a sturdy, +khaki-clad figure, swinging happily over the parade in the direction of +the mess-hall, "He--he reminded me--" + +"Yes," they cried, crowding about her solicitously, while Betty pushed a +chair toward the window and gently forced her into it. + +"He--he was--just like--" The slight form was shaking and the words forced +themselves from between her chattering teeth, "what my Willie boy would +have been now--if he hadn't--run away. My little son! My baby!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +MRS. SANDERSON'S STORY + + +Tears were not only in her eyes now, but running down her wrinkled old +face, and the girls, with the tears of real pity in their own eyes, +crowded closer about her. + +"Would it help," Betty suggested gently, "if you told us about it?" + +The old lady drew her gaze from the window and let it rest on the sweet, +sympathetic young face, and she nodded slowly. + +"I guess maybe it would," she agreed, taking a handkerchief from the +pocket in her dress and wiping her eyes. "You see, I never have told +anybody for years and years, and if it hadn't been for this war I suppose +I should have gone right on not telling anybody for the rest of my life. +Of course the Yates and Baldwins and all the folks that lived around us +knew it, so there was no use telling them--" Her voice trailed off and her +eyes sought the window with its vista of parade ground and low, roughly +built barracks buildings. + +The girls looked at her. Never in their lives, they thought, had they been +so thoroughly interested in anything as they were in the secret sorrow of +this gentle old lady, the sorrow that brought that strange cloud of +unhappiness every time she mentioned this son of hers who had run away. + +"He must have been a pretty ungrateful sort," thought Mollie resentfully, +"to have run away from a mother who loved him like that." + +Once more the old lady drew her eyes from the window and fixed them on the +circle of eager young faces. + +"I suppose young things like you couldn't be expected to understand," she +went on, "and yet perhaps you'll be interested more than other folks, +'count of your having met so many young boys." + +"Oh, we are interested," they cried in chorus, at which the old woman's +face lighted up and she went on with more cheerfulness. + +"Well, to begin with," she said, "we lived way at t'other end o' the +world. Danestown, it was called, and my husband--better man never +breathed--died when my little boy was only four years old. I wasn't so +young any more, for Willie was the youngest--the others had all died when +they was babies--and Willie's pa and me was getting along in years when +he come to us--the dearest, sweetest, prettiest baby you ever set your +eyes on. + +"Well, we had managed to save some little money, though 'twasn't over much +at best, and with me workin' on the farm week days and Sundays, we managed +to get along pretty well. An' I was savin' pennies--" Here the old voice +trembled and nearly broke, so that it was some minutes before the speaker +could go on. + +The girls tried hard to think of something to say, but as everything that +came to them sounded flat and inappropriate, they kept a sympathetic +silence--which was perhaps the best they could have done, after all. + +"As I was sayin'," the old voice continued after a while, "I was squeezin' +every little penny I could from the bare necessities to lay aside for the +boy. You see, it had been his father's wish that Willie should be given +the chance neither of us had ever had to get some schoolin' and have his +chance in the world. I was hopin' that by the time the boy grew up I might +maybe have enough to send him to college. + +"Of course," she added, with an air of apologizing for a weakness that +went straight to the girls' hearts, "they was only dreams. But I don't see +as there was any harm in them, seein's I always kept them to myself an' +never told anybody 'bout them--leastways, no one but Willie. + +"Sometimes, on a winter night when the snow was fallin' outside an' the +wind was howlin' round the house, I used to draw Willie up to the big, +open fireplace we had in the kitchen and tell him 'bout his pa an' how he +had always wished for Willie to be a fine, big man. + +"An' Willie, he'd listen with those big, earnest eyes o' his--such +beautiful eyes my Willie had--" Again the voice broke and trailed off into +silence while the girls sat and waited as before, only with a stronger +pity in their hearts for this faithful little old woman who had loved so +well--and lost. + +"An' then," the voice continued, more softly and dreamily than before, my +little boy would reach up and pat my cheek, just like his father used to +do, and seems like I can hear his voice now, just as plain as I did all +those long, long years ago. + +"'Maw,' he'd say, drawlin' a little in his cunnin' way, 'just don't you +worry. I'll do all those things, jest like pa said, an' then we'll go an' +live in a big house an' you won't have to work so hard any more--jest be +happy.' + +"An' then he'd take my hand that was coarse an' rough from workin' in the +field and rub his soft little cheek against it an' look up at me, an' +just smile--" + +There was a little sob from the spot where Amy was sitting cross-legged on +the floor, while the other girls were frankly and openly crying and not +even noticing it. + +"He--he must have been a darling!" cried Betty, unsteadily. + +"He was," answered the old lady simply. "It wasn't very long after that he +ran away, and I suppose"--again her eyes sought the parade ground--"if I +was to meet him now I maybe wouldn't know him. You see, I'd still be +lookin' for my little brown-eyed, yellow-haired Willie boy." + +"But what made him run away?" asked Mollie, rubbing her eyes furiously +with her handkerchief. "I shouldn't have thought--" + +"Neither would I," the strange little woman interrupted abruptly. "If he +hadn't had such a high spirit he never would. But--well, seem like I'm +gettin' ahead of my story. + +"You see, some o' the neighbors' children was a pretty wild lot an' they +always had a grudge against my boy 'cause he wouldn't join them in all +their escapades. + +"You see, Willie took a lot after his father. He used to just like to sit +and dream and read books you'd thought a little fellow like him couldn't +understand at all--he was just twelve when he ran away. + +"An' o' course these other boys, they didn't like him 'cause he was +different, an' they was always layin' the blame for all their pranks on +him. + +"But my Willie, it didn't bother him much. He used to tell me that as long +as he knew he didn't do it and I knew it, what other folks thought wasn't +worth worryin' 'bout--just his pa all over. + +"Only, I remember one time," the bent old form straightened up proudly and +the bright old eyes gleamed, "when the other boys started pushin' things +too far an' begun callin' my boy names--no names that a boy with any pride +in him would stand for--I heard them--they was jest around the back o' the +house, an' I came to the door with my mad up to the boilin' point, but +what I saw made me stop right short an' wait for what I knew was goin' to +happen. + +"Willie, he was sittin' on a log by the barn, jest wrapped up in a new +book he'd found, an' it was some time before just what those ragamuffins +was sayin' seeped in. When it did was when I came to the door, boilin' +with rage. + +"Very quiet, but with a sort o' bulldog set to that chin o' his, just +like his pa, he closed his book an' laid it down beside him. + +"'I'll be askin' you,' he said, drawlin' very marked and facin' the bully +o' the crowd that was at least two or three years older than he was--'I'll +be askin' you to say what you been sayin' all over again.' + +"The bully did, with trimmin's, an' Willie listened without turnin' a hair +till he got all through. + +"'Now,' he says, more quiet than ever--I can see him now, with his big +eyes blazin' black out o' his white face and his little hands that seemed +to me scarce more'n a baby's clenched tight at his side--'Now, I guess, I +got to lick you!' + +"An' he did!" + +"He beat him?" cried Mollie excitedly. "Oh, weren't you proud?" + +"I guess I was!" answered the little old woman, her eyes snapping with the +memory. "That was the day my boy showed what was in him, an' after that +the other boys never called him any more names. + +"But, o' course," she added, while the old cloud erased the glow from her +face, "that didn't keep the boys from wantin' to get even. + +"Well, then came the awful day when Abner Conway's barn burned an' Abner +himself came over to accuse my Willie of havin' started the fire, +bringin' with him two or three o' the boys who had tried to call Willie +names to swear they'd seen him do it. + +"O' course Willie denied it an' I backed him up by sayin'--an' there never +was truer word spoken--that Willie was with me before an' at the time the +barn took fire. + +"But it didn't do any good. Abner was ragin' because it meant considerable +loss to him, an' so much blame had been laid at Willie's door by the other +boys that he declared this time he was goin' to have him punished. + +"'I'll have the law on him!' he shouted, rampagin' round my kitchen like a +wild animal. I'll show that boy o' yours if he can go round settin' folks' +barns on fire an' not get come up with! I'll give him a taste o' what it +feels like to be behind bars. It's time somethin' was done, an', by Jerry, +I'm the one to do it!' + +"An' without another word he slammed out with those grinnin' imps that was +makin' all the trouble followin' at his heels. Well, there isn't very much +more to tell." + +Here she paused, the animation left her face and she looked pityfully old +and weary. Betty reached over and patted her hand, and finally she resumed +her story. + +"Abner kept his word and brought the sheriff around that same afternoon, +but they couldn't find Willie--he was gone. He'd left a note for me--full +o' love--but sayin' that he couldn't bear to bring disgrace on me an' so +he'd gone away. When he'd done what his pa wanted him to, he said, he'd +come back an' then we could live in the big house an' be happy. + +"An' from that day to this, I've never heard a word from my little boy." + +"Oh," cried Betty, pityingly, "what a terrible thing! I should think he +could have written. But maybe he did, and his letters never reached you." + +"That old Abner must have been a beast," cried Mollie, clenching her hands +belligerently. "And those boys! Wouldn't I like to put them behind the +bars?" + +"You see," the old lady went on tonelessly, "it was only a little while +after Willie ran away that they found out that tramps started the fire. Of +course Abner was sorry then, but it was too late. My boy was gone." + +"But you'll find him yet," cried Betty hopefully, springing to her feet. +"I'm quite sure you will." + +But the old lady shook her head sadly. + +"I don't think so, my dear," she said slowly. "If my Willie boy had been +alive I'm sure he would have come to me. He's--he's--almost certain--to +be--dead." + +The girls tried to comfort the little old woman for a few minutes more, +then had to hurry away to various duties about the Hostess House--Mollie +to help a young Polish boy who had been drafted into the army and who was +struggling valiantly and conscientiously to learn English, Grace to write +a letter for a Southern mountain boy who had never learned to read and +write, and Amy and Betty to help a timid and somewhat helpless mother +through the long hours of waiting before she could have a brief visit with +her son during his time of relief from duty. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +FUN AND SOLDIERS + + +"I wish we could do something for Mrs. Sanderson," Betty remarked with a +sigh. "I haven't slept a wink for two nights just trying to think out some +way of finding that boy of hers." + +"He must have been a darling," Grace added thoughtfully. "I can't +understand how a boy like that could run away from home and stay away for +years without even trying to get in touch with his mother." + +"Maybe that charge changed his character," Mollie suggested dramatically. +"I've heard of such things." + +"I've read of 'em," sniffed Grace. "But I must say I never believed it. +Give a boy the right sort of character to start with--" + +"I don't see where you get that," Mollie interrupted hotly. "Why, half the +criminals in the world are made up of boys who were good enough to start +with, but because of some temptation, or their environment, went wrong--" + +"But Mrs. Sanderson's Willie wasn't a criminal," suggested Amy mildly. + +"But he was accused of being one and threatened with jail," retorted +Mollie. "And how do you know that wasn't just what he needed to start him +on the downward path--" + +"Heavens, how melodramatic," drawled Grace. "Here, Mollie dear, have a +candy and try to cheer up." + +"Then I'd have indigestion and never cheer up," retorted Mollie crossly. +"Sometimes you make me feel as if I were on a little island completely +surrounded by chocolates, Grace, and whenever anything bothered me I'd +only have to eat one--a chocolate, I mean, not the island--to forget all +my troubles." + +"Oh, bliss," sighed Grace ecstatically. "If you have discovered any such +wonderful island, Mollie darling, lead me to it, and I will spend all the +rest of my life worshipping you." + +"When you're not too busy gobbling the chocolates," Mollie returned with a +twinkle in her eyes. + +"Which reminds me," broke in Betty, shaking off the thoughtful mood that +had taken possession of her, "that this is the day of our picnic, and if +we don't get back to the Hostess House pretty soon the boys will be there +before we have even made a sandwich." + +"Goodness," cried Mollie in consternation, "all this talk about criminals +put the boys entirely out of my head." + +"I should hope so," twinkled Betty. "Our boys are as little apt to remind +us of criminals as anybody I know. But seriously," she added, a little of +the thoughtfulness returning, "I think we're making a mistake in thinking +that Willie Sanderson has become a criminal. I think there is probably +some satisfactory explanation of why he stayed away from home; and perhaps +with the help of the people we know we may be able to solve the mystery. +Anyway, I don't believe that a boy like that and with a mother like this +dear old soul could turn out very badly." + +"But suppose he's dead!" Mollie put in. + +"Well, then our days of detectivities will be over as far as he's +concerned," put in Grace before Betty could reply. "Here, Mollie, take +another chocolate and don't ask foolish questions." + +"Goodness, I think you're going to die, Gracie," said Mollie, looking her +friend over anxiously. "This is the first time since the fateful day of +our meeting that I can remember your offering, actually offering, me two +chocolates in succession." + +"It isn't the first time you've taken them, though," suggested Grace +dryly. "It just occurred to me that since you will take them anyway, I +might as well get the credit of offering them." + +"Ah, I guessed it, villainness," cried Mollie darkly. "I have long +suspected that that lovely face hid a soul of venom--I should say, a +venomous soul--" + +The girls chuckled and Grace answered lightly: + +"Well, as long as you admit my beauty I don't care what you say about the +rest." + +"Ah, heartless one--" Mollie was beginning, when with a laugh Betty hooked +an arm through hers and hustled the dramatic one in very undramatic +fashion, up the steps into the Hostess House. + +"Oh, Betty, you are so impulsive," sighed Mollie, as she was finally +permitted a chair in the kitchen. "If you don't stop rushing around so +you'll have me worn to skin and bones--" + +"Goodness, have you got those things, too?" asked Betty, as she hurried +busily from table to pantry and back again. "Please don't be so lazy, +Mollie dear. The boys will be here before we're half ready, and we don't +want to lose a minute of this perfect day." + +Harder heart than Mollie's must have softened at this appeal, and she set +to work with a will preparing delicacies for this picnic with the +boys--perhaps the thought was accompanied by a strange, panicky sinking +of the heart--the very last picnic they would have together, at least +until after the war. + +"Did Allen have any more news for you, yesterday?" Mollie asked suddenly, +following up this train of thought. + +"No, nothing definite," the Little Captain responded, deftly slipping +currant jelly into layers of buttered biscuit. "Of course, he said there +were all sorts of rumors, but since they all came from equally good +sources and no two of them pointed the same way, he wasn't listening to +any of them. All they really know is that the regiment is all ready and +equipped and will surely be on its way very soon." + +"I'm not even thinking of it," said Mollie, slamming down the cover of the +bread box by way of emphasis, as Amy and Grace came upon the scene. "I +don't dare to let myself think," she repeated. + +"That's right, dear, I wouldn't either," approved Grace, patting her +encouragingly on the back as she passed on her way to the pantry. "You +want to get your mind used to it by degrees, otherwise the shock might be +too great. What's that, Betty--the sugar? Surely. Anything to be +agreeable!" The last hamper had just been done up, filled to the brim +with good things, when the boys arrived. + +"Heavens, I'm a fright," cried Grace, viewing herself in the kitchen +mirror--a mirror, by the way, which brought out all a person's bad points +with Puritan honesty. + +"Go in and keep the boys quiet, Amy, that's a dear," she begged, then, +seeing refusal in Amy's eyes, added cajolingly: "You always look as if you +came out of a bandbox yourself, you know. Please, dear--" + +But Amy was already half way up the backstairs and paused to make a face +at her. + +"Taffy!" she cried succinctly. + +Five minutes later the three girls, in various attitudes of impatience, +were waiting for Grace while she still primped before the mirror. + +"Just one minute more I give you," stated Mollie, regarding her wrist +watch frowningly. + +"Oh, Mollie, if you only wouldn't talk so much," sighed Grace, turning +with an air of resignation from the mirror. "As soon as you begin to talk +everything goes wrong. My gloves walk under the bed, and my hair stands on +end--" + +"Goodness," cried Mollie, looking injured, "anybody'd think I was a ghost. +I'll stand for being called lots of things, but a phantom--Ouch! Now +what's the idea?" For Grace's thumb and forefinger had come together in +the fleshy part of her arm. + +"I was just trying to reassure you," explained Grace innocently, as Mollie +stared indignantly. "There's nothing the least bit ethereal--" + +But Mollie waited to hear no more, and sped down the stairs after Betty to +bounce unceremoniously in upon the boys. + +"Beware!" she cried. "A lunatic is about to descend upon us!" + +"I should say one had already," grinned Allen, at which Mollie +surrendered. + +"Everybody's against me," she sighed. "When one whom I have always called +my friend, turns agin me--Never mind," she added diplomatically, "I made +the layer cake, Allen Washburn--" + +"Oh, Mollie, let me carry your pocketbook," begged Allen in alarm. + +"How do I know you're honest?" she retorted with a twinkle, and peace was +once more restored. + +The young folks paired off as usual, and Allen drew Betty a little behind +the others. The two formed so handsome a couple that many a passer-by +stopped and looked back after them with an admiring smile. + +The camp training had improved Allen wonderfully. Always splendidly +athletic, he carried himself with a poise and moved with a swing that +spoke of perfectly trained muscles, while his handsome face had been +tanned to the color of an Indian's. + +No wonder that when Allen bent toward her and spoke in a certain tone +reserved for her alone, Betty found it hard to look at this tall, bronzed +soldier who had been her faithful cavalier for--oh, she could not remember +how long. + +"I haven't seen you for ages," he murmured, and she glanced sideways at +him, dimpling. + +"Not for twenty-four whole hours," she agreed soberly. "Wasn't it this +time yesterday--" + +"What has yesterday to do with it?" he interrupted ardently. "I tell you +when a fellow's to be parted from the thing he wants most in the world +every twenty-four hours count--" + +"Allen!" she cried, turning upon him in swift alarm, "is it settled then? +Have you learned anything definite?" + +He shook his head, while his laughing eyes said things that made her turn +her own away. + +"Then why," she asked, with a little pout, "do you have to scare me so?" + +"Because," he answered happily, "there's nothing I like better than to +see you scared--about that," he added quickly, as she turned an indignant +glance upon him. + +For a moment it seemed as if anger were there to stay, but it was +impossible to be very angry with Allen--when he looked at one like that. +At least Betty thought so. + +"You'd better be careful," she said with a soft little laugh. "If you try +that too much, I may not believe you when the real time comes." + +"Betty," he cried fervently, "I won't ever do it again--I promise you. At +least," he added, straightening up, while in his eyes grew a great +resolve, "not until--that real time comes! + +"But what have you girls been doing this morning?" he went on, after a +pause. + +The girl gave an amused but sympathetic laugh before she answered. Then +she said: + +"Mollie and I have been trying to keep the hearts of three of those +recruits that came in yesterday from breaking outright. Poor boys, they're +awfully young--I believe they fibbed about their ages--and look like +cherubs. None of them has ever been away from home before, and they are +pathetically homesick. But they have told us about their homes and their +mothers and fathers and the little brothers and sisters, and Mollie has +joked with them and--Well, anyway, Allen, I believe we have made them +feel that they are not wholly friendless." + +"I'm sure you have, Betty dear." + +"Poor boys," went on Betty. "I presume it will get easier as they get used +to it." + +"Grace has been writing letters for some of the boys who find it hard to +do that. Grace is awfully good at that. And Amy, I believe, has been +showing some girls who came down to see their brother, about the place and +trying to keep them interested during the long waits between the times +they can see the boy, who, like his sisters, is almost too timid to look +out for himself." + +Admiration shone in Allen Washburn's eyes as he looked at the Little +Captain and remarked: + +"What lucky people those Y.W.C.A. officials were to get you girls down +here for this Hostess House! But come, Betty, the others are beckoning to +us." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +PLANNING CAPTURE + + +The spot they had chosen for the picnic was quite a distance away from +Camp Liberty, and by the time the party finally reached it, both boys and +girls were wondering if the generous contents of the hampers would serve +even to take the edge off their appetites. + +"I don't see why we didn't take your car, Mollie," Grace complained, as +they covered the last stretch of dusty road. "We would have been on the +picnic grounds and had our lunch eaten by this time." + +"But just think what's in store for us," Betty reminded her cheerily. "We +need a good appetite to eat up all this lunch." + +"Well, I don't know," Grace grumbled back. "It seems to me I had a good +enough appetite for two lunches, each twice as big as this, when we +started." + +"Heavens!" cried Frank Haley, who was walking in front with Mollie, "I +see my chances of a square meal dwindling." + +"I'm beginning to agree with Grace," grinned Roy Anderson, "that we made a +big mistake in not taking the car." + +"Oh, you're all just lazy," was Mollie's accusation. "We haven't been +walking more than an hour and there's the spot, just around that turn in +the road." + +"Say," and Will, who had not yet spoken, turned suddenly to Betty, "isn't +this the road where the accident happened that introduced that nice little +old woman--what's her name--" + +"Mrs. Sanderson," Betty supplied. + +"Yes, that's it. Isn't this about the place where you found her?" + +"Goodness, no," put in Amy. "It was on this road, but we were miles out of +town." + +"Will, I'd love you all the rest of my life if you'd only find that +motorcyclist and have him punished," said Betty fervently. "It makes me +wild when I think how easily he got away from us--" + +"Never mind that," interrupted Will, his eyes twinkling. "All I want is to +have you repeat the first part of your speech. What was that about loving +me all the rest of my life?" + +"Say, what's the idea?" demanded Allen suddenly, having been engrossed in +a little dream all his own. "What kind of rash promises are you asking +Betty to make?" + +"Well, I would," contended Betty stoutly, adding with a twinkle: "Like a +sister." + +"Oh," said Will, turning disappointedly away. "If that's all you have to +offer me--" + +"But I've got lots more than that," Betty assured him quickly. "Why, Will, +if you're real good, I may even give you an extra piece of cake." + +"Well, now, that's different again," cried Will, his interest rekindling. + +"Will," remonstrated Grace plaintively, "I'm surprised at you. You are +really getting shockingly material." + +"Getting!" interjected Frank, with a grin. + +"Go on, Betty, never mind this vulgar rabble--with apologies to you, sweet +sister," as Grace shot an indignant glance at him. "You were saying that +if I found this motorcyclist you'd give me an extra piece of cake, or +words to that effect. Am I right?" + +"Perfectly," laughed Betty, then added, seriously: "But, really, I think +something ought to be done." + +"So do I," Amy backed her up stoutly. "We ought to let those old +motorcyclists know they can't run over poor old ladies whenever they feel +like it--" + +"Favorite outdoor sports," murmured Roy. + +"It was the most heartless thing I ever saw," said Mollie, entering into +the discussion with a will. "He never even stopped to find out what damage +had been done. He might have killed her--" + +"But what wouldst thee, sweet damsel?" asked Will patiently. "We can +hardly go out on the broad highway and hold up every motorcyclist that +comes along--" + +"Well, I know what you could do," said Grace, with unusual animation. "You +could take one of us along to point out the suspicious characters." + +"Yes, we got a fine view of him," added Amy eagerly. "He had small eyes +close together--" + +"Regular villain type," murmured Frank, but Amy refused to be +side-tracked. + +"And goggles--" + +"They all have those," interrupted Roy. + +"And a tiny little mustache that looked as if it had got there by +mistake." + +"Probably false," suggested Will. "One of the kind you stick on with +molasses--like feathers--" + +"Oh, do be sensible," cried Mollie impatiently. "Of course you can't go +holding him up at the point of a gun, but there ought to be something--" + +"Give us time, give us time," Allen interrupted. "Wasn't it Antony who had +time and conquered, or something like that--" + +"Goodness, anybody'd know you'd been out of school a long time," drawled +Grace scathingly. "Mark Antony, indeed!" + +"Well, it was one of those guys, anyway," maintained Allen, with admirable +impartiality. "And you have to admit the sentiment was fine. All we ask is +time--" + +"And a little grub," supplemented Will hungrily. "It seems to me I +remember somebody saying a couple of hours ago that we were even then +approaching our destination, and we seem to be getting no nearer +rapidly--" + +"Oh, do try to be sensible," cried Mollie, for the second time. "If you +would only have some patience--" + +"Never heard the word," declared Will with a grin, and Mollie made a face +at him--a very disrespectful face. + +"Well, but when--" Will was insisting plaintively when Betty interrupted +him with a cry of delight. + +"Look, people," she said, breaking away from them and running up the +rather steep bank lightly. + +"This isn't the spot we picked out, but it's twice as pretty. Big rocks +for tables--and everything." + +"Especially everything," commented Allen, his eyes twinkling. + +"Oh, boy!" cried Roy ecstatically, setting down the hamper that had been +his share and beginning to examine its contents without further delay. +"Chicken! Ham sandwiches! Biscuits! Jelly--" + +"Say, get out of that!" cried Frank, snatching the hamper away with a +vigor born of fear. "What kind of manners do you call that?" + +"They're as good as yours," retorted the outraged Roy hotly. "Besides, +there's another hamper, isn't there?" + +"Goodness, they seem to think they can have a whole basket apiece," cried +Amy Blackford in dismay. + +"Well, I guess they've got another think coming," said Allen, inelegantly, +placing himself with outstretched arms before the two precious hampers as +though he were guarding a gold mine. "Now let him come who dares. Only +over my dead body--" + +"Oh, what's the use of spoiling our perfectly good party," complained +Grace. "Can't we ever begin to enjoy ourselves but what somebody starts +taking all the joy out of life by talking about killing somebody, or +something--" + +"Never mind, Gracie," Frank soothed her, nibbling a chicken bone with +great relish. "You'll get over it. It may take time--" + +"Silence," commanded Mollie, raising a pickle fork threateningly. "Else in +a twinkling I will split thee to the heart--" + +"Goodness, she's got it, too," sighed Grace drawlingly. + +"What?" asked Mollie briskly, "I'm always interested in my symptoms--" + +"It isn't a disease, you goose," drawled Grace. "Unless," she added, as a +second thought, "you can call insanity a disease--" + +"Well, you ought to know," retorted Mollie, as she proceeded to use the +pickle fork to advantage. "What does your doctor say?" + +"Now who's bringing war into the party, I'd like to know?" asked Will, +helping himself to his ninth biscuit. + +"Goodness, that's just the usual thing," Betty explained, looking +prettier, so Allen thought, than ever before with the background of lacy +green to set off her bright coloring. "If they don't behave like that we +know they're sick or something. Do have another biscuit, Roy. Goodness," +and she stared round-eyed down into the empty space where the biscuits +had been, "they're every one gone! Who did eat them all?" + +"Well, you needn't look at me," said Frank in an aggrieved tone. "Will's +the fellow you've got to watch." + +Will was about to utter some scathing retort when Grace, who had gotten up +to shake the crumbs from her dress and had walked down toward the road, +suddenly called to them. It was such an excited, urgent call that they +left everything and came running. + +"What--" began Betty. + +"It was the motorcyclist!" cried Grace, her face flaming. "I couldn't have +been mistaken, because I caught a good view of his face." + +"But what was he doing back here?" demanded Amy, while the rest stared at +Grace excitedly. "That's only a rutty old wagon road, and--" + +"Well, he was bumping and bouncing like everything, and when he caught +sight of me he sent his machine ahead so fast I thought surely he'd have a +smash-up." + +"Wish he had," said gentle Amy, and at the unusually vindictive expression +on her face the others had to laugh. + +"Well, there's nothing more we can do now," said Frank practically. "Let's +go back and finish our lunch. Probably," he added, as they thoughtfully +retraced their steps, "he took the wagon road for fear of running into one +of you girls." + +"Big coward!" cried Betty, with clenched hands. "I wish I had been with +you, Grace, we might have stopped him." + +The boys shouted. + +"Such a chance!" crowed Roy, but Betty turned on them with flashing eyes. + +"Well, we might at least have tried," she cried hotly. "That is more than +you boys would have done. You don't seem to be even interested," she +continued indignantly. "If I were a man in uniform I'd show that coward +that he can't knock old helpless women down and then run away. I'd show +him that in insulting an old woman he was insulting the whole United +States army--" + +"Hurrah!" cried Will irrepressibly, jumping to his feet. "Now you're +talking, Betty. How about it, fellows? Shall we do as she says?" + +"You bet we will!" they cried, and at the ring in their voices, even +Betty's ardent little heart was satisfied. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +A LARK IN THE OPEN + + +"Well, where do we go from here, boys?" asked Allen, lazily stretching out +on the grass with a convenient, raised bank of moss for a pillow, while +the girls repacked the depleted hampers. "It's such a wonderful day, and +camp was never like this." + +"Tell us something we don't know," Frank retorted. "Gee, it's been a fine +experience and all, but, believe me, I'll be glad when the call comes for +action." + +"They're off again," said Grace plaintively. + +"I must say you're not awfully complimentary," added Mollie, busily +folding napkins. + +"In what way, sweet maid, do we offend?" Will inquired. + +"Oh, always talking about how glad you'll be to get away from us," she +explained. "Here we thought we'd been entertaining you so beautifully--" + +"Gee, you have!" cried Roy, propping himself on his elbow and speaking +with unaccustomed solemnity. "It's been just great, having you girls +here." + +"It certainly has," added Frank. "I guess we'd have gone clean crazy +because of homesickness if you hadn't come along just when you did." + +"Now you're saying something," added Allen warmly, while the girls stopped +packing and looked on happily. "Do you remember what we were talking about +that day when we almost--" + +"Ran into what we were talking about?" finished Frank with a grin. "You +bet I do." + +"Well, what was it?" drawled Grace, after they had waited patiently for +the boys to continue and the latter had smiled aggravatingly to themselves +over their thoughts. + +"If it's bad," added Mollie briskly, "we don't want to hear it, for, as +the old lady said that used to come to see Mother regularly once a year, +'I don't care what terrible things people say or think about me, if they +don't tell me about it,' But if it's good--we might stand it." + +"Oh, it was good all right," Frank assured her, still smiling over his +thoughts. "We were saying that if we didn't get a furlough so we could go +back to Deepdale--" + +"For a certain purpose," suggested Will. + +"For a certain purpose," Frank repeated solemnly--"we were afraid we +might have to desert." + +"Yes, that would have been sensible," scoffed Mollie. "Get half a dozen +years in prison for yourselves and I'd like to know where your furloughs +would be then." + +"And you haven't really told us a single nice thing about ourselves," +added Betty plaintively. "All the time we've just been holding our breath +to listen--" + +"We've been doing our best to tell you those nice things, every minute of +every day since then," said Allen in a low voice. "If you haven't heard, +it's because you wouldn't listen." + +Betty colored adorably--to quote Allen again--and resumed her packing with +great fervor. + +"All of which," Frank finished his self-justification, "shows that we're +far from anxious to leave you girls when we say we're eager for action. I +guess," he added, thoughtfully, "it's just because we're so crazy to be +with you that we're eager to go across." + +"That sounds rather--" began Grace, but Frank would not let her finish. + +"I know it does," he admitted. "Sounds like a contradiction. But I think +you know what I'm trying to get at, just the same." + +"Why, sure," Will backed him up eagerly. + +"Frank means that we've got a confounded, disagreeable job to do before we +can settle down and be happy on good old United States soil again--" + +"And the sooner we get it done, the better," finished Roy. + +Allen nodded. + +"I guess that's about the size of it," he said. "The sooner we get there, +the sooner we'll be coming home again. And, say, fellows, what a home +coming!" + +At the wistfulness in his voice the girls felt the tears rise to their +eyes, and to save them from a breakdown Betty crisply changed the subject. + +"I hope you boys can get over to the Hostess House Thursday night to see +the entertainment we are helping get up among those new fellows who came +week before last," she cried. + +"Working yourselves to death over it, are you?" inquired Allen. + +"Never!" returned Grace, with sudden emphasis. + +"But it's lots of fun," chuckled Mollie. "We have found out by judicious +inquiry--Amy, here, soon worms out the heart secrets of these boys by her +quiet, sympathetic way--that a number of those boys have parlor tricks of +one sort or another, and--" + +"That orchestra fellow really is good," interrupted Amy. "Boys, you should +hear him play! He has a guitar hung over his shoulder, a harmonica +strapped to his head, a piano near by to which he makes sudden dashes, and +all the while he dances the most marvelous dance!" + +For once Amy was aroused to enthusiasm. The boys, however, were less +interested, and Roy wanted to know what the girls themselves had to do in +the coming entertainment. + +"Oh," laughed Betty, "we are stage managers, scenic artists, stage hands, +costumers, modern mutation of the Greek chorus, stays and props for the +weak and timid, brakes for the overbold--in fact, we are around to do any +work that nobody else wants to do. + +"But we haven't decided," she reminded them suddenly, "just how we're +going to spend the rest of the afternoon. Of course we can always take a +walk--" + +"Not after that lunch," declared Allen, striving to sit up, and sinking +down again with a moan, "I'm ten pounds heavier than when I came." + +"Well, you ought to be ashamed to admit it," retorted Mollie. "I thought +in the army you had to be able to hike fifteen miles without winking." + +"Sure. But this is our day off," objected Roy. "What do you suppose we get +leave for--just to do what we can do every day of our lives?" + +"Well, then, for goodness sake, suggest something," cried Mollie +impatiently. + +"I have an idea," cried Allen, so suddenly that they all started. + +"Well, you needn't be so proud of it." + +"Do you remember that pond we came across the day we went prospecting +alone, Frank?" he continued, not noticing the interruption. + +"Yes," Frank answered, catching the idea and looking interested. "Seems to +me it ought to be somewhere in this neighborhood. Going to catch some +fish?" + +"Why, of course," put in Roy scornfully. "We're so attractive all we have +to do is to whistle to the little animals to have them squabbling for the +best place on the hook." + +"My, isn't he the sarcastic boy," grinned Allen. "That little trick might +work with you, Roy, but we're more modest." + +"Well, have you got any fishing tackle?" queried Roy patiently. + +"Sure," it was Frank's turn to be sarcastic. "Don't you know that's a part +of every dough boy's outfit--so he can go fishing for the Huns?" + +"Peace, peace, my children," entreated Betty plaintively. "Can't we ever +talk about anything without getting into an argument?" + +"But this isn't an argument; it's a suggestion," said Allen. "Though I +expect the scorn and ridicule of an unthinking populace. Perhaps you have +heard of the old-fashioned, but sometimes effective, string and bent pin?" + +The boys shouted, and Allen bent upon them a pitying glance. + +"It is even as I expected," he said sorrowfully. "Well, I have done my +best--" + +"I say old man," Roy interrupted suddenly, proving an unexpected ally, +"I'm for you. Of course we won't get anything, but it will be an +adventure. And gee, some fresh fish would taste good!" + +So they went to work, eager as children on a lark. The girls managed to +furnish enough pins for the hooks, and when the available string gave out, +the boys made use of stout, withy vines as substitutes. + +And, strange as it may seem, they actually were successful. The little +stream proved to be full to overflowing with fish, small to be sure, but +still eatable. + +"Gee, I never saw anything like it!" cried Roy as he excitedly pulled out +one fish after another. "They seem to be eager to be caught. And to think +that we actually scoffed at the idea." + +"That's what genius always has to bear," put in Allen, resignedly, while +Betty gave him a side-wise glance from under her long lashes. + +"Oh, don't we hate ourself," she chided softly, as she handed him more +bait. "You really shouldn't, Allen--" + +"What! Hate myself?" he demanded, letting a fish slip back into the water +in his preoccupation. "I'd just as soon--as long as you don't!" + +Betty laughed happily. It was so good to be there, unbelievably catching +fish, with Allen beside her saying delightful--and foolish--things. + +Then she thought of the parting that must inevitably come and her bright +face clouded. Allen saw the shadow and leaned toward her anxiously. + +"What is it, dear?" he whispered softly. "Have I done anything?" + +"No," she answered with a little smile, half-whimsical, half-wistful. "You +haven't done anything. It's what you're going to do that hurts." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +ENTER SERGEANT MULLINS + + +"Mollie, you've been crying." + +"I have not!" snapped Mollie, turning so the light would not fall on her +face. + +"Well, what are your eyes and nose all red for then?" asked Amy +reasonably. + +"Ask them," retorted Mollie. "Probably just did it to make me mad." + +Several days had gone by, and the entertainment into which the girls had +thrown themselves with so much enthusiasm had been given and pronounced a +great success by the soldiers stationed at Camp Liberty. Since then the +days had been given largely to the routine work of the Hostess +House--afternoon teas, evening coffee served to those who wished it, +writing letters for the boys, entertaining others, looking after wives and +mothers and sisters who were visiting near the camp, suggesting books for +some who seemed to be of uncertain taste. Now, on this day, something +unusual had plainly happened. + +"Oh, girls, I've got a wonderful plan--something new for the soldier +boys!" cried Betty, breaking in upon her two friends merrily. Then, seeing +that she had interrupted something, paused and looked uncertainly from Amy +to Mollie and back again. + +"Why, Mollie," she cried anxiously, "what is the matter?" + +"Oh, can't you find something original to say?" snapped Mollie irascibly. +"Seems to me that's all I hear from morning to night. 'Oh, Mollie, what's +the matter--what's the matter, Mollie?' till I could scream." + +"Oh, please excuse me," said Betty, with a little freezing quality in her +voice. "I thought I might help; but if that's the way you feel about it--" + +Quick as a flash Mollie had run to her and, repentant, thrown her arms +about the Little Captain's neck. + +"Please forgive me, Betty," she cried. "I'm perfectly horrid, and I know I +don't deserve a friend like you. But--well, I'm just a beast, that's all," +she finished lamely. + +Betty laughed and patted her shoulder comfortingly. + +"I guess we all are once in a while," she said, adding with a return of +her old cheeriness, "Now, prove your repentance by 'fessing up. It's sure +to make you feel better." + +"Well, it wasn't anything much," Mollie replied, her face clouding again. +"Only--I had a quarrel with--with--somebody--" + +"How very explicit," drawled Grace, who had entered the room in time to +hear the last part of the sentence. + +Mollie stiffened, and Betty sent Grace a warning glance. + +"Go on, Mollie dear, I'm awfully interested," Betty hurriedly interposed. +"Because, you see," she added ruefully, "I just had a quarrel myself." + +"You did," cried the three at once, and crowded around her eagerly. + +"Oh, Betty, who with?" asked Amy, too excited to bother about grammar. +Betty quarreled so seldom with anybody that when she did the girls +considered it an event. + +"I'll tell you about it after Mollie has 'fessed up," evaded Betty, +seeming a trifle sorry for her confidence. + +"Oh, did Mollie have one, too?" cried Grace delightedly, while Mollie sent +her a hostile glance. + +"Well, you needn't be so glad about it," she retorted glumly. "Maybe it +wouldn't seem quite so interesting if it were you and Roy." + +"Well, how do you know it wasn't?" + +The three girls stared. + +"What was that you said?" demanded Betty weakly. "I don't think I quite--" + +"I said," returned Grace calmly, and pronouncing each word with +exaggerated distinctness, "that Roy and I have had a quarrel, which +probably would make yours look like nothing at all." + +"Grace!" they cried in chorus, "do you mean it?" + +For answer Grace turned to the mirror and began to arrange her hair. + +"Ask Roy," she flung at them over her shoulder. + +Behind her the girls looked at each other dumbly, struggling with a wild +desire to laugh and cry at the same instant. + +"But how?" Amy was beginning dazedly when once more Betty came to the +rescue. + +"All this would be funny if it weren't so impossible," she said. "Suppose +we begin at the beginning and tell our experiences, since we're all in the +same boat. It ought to be interesting--if not instructive." + +Grace turned from the mirror and seated herself expectantly on the arm of +a chair. + +"Well, who's first?" she demanded. + +"I am," volunteered Mollie unexpectedly, her eyes glittering. "It was all +so utterly absurd, and it made me so m-mad that I had to c-cry--" + +"So we see," murmured Grace impatiently, but once more Betty sent her a +warning glance. + +"And then--" she suggested. + +"Well, Frank and I were taking a little walk when all of a sudden I +happened to think of the bayonet drill Sergeant Mullins had invited us +to." + +Betty and Grace started and leaned forward eagerly in their chairs. + +"Yes?" they breathed. + +"Well," continued Mollie, her color rising, "I don't know whatever got +into Frank--he never used to be like that. He just sort of froze up and +wouldn't answer my questions or anything until I got so angry I told him +that if he didn't tell me what the matter was I'd say good-by to him right +there and wouldn't ever speak to him again." + +"Yes?" breathed the girls again. + +"Then what did he say?" asked Grace. + +"Why, he just got red in the face," replied Mollie, "and said all right +then, he'd tell me what the matter was. And then he said"--she laughed a +little hysterically--"that he just couldn't stand the thought of my seeing +so much of Sergeant Mullins--think of it--me, who have never said two +words alone to the man in my life!" + +"Well, I never!" Betty exploded, while the usually placid Grace seemed +hardly able to keep her seat. "That's almost exactly what Allen said!" + +"And Roy, too!" cried Grace dazedly. "Girls, what does it mean?" + +"It seems to mean," put in Amy dryly, "that one or all of us are ready for +the insane asylum." + +"Allen said," Betty contributed, wide-eyed, "that it made him mad to see +the way that Sergeant Mullins hung around the Hostess House all the time. +He made it quite plain that there was no doubt but what I was the main +attraction." + +"And Roy thinks it's me," said Grace, her own grammar suffering from +excitement. "Goodness! does he think the poor boy is after all of us?" + +"Thinks he's going to start a harem, maybe," cried Mollie hysterically. +"Oh, dear, isn't it too ridiculous?" + +"I suppose," said Amy thoughtfully, "it's because Sergeant Mullins is so +awfully good-looking." + +"And, of course, he does come around a good deal," added Mollie. + +"I know. But that's because he's so lonesome," put in Betty. "And, of +course, we have all tried to be nice to him. I think it's horrid," she +added, flaring up, "for the boys to act so ridiculously just because he +happens to be good-looking and awfully attractive!" + +"Oh, Betty, Betty," chided Mollie, wiping a tear--this time of +merriment--from her eyes. "If Allen could only hear you now!" + +"Nonsense!" retorted Betty, almost snappishly. "There are dozens of boys +who come here to tell us their troubles, and I don't see why they have +to--" + +"Pick on him," finished Grace. "Only you must remember," she added with a +twinkle, "that he is much more attractive than most--" + +"And he never tells us any troubles either," added Mollie, with a chuckle. +"Maybe the boys think that's suspicious." + +"Well," said Amy, with a sigh, "I seem to be the only one left out. Nobody +thinks it's worth while to quarrel romantically about me." + +The girls laughed, and Grace added with a grimace: + +"Goodness, you needn't feel bad about it. It was just your luck that you +didn't meet Will this morning and tell him the awful news, that's all. I +suppose he'd have acted as silly as the rest of them." + +"Maybe it's a plant anyway," suggested Mollie dolefully. + +"A plant?" queried Betty. "What kind--a flower or a T.N.T. factory?" + +"A plot was what I meant," explained Mollie patiently, while the others +chuckled. + +"A plot!" repeated Grace, with a return of her drawl. "Heavens, Mollie, if +there is anything in signs you ought to be a great author some day from +the way you're always seeing a plot in everything." + +"Thank you, I hope so," said Mollie. + +"Well, for goodness' sake get to the point," urged Grace impatiently, +glancing at the clock. "We'll have to dress pretty soon, to go down to +serve the regular afternoon tea to the soldier boys and their friends." + +"Oh, it just occurred to me," Mollie explained, "that perhaps the boys had +met some girls in town they liked better than they like us and had gotten +up a conspiracy--to--to--quarrel with us--" + +"What a brilliant idea!" scoffed Grace. "Especially as the boys have been +following us around like Mary's little lamb, and have scared all the other +boys away." + +"And without being conceited at all," added Amy, with a chuckle, "the +girls I've seen around the town really aren't calculated to steal their +hearts away." + +"In that case, haven't we still got Sergeant Mullins?" chuckled Betty. + +They laughed, and Mollie added, as they started to dress for the +afternoon: + +"I wonder if the boys really expected that we wouldn't go to this special +bayonet drill to-morrow--especially when we've been longing to see one for +ages--just because Sergeant Mullins invited us?" + +"I'm sure I don't know," said Betty carelessly. "But it really doesn't +matter since we're going anyway!" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE BAYONET DRILL + + +It was a beautiful sunshiny day, and the girls felt their spirits soaring +happily as they ran down the steps of the Hostess House and started across +the parade. + +Also the, what appeared to them, foolish objections of the boys to their +attending the bayonet drill lent spice to the adventure, and they hurried +on gaily over the parade. + +Sergeant Mullins, who had unwittingly caused all the excitement, was, as +the girls had said, a tall, splendidly built fellow, good looking to an +unusual degree, but very silent and reserved. + +He had seemed immensely attracted from the first by the girls from the +Hostess House, and had made overtures in a half-shy, half-humorous manner +that the girls themselves had found very attractive. + +But to them he had been only one of many interesting soldier boys who had +come and gone and whose meetings and partings with dear ones they had +watched with swelling throats and tears in their own eyes. + +But Sergeant Mullins was an expert with the bayonet and had been attached +to Camp Liberty for the purpose of giving the boys special drills in that +work. + +He had proved so wonderfully successful that, much to his secret +chagrin--for Sergeant Mullins, like all the rest of our brave boys, had +dreamed of the great things he would do "over there"--the Government had +decided to keep him at Camp Liberty indefinitely. + +Then, one day, he had invited the girls, in return for the many little +kindnesses they had done him, to attend one of his special, exhibition +drills. + +They had accepted eagerly, little dreaming of the storm their acceptance +would evoke. And it is very doubtful whether, even if they had known, it +would have made any difference, for they had long desired just this thing +and knew that in years to come they would look back upon it as one of the +biggest experiences in their lives. + +"What time is it, Amy?" Betty inquired a little anxiously. "I'm afraid we +stopped to talk too long to those women who came out to see their nephew, +and I don't want to be late." + +"We have just a minute to spare," returned Amy, and they quickened their +pace. + +"Wouldn't it be fun," said Mollie, her eyes sparkling, "if we could only +meet the boys? I'd just like to pay them back for being so silly!" + +"Maybe they'll be in the drill," drawled Grace hopefully. + +"That would be adding insult to injury," Betty chuckled. "Then they never +would forgive us." + +"I just hate jealous people, anyway," added Grace, diving into her pocket +and bringing forth a luscious bonbon which Mollie eyed covetously. "I +think it's so ridiculous and narrow, don't you?" + +"I think it's a good deal more ridiculous and narrow," grumbled Mollie, +still hungrily eyeing the rapidly disappearing chocolate, "to keep all the +candies to yourself." + +"Oh, goodness! Take one," returned Grace, offering a capacious pocket. "I +didn't know you were such a shy and shrinking little violet, Mollie. You +usually are perfectly capable of helping yourself." + +"Well, not out of your fuzzy old pocket," Mollie retorted ungraciously. +"Why didn't you bring the box along?" + +Grace eyed her pityingly. + +"Wouldn't I look nice," she demanded, "lugging a candy box along to a +bayonet drill?" + +"I think you'd probably be exceedingly popular," Betty broke in, with a +chuckle. "You'd have all the boys around you in earnest." + +"And then what would Roy say?" teased Amy. "He'd never speak to poor Grace +again." + +"Poor Grace, indeed!" sniffed the owner of the name scornfully. "I'd just +like to have anybody try to 'poor Grace' me! He'd never do it a second +time." + +"Goodness, don't look so ferocious, Gracie," Mollie soothed her. "Some one +give her another candy--do." + +"I'm not a cripple," Grace retorted, evidently in a belligerent mood. +"I've always been quite able to help myself." + +"So we've noticed," murmured Mollie irrepressibly. + +"Will you two please listen to reason?" queried Betty, in her primmest +tones. + +"Yes, grandma," replied Mollie soberly--which was so ridiculous that even +Betty dimpled. "What have we done now?" + +"Nothing. It's what you may do," Betty answered, adding, in an explanatory +tone: "You see, we are just about to enter the sacred precincts of the +drill ground, and it is fitting that we do so with an air of propriety and +sobriety." + +"Goodness, is she insulting us?" cried Mollie, in mock indignation. "I'll +have you know, Miss Nelson, that I, for one, am not intoxicated and, what +is more, never expect to be." + +"Goodness! that is a relief," sighed Grace, who had been hanging +breathlessly on her words. "I thought you were going to say 'I am not +drunk, but soon shall be,' or words to that effect--" + +"But will you listen?" cried Betty despairingly. "I've got about as much +chance of saying anything sensible--" + +"As the man in the moon," finished Grace innocently, then, meeting Betty's +outraged eye, added hastily: "Oh, wasn't that what you were going to say?" + +"No, it wasn't," Betty was beginning, when Mollie, for the first time in +her life played the part of peacemaker. + +"Go ahead, honey," she interrupted soothingly. "We're all ears." + +"Speak for yourself," Grace murmured. + +But this time Betty would not yield, and insisted upon being heard. + +"Please listen a minute, girls," she begged. "You know we've got a +reputation, deserved or not, of being respectable--" + +"Oh, what a mistake," interpolated Mollie. + +"I said it might be a mistake," Betty continued patiently, although her +eyes twinkled. "Anyway, we've got to live up to it--Goodness! just look +at the boys. I guess the whole camp must be in the drill." + +"Yes, I guess Sergeant Mullins was right when he said it was to be an +exhibition drill," agreed Mollie, all fun temporarily swallowed up in a +very real admiration of the spectacle before them. + +"It's no wonder that Sergeant Mullins is considered a very important +personage around here," added Amy. + +"Oh, look!" cried Grace, as they sat down upon a convenient bench. +"They've started. Oh, girls, I'm glad I came!" + +Mutely the girls echoed the sentiment, and for the next hour they sat +motionless, eyes and attention glued upon the magnificent spectacle of a +thousand men, running, advancing, retreating, attacking, all in obedience +to one great plan. + +They forgot it was only a sham attack, an imitation battle, an exhibition +drill. For the moment a curtain had been lifted and they were permitted to +see something of the glory, the passion, the horror of democracy's +struggle against the armed autocracy of the world. + +When it was over they sighed and came back to the present almost with a +shock; so greatly had they been engrossed in the scene. + +"Well, Sergeant Mullins may not be much of a talker," were Mollie's first +words as they rose to go back, "but he certainly knows how to act!" + +"It was wonderful!" breathed Betty, her eyes gleaming. "Just think what it +must be to be a man in these times! To be able to fight for one's +country!" + +"Well, I don't know," said Amy, with a little shudder. "That part of it's +all right. But when it comes to being maimed and crippled for life it +isn't so much fun." + +"Oh, Amy, don't!" cried Grace, clapping her hands to her ears, while Betty +continued spiritedly: + +"I didn't say it was fun," she cried. "Naturally the boys have to take +into consideration the possibility of all that you said, Amy. But there's +no glory in the world like giving yourself for a great cause--" + +"Hear, hear!" came a masculine voice in applause, and they turned to find +Allen and Frank close behind them. + +"Well, what will you have?" asked Mollie, eyeing them hostilely. "We +thought you were lost and gone forever like Clementine--" + +"And were quite reconciled," finished Betty primly, her eyes twinkling. + +"Oh, you did, did you?" cried Frank, regarding Mollie's haughtily tip-tilt +little nose with mingled fear and admiration. "Well, I'll have you know, +young lady, that you can't get rid of us as easily as all that. May I be +permitted to walk beside you, mam'selle?" + +Mollie sighed and permitted the liberty with an air of great resignation. + +In the meanwhile, Allen was whispering into Betty's almost reluctant +little ear. + +"Did you really mean what you said about its being glorious to give +yourself for a great cause?" he asked softly. + +"Why, I--g-guess so," she stammered, taken off her guard. "Why?" + +"Oh, just because," he answered vaguely, watching the elusive little +dimple at the corner of her mouth, "I might want to remind you of it--some +day." + + + + +CHAPTER X + +ALARMING SYMPTOMS + + +The girls awoke one morning several days later--days of routine duty at +the Hostess House--with the delightful sensation of something good +impending. Crowded as they were in the one big room for Mrs. Sanderson's +accommodation, they had formed the habit of talking over their prospective +fun before the actual work and hurry and bustle of the day began. + +So it was this morning, just after the sun had streamed in through the two +big east windows and settled on the tip of Betty's upturned little nose in +a most provocative manner. + +Sleepily she rubbed a hand across her face, then sneezed. + +"Goodness, she's got the 'flu'!" cried Grace in alarm, as she sat up in +bed, jerking the covers from her now fully aroused bedfellow. "Amy! +Mollie! Get me a gas mask, somebody!" + +"I think it's poor Betty that needs the gas mask," retorted Mollie dryly. +"I never heard you talk so much this early in the morning since the first +day of our acquaintance, Grace. What happened to wake you up?" + +Whereupon Betty sneezed again, and Grace jumped about a foot in the bed. + +"Please take her away, somebody," she wailed plaintively, while Betty +regarded her out of wide and sleep-brilliant eyes. "I heard a doctor say +the other day that at the second sneeze it was time to go to the +hospital." + +"Well, run along," twinkled Betty, adding, with a speculative look: "If +you'll wait just about two minutes, I think I can give you another one." + +But Grace waited to hear no more. With a bound she was out of the bed and +half-way across the room. + +"Goodness!" remarked quiet Amy, with a laugh, "I should think it would be +almost worth while having the 'flu,' Betty, just to see Gracie move like +that." + +"Well, I don't know about that," said Betty, rubbing the offending little +nose ruefully. "It's easy to talk when it's some one else who's got it. +Nobody seems to have any sympathy for me at all." + +"We would, dear," cried Mollie, slipping out of her own bed and taking +Grace's place beside Betty on the sun-flooded cot, "only you don't really +look as though you were dying of anything, you know--especially influenza. +Betty dear," she added, with an impulsive little hug, "you do look so +pretty!" + +"Now she does want a quarter," remarked Grace skeptically, as she took the +place Mollie had vacated. "Don't you believe her, Betty Nelson. It's too +early in the morning to see straight anyway." + +Betty laughed delightedly. + +"How very complimentary," she said, with a droll twist to the corner of +her mouth. "Never mind, Mollie, it's worth a quarter just for seeing +crooked!" + +Mollie hugged her, and even Grace had to laugh. + +"Which reminds me," continued Betty, apropos of nothing at all, "that we +have a whole holiday which we can spend just exactly as we please." + +"Yes, where shall we go?" cried Amy eagerly. "I thought maybe we could +take Mollie's car and--and--" + +Three pairs of curious eyes were focused upon her as she hesitated. + +"And what?" they queried in chorus. + +"Well, I thought," continued Amy, a little shy, as she always was when +about to suggest something for another's comfort, "I thought we might +invite Mrs. Sanderson to go along." + +"Good for you, Amy dear," cried Betty eagerly. "That's just exactly what I +was thinking. The dear old lady seemed so much better yesterday I thought +we might persuade her to share our picnic with us. How about it, Mollie?" + +"Why, of course," answered the latter heartily, "I'd love to have her--if +she'd come." + +"If she'd come?" repeated Amy, puzzled. "Why shouldn't she come--that is, +if she's feeling strong enough?" + +"Well," explained Mollie, with a little smile as she recalled one of the +many unusual conversations she had had with the little old woman, "she +told me the other day that she 'hated them gasoline wagons worse than +poison,'--that the only reason she rode in ours was because she was +unconscious when we put her in and she couldn't help herself. And she +added somebody'd have to run over her again to make her do it a second +time." + +Betty laughed gayly as she flung back the covers and slipped out of bed. + +"Goodness, I don't wonder you were doubtful," she said. "Maybe she's +changed her mind by this time. Anyway, we can ask her and see." + +"I think she's the most wonderful old person I ever saw," remarked Amy +thoughtfully, as they dressed hastily. "She must be pretty old, and yet +she says the funniest, wittiest things, and her eyes sparkle and twinkle +like a girl's." + +"Well, I really think she looks older than she really is," said Grace +slowly and very judicially. "You know working on a farm in the hot sun the +way she did for years, isn't calculated to make a person look younger than +she is." + +"Oh, and if we could only do something to find him for her!" sighed Amy +for--the girls did not know whether it was the fiftieth or the hundredth +time, they had given up counting. + +"Well, wishing won't accomplish anything," said Mollie practically, as she +vigorously pulled on a shoe as if it were in some mysterious way +responsible for the unsatisfactory state of affairs. "I think some one +ought to nickname us the 'four Dianas.'" + +"Well, of course Diana was very beautiful," said Grace, complacently +regarding her own pretty reflection in the mirror. "But if you meant that, +Mollie, of course the description applies to only one of us." + +"Goose," remarked Mollie. "Of course I wasn't thinking of Diana's beauty. +I was merely thinking of her in the role of a fair huntress." + +"Goodness, now she is insulting us!" cried Betty, turning upon her friend +with a melodramatic frown. "Do you mean to imply that one or all of us are +huntresses?" + +"Not of men," said Mollie scathingly. "That shows a guilty conscience, +Betty. I'm surprised at you." + +"O-oh! Squelched!" said Betty meekly. "May I ask," she added very humbly, +"just what you did mean?" + +"I simply meant," explained Mollie patiently, "that we were after two +men--" + +"Oh!" cried Amy, turning upon her in horror. "And you just told Betty you +didn't mean that!" + +"I didn't," cried the badgered Mollie in desperation, then turned away in +disgust. "There's no use trying to tell you anything," she said. + +"Go ahead, Mollie dear," urged Betty. + +"I meant," Mollie continued slightly, but only slightly, mollified, "that +we were hunting two men--Mrs. Sanderson's Willie and the motorcyclist who +ran her down. And we haven't any more real chance of finding them than--" + +"A celluloid dog has chasing an asbestos cat in--" began Grace. + +"That will do," cried Betty primly, though her eyes danced. "After this, +you will kindly answer when you are spoken to, Miss Ford, and at no other +time." + +"Oh, is that so?" mocked Grace. "Well, I'll just tell you, Miss Nelson, +that although I am extremely fond of you--mistaken as that may be--I will +take no dictation from you or any one else." + +"I'll give you more than dictation, if you don't stop maundering," +threatened Mollie. "A girl has about as much chance of saying anything +sensible--" + +"Did you ever try?" queried Grace innocently, and Betty and Amy had to +form a human barrier between the two enemies. + +"Goodness, please don't kill her, Mollie," begged the Little Captain, her +eyes twinkling. "Not till after breakfast, anyway. I want to give you a +chance to think it over." + +"Yes, they're punishing murderers terribly," added Amy. "I heard Major +Adams say--" + +"All right," Mollie agreed, "I'll let her off until after breakfast, but +for one reason and one only--" + +"And that?" they queried breathlessly. + +"I'll be stronger then!" she said. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +POLITE KIDNAPPERS + + +But it seems that breakfast "hath charms to sooth the savage breast," for +after Mollie had attacked and conquered the appetizing fruit and cereal, +ham and eggs, she seemed to forget all about her dire threat and smiled +amiably at her intended victim across the table. + +"How long will it take you to get ready, Grace?" she inquired. "Can you do +it while Betty and I go around to the garage and back out the car?" + +"Let Amy help you with the car this time," Betty objected before Grace +could reply. "I want to ask Mrs. Sanderson to go with us." + +Mollie clapped her hand over her mouth in a gesture of dismay. + +"Goodness," she reproached herself, "I almost forgot about her. Yes, go +ahead Betty and do your best to get her. I know it would do her good. But +you had better take Amy with you to help persuade Mrs. Sanderson. Amy and +you together are a pair that will be hard to refuse. There goes Mr. +Bretton now! He's so grateful for what we girls have done for him here--as +though it were anything at all--that he'd do far more than help get the +car ready. I'll get his help, while you and Amy go for Mrs. Sanderson and +Grace gets ready. Now, rush! hurry! fly! off with you!" + +Mollie ran out of the house and after the young soldier whose help she +sought. Grace went to her room for some last-minute dressing, and Amy and +Betty went upstairs to importune Mrs. Sanderson. + +"Well, good morning, my dears," said the old woman, delighted at sight of +their bright faces. "I declare, if you don't bring all the sunshine in +with you! It is lovely of you to call on an old woman so early in the +morning." + +"Well, you see," said Betty, eagerly diving right into the middle of her +subject. "We've come to kidnap you. Please, won't you let us?" + +"Kidnap me," repeated the old lady, patting the soft cheek with a puzzled +air. "Why, it seems to me sort of unusual to ask a body if you can kidnap +'em." + +Betty laughed. + +"Well, I guess maybe it is," she admitted gayly. "But, you see, we can't +very well do it without asking you. Mollie said," she added, taking the +little lady's hand in hers and squeezing it affectionately, "that you +told her the only way we could get you to do it was to make you +unconscious again. And," she finished, with an adorable little coaxing +smile, "we couldn't do that, you know. We're altogether too fond of you." + +Mrs. Sanderson laughed and pinched her cheek. + +"Very well, honey," she chuckled. "Now if you'll tell me what it's all +about--" + +"We want you to go on a picnic with us," broke in Amy. + +"A picnic!" repeated the old lady, more puzzled than before. "What sort of +picnic?" + +"An automobile picnic," explained Betty, adding quickly as she saw refusal +in the bright old eyes. "Oh, please don't say 'no' yet. We've got the +whole day off, and we're going to take Mollie's car and go off all by +ourselves and eat our lunch and admire the view and--" + +"Taste gasoline for a week after," finished the old lady with a little +grimace. Then she added quickly, as she saw the hurt look in Betty's +bright face: "No, I didn't exactly mean that, dear, and I wouldn't say +anything to make you feel bad for worlds, that I wouldn't, only--I jest +can't bring myself to ride in those automobiles. You see," there was an +almost pathetic appeal for understanding in the bright old eyes, "I guess +I'm maybe too old to change my ways, an' I get tired easy--" + +"I'll tell you what we'll do," Amy intervened with rare tact. "Some day +when we're going for just a little ride around the block we'll ask you +again. Maybe you'll feel more like it then, and you can get used to it by +degrees." + +"That's awfully nice of you, dearie," said the old woman, looking +gratefully from one bright face to the other. "I suppose you don't know +how much I appreciate all you've done for me," she added, her voice +breaking a little, "'cause I never could tell you if I lived for a hundred +years. But you just sort o' revived my faith in human nature. Since my boy +went away--" The old voice broke down entirely then, and Betty continued +patting her hand soothingly, + +"But there," she added, in a different tone, wiping her eyes determinedly +and smiling at them, "this ain't no kind of a mornin' for tears, an' I +know my son Willie would be the first one to tell me so. + +"Thank you jest as much for askin' me, dearies, and maybe some other time +I'll get my courage up to it. But now you jest run along an' enjoy +yourselves. + +"An' when you come back," she added, taking both of the soft young hands +in her wrinkled one and patting them gently, "you can come up an' tell me +all about it." + +"Oh, will you let us?" asked Betty eagerly, jumping up and dropping a +kiss, light as thistle-down, upon the old face. "And we'll bring you +flowers, whole bunches of them. Will you promise to be happy while we're +gone?" + +"Yes, dearie, just happy thinking of your coming back and the flowers," +she agreed, and the smile remained on her lips even after the door closed +behind them until the sound of their light footsteps and laughter faded +away. + +Then the brave lips drooped and the gray head went down upon her arms. + +"They're such lovely little ladies," she murmured to herself. "An' I will +try to be happy. Only--I want my boy, my little son--my baby--" + +Meanwhile-- + +"Isn't she the dearest thing?" asked Amy of Betty as they went into the +kitchen to gather up the picnic baskets. "I'm getting so fond of her it +will just hurt like everything to have her go away." + +"Go away? Oh, Amy!" cried the Little Captain in surprise, facing her as +though that possibility had not yet entered her mind. + +"Why, yes," repeated Amy, astonished at Betty's amazement. "She's almost +well now, and, of course, she's too independent to want to stay here when +she's all right again. Why, Betty, what's the matter?" + +For Betty had sunk down in one of the kitchen chairs and was regarding her +tragically. + +"But, Amy, she mustn't go away," she argued weakly, knowing that she +really had no argument at all. "Why, I really can't imagine it! I--I never +thought--" + +"Well, of course, none of us wants her to," Amy admitted, adding +reasonably: "But I really don't see how we're going to stop her if she +makes up her mind to go. Do you?" + +Betty picked up one of the hampers and they walked slowly back through the +hall to the front porch. + +"Why no, not exactly," she said thoughtfully, then added, with a sudden +gleam in her eyes: "Unless--unless--" + +"Unless what?" queried Amy breathlessly. + +"Oh, I don't know whether you'd call it an idea or just plain +foolishness," answered Betty, striving to speak carelessly. "I was just +thinking that we might persuade her to stay longer on the plea that we +wanted to bring the motorcyclist to justice and needed her +identification." + +Amy looked a little disappointed. + +"Well, I don't know," she said doubtfully. "She said the other day that +she didn't care much about bringing the fellow to justice. She said one +motorcyclist was as bad as another, and the only thing that would give her +satisfaction would be 'to arrest the whole tribe o' them.'" + +Betty laughed a little at the characteristic remark, but her eyes were +troubled. + +"Well," she said with a sigh, "I suppose you're right. She is rather hard +to reason with at times. If only I could think of something." + +The sharp toot of a horn as Mollie grazed the curb with the huge touring +car put an end to the conversation for the time being. Grace was already +on the porch, and as they raced down the steps the girls' spirits rose +happily. + +After all, it was a perfect summer day, the sun shone brilliantly down +upon them, the wind caressed their faces, and, above all, they were young. + +It was not till they were several miles out upon the shining road that +Betty once more thought of Mrs. Sanderson. + +"We might," she said thoughtfully, as though speaking to herself, "tell +her that we were trying to find her son. That might have some effect upon +her." + +"Upon whom?" asked Mollie, nearly running the car into a tree by the +roadside in an effort to get a glimpse of Betty. + +"Oh, Mollie, do be careful," cried Amy plaintively. "I never come out with +you but what I expect to be killed." + +"I should think you'd be tired expecting by this time," returned Mollie +practically. "Now will you please repeat that somewhat meaningless jumble +of words, Betty dear? What was it--something about somebody's son having a +good effect upon somebody--" + +"Well, I hope you feel better, now that you've gotten it out of your +system," drawled Grace. "Now, Betty, go on. I'll keep her quiet with +chocolates till you've had your say." + +"Go on talking all night, will you, Betty dear?" entreated Mollie, +speaking thickly because of a mouthful of chocolate. "Home was never--" +But here Grace inserted another bonbon so deftly that Mollie choked and +almost precipitated another appalling accident. + +"For goodness sakes, hurry, Betty!" cried Amy, in dismay. "If you don't, +there won't be anything of us left to listen to you." + +"Well," said Betty obediently, for she had been so busy with her own +thoughts that half the persiflage and gay bantering had passed above her +head, "I was speaking of Mrs. Sanderson and her son. I thought that if we +told her we were trying to find her Willie, she might consent to stay on +with us a little longer." + +"But wouldn't that be rather raising false hopes?" objected Grace. "We +haven't very much chance of really making such a promise good, you know." + +"Well, but if we tried hard enough we might think of something," Betty +insisted. "We might," she added vaguely, "We might--advertise--" + +"In what?" queried Amy. + +"The papers, of course," Betty answered impatiently. + +"Well," said Mollie, chewing down the last bit of chocolate and speaking +thoughtfully, "there may be something in your idea, at that, Betty. I +don't know about the others, but I'm with you, anyway." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +WHERE LOVE IS DEAF + + +"Doesn't it seem funny," Amy was saying as she daintily but thoroughly +gnawed a chicken bone, "not to have the boys with us?" + +"Well I think," returned Mollie, her nose at an independent angle, "that +it's mighty nice--for a change." + +"Yes," Grace agreed, employing her paper napkin to remedy the damage done +by a vivid spot of jelly on her skirt. "They seem to think they can +dictate to us. Imagine it! To us! Outdoor girls who have never known what +it was to take dictation from any one!" + +"Except our Daddies," Betty broke in, her eyes twinkling. "I've seen even +you stand at attention, Gracie dear, when Mr. Ford spoke." + +"Oh well, of course," said Grace, dismissing the interruption with a wave +of her hand. "We've got to obey our parents, till we're twenty-one +anyway." + +"Then I guess we've got to go on obeying all the rest of our lives," said +Mollie, with a sigh. + +They looked at her curiously. + +"For who," she went on to explain reasonably, "in her right senses is +going to admit to being twenty-one?" + +"To finish what I was saying," Grace continued, while Betty and Amy +chuckled and Mollie looked wide-eyed and innocent: "I, for one, will never +take dictation from any one outside the home folks--especially mere boys +our own age," + +"Well, no one asked you to," said Mollie calmly. "I really don't see what +all the speech-making's about," she added. + +"It was about the boys," said Amy, mumbling over her third piece of +chicken. + +"And by the way they take it for granted we've got to do what they say," +finished Grace. + +"Well," said Betty, plucking a piece of grass and rolling it thoughtfully +between her fingers, "don't you think perhaps they act that way because +they're going 'across' so soon?" + +"I don't see what that's got to do with it," returned Mollie, puzzled. "I +should think that would make them want to be especially nice to us--leave +a good impression, you know." + +"Just the same I can't help thinking," Betty persisted, "that that was why +they acted so queerly about Sergeant Mullins. Maybe they think that when +they're several thousand miles away the other boys will have their +chance." + +"But that's silly," objected Mollie. "As if we wouldn't think a good deal +more of them when they get over there." + +"Distance lends enchantment?" queried Grace, with lifted eyebrows. + +"Goose," commented Mollie. + +"Goodness," cried Grace plaintively, "that's the second time I've been +called a goose in the last five minutes. Pretty soon I'll be a whole flock +of them!" + +The girls laughed, and Mollie said with aggravating condescension: + +"It's hard sometimes to tell the truth, Grace dear, but we only do it for +your own good. That's what friendship is for, you know." + +"Then give me enemies!" cried Grace. "I don't care how many faults I have +if people just won't tell me about them." + +"Which reminds me of something," said Mollie with a chuckle. + +"Well, don't tell us about it," said Grace hastily. "I'm trying hard to +love you, Mollie, but I can't stand everything--" + +"Oh, but it's a joke on me this time," Mollie reassured her, and Grace sat +back with a sigh of relief. + +"It happened while we were at Pine Island," Mollie continued with a +chuckle. "I was sitting in the living room playing the piano--" + +"Or trying to?" interrupted Grace. + +"Or trying to," agreed Mollie with perfect good-nature. "You know my +repertoire consists of two pieces, and I was humming one of them as I +played. + +"Frank and Roy were sitting on the steps of the porch outside and I heard +Frank say to Roy very earnestly: + +"'Do you know, I think Mollie would have a wonderful voice if she would +only have it cultivated.'" + +"Goodness, I thought--" began Grace, but the Little Captain very hastily +pinched her into silence. + +"Evidently they thought I couldn't hear them," Mollie continued. "But they +were mistaken, for I heard Roy answer pityingly, 'Say, old man, I've heard +of love being blind before, but here's a case where the poor little god is +deaf.'" + +"Mollie," cried Amy, shocked, while the others laughed merrily, "what did +Frank say? Did he stand for that?" + +"Most decidedly not," chuckled Mollie. "The last I saw of them, Frank was +leaping a fence, hanging on to Roy's coat tails. It was awfully funny. I +think I laughed for an hour afterward," + +"It was a wonder there was enough of poor Roy left to come home," giggled +Betty. "Frank isn't what you might call gentle, when his temper is +roused." + +"Oh, I believe I know when that was now!" exclaimed Grace, with sudden +animation. "It must have been that evening when I was baking biscuits and +I looked out of the window and saw Roy. He looked like a tramp, hair all +disheveled and face as red as a beat. + +"I called to him and asked him if he'd been in a fight or something, and +he just got redder than ever and backed off into the woods. + +"I concluded he'd gone suddenly and violently insane, and as the aroma of +nearly burned biscuits filled the air I promptly forgot all about him." + +Mollie chuckled. + +"There was probably a very good reason for his _backing_ off," she said. +"I shouldn't wonder if after that he kept his meditations to himself." + +"Yes," said Grace, with gentle malice, "I've long since concluded that +it's better to keep still about personal matters, no matter what you +think." + +"Well, perhaps you have," said gentle Amy with sudden spirit: "But I must +say I never noticed it." + +Grace struck a dramatic attitude. + +"And you too, Amy?" she cried. "Ah, this is too much--" + +"Yes, it's all right, dear," soothed Betty, hastily rescuing a basket. +"But please don't step on the lunch. These baskets cost four dollars and +ninety-eight cents at a bargain sale." + +"Oh, how sordid of you, Betty," chuckled Mollie. "As if Grace cared for a +mere little five-dollar bill." + +"Goodness, I don't know whether I do or not," remarked Grace plaintively. +"It's so long since I've seen one I can't tell." + +"As Allen remarks," laughed Betty, as she gathered up the remains of the +lunch, "'money must think you're dead.'" + +They laughed at her, and then suddenly Betty changed the subject. + +"You know, I overheard something the other day," she said, "that's just +made me terribly blue whenever I've let myself think of it." + +"Oh, Betty," gasped Mollie, jumping unerringly to the catastrophe they had +been dreading all these months, "do you mean the boys have got their +orders?" + +"Oh, no, I don't actually know a thing," Betty hastened to assure her, +but there was a brilliant light of excitement in her eyes that did not +reassure the girls. + +"Then what do you mean?" cried Mollie impatiently. "Oh, Betty dear, I just +haven't realized how awful it will be until this minute. When, those boys +have actually gone, I'll lie down and die, that's all." + +"Well, for goodness sake, don't tell them that," beseeched Grace. "Then +they will think they can dictate." + +"Well, let 'em," said Mollie recklessly. "They can, for all I care." + +"Go on, Betty, do," urged Amy, her hands clasping and unclasping +nervously. "Tell us what it was you heard." + +"Well, Major Adams was talking with the colonel," Betty complied, her +color bright, "and I just happened to catch a couple of phrases as I +passed. + +"'In a week!' the major was saying eagerly. 'The boys will be glad of +that, Colonel. I've had all I could do to keep them pacified at all. Once +let them get at the Huns and it will be all over but the shouting.' + +"'Yes, they're a fine bunch of young fighters,' the colonel answered. And, +oh girls, I wish you could have seen the way he looked, so splendidly +straight and martial and proud. 'I tell you, Major,' he said, 'it's a +great thing to have the leadership of such lads as those. They're the pick +of the nation.' + +"And then I went on and my heart was beating so hard I had to hold on to +it," Betty finished. "It seemed to me I could almost hear the cannon and +see the boys--our boys--" + +Her voice trailed off into silence, and for a long time no one spoke. Each +one of these young girls, who, a few short months before, had scarcely +known the meaning of the word war except as they had read about it in +their histories, was striving desperately to visualize the battle +front--the trenches, great guns belching forth a deadly hail of shells, +the roar of cannon, the moans of dying men-- + +And there, perhaps, in the mire and horror of it all--the boys--their +boys-- + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE COPPERHEAD + + +Betty was the first to break the silence. + +"But, of course," she said, and they started at the sound of her voice--so +far away had their thoughts been wandering, "it may only be one more of +those rumors the boys are always talking about." + +"I suppose so," said Grace, with a sigh. "Anyway, it won't do any good to +worry about it till the time comes." + +"Well, I don't know," said Mollie a little irritably. "It's like having a +sword hanging over your head all the time. I'd just as soon have it cut me +in two now and get it over with." + +"Yes, it is something like cutting the poor dog's tail off an inch at a +time," sighed Amy, and at the comparison and her sober countenance they +had to laugh despite the very real trouble at their hearts. + +"I wish," said Betty wistfully after a while, "the boys could have gotten +leave to-day. I should like to have just one more picnic with them. We've +had such good times together. And we're going to have lots more," she +added, springing to her feet with a sudden, swift smile. "That's our part +of the business from now on. Just to keep smiling and make up our minds +that they're coming back to us just as they went--only better." + +"They couldn't be," declared Amy, and once more the other Outdoor Girls +laughed and hugged her. + +"Anyway, they've got one good backer in you, Amy dear," said Betty fondly. +"You've no idea how fond all the boys are of you. I declare, sometimes I'm +almost jealous." + +"You," cried Amy incredulously, looking at the flushed face and shining +eyes. "You'll never need to be jealous of anybody in your life Betty +Nelson--and especially of me," she added modestly. + +Betty laughed and hugged her again. + +"Girls, it's getting late," she said suddenly, with another of her swift +changes of subject. "I guess perhaps it's time we were starting back. Oh, +I forgot," she added, in consternation, "I, or rather, Amy and I, promised +Mrs. Sanderson we'd gather some flowers for her, and now we've got to do +it, even if it is late--" + +"Of course we have," agreed Mollie, rising with alacrity. "It wouldn't do +at all to disappoint her." + +"It must have been a pretty lonely day for her," said Amy thoughtfully, as +she snapped the lid of a basket shut. "I wish she had come with us." + +"Well, we're pretty much in the same boat as she is--or will be soon," +mused Mollie, as the girls scattered to make good Betty's promise. + +"How so?" queried Amy. + +"Why," said Mollie, "she's already lost her boy and now we're about to +lose ours." + +"Goodness, Mollie," cried Grace indignantly, while the others chuckled, +"you make me feel eighty years old. They're not our sons, you know." + +"Of course you had to tell me that--" Mollie was beginning, when a scream +from Amy and a hurried scramble onto a convenient stump interrupted her. + +"What is it?" they cried, running to her anxiously. + +"Look out, look out," Amy cried, bringing them up with a sharp turn a +couple of feet from her perch. + +"What is it?" they cried again, looking wildly about them. + +"A snake," she screamed. "Look out, Grace, it's coming for you! Oh, look +out!" + +Wide-eyed and open-mouthed, the girls looked where Amy pointed, and saw, +wriggling ominously toward them through the short grass, a large +coppery-headed snake. + +Grace gave one desperate leap and landed beside Amy on the stump while +Betty and Mollie stepped to one side out of the reptile's path. Then, +almost miraculously--or so Betty thought when she looked back upon it +afterward--her eye fell upon a forked twig lying at her feet. + +Quick as light she stooped and picked it up, then turned to Mollie, who +was standing backed up against a tree, white-faced, terrified, in a +half-hypnotized condition, staring at the snake. + +The reptile had coiled itself and lay hissing at them viciously. + +"I'm going to hold out this stick," whispered Betty feverishly between +lips that scarcely moved, "and when he strikes, pick up that rock at your +feet and let him have it. Ready?" + +"Y-yes," stammered poor Mollie, terrified, yet game to the last. "Oh, +Betty--" + +But the sentence was never finished for, with a menacing movement, Betty +had thrust the stick toward the reptile and the latter with a hiss had +struck. + +Quick as a flash and before the snake had time to coil again, Mollie +picked up the rock and hurled it at his sinister copper head. Her aim was +true, and the long, slithery body, robbed of its deadliness, writhed and +beat furiously at the short stubbly grass. + +Mollie put her hands before her eyes, shivering, and even Betty leaned +weakly against a tree, faint and sick, now that the crisis had passed. + +"I--I thought you'd be k-killed," moaned Amy, and though the tears of +excitement and horror were rolling down her cheeks, she would have been +the first to deny it had you told her she was crying. "Oh, B-Betty, you're +w-wonderful!" + +"No I'm not--I'm just scared stiff," cried Betty hysterically. "Anyway, +M-Mollie did it all." + +"Well, let's g-get out of here," cried Grace. Later they had time to laugh +at the chattering teeth that made it impossible to say anything without +stammering--but it seemed anything but funny to them then. "Let's g-get +out!" + +"Second the motion," cried Betty, with a wry little twist to her mouth, +being, as usual, the first to recover her self control. "I can't see any +sense in lingering." + +A few seconds later they had gathered up their belongings and jumped +thankfully into the road--out of sight of that sinister body still +writhing in the grass. + +It was not until they had climbed into the car and were whirling over the +smooth road at a rapid rate that they began to feel like themselves again. + +"I guess that was one of the narrowest escapes we ever had," said Mollie +over her shoulder with a laugh that was still a little unsteady. "I guess +we won't go picnicking in the woods alone again for quite some time." + +"But I didn't know there were any snakes around here," said Grace +wonderingly, and, it must be admitted, still with a little quaver in her +voice. + +"There aren't many," Betty explained, "Allen told me that poisonous snakes +of any sort had been so rarely seen around these parts that people thought +the stories of them were made up. He said they always looked suspiciously +at the bearers of the snake tales, shrugged their shoulders, winked, and +asked each other to guess where So-and-So had been the night before." + +"Goodness," cried Mollie. "I suppose we'll never dare to tell it then. +They'll think we are--" + +"Slightly inebriated," finished Betty drolly. + +"Goodness, I don't know what that means," objected Mollie, "but it sounds +worse than what I was going to say. Now what's the matter?" + +This last exclamation was caused by a sudden, grinding noise within the +machine and a jerking stop that jarred them all nearly out of their seats. + +Mollie looked back over her shoulder with a despairing expression: + +"Well, this certainly isn't our lucky day," she said, with forced calm. +"First we nearly get eaten up by a snake, and then the car breaks down--" + +"But, Mollie, what's the matter?" cried Grace impatiently. "We can't stay +here. Can't you see?--there's a storm coming up." + +"Well I didn't do it," snapped Mollie. "I do think, Grace, you can be the +most unreasonable--" + +"Oh, please don't start anything else," cried Betty, herself a little on +edge with the rather exciting day's events. "Let's get out and see if we +can find what's wrong. We certainly can't do any good by talking about +it." + +They got out, and Mollie even consented to "get under," but all to no +avail. The machine refused to be placated and stood stubbornly still in +the middle of the road while the storm clouds gathered and the first drops +began to fall. + +"Well," Mollie decided at last, sitting miserably on the running board, +"I guess we've either got to sit here all night or walk home and trust to +luck the car doesn't get stolen." + +"Also get soaked through ourselves," Grace was adding disconsolately, when +a familiar sound caught their ears. It was the regular tramp, tramp of +marching men. + +"Some of the boys from the camp!" cried Mollie, springing up joyfully. +"Maybe they'll help us." + +As the small squad swung around the turn in the road they were delighted +to see that Sergeant Mullins was in charge. He brought the boys to a sharp +halt at sight of them, and came forward to meet them, saluting gravely. + +"Are you in trouble?" he asked, with his quiet smile and a glance at the +stalled machine. "May I help?" + +"Oh, would you?" cried Betty, her pretty forehead puckered. "We do want to +get back before the storm breaks." + +Without a word, the young fellow removed his jacket and examined the +machine carefully. Then, with equal gravity, he wormed his way under the +car. + +In what seemed to the girls no more than a minute, he reappeared and +smiled at them. + +"I guess it's all right now," he assured them with another punctilious +salute. "If I might suggest that there's no time to be lost--" with a +significant glance toward the lowering sky. For answer, Mollie threw in +the clutch and the machine purred evenly. Then, with a little impulsive +gesture, she turned to the sergeant. + +"It's--it's a long way to Camp Liberty," she said, with pretty hesitation. +"Won't you let us show you how grateful we are by letting us take you +there?" + +"Please do," urged Betty. + +He considered a moment, then with another of his grave smiles saluted once +more and turned to the boys who stood waiting in the road. + +"Pile in, fellows!" he said. "We'll just about make it before the storm." + +Then, while the boys obeyed, scrambling in any way, and Betty and Grace +squeezed themselves into the front seat, Sergeant Mullins leaned over and +said, very quietly: + +"Thank you." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE REINS TIGHTEN + + +"A week!" sighed Betty. "Oh, Mollie dear, a week's such a very little +time!" + +"Goodness, it isn't even that now," Mollie returned, dropping a stitch in +the sweater she was making and not even noticing it--an almost unheard of +procedure. "That is," she added, with a slight little flicker of hope, "if +you're sure you heard the major aright, Betty. Mightn't he have been +speaking of something else?" + +"Well, I told you what he said," answered Betty, a trifle impatiently, for +she also had dropped a stitch and saw before her the weary process of +ripping out two whole rows of her helmet--and helmets were such mean +things to make, anyway! + +"When he spoke of a week," she added, ripping vindictively, "and then said +that the boys would be glad the waiting was over, it seems to me there's +just about one conclusion we can come to." + +"Oh, all right, but you needn't be so cross about it," returned Mollie, +who, being very cross herself, could not make allowance for the malady in +any one else. + +"Have you seen any of the boys lately?" she asked, after an interval of +deep concentration. "We've been kept so busy here at the Hostess House +lately with these other boys that our boys might as well be dead and +buried for all I've seen of them." + +"Who's talking about being dead and buried?" demanded a third voice, and +they turned to see Grace in the doorway with the inevitable candy box +under her arm. + +"Can't you choose a more cheerful subject?" she added, coming in and +seating herself luxuriously in a big chair. "There's enough of that being +done anyway--" + +"You talk as if getting dead and buried were some sort of new indoor +sport," interrupted Mollie, glad to have this old familiar enemy to spar +with. + +"Goodness, there's no more sport in anything," returned Grace, +disconsolately. "I don't see why any old swell-headed German--" + +"Grace!" exclaimed Betty, but with twinkling eyes. "What language!" + +"Oh, I could do lots better than that," returned Grace tranquilly, "if I +weren't in polite society." + +"You flatter us," murmured Mollie. + +"I know it," Grace retorted, still calmly. "Anyway, I was remarking that I +didn't see why any swell-headed old German was allowed to take the world +by the ears and turn it upside down--" + +"Gee, who's allowing him?" cried a masculine voice from the door, and the +girls turned with a chorus of greetings to welcome Roy. + +"We were just saying we thought you were dead," remarked Mollie somberly, +never lifting her eyes from the sweater as he seated himself beside her. + +"Sorry to disappoint you," he replied cheerfully. "As Frank remarked +unflatteringly this morning, 'You are far from being a dead one--go and +reform.'" + +"Was he speaking of me?" demanded Mollie Billette in deadly quiet, but Roy +raised a placating hand. + +"No, no, of course not," he said hurriedly. "He was speaking of me, poor +worm that I am. But, I say," he added, looking around at the busily flying +needles, "what's the idea of the knitting. We've got more sweaters and +things than we know what to do with now." + +Mollie lifted her eyes long enough to give him a withering glance. + +"Do you think you're the only ones we care about?" + +"I hope so," he responded promptly and daringly. + +"Do you think maybe we'd better leave, Betty?" inquired Grace with +delicately lifted eyebrows, while Mollie flushed scarlet. + +"If you do, I'll never speak to you again," cried the latter, in alarm, +adding, to change the subject: "Where are the other boys, Roy? You usually +travel in fours." + +"Well, as long as you didn't say on all fours, it's all right," responded +Roy in a weak attempt at a joke that focused three pairs of girlish eyes +scornfully upon him. + +"Roy!" they chorused. + +"All right, don't shoot," he pleaded. "What was that you asked me, +Mollie?" + +"I asked you," returned Mollie, with deliberation, "where the other boys +were." + +"I don't know, and what's more I don't care," replied Roy independently, +leaning back and crossing his long legs with a sigh of content. "We've all +been trying to get leave to come over and see you girls, and so far I'm +the only one who's succeeded. The old boy, that is, the colonel," he +corrected himself, gravely saluting the imaginary officer, "is drawing the +reins pretty tight these days. Looks," he added, striving to keep the +excitement out of his voice, "pretty much like business." + +"Like business," they repeated in chorus, and were about to follow it up +with a shower of questions when there was the sound of more masculine +voices in the hall and the missing members of the quartette precipitated +themselves upon the assembled company. Roy looked disgusted--the girls +happy. + +"So you thought you'd have the field all to yourself, did you?" Allen +demanded of the disconsolate Roy. "Well, that's the time you counted your +chickens too soon." + +Then, turning to Betty, he caught her two hands in his and waltzed her +exuberantly about the room. + +"Betty, Betty," he cried, his voice keen, his eyes shining with +excitement, "we've got special permission to tell you, because you're in +the service. We're going, little girl! We're on our way to lick the tar +out of those Huns!" + +"Allen!" Betty's face went suddenly white and she sank down on the arm of +a chair, regarding him with wide, dark eyes. The other three boys with +Mollie and Grace were gathered in the opposite corner of the room, +chattering like magpies. + +"It's--it's really come?" she demanded, unsteadily. "Oh, Allen, when?" + +"Day after to-morrow," he replied, his own hands shaking a little as they +closed over hers. "Are you going to congratulate me, Betty?" + +"A--of course," she answered, smiling at him with a bravery that made him +long to gather her in his arms and comfort her. She looked so little and +plucky and utterly adorable. + +"Then do it," he said whimsically, putting his hands behind him to keep +them out of temptation. + +"C-congratulations," she stammered, then her lip trembled and she bit it +to keep it steady. "I know how much you've been wanting it," she +continued, striving for a matter-of-fact tone, "and so, of c-course, I'm +glad for your sake. Only--" + +"Only?" he prompted, gripping his hands hard to make them behave. + +"Only," she added, her voice scarcely above a whisper, and glancing up at +him shyly, "I can't very well help missing you, Allen, just at first--" + +"Betty," he cried, his hands breaking away from their imprisonment and +seeking hers fiercely, "I'm trying so hard to do the right thing,--be +honorable and all that--wait till I come back, you know--but I can't. +It--it isn't human nature. You're too wonderful--too utterly--" + +"Allen, don't!" she cried breathlessly. "You forget we're not alone." + +"I--don't--care--" he was beginning headily, but she wrenched her hands +free, and, eluding him, plunged into the excited group at the other end of +the room. + +"Hello, Betty," Mollie cried, her voice high with excitement. "I guess you +were right after all--only it's five whole days sooner than we expected." + +"I--I wish they'd stop the old war," sighed Amy, who had come in in time +to share the wonderful news. "I just can't bear the thought of it." + +"Gee, that would be a nice note," broke in Will boyishly. "After all these +weeks of training, to have the war stop just as we got ready to have a +hand in it!" + +"We'll be lucky if we don't leave a couple of hands in it," said Roy, +again trying to be witty and again finding himself the battery for a score +of indignant glances. + +"If you think that's funny," Grace was beginning when Betty, color high, +heart still beating suffocatingly from that brief little battle with +Allen and her own inclination, interceded in his behalf. + +"Oh, do leave him alone," she cried, patting Roy's scorned shoulder +soothingly. "I, for one, would forgive him for anything he said or did +just now without even being asked." + +Roy gave her a grateful glance and Allen whispered close in her ear. + +"You can be kind to every one but the one who loves you, Betty. Is that +it?" + +His voice was so low that no one but Betty could hear. And Betty felt an +added rush of color sting her cheeks, and turned her eyes away to hide the +confusion, the sudden fright in them. + +If they had been alone no one knows what might have happened. But, even as +it was, Allen, watching the flaming color and the downcast eyes, felt his +heart leap joyfully and was almost--almost--satisfied. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE FATEFUL DAY + + +The rain that had been pouring down steadily all night stopped about dawn. +Betty raised herself on one elbow to look out the window and was greeted +by a dazzling burst of sunshine, as the glorious disc dispersed the fog +and took possession of the world. + +"A good omen," she murmured to herself, rubbing the sleepiness from her +eyes. "Perhaps that's how the Huns will melt away before our boys!" + +"What are you talking to yourself about?" queried Grace, irritably. "A +person has a fine chance to sleep--" + +"Sleep!" cried Betty, indignantly. "What on earth do you want to sleep +for? Do you know what day this is?" + +"Friday," Grace answered mechanically, then seeing the point of the +question, sat up in bed, rubbing her eyes. + +"Oh, I--forgot," she stammered. "They're--they're going away, aren't +they?" + +"Yes; unless, they've changed their minds since last night," returned +Betty dryly. "Oh, Grace, please don't look so sleepy. You--you annoy me," +she finished hysterically. + +"Well, I'm sorry," said Grace, trying comically to appear dignified. "But +it really isn't so strange that I should look the way I feel--" + +"Goodness, if I looked the way I feel, I'd be an awful mess," sighed Amy +from the other bed. + +"Maybe you do," chuckled Mollie. "Shall I get you a mirror?" + +"Well, if you'd been awake almost all night," Amy began, but Mollie cut +her short with a bear's hug. + +"Forgive me, Amy," she said, with unusual humility. "I do know how awful +it is to lie awake nearly all night and just think. + +"And I shouldn't blame any one the least bit," she finished, "for calling +me a mess, because I know I am. I'm positively afraid to look in the +mirror." + +"All right, we'll have 'em all draped in black, just for your special +benefit," said Grace dryly. "Mollie, where did you put my stockings?" + +"Goodness, what do you think I am?" retorted Mollie. "Your little French +maid?" + +"Nothing half so cute," returned Grace ungraciously, while Betty and Amy +exchanged glances which, interpreted, meant: "We'll have our hands full +with these two, to-day, all right." + +"Anyway, you didn't answer my question," Grace persisted. "I asked you +what you did with my stockings." + +"Oh, I've got 'em on," replied Mollie sarcastically, smothering a yawn. "I +mislaid my slumber shoes and used them instead." + +The girls giggled and Grace looked around for an instrument of punishment. +Not finding any, she was forced to resort to sarcasm. + +"I guess you must have caught that particular form of insanity from Roy," +she said. + +"Well, as long as it wasn't the measles--" Mollie was beginning when Amy +broke in with one of those absolutely irrelevant remarks of hers, that +made her different from every one else. + +"I wonder," she said thoughtfully, "if the boys will fall in love with +those nice little French girls. They say they're awfully attractive." + +"Amy, what ever put such a thing into your head?" cried Betty, while the +other two stared at her wide-eyed, not knowing whether to laugh or to be +indignant. + +"Oh--nothing," she answered vaguely. "I was just wondering, that's all." + +"Well," said Mollie, throwing back the covers preparatory to rising, "I +might suggest that the next time you feel it coming on, you might choose +something more comfortable, that's all. Wondering about such things might +become wearing. What's that?" she asked, as a sharp tap sounded on the +door. + +"A caller, presumably," Grace remarked, as she slipped on a dressing gown +and approached the door. + +The early morning caller proved to be, much to their surprise and delight, +no other than Mrs. Sanderson. + +The old lady's eyes were unusually bright, and there was a flush on her +face. + +"I haven't been able to sleep all night," she said, her hands fluttering +nervously in her lap. "Ever since Betty told me the boys were going this +morning I couldn't think of anything but just that one thing." + +"I am sorry I told you then until this morning," cried Betty, reproaching +herself. "I didn't know it was going to make you feel bad." + +"Oh, it wasn't your fault, dear," the old woman hastened to reassure her. +"And it really didn't make me feel bad--not for them, anyway. They're +lucky to be able to fight--even to die--for a country like ours. Only," +she paused, and some of the light died out of her eyes, "I couldn't help +wishing--" + +"Yes," they prompted gently. + +"That my Willie boy could have gone with them," she said, the words so +soft that they had to lean close to her to catch them. "I would have been +so proud of him." + +The girls were silent, not knowing how to comfort the poor old woman. + +"Perhaps," said Amy at last, scarcely knowing what she was saying, yet +trying so hard to comfort, "he is a soldier somewhere. There are so many +thousands of them, you know." + +Mrs. Sanderson turned to her with such fierce emotion in her eyes that the +girl unconsciously shrank back. + +"If I thought that," she said, her voice tense, her hands clasped so +tightly in her lap that the knuckles showed white, "I'd be willing, glad, +to die the next minute. If I could just see my boy in uniform--even if I +knew I could never see him again--" her voice trailed off, and once more +the light died out of her eyes. + +"But, of course, that's impossible," she said wearily. "If my boy had been +alive, he'd have come back to me. But that wasn't why I came in to see you +so early," she added after a moment, straightening up with that +indomitable courage that had won, first, the girls' admiration, then +their love. "I jest wanted to find out when 'twas the boys was startin'." + +"We're not quite sure. The boys thought some time between nine and ten +o'clock, but they didn't seem to be at all sure about it. The only thing +we really know is that they're going to start early," Betty answered. + +"Thank you, dear." The old lady rose, and when she started for the door +Mollie ran before her and opened it. + +When she had gone, the girls sat still, just looking at each other for a +few minutes. Then-- + +"Isn't she wonderful?" breathed Betty. "After all these years she would +give him up gladly for the sake of her country. That's real patriotism." + +"She deserves to get him back," murmured Mollie, as though speaking to +herself. + +"Well, that's just the reason she won't," said Grace, irritably struggling +with an unruly lock of hair. "Nobody ever gets what he deserves in this +awful world. What is the matter with my hair this morning? It looks just +exactly as I feel." + +"Oh, come away from the mirror, Gracie," cried Betty, putting an arm about +her and dragging her, an unwilling victim, out into the hall. "You'll feel +better after you've had your breakfast. And remember," she added +diplomatically, "there's a brand new box of candy in your left-hand +dresser drawer." + +The ruse worked, and a smile forced its way through Grace's discontent. +Then a sudden thought struck her and the smile flickered and went out +altogether. + +"It was Roy's parting gift," she said, striving to speak lightly, though +her voice trembled ever so little. "You know, Betty," she said in a rare +burst of confidence, "I never had the slightest idea I could feel so +really b-bad--" her eyes filled and she brushed her hand across them +impatiently. + +"Am I not a goose?" she asked plaintively, and Betty, trying to laugh, +choked, too, and abandoned the attempt. + +Then they both smiled, an April sort of uncertain smile and went in to +breakfast. + +"I guess," remarked Betty whimsically, just as Mollie and Amy ran down the +stairs and into the room, "that we're fast becoming what you said you were +the other day, Gracie--a regular flock of geese!" + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +SPARRING FOR TIME + + +The roads were muddy from the heavy rain that had fallen over night, but +Mollie demurred when the girls suggested that they walk to the station +rather than go in the automobile. + +"It may be all very well for you," she declared, "but I certainly don't +feel in any mood for taking a two-mile walk this morning." + +"Well, my knees do feel kind of weak and wobbly," agreed Amy plaintively. +"But you know how reckless you are, Mollie, and on these wet roads we're +very apt to skid." + +"Well, but what's one skid more or less in a good cause?" interrupted +Betty merrily. "Besides, I guess we wouldn't have time to walk, anyway," +she added quickly, as dozens of soldiers began pouring from their +barracks. "We'll never be able to get to the station before the boys +unless we take the car." + +"Girls, they're really going," wailed Amy, as they quickly got into their +wraps. + +"Certainly looks like it," said Grace grimly, for once not knowing or +caring whether the becoming little hat was tilted at exactly the right +angle or not. "It makes me feel all queer and--wobbly inside." + +"Better take some candy along," advised Mollie, with a weak attempt at +raillery as they ran down the porch steps and piled into the car. "You +won't be able to come out of it alive if you're not properly fortified, +Gracie." + +"Oh, that reminds me," cried Betty, springing from her seat and from the +car at the risk of her neck, for the machine had already begun to move. +"We forgot the chocolate and tobacco for the boys. Wait for me, Mollie." + +But Mollie, who had already brought the car to a standstill with a jerk +and a grinding of brakes, leapt out after her, and the two flew up the +steps, taking two at a time, and into the house. + +Left behind, Amy and Grace looked at each other. + +"I wish I could move like that," sighed the latter. "Those two get things +done while I'm just beginning to think about it." + +"And here they come back again," marveled Amy. + +"Yes we have, and it's just about time, too," panted Betty, as they +scrambled into the machine. "The boys are coming from the main gate now, +and we'll have to make things hum if we want to get there before them." + +"As Frank would remark," agreed Mollie: "'You said it!' This is going to +be the race of a lifetime," + +"But Mollie," said Amy, gripping both hands tight in her lap as the car +swerved sharply and executed a magnificent skid on two wheels, "you know +it won't do either the boys or us any good if we get killed on the way. Do +be--" + +"Amy Blackford," cried Mollie in an ominous tone of voice, "if you say +that word to me again I will run into a tree or something just for spite!" + +Amy gave a plaintive little moan, and her two hands gripped tighter in her +lap. + +"All right," she said. "I'm glad I made my will a couple of days ago." + +Grace turned an interested and speculative eye upon her. + +"Oh, you did," she remarked, adding in a wheedling tone, "What did you +leave me, dear? You know I always was your best friend." + +"Goodness, I wonder who's my worst then," retorted Amy, with an unexpected +flash of humor. + +"Oof, that was a bad one, Gracie," Betty laughed, glad of any diversion +to keep the vision of those splendid, marching boys in the background as +long as possible. + +Unconsciously the girls were sparring for time. They knew that once they +let themselves think, that once they let themselves realize the full +significance, the utter finality of this thing that was about to happen, +it would be hard for them to smile. And they so wanted to smile! + +They had been so glad, so proud when the boys had volunteered among the +very first. Down in their hearts they had known that that was the only +thing they could have done. + +And the thought of their going away had seemed so far in the future that, +as yet, it need not worry them. Blinded by their own passionate +patriotism, they had seen all of the glory of war and none of its horror. + +And now, in order to send the boys away with the thought of bright faces +and encouraging smiles to cheer them on their long, grim journey, the +girls joked and laughed, carefully avoiding the subject that was uppermost +in their minds. + +"Oh, well, that's all a person can expect in this world," Grace had +answered resignedly, in reply to Amy's thrust. "Just be kind and loving +and thoughtful of other people's comfort, and you're sure to be sat +upon--" + +"Goodness, she doesn't think anything of herself, does she?" Mollie flung +back over her shoulder. "Now see what you made me do!" the exclamation was +fairly jerked from her as the car lurched into a deep rut at the side of +the road, skidded for a minute, seemingly uncertain whether to fling them +out on the bank or continue its way, then bumped up on the road again and +continued its flight. + +"Oh, Mollie, do be--" Amy began, but a sudden grim straightening of +Mollie's back warned her in time and with a gasp she choked back the +forbidden word. + +"Goodness, isn't she well trained?" laughed Betty, as Mollie bent once +more over the wheel. + +"Who wouldn't be," protested Amy plaintively, "if a cannibal should come +and hang an axe over his head--?" + +"Is she calling me names?" demanded Mollie ferociously, half turning in +her seat. "If she is, please tell her to say it to my face." + +"Well, I would if I could," cried poor Amy desperately. "But I'd have to +be an acrobat--or an idiot--" + +"The last ought to be easy," drawled Grace, then hastily offered her +candy. "I didn't mean it, Amy dear," she retracted humbly. "Really I +didn't." + +"Don't you believe her," said Betty whimsically. "She only wants to find +out what you left in your will, Amy." + +"I wouldn't dare tell her now, anyway," returned Amy, with a twinkle. +"Methinks it might very easily become my death warrant." + +"How so?" queried Mollie with interest--or perhaps it might be said, +Mollie's back expressed interest. For Mollie's back could express, Grace +had once said, "more emotions in a minute than most people's faces could +in a year." And, riding as they so often did, in full view of that +expressive back, the girls had come to interpret its owner's emotions +correctly in nine cases out of ten. So now they were able to detect a very +quickened interest. + +"Why," Amy explained naively, "it's barely possible that I've left +something to Mollie, too, isn't it?" + +"Barely," agreed Mollie dryly. + +"Well," Amy chuckled, "then what would be easier than for Mollie to +precipitate an accident, dash my brains out against some convenient tree, +and then brazenly protest all innocence in the murder." + +"Nothing," said Mollie, with the same dryness of intonation, "except the +bare possibility of dashing my own brains out in the transaction." + +"Oh, well, it could be fixed," said Amy with confidence. + +"Do you really think so?" Mollie's back once more betrayed a lively +interest, and the girls chuckled. "Suppose you tell me about it." + +"And sign my own death warrant?" returned Amy plaintively. "Goodness, you +must think I'm foolisher than I am." + +"Impossible," retorted Mollie and once more Amy sighed and folded her +hands resignedly in her lap. + +"All right," she threatened, "if we only live through this, I'll change my +will, that's all, and leave everything to Betty and Mrs. Sanderson." + +"Goodness, what have I done?" cried Grace in dismay. "Didn't I just offer +you another candy and--and--everything" + +"I didn't notice the everything," said Amy. + +"Well, you noticed the candy," retorted Grace with spirit, "and it was the +fattest, juiciest one in the box, too." + +"Well, give it back, Amy," directed Mollie, and Amy, in the act of +swallowing the fat juicy chocolate, choked on a chuckle. + +"Too late," she cried. "It is decapitated." + +"I thought I heard its death rattle," sighed Grace, mournfully adding, as +the girls laughed at her: "Oh, I don't know what's the matter with me +this morning. I never felt so foolish before. + +"Girls," she said, and suddenly her voice quivered and her eyes filled, +"I've tried so not to think of it, but I can't fight it off much longer. +Will and I have always been such chums, played and worked and +even--quarreled--together--" + +"Please don't, Gracie," cried Betty, her face flushing and her eyes +growing dark and wide. "It would be so easy just to g-give way, but we're +in the service, too, you know, and we must be at least as b-brave as the +boys." + +"I--I guess maybe that's impossible," said Mollie, her voice, even her +straight little back betraying emotion. "Nobody could be as b-brave as +they are." + +"Well, we never know what we can do till we try, do we?" cried Betty, that +indomitable fighting spirit of hers rising to the emergency. "If we say we +can't, of course we can't, but we can do our best, can't we? If the boys +aren't c-crying, why should we?" + +"That's the way to talk," cried Mollie, straightening defiantly at the +challenge. "We don't have to, and, what's more, we won't!" + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +TEARS AND PATRIOTISM + + +It was a valiant determination, that one to smile whatever happened; but +somehow, 'way down in their brave hearts, the girls doubted a little. They +would do their best, but, after all, they were only human and there are +times when to smile is the hardest achievement in the world. + +"We're--we're nearly there," ventured Amy, after a little interval of +silence, during which the girls had been busily gathering all their +resources for the crisis just before them. "Do you suppose we've got in +ahead of the boys?" + +"Goodness, I should hope so," retorted Mollie, with a brief return of her +old spirit. "If this old car couldn't make better time than boys on foot, +I'd give it away to any one who'd take it off my hands." + +As she spoke the car swung around a sharp curve, and the station that had +appeared so attractive to them several months ago, loomed into view. +To-day they greeted its appearance with as much enthusiasm as they would +the electric chair. + +A train was coming in, but it was not one for the troops. It was a mixed +train, composed of one passenger car, a baggage and smoker combined, and +several milk cars. + +"What a country-looking train," was Amy's comment. + +She addressed Betty, but the Little Captain did not answer, for the reason +that she was staring into the baggage car, the side door to which was wide +open. + +"See that man!" + +She pointed to an individual who stood in the baggage car, his hands +holding up a motorcycle. + +"Oh, Betty, is it that man--our motorcyclist--?" began Mollie. + +"I am sure it is!" cried Grace. + +The man was looking toward the end of the baggage car, so they got only a +side look at his face. Then the train moved away and was soon out of +sight. + +"Well, if that's the fellow, he is gone," murmured Amy. + +"Now, maybe, we'll never have a chance to catch him," added Mollie. + +"Oh, we'll catch him yet," declared Betty, + +Under ordinary circumstances the Outdoor Girls would have given the +incident considerable attention. But now their thoughts were of the +soldier boys so soon to leave. + +"Didn't the boys say they were entraining for Philadelphia?" asked Grace, +trying hard to make her voice sound natural and merely conversational. + +"Yes, that's where a great many of them go," Betty answered, praying +desperately that she might fight down that flood of tears that every +moment threatened to rise and overwhelm her. "I _won't_ be weak and +f-foolish," she was saying, over and over, to herself. "I won't, I won't, +I won't!" + +Then the car came to a standstill beside the platform and the girls sat +looking at each other, not quite sure what to do next. + +"Do you think it would be all right to stay here?" asked Mollie +uncertainly. "Of course we could get out when the boys came." + +"It's a little conspicuous, don't you think?" suggested Amy mildly. + +"Yes, it looks as if we had come to see a parade or something," Grace +agreed. + +There was a great deal of luggage and many boxes piled at one end of the +station and it was upon these that Betty's eyes, roaming in search of some +sheltered spot, finally focused. + +"We could slip in behind those packing cases and things," she suggested; +"and then we could see without being too much seen ourselves." + +"Then the boys might not see us," protested Mollie, clenching her teeth +over her trembling lip. "We don't want them to think we weren't here to +say g-good-bye." + +"Well, they'll see the car, won't they?" Betty argued, a little +impatiently, for even her sweet temper was beginning to give way under the +strain. "They'll know by that that we're here and then if they miss us, +they deserve to--that's all." + +"Well, I suppose we'll have to take a chance," said Molly, almost crossly, +as she jumped out after Betty. "I only wish it was all over. The waiting +is getting on my nerves." + +"Well, you don't think you're alone in that, do you?" Grace was beginning +when Betty interrupted with a little hysterical laugh. + +"I--I don't see how it's going to make us feel very much better to quarrel +about it," she said, adding whimsically: "Come ahead you two--kiss and +make up before the boys come. You know they always said it made them +jealous enough to commit murder when we did it in their presence." + +They laughed unsteadily, and Mollie threw an affectionate and repentant +arm about the Little Captain's shoulders. + +"Betty, dear, you make me ashamed of myself," she said impulsively. "As if +you didn't have enough to worry about yourself without my making you more. +I'm a selfish pig, that's all." + +Just then the sound that they had all been unconsciously listening for +struck heavily upon their ears. The regular tramp, tramp of hundreds, +thousands, of marching feet! + +"Oh, they're coming, they're coming!" cried Amy, in a sort of suffocated +little moan. + +"Well, of course they're coming," retorted Mollie, her nerves jumping with +the effort to speak coolly. "We've been almost expecting that they would, +haven't we?" + +"Oh, I know. But it all seemed like a terrible d-dream till now," returned +Amy, looking so like a bewildered child that Betty put a comforting arm +about her and drew her into the little recess beside her. + +"It isn't a dream, Amy dear," she said, very steadily. "I don't think we +were ever more fully or terribly awake than we are now. Not even that day +when we heard of the sinking of the _Lusitania_, did we realize just what +this war was going to mean to us. It's only by some sacrifice--some +personal sacrifice--" but the brave voice broke and died into silence +while she listened with almost straining intensity to that regular beat of +marching feet, coming nearer, ever nearer-- + +And in the distance came the long, warning whistle of the train--the train +that was going to take them away! + +"Oh, keep still," cried Mollie, turning with sudden, unreasoning fury +toward the oncoming locomotive with the smudge of smoke in its wake, her +hands clenched passionately and her black eyes smoldering. "We know you're +coming for them--Roy and Allen and Will and Frank and--and--all the +others. But that's no reason why you have to rub it in, is it?" + +At any other time, the rather unreasoning attack upon the train would have +seemed funny to the girls, and even in their trouble a faint gleam of +humor came to them, but no one laughed, no one even smiled. + +"I--I wonder," said Grace, nervously patting a stray lock of hair into +place beneath the smart little hat which, under the spell of excitement, +had gotten slightly awry, "if we'll be able to pick our boys out from all +that crowd. Oh, girls," taking a quick little survey over the top of her +own particular packing case, "they're almost here! Swarms, just swarms of +them!" + +"Goodness, that sounds like locusts--or mosquitoes," cried Betty +hysterically, scarcely knowing what she was saying. "Squeeze in tight, +Amy, or you'll get your toes stepped on. Grace, look again. How far away +are they?" + +"Just around the corner," reported Grace. "Goodness," she cried in sudden +panic, "I almost wish we'd stayed in the automobile. I'd feel s-safer--" + +"Safer?" cried Mollie scornfully, "I'd like to know what there is to be +afraid of. Oh, there you go again," shaking an impotent little fist as the +great train rumbled into the station with a screaming of brakes and a +shrieking of whistles. + +And then the flood broke. Down the station platform came hundreds upon +hundreds of khaki-clad figures, talking, gesticulating, faces eagerly +flushed, eyes brilliant as they prophetically looked into the future. + +"Oh, we'll never be able to pick them out of the crowd," cried Grace +despairingly. "I'm getting cross-eyed as it is. Oh, there's Corporal +Harris! Yes, and there goes James McDonald! Oh, oh--" + +And indeed there were scores of familiar faces among the boys that were +passing perhaps forever out of their lives. Some saw the girls and saluted +them gaily, but most of them were too intent upon boarding the train +and embarking upon the glorious adventure with as little delay as possible +to look either to the right or the left. + +Then, just as the girls thought they must have missed "their own +particular four" and were bracing themselves to stand the disappointment, +they saw them! + +They were together, the four of them, splendid specimens of young manhood +with their cropped heads and service hats and packs slung over their +backs. + +"Allen," cried Betty impulsively, and he turned as though shot, a deep +flush staining his face. + +They came over then, those four, to the girls they were leaving +indefinitely--perhaps forever. Their young faces were very grave, their +jaws grim and set, and the girls realized suddenly that these were not the +boys who had so joyously left Deepdale in the service of their country. +These were no longer careless, irresponsible boys, but men with a great +and glorious duty to perform, and their hearts thrilled with a new pride. + +And while eloquent things were being said, not only with lips, but with +eyes and clasping hands, Allen bent nearer to Betty's little, upturned +face. + +[Illustration: "IT MAY BE A LONG TIME, BUT--I'M COMING BACK." _The Outdoor +Girls at the Hostess House. page 145_] + +"It may be a long, long time, little girl," he whispered, gravely, +"but--I'm coming back. And, Betty, I have your picture--that little +snapshot you gave me, the laughing one, you remember?" + +Betty nodded, smiling bravely while she choked back something deep down in +her throat. + +"And--" his eyes had grown very wistful, "and--I'm counting on some +letters from you, Betty?" + +"Oh, Allen," she cried breathlessly, "I'll write you all the time, dear, +every day--" + +But he had caught both her hands in his and was drawing her irresistibly +toward him. + +"'Dear,'" he was repeating dizzily, incredulously. "Did you call me that, +Betty? Did you say 'dear'?" + +"Y-yes," she nodded, breathless, a little frightened, yet adorably brave. +Why, this was Allen, and he was going away! He might be killed over there! +She might never see him again! "And," she added, looking up into his eyes +with a shy recklessness, "I--I'd say it again, Allen, if you asked me--" + +With a little cry he drew her to him, and for one unbelievable, breathless +second his lips rested on hers. + +"Betty, Betty, I love you," he whispered unsteadily. "I'll be dreaming of +you always. Whatever I do 'over there' will be because of you--" The +whistle shrieked a rude warning and his hands tightened on hers. They +were both trembling a little. + +"Good-bye," he whispered hoarsely. "I--love--you--" then he tore himself +away, swinging up the steps and into the car. + +The train began to move amid a great storm of cheering and waving of +service hats. Betty saw it all dimly, through a mist of tears. She pressed +her hand against her lips to still their trembling. + +"Good-bye, dear," she murmured brokenly. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +AFTER THE BOYS LEFT + + +"Well--it's--over," sighed Grace, as they made their way slowly down the +platform to where the machine stood waiting. "I feel as though I'd like to +go home and cry for a week without stopping." + +"Favorite indoor sport," retorted Mollie, wiping her own eyes impatiently. +"I'm sure the boys would admire us for doing that." + +"I don't think they'd admire us very much if they could see us now," +sighed Amy, dabbing a rather red nose with a generous portion of talcum +powder. "Crying is so terribly damaging to my particular style of beauty! +Every time I do it I vow I never will again--" + +"And then the boys do foolish things like going away to be shot," finished +Mollie, "and--poof, go all our good resolutions." + +"But you girls are all Helen of Troys compared to me when I cry," said +Grace, her tear-dimmed eyes fixed mournfully on space. "Why, after I've +had a good cry I cover up all the mirrors in the house for a couple of +days afterward." + +"I guess," sighed Betty, "that just about everybody we know went away on +that train this morning. Oh, girls, I feel as though somebody were dead." + +"Well, I'd rather be, than look like this," said Grace, eyeing her +somewhat disheveled reflection in the tiny mirror somberly. + +"Oh, you're not quite as bad as that, Gracie," Betty comforted her, +laughing a little despite the ache at her heart. "A little cold water and +a curling iron will work wonders--" + +"Betty," cried Grace, pausing in the act of applying still more powder to +the tip of her nose and regarding the Little Captain with a horrified +expression, "why drag the mention of such unromantic things into the +open--" + +"Goodness, nothing could be much more unromantic than straight hair and +red noses," broke in Mollie practically. "It's lucky the boys don't do +this every day--I'd be a wreck in a week!" + +"Well, at least you'd be wrecked in a good cause," said Betty, half +wistfully, half whimsically. + +"Goodness, you'll make me cry again after I've just powdered my nose," +cried Grace in alarm, and the foolishness of it made them all laugh. + +"You're a goose, Gracie," Mollie commented. "But I love you, just the +same. Now," she added, "who's going to take the wheel while I do my duty +with the powder puff? I need both hands you know--" + +"Heavens, don't let Amy do it," cried Grace, in still greater alarm. "She +doesn't know a thing about it. Mollie, what are you doing?" + +"You put the powder on then," Mollie suggested, and Amy reached for the +vanity case. "If you can't drive you can at least do that much. Amy! +you're getting it in my eyes. Do be careful!" + +"Mollie Billette, if you dare use that word again," cried Amy, her eyes +twinkling, "I'll blind you with powder--just for spite!" + +The girls chuckled, and Mollie, figuratively speaking, threw up her hands. + +"Oh, all right," she said, meekly yielding up her nose to treatment. "I +surrender. Only, Amy, do be--" + +Amy raised the puff threateningly, and the badgered one continued hastily: +"I was only going to say--do be a nice little girl." + +"As if I were not always that!" retorted Amy, dabbing so liberally at the +unfortunate member that Mollie sneezed, bumped over a rock in the road +and nearly dashed the car against that long-threatening tree. + +"Oh, goodness! I was sure we'd never come out of this alive," cried Grace +miserably. "Isn't it enough to have our hearts broken, without our necks +in the bargain?" + +"Oh, might as well make a good job of it," returned Mollie cheerfully. "I +don't know that I'd mind very much, anyway." + +"Oh, now I know I'm going to cry!" wailed Grace, wiping a starting tear +with her handkerchief. "Just when we're almost at Camp, too, and apt to +meet somebody any minute--" + +"Didn't you just hear Betty say," Mollie broke in, with the patient air +one assumes in speaking to little children, "that everybody who is really +worth anything has gone away on that train?" + +"Well, I guess I didn't altogether mean that," said Betty thoughtfully. +"Of course there is the medical personnel that is stationed here +indefinitely and very much against its will. And, of course," she added, +after a moment's pause, "there is Sergeant Mullins." + +"Goodness! we did forget all about him, didn't we?" agreed Mollie, as +though surprised at herself. "I don't know how we could have done such a +thing!" + +"And he's simply desperate at being kept here," added Amy suddenly. "He's +done everything he possibly could to get away, but they say they need him +more here than on the other side, and so, of course, he can't do a thing." + +"How did you know?" they asked in chorus, growing gleeful as she colored +under their gaze. + +"Why, he--he told me," she stammered. + +"Aha! I have you now, woman," cried Mollie, with a deep villain frown. +"Secret meetings on moonlit nights--" + +"This one happened to be in the broad daylight, in the glare of noon," Amy +retorted. "And if you can find anything secret or romantic about that, +you're welcome to." + +Mollie stared for a minute, then joined in the laugh. + +"Strike one," she cried. "But do tell us, Amy clear, about this meeting +with Sergeant Mullins that occurred in the broad light of day. It must +have been interesting--though unforeseen," she added hastily, as Amy +turned a suspicious eye upon her. + +"Yes, Amy, I humbly beseech you," added Grace. + +"No, sir, I have been insulted enough," declared Amy stoutly, and nothing +they could say seemed to have any effect upon her decision. + +"You ask her, Betty," entreated Grace at last, turning to the Little +Captain, who had been very silent and thoughtful during the ride. "She'll +do anything for you, you know." + +Betty brought back her wandering attention with a start. She had been +thinking of those last words of Allen's, had been seeing again that +exalted look in his eyes, could feel again the trembling of his hands as +he grasped hers in a grip that hurt--hurt gloriously. + +"Wh-what did you say?" she asked, dimly conscious of having been +addressed. "I--I'm afraid I wasn't listening." + +"I'm afraid you weren't," returned Grace, throwing a loving arm about her. + +Then she repeated Amy's confession and her own question, and gradually +there began to dawn in Betty's eyes a real interest. + +"Oh, Amy, do tell us about it," she begged earnestly. "You know he has +always been something of a mystery to us because of his reserve, and we'd +love to know more about him. You know we're really not curious--just truly +interested." + +"Well," agreed Amy, with a smile, not able to resist Betty--nobody ever +was for long--"of course, I'll tell you all there is to tell--although it +really isn't much. I was hurrying along the parade a day or two ago, +watching the boys drill, when somebody ran plump into me and made me drop +the package I was carrying. I gasped and started to apologize for not +looking where I was going when I saw that it was Sergeant Mullins. Then we +both laughed and he picked up my package and offered to see me safely back +to the Hostess House. Now what are you laughing at, Mollie?" + +"I was just thinking," Mollie chuckled, "of the desperate need there was +of a brave escort and of all the lions and tigers that were apt to attack +you on the parade--" + +"Well, you don't have to be silly," Amy retorted hotly, flushing despite +herself, adding, rather lamely: "He said it was so no one else would run +into me." + +"Worse and worse, and more of it," chortled Mollie, skidding deftly about +a curve. "What an excuse!" + +"Oh, all right then," Amy was beginning indignantly, when Grace hurriedly +thrust the candy box beneath her nose. + +"Have one, honey," she said, in a voice of sugar sweetness. "You needn't +pay any attention to Mollie, you know. We're listening." + +"Well," Amy continued, slightly mollified, "it was then he told me all +about the ambition he had had of being one of the first on the firing line +and how hard it was to train all the boys to go after the Huns and then +not have a chance at them himself." + +"And, of course, you told him the same old thing about his doing a great +deal more for his country here than he could do on the other side--" began +Mollie. + +"Well, what else was there to say?" Amy replied, a little sharply. "Of +course, it didn't make him feel any better, and I knew in my heart that it +wouldn't, but anything's better than just staying quiet and acting +foolish." + +"And natural," murmured Grace. + +"Anyway, he seemed to understand that I was really sorry for him," Amy +continued, not noticing the interruption. "He said he was sorry he'd +bothered me with his grouchiness, that he wouldn't have felt so bad about +it if it hadn't been for all the boys going away, and he supposed he'd +even get used to that after a while if he tried hard enough. + +"Just the same, he did look mighty grim as he turned away," she finished, +with a little smile at the memory, "and he said something about not being +surprised if he got mad at the last minute and hitched on the rear +platform, anyway." + +"It's wonderful how eager they all are," said Betty, her eyes shining and +a little catch in her voice. "I suppose there are slackers, lots of them, +but so far I haven't met a boy who wasn't desperate at being given a 'safe +berth' away from the firing line and danger. + +"It never seems to enter their minds to be thankful that they don't have +to run the risk of having their arms and legs shot off, or perhaps being +blinded for life. + +"And it isn't that they don't think of it, either," she went on, her face +flushing with enthusiasm, "or realize what it means. Just the other night +Will was talking to me, Gracie--you know he's always been almost as much +my brother as yours--and he said, 'I tell you what, Betty, it isn't often +I let the grim side of this war business get to me, and it's the same with +the other fellows. Of course we know it's there, but we're willing to take +the bad with the good for the sake of doing what we're pretty darn sure is +the only thing to do. Only,' he added, slowly, 'we're none of us +pretending to say that we enjoy the idea of being maimed or perhaps +crippled for life. There's not one of us but who's praying that if we have +to go, it will be a good swift bullet that will do the business. + +"'But,' he added, with a smile--and I could have hugged him for that +smile, girls. 'But, of course, as I said before, we're not thinking of +that side of it. It's enough to know that if it comes, we'll know how to +meet it.'" + +"And th-that's my brother," cried Grace, half tearful, yet radiant with +pride in him. "Those horrible old Huns won't have even half a chance when +he gets at them." + +"And Frank and Allen and Roy," added Mollie loyally. "You can't leave any +one of our boys out, Gracie. They're all built on the same plan--as far as +bravery is concerned." + +"Of course, I know that," said Grace, her eyes softening with the picture +of Roy as he had said good-bye--so youthfully gay, yet so strangely +self-reliant. + +And Mollie's eyes that could flash so wrathfully at times, were also soft +with memory, and Amy, thinking of those last words that were almost, yes, +so very near, a promise, flushed hotly and wondered if after all she +ought--so soon-- + +"It's no wonder that we're proud of them--our boys," said Betty softly. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +REAL TRAGEDY + + +A day or two went by during which the girls tried pluckily to go on with +their duties about the Hostess House with bright and smiling faces. It was +hard, though, to keep their thoughts from wandering to the four boys who +were now on their way to face all the realities and all the horrors of the +terrible war, and perhaps it was well that the leaving of so many made +their duties lighter than usual. + +On their return from the station after seeing the boys entrain they had +found a letter from their friend, Mrs. Barton Ross, of their home town of +Deepdale, head of the Young Women's Christian Association, under whose +auspices the Hostess House at Camp Liberty was run. In this letter Mrs. +Ross had said that she had sent to the girls a box of books for which they +had sent a request--books all of which one boy or another had asked for, +and which the regular Camp library had not been able to supply. + +The books had now come, Mollie had learned on a visit to the postoffice, +and as it was a heavy package she had got out the car and with the other +girls had run down for it. + +As the car rolled up to the curb and stopped once more before the Hostess +House, Betty waved her hand to an upper window. + +"There's Mrs. Sanderson," she explained as they got out of the automobile. +"She looks kind of pathetic sitting up there all alone." + +"She always looks pathetic to me," sighed Amy, winding an arm about the +Little Captain as they ascended the steps. "But everybody looks sadder and +more forlorn than usual the past few days." + +"Well, we can't be sad and forlorn any longer," said Betty determinedly. +"We came here to cheer people up, you know, and how we're going to do it +by being doleful ourselves, I don't know. So, in the words of the +vulgar--'here goes.' How's that?" + +"That" was a rather forced and pitiful little smile, but it brought an +answering one from Amy and another warm hug. + +"You're just wonderful, Betty!" she said lovingly, "and we'll do just +whatever you say. If you want us to smile, we'll smile, that's all. Of +course, we have tried, but we'll try still harder." + +Betty hugged back, and they went up the stairs toward the old familiar +room, feeling better and more cheerful for their renewed good resolutions. + +For a while the girls were busy unpacking the books and putting them in +place. Then Betty announced her intention of calling on Mrs. Sanderson. + +"I can't bear to think of her in there by the window all alone," she said. +"It has been awfully hard for her to watch all those boys going away, +knowing that her Willie wasn't among them. I might be able to comfort her +a little." + +"Let me go too," begged Amy, and arm in arm the two girls went on their +little mission of kindness. + +They knocked on the door, but, receiving no answer, pushed it open and +stepped inside the room. The old lady was sitting in exactly the same +position as when Betty had seen her from the car, almost an hour before. + +She glanced up, a little startled when they spoke to her, and half rose to +her feet. She looked dazed and very old and drawn. With a little cry of +compassion, Betty ran over to her and gently forced her back into her +chair. + +"Did we startle you?" she asked anxiously. "We knocked, but you didn't +answer, and we came right in. I'm sorry--" + +"You needn't be, dearie." The old eyes twinkled and the old hand was very +gentle as it patted Betty's cheek reassuringly. "I'm always glad to see +you and I've told you to come right in any time. I was thinking very hard, +I guess, and that's why I didn't hear you." + +"Then we may stay a little while?" said Betty, relieved. "But please tell +us if we'll be a bother," she added hastily, as the old woman turned once +more to the window. + +"No, no, I was hoping you would come," said the latter so eagerly that +Betty knew her impulse had been a correct one. The old woman had wanted +some one--some one who understood--to pour out her heart to. + +"It was wonderful just to sit here and watch those boys who went, an' I've +been thinkin' of it," she said, after a brief silence. "Only, somethin' +inside o' me, I guess 'twas my heart, kept bleedin' an' cryin' out that my +boy should have been among them--my little brown-eyed Willie who used to +sit out in the sun readin' every minute he could get. I can see him now, +sittin' there, jest as if 'twas yesterday--" Her voice trailed off, and in +a silence eloquent with sympathy the girls waited for her to go on. + +"But I wanted to tell those boys too," she cried, straightening up with +sudden fire, "that my Willie wasn't only a reader an' as bright as a +dollar,--he could fight, too. He'd have made a soldier to be proud of. + +"It wouldn't be near so bad," she added, turning to the girls with such a +depth of tragedy in her eyes that their hearts bled for her, "if I could +only be sure o' his bein' dead. It's the heartbreak of not knowin' that's +goin' to kill me in the end! + +"But there," she said, catching herself up as though ashamed of the +outburst, "seems like I talk to you little ladies more'n I ever talked to +anybody else in all my life. Seems like it's jest been bottled up inside +o' me so long it's jest got to come out. + +"I wish you'd tell me," she added, looking at them wistfully, "when it +bothers you, an' I'll jest bottle it all up again twice as tight as 'twas +before." + +"Oh, please," cried Amy, taking one of the work-worn hands and pressing it +earnestly between her own warm ones. "We just feel honored to think that +you trust us enough and like us enough to tell us these things. If you +didn't we'd be miserable!" + +"Indeed we should," added Betty fervently. + +Mrs. Sanderson looked from one of the flushed earnest faces to the other, +and her eyes filled slowly with tears. + +"I never thought," she said tremulously, "that there were girls like you +in the world." + +Several days later Mrs. Watson, their chaperone, and the head of the +Hostess House, called the girls to her for a consultation, and, wondering +what new thing was in store for them, they responded to the call. + +The boys had been gone for a week, time enough to get accustomed--a +little--to the feeling of loss that had so oppressed them during the first +few days. + +And now there were rumors of new soldiers arriving at the camp and of more +than enough work for the girls at the Hostess House to keep their minds +continually occupied. + +And, in fact, it was to discuss that very situation that Mrs. Watson had +called them to her this morning. + +"Well, girls," she said when they had seated themselves in characteristic +attitudes about the room, "we've had a little breathing spell now, just +enough time to rest up before the next onslaught." + +She paused over the word, smiled, and they smiled back at her. + +"Of course that means," Betty interpreted, "that not only the boys but +hundreds of their relatives and friends are coming to be entertained and +housed and amused." + +"Exactly," nodded Mrs. Watson. "And, of course, the work that you girls +have done--" + +"And you," Betty interjected loyally, but Mrs. Watson brushed the +interruption aside with a wave of her hand, though she flushed happily. + +"Of course I've done my part of it," she agreed modestly. "But equally of +course I couldn't have done it if you girls hadn't stood shoulder to +shoulder with me. And," she added, enthusiastically, "it has been more the +spirit with which you did the work than the actual work itself that has +won such a reputation for our Hostess House here." + +"'Reputation!'" repeated Mollie wonderingly, then added with an impish +inflection: "Oh, have we one of those things?" + +"We have," responded Mrs. Watson, with an indulgent smile. "And, whether +deserved or not, modesty would prompt us to say that it is not, of +course--" and the girls laughed amusedly. "Our reputation is unusually +good and unusually widespread. So good, in fact, that the boys are glad +when they find they are to be sent to Camp Liberty." + +"Yes," Betty nodded thoughtfully, "several boys have told me that, but I +thought they only said it in a spirit of gratitude, or perhaps, as +flattery." + +"That is modest," said Mrs. Watson with another smile. "But," she added, +leaning forward in her chair and speaking earnestly, "I honestly think +that you girls don't even begin to realize what a wonderful work you have +been doing right here in this little city that sprang up over night. It +isn't a small thing, you know--sending thousands of our boys away cheered +and strengthened, armed to meet the future--better men, just for having +met you. + +"And the mothers and wives and sweethearts who have been entertained so +royally and permitted to say good-bye to their loved ones under the very +best and cheeriest conditions possible--why, they have spoken to me of you +with tears in their eyes!" + +There were tears in their own eyes as the girls smiled happily at her. + +"But it's been such fun," Mollie protested, "just seeing how much you can +make people forget their troubles." + +"That's it," Mrs. Watson broke in quickly. "That's the spirit that has +made your work here such a wonderful success. You've done it--and whether +you will admit it or not, sometimes we've all been so tired at night we've +ached in every joint and muscle when we've crawled into bed--because you +loved to do it and because it was 'fun' to make people forget their +troubles, if only for a little while, and be happy. + +"That's the secret, dear girls, and that's why the boys are all eager to +be assigned here. Also, the boys in the permanent garrison will sing your +praises to the few who have not already heard them, and of course we shall +have to live up to their opinion of us." + +"Well, if just doing what we have been doing gives us such a reputation," +said Amy soberly, "I guess it won't be hard to live up to it in the +future." + +"Only," said Mrs. Watson warningly, "the work before us is apt to be very +much more trying and arduous than any we have yet had. The camp is going +to be filled to overflowing, and of course that will mean entertaining +continually for us. + +"We may even," she added thoughtfully, "have to quarter some of the +relatives and friends outside the camp in private homes, and, of course, +it will be up to us to find those homes." + +"You mean we are to go canvassing--the way we did that Thanksgiving?" +queried Betty. + +Mrs. Watson nodded, and Grace groaned. + +"Well," said the latter, "I don't care. In fact, I rather like the idea if +only my feet will hold out." + +"They look pretty durable," remarked Mollie gravely. + +"But you don't know how they feel," retorted Grace, wiggling one foot in +its trim slipper experimentally. "Every time I get a pair of shoes I have +to get a size larger, and you know," argumentatively, "at that rate I'll +be a freak and you'll be able to charge admission for a look at me." + +"Good," cried Mrs. Watson, laughing with the others. "I knew some one +would be clever enough to think up a new way of making money. Keep it +right up, Grace." + +"Yes," said Betty drolly, "just think of the good you can do!" + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE MOTORCYCLIST AGAIN + + +"What a glorious morning!" cried Betty, raising her face to the brilliant +sunshine. "I feel as if I could walk miles and miles and miles and never +stop." + +"Well, it's lucky for you that you do," sighed Grace. "Perhaps you'd be +willing to walk a few for me." + +"Oh, don't give up, Grade dear, before we've even started," cried Betty, +giving a little exuberant skip with the sheer joy of being alive. +"Anyway," she added, with inspiration, "if you get tired you and Mollie +can go back and get the car." + +"And have to walk miles to get it," Grace objected. "No, Betty, you'll +have to think up something better than that." + +"I wouldn't waste my time on such a lazy person, Betty," said Mollie, who +was walking briskly ahead with Amy. "I suppose we might have brought the +car," she added, after a minute, "only it seems foolish when you have to +stop at every house you come to." + +"It not only _seems_ foolish--it _is_ foolish," said Betty cheerily. + +"Oh, I tell you what," cried Amy, seized with sudden inspiration, while +the girls stared at her expectantly. + +"Hasten, Amy," cried Mollie, in a mock agony of suspense. "Do not keep us +waiting in this fashion." + +"Well," said Amy with a twinkle, "let's buy a couple of the worst sounding +horns we can find in town, go back and get Mollie's car--" + +"Yes?" they queried breathlessly. + +"And go through the streets tooting the horns until we've collected a +crowd," finished Amy triumphantly. + +"And when we've got it, what'll we do with it?" queried Mollie reasonably. + +"Well, I should think you'd guess the rest," remarked Amy. "We could just +tell 'em what we'd come for, that's all, and ask all who were willing to +take a 'guest' to say 'aye.'" + +"Never mind, dear, there's still hope," remarked Mollie, patting her arm +soothingly. "The doctor said, with absolute rest and quiet, you might get +over it." + +Betty chuckled. Grace did not, for the reason that her feet were +beginning to hurt and she did not feel in a chuckling mood. + +"Well, I don't know but what there's something in your idea after all, +Amy," she said, while Amy looked immensely gratified. "I'm in favor of +anything that cuts out walking." + +"'Cuts out'?" queried Mollie reprovingly. + +"Yes, cuts out," returned Grace, sticking to her guns. "What do you say, +Betty? Don't you think Amy has the right idea?" + +"Well," said Betty diplomatically, while her eyes twinkled at the +imaginary spectacle of whirling through the streets of the town, blowing +raucously on horns and making stump speeches from the running board of the +machine, "it would at least have the advantage of being spectacular--" + +"There, Mollie!" cried Amy, not waiting for her to finish, the light of +triumph in her eyes. "You see it's three to one. Now, what have you got to +say for yourself?" + +"Nothing," remarked Mollie dryly, "except to suggest that you wait until +Betty gets through. I imagine she hadn't said all she wanted to on the +subject." + +"Hadn't you, Betty?" queried Amy, a trifle disconcerted and looking back +at Betty over her shoulder. + +"We-ll," said Betty slowly, "I never say a thing can't be done until it's +tried--" + +"There!" Grace exclaimed, but Betty interrupted her. + +"But," she said hastily, "I think it might be just as well to try the less +spectacular method first. Don't you?" + +Both Amy and Grace heaved a great sigh of disappointment. + +"For one beautiful moment," said Grace plaintively, "I dared to hope that +you were with us, Betty." + +"Goodness, I am!" exclaimed the latter, wilfully misunderstanding. "With +you to the death, if need be. But look," she added as they turned a +corner, "Methinks we have pretty nearly reached the scene of our +activity." + +"Methinks it's pretty nearly time," groaned Grace. + +"I tell you what we'll do," suggested Betty, as they crowded eagerly about +her. "It will save time, and, I think, be the easiest way. We'll each one +take an entire street, visit as many of the houses as possible within an +hour, and at the end of that time we'll meet here again and each make her +report." + +The others agreed to this, and they separated, each determined to find as +many boarding places as possible for those relatives and friends who +wished to be near their soldier boys. + +At the end of the hour they met again, looking a little warm and tired, +but immensely triumphant. + +Grace was wildly excited. + +"Yes, I found places," she said, in answer to a question from Betty. "But +what do you think?--I saw that motorcyclist." + +"You did!" came in a chorus from the other Outdoor Girls. + +"Of course you mean the rascal who ran down poor Mrs. Sanderson," came +from Mollie. + +"The same. I was so startled I hardly knew what to do. He was coming from +a small hotel--not a very nice place." + +"Maybe that is where he plays cards," suggested Betty. + +"As soon as he saw me he leaped on his motorcycle and left in a hurry, +before I had a chance to say a word to him." + +"What a shame that you didn't have a chance to have him arrested," cried +Amy. + +The girls talked the matter over for several minutes. As the motorcyclist +was gone there seemed nothing they could do. + +"But we'll keep our eyes open for him," declared Betty. + +"I think this is the most wonderful town," Mollie remarked after a pause. +"Why there's hardly a house that I visited but what the people were +willing to accommodate at least one boarder, and in some cases two or +three, and, what's more," waving her hand enthusiastically, "several of +them didn't even want to take any money for it." + +"And I found almost the very same thing," agreed Betty, as they linked +arms and started on the homeward walk. "I guess we have enough promises to +start with now, and I don't think we'll have any trouble finding quarters +for all who want them." + +"I shouldn't wonder if Mrs. Watson is right about our reputation," said +Grace, a little ruefully. "Because the minute Mrs. Robinson opened the +door and saw me she said she hadn't the slightest idea what I was going to +ask her this time, but, seeing it was one of the girls from the Hostess +House, she expected to say yes, anyway." + +The girls laughed and for some time afterward walked on in silence, busy +with their thoughts. Then suddenly Betty spoke. + +"Girls," she said soberly, "Mrs. Sanderson is almost well again and I +don't think we'll be able to keep her with us very much longer." + +"What do you mean?" they cried together, their voices showing how very +real their concern was. + +"Well," Betty explained slowly, "it seems she overheard some of us girls +talking about the rush of work in store for us and got it into her head +that we might need her room." + +"But I don't see what difference that makes," protested Mollie. "As long +as we're doubling up and giving her our room." + +"Well, of course, it appears that way to us," replied Betty, shaking her +head thoughtfully. "But I'm afraid we can't hope to make her see it so. +Anyway, Mrs. Watson said she spoke to her about it and said she would be +going as soon as she had a chance to say good-bye to the 'young ladies.'" + +For a long time the girls stared straight before them, deeply troubled. It +was not so much the thought of losing the old lady, although, having grown +fond of her, they would miss her badly, as it was the realization that +here was one person in deep trouble, whose burden they could not seem in +any way to lighten. + +"And we haven't been able to get hold of that motorcyclist," mourned +Mollie. "It makes me simply ferocious," she added, with sudden vigor, "to +think of his getting away with a thing like that and not even a day in +prison to show for it." + +"And now with the boys gone," added Amy, "I don't suppose we'll have a +chance in the world of capturing him." + +"Humph," groaned Grace disgustedly, the temporary glow of success fading +before the torture of aching feet, "I don't see that they helped very much +when they were here. We did the suggesting, and all they did was to laugh +at our suggestions--" + +"Well, there's no use in saying things about them now they're gone," said +Amy, but Mollie caught her up indignantly. + +"Goodness, Amy," she cried, "it may not be your fault that you have a +gloomy disposition, but you don't need to sound exactly like a funeral!" + +At this moment they were startled by the sound of a machine coming behind +them at furious speed. Some chickens, crossing the road and pecking lazily +as they went, scurried with alarmed squawking into the woods on either +side. + +The girls, turning, started, gasped, then stared at each other. + +"The motorcyclist!" cried Mollie, as they turned and ran after the fast +disappearing machine. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +THE CHASE + + +"I--I--don't know what we're running after him for!" gasped Mollie. "We +haven't got a chance--in the world--of catching--him." + +"Look," panted Betty, pointing to a machine at the side of the road with a +man in chauffeur's uniform sitting behind the wheel, "maybe we can get +him! Quick--" + +Betty's action always followed hard upon the heels of impulse, and before +any of the girls had time to realize what she was going to do she had +darted across the road, had said a few excited words, and was tumbling +into the tonneau. + +Without stopping to question, the girls followed, jumping in beside her, +and the chauffeur, after one surprised look, touched his cap and the +machine leapt forward like a wild thing. + +Mollie had time, even in her excitement, to wonder how Betty had managed +it. + +"I think she hypnotizes them," she muttered to herself. + +And all Betty had really said to the man was, "Please follow that +motorcyclist! We mustn't lose sight of him!" and the man, obeying that +impulse for adventure that is in all of us, had complied. + +The motorcyclist had sped around the corner and darted into one of the +side streets. A few minutes later the chauffeur turned the same corner +with a recklessness that made them gasp, turned it just in time to see +their quarry disappearing round another corner. + +"Gosh, that fellow can coax some speed out of that machine of his!" cried +the man at the wheel. "But if you young ladies don't mind a little danger, +we may catch him yet." + +"Oh, please don't think about us," cried Betty, her hands clutching the +back of the seat, her eyes straining after the flying speck that seemed to +be growing smaller every second. "Oh, we must catch him,--we must! It +would be awful to lose him now!" + +"Well, here goes," responded the man behind the wheel, and under his +skillful touch the machine leapt forward like a spirited horse at the +touch of the lash. + +"That's it, that's it!" cried Mollie, almost beside herself with +excitement. "Just hear that engine purr! He can't get away from us now!" + +"Oh, if we could only take him back to Camp Liberty with us!" + +"I thought so," said the chauffeur, and even in their excitement they had +time to look in surprise at his back. + +"Wh-what did you think?" stammered Betty. + +"That you were the girls up at the Hostess House that everybody is talking +about," he told her, while the girls fairly gasped with surprise at this +proof of their widespread fame. "That's why I didn't ask questions but +just did as I was told," he added. And somehow they knew, though they +could not see his face, that he was grinning. "You see, I'd always heard +that you most always got what you set out to get, and I didn't waste time +arguin'," he finished. + +The girls laughed hysterically, and Betty said, with a funny little +inflection: + +"Sounds as if we were very strong-minded. But we don't care about that," +she added, once more fixing her gaze anxiously on the road before them, +"if we can only catch that man." + +"May I ask who he is, miss?" asked the man. + +"He's--he's a--criminal!" returned Betty, her little fists clenched +fiercely. + +"A criminal?" he repeated with interest. "May I ask what kind?" + +"A murderer," cried Mollie fiercely, adding, as the man started and the +girls looked at her in surprise: "Well, he might just as well have been. +He didn't even stop to see whether he was or not, which is about the same +thing." + +There was a sound from the front seat that sounded suspiciously like a +chuckle, but not being quite sure, the girls could do nothing whatever +about it. + +"But look--he's getting away from us!" wailed Amy suddenly, and once more +all their attention was focused on the chase. + +And, quite suddenly, while they watched, the motorcyclist disappeared from +view as if the earth had opened and swallowed him up. + +A few seconds later, with a grinding of brakes, the car stopped at the +spot where he had disappeared, and the girls looked at one another +despairingly. + +The path that he had taken seemed no more than a broad foot path through +the woods, so narrow that no machine could follow him, and of course there +was no chance of catching him on foot. + +"He got away from us!" cried Grace, voicing a rather self-evident fact. + +"I'm afraid so, miss," said the man, and he seemed so genuinely +disappointed that they looked at him gratefully. "The man must be rather +much of a dare-devil, your criminal," he added, eyeing the bumpy path +thoughtfully. "An ordinary rider wouldn't be able to go two yards along +that path without coming to grief." + +"Do you know where this path leads to?" asked Betty, struck with a sudden +inspiration. "If there's another road we might circle round and head him +off." + +"Sorry, miss," he said, "but the road that path leads to is nothing but a +wagon road, and we'd have to go several miles before we'd cross it. And +the chances are," he added, "that the fellow would double back upon +himself and we'd have the run for nothing." + +Betty shook her head resignedly, for, hard as it was to relinquish the +man, all that the chauffeur had said was founded on hard common sense and +she could see there was no alternative. + +"I guess you're right," she said at last, after a pause during which the +girls had looked at her hopefully. Betty so often found a way where no one +else could that they never completely gave up hope until she herself +relinquished it. + +So now they sighed and climbed soberly back into the machine. + +"Where to?" inquired the chauffeur, as he turned the car and headed back +the way they had come. "If you're going back to the camp," he suggested, +"I can take you there. Or anywhere you say." + +"You've been awfully good," cried Betty, with real gratitude in her voice. +"But you don't have to take us away back to camp. If you will drop us at +the end of the road we can walk back." All this despite sundry vigorous +and desperate shakings of Grace's head and pantomimic pointings toward her +feet. At the conclusion of Betty's sentence she groaned, but brightened up +again at the chauffeur's response. + +"It won't be any trouble," he said, "to take you all the way back to camp. +In fact"--a little shyly--"I'd like to." + +"Then we'd be very, very glad to accept," said Betty cordially. "For we +have walked a long way and are rather tired." + +At the gates of Camp Liberty they got out of the car, thanked the +chauffeur, and while they were hesitating whether or not to offer him +money for his trouble, the latter turned the car and, with a last lifting +of his cap and waving of his hand, was gone. + +"Isn't he nice?" sighed Amy, as they started toward the Hostess House, +Grace limping a little and bringing up the rear. "Meeting a man like that +gives you new faith in human nature." + +"Goodness, Will had better look out," chaffed Mollie, a little gleam of +humor shining through her weariness. "I always thought you had it in you +to run off with a chauffeur, Amy." + +Before Amy had time to retort they saw a stalwart and familiar figure +swinging toward them and recognized Sergeant Mullins. + +"Good afternoon," he called to them, with the smile that always so +surprisingly lighted up his usually grave face. "You look as if you had +had rather an exciting time of it." + +"Oh, we did almost have such a beautiful adventure!" cried Mollie, her +eyes sparkling with the memory of it. + +"And all we really got," said Grace gloomily, "were four pairs of sore +feet." + +Sergeant Mullins laughed at her with the rest, then asked, with real +interest: + +"But the adventure that you almost had,--would you mind telling me about +it?" + +Whereupon Betty launched into a full and graphic account of the chase in +somebody else's automobile after an unknown criminal who, at the last +minute, had escaped in an apparently impossible manner. + +"And that's all there is to it," she finished plaintively. "After all our +trouble and everything, we find ourselves just where we were before." + +The sergeant looked very grave. + +"The man was a cad," he said, "to knock down an old woman that way and +then not stop to see how badly she was hurt. I wish you could have won out +to-day. Could you give a good description of him?" + +"Yes, I can," cried both Amy and Grace in the same breath, and thereupon +proceeded to do it without delay. At the description the sergeant's +interest grew and his face flushed with excitement. + +When they had finished, Betty, who had been watching his face closely, +unable to restrain her curiosity longer, burst forth an eager question. + +"Have you seen the man, Sergeant?" + +"I think I have--often," he replied slowly, adding as they turned +incredulous eyes upon him. "If I'm not mistaken, this criminal of yours is +one of the most famous card sharpers of the day." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +STARTLING DEVELOPMENTS + + +For a moment the girls stared. Then Sergeant Mullins was besieged with a +veritable flood of questions. + +"He hangs out mostly at Thomasville, a town about fifteen miles from +here," the sergeant explained, when at last the girls had realized that if +they ever hoped to learn anything at all they must give the man a chance +to speak. "And he makes most of his money by skinning the rookies." + +"You mean," cried Betty, translating camp slang into intelligible English, +"that he gets the newly enlisted men to play with him before they have a +chance to learn his reputation, and of course gets all their money, +because his game is crooked?" + +"Exactly," agreed Sergeant Mullins, his grave face clouding angrily. "And +equally, of course, it's the week following pay day when he makes his big +haul. I hope you succeed in getting him," he said, turning earnestly to +Betty. "And if there's anything I can do to help, you can count on me." + +Betty thanked him, and the girls watched the Sergeant's straight, +retreating back with thoughtful eyes. + +"Well, it's a comfort anyway," said Mollie, as they turned and went into +the house, "to know that he's as bad as we thought he was. And perhaps," +she added hopefully, "Sergeant Mullins will be able to help us." + +It was more than a week later when the first eagerly looked for letters +began to arrive from overseas. It was one day when the promised rush of +soldiers into the camp had been fulfilled and the girls were particularly +busy entertaining and finding comfortable quarters for their relatives and +friends that Mollie whispered the joyful news into Betty's ear. + +"Letters!" she cried. "Letters, honey! Here are yours, two of them, and +each one of us others got one apiece. We've decided not to open them until +to-night, when we'll have time to read them in comfort. If you'll wait, +too--" + +"Of course," promised Betty, eagerly accepting her portion of the precious +correspondence. "And they're thick ones, Mollie, and--" + +"Both from Allen," Mollie finished mischievously, looking back over her +shoulder to enjoy Betty's blush. + +And that night, when they should have been tired out with the day's +unusually hard work, the girls assembled in their one big room, feeling +more wide awake than ever before in all their lives. + +"Oh, hasn't it been perfectly awful," cried Mollie, facing them with +shining eyes, "to have to go around calmly for hours and hours as if +nothing had happened?" + +"With a letter just begging to be read, too!" put in Betty, two fever +spots of excitement on her cheeks. "I don't think I could ever do it +again." + +"Well, it's all over now," said Amy, taking her own thick and promising +looking letter from her silk blouse where it had rustled and crackled +betrayingly all day. "I don't know about you girls, but I just can't wait +another second." + +"Oh, please wait just a moment until I get my shoes off," begged Grace, +sinking down on the edge of the bed and removing the shoes from her aching +feet. "Oh dear," she moaned, "I know I'll have to get a size larger next +time, and if I do I'll be ashamed to be seen in the street." + +"Well, even my patient and much-tried pedal extremities feel a little the +worse for wear to-night," admitted Mollie, as she flung a shoe +vindictively to the farthest corner of the room. + +"And mine," agreed Betty, taking up the plaint. "I tell you what," she +added. "Let's all just get undressed and tumble into the big bed +and--enjoy ourselves." + +The suggestion was unanimously accepted, and thereafter various soft and +filmy garments flew thick and fast as the girls got ready for the treat +which had been postponed all through the long, long day,--almost the +longest they had ever known. + +"Come on, Gracie," called Mollie, as barely five minutes later three +figures sat propped up in the bed, waiting impatiently for the fourth. +"What's the use of primping to-night? Nobody's going to see you." + +"You flatter yourself," drawled Grace, as she turned away from the mirror. +"Anyway, I once read that a girl should never allow herself to look +homely, even when she's alone." + +"Goodness, if I have to work so hard to be beautiful," retorted Mollie, +holding her letter up to the light in a vain attempt to read its contents +through the envelope, "I'd rather be good and homely and comfortable." + +"If all wishes were so easily granted," Grace began, but at the look in +Mollie's eyes thought better of it. "I meant," she corrected herself +blandly, "that, of course, you can never be anything but beautiful, +Mollie." + +"Well, I don't know, of course," said Mollie, with the same vengeful light +in her eyes, "but I'm always suspicious of any one who goes to extremes." + +"Never mind your suspicions, Mollie," cried Betty, with a happy ring in +her voice, as the last of the quartette climbed in under the covers. "All +that really interests me now is the fact that I have a couple of letters +that are just begging to be read." + +"Yes, and I'd like to know if that's fair," said Grace, looking injured. +"We only got one apiece, while here you are rolling in luxury--" + +"And they're both in the same handwriting--Allen's of course," added Amy, +peeping over Betty's shoulder. "Why does he write you two letters that he +knows will both reach you in the same mail, Betty?" + +"Just to be original, I suppose," answered Betty, striving to speak calmly +while a hot flush mounted to her forehead. "Anyway," she added lightly, "I +suppose the best way to satisfy our curiosity would be to read our letters +and find out." + +"Oh, I forgot," cried Grace, pushing back the covers and slipping out of +bed. "There's just one thing better than reading letters." + +"Now what are you after?" cried Mollie despairingly. "Well," she added, +tearing open her letter decidedly, "there's one thing certain,--I'm not +going to wait another minute!" + +"Well, nobody asked you to," retorted Grace, slipping back into bed with +the precious candy box under her arm. "And, what's more," she added +threateningly, "if you're going to be uncivil, I won't ask you to share my +candies." + +"Goodness! now isn't that the limit?" cried Betty suddenly, and they +looked at her in surprise. She, in her turn, having thought aloud, flushed +and turned back to the letter. "I'm sorry," she stammered. "I really +didn't mean to interrupt you." + +"No you don't, Betty Nelson!" cried Mollie, slipping a hand over Allen's +letter and forcing Betty to meet her eyes. "We won't any of us read +another word till you tell us what you were going to say." + +"Well, you don't need to," Betty was beginning when she met Mollie's eyes +and laughed resignedly. + +"Oh, all right," she capitulated. "I was simply going to say that the nosy +old censor crossed out a whole line just at the most interesting part." + +"What was it?" coaxed Amy teasingly. "Come, Betty dear, tell us what he +said." + +"Goodness!" cried Betty crossly, getting redder every moment, and knowing +it, "didn't I tell you the censor crossed it out?" + +"You know very well that wasn't what we meant," cried Mollie, with a +frightful frown. "Amy was referring to the sentiments on both sides of the +censored part." + +"Oh well, you could hardly expect," Betty was beginning, when Amy, who had +been peeping over her shoulder clapped a hand to her mouth too late to +check a sudden exclamation. + +"Oh girls!" she cried gleefully. "What I saw! What I saw!" + +"Amy Blackford," Betty's eyes were black with real anger now, "I don't +know how you could do such a thing. I didn't think it of you!" + +Not only Amy, but the other girls were frightened by this sudden change in +their usually good-natured Little Captain, and Amy hastened to make +amends. + +"I'm sorry, Betty dear," she said, flushing with real shame beneath +Betty's accusing eyes. "I didn't mean it--truly I didn't. And I'll never +do it again, never!" + +"Oh, all right," replied Betty, controlling herself with an effort and +turning back to the letter. "I'm sorry I said anything, Amy, if you +didn't mean it." + +There was a little constrained silence after that, no one knowing just how +to clear the rather electric atmosphere. They went on reading absorbedly, +only the crackling of the paper as they turned a page breaking the deep +stillness of the room. + +It was Betty who finally relieved the tension. + +"If that doesn't sound just like Roy," she said, and they looked up +expectantly, relieved at the naturalness of her tone. "Allen says that +he--Roy, that is--was very much impressed with his first sight of a +camouflaged ship. Said he had devised a fine scheme of killing off the +German army in a hurry. He'd disguise himself as a piece of Limburger +cheese, and when the Huns came running to him, he'd simply give them a +gentle little tap on the head." + +"Humph," snorted Mollie contemptuously, "how long do you suppose he'd be +able to keep that up?" + +"He says they'd never suspect the truth," Betty chuckled. "They'd simply +think it was a particularly husky piece of cheese!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +THE MIRACLE + + +It was only a few days later that the wonderful, the incredible thing +happened! + +The girls were returning from a rather hurried excursion to a near-by town +when they came face to face with the motorcyclist. His motor had evidently +stalled, and he was standing in the middle of the road tinkering with it. + +Paralyzed by the suddenness of the thing, the girls just stood still and +stared until the man, evidently feeling their eyes upon him, turned slowly +about and faced them. + +He seemed to recognize them immediately, for his first look of +bewilderment was followed quickly by one of fear, and with an abrupt +motion he turned back to his machine. + +"Now we have him, what are we going to do with him?" whispered Mollie, a +comical look of chagrin on her face. "We can't capture him all by +ourselves, and we can hardly expect him to wait while we get some one." + +"He is huskier than I thought," admitted Grace, adding suddenly, "Betty, +what are you going to do?" + +But Betty either did not hear or did not want to, for she was approaching +the man without a backward glance in their direction. Though not knowing +just what was about to happen, the girls followed loyally, close at her +heels. + +As for Betty, she simply stepped up close to the man and stood looking at +him steadily, finally forcing him by sheer concentration to straighten up +and meet her eyes. + +"Well, who are you?" he demanded at last, gruffly. + +"That was just the question I was about to put to you," Betty replied, and +by her outward composure no one could possibly have guessed how hard her +heart was beating. "We are really quite desirous of knowing all about +you." + +"May I ask," he said, his cruel mouth sneering under the absurd moustache, +"what has happened to arouse this sudden interest?" + +The sneer brought a flush to Betty's face and made her eyes glow angrily. + +"You ought to know that without my telling you," she said coldly. "Perhaps +you will remember, if I recall it to you, the day you knocked an old woman +down in the middle of the road and then rode away without finding out how +seriously you had injured her." + +"I really don't know what you're talking about," the man replied, with an +attempt to appear frank, which made his face more sinister than before. +"You must have mistaken me for some one else." + +"That's impossible." Mollie's voice was crisp and clear cut, and the man +glanced with surprise and a shadow of alarm at this new assailant. + +Then suddenly his manner of cool insolence changed, and he shot them a +look that remained quiveringly in their memories long after the man +himself had passed forever out of their lives. + +"Whoever you are, you're fools," he said gruffly, menacingly. "And if you +don't forget all about this thing you've been spouting about, I'll make it +pretty darned unpleasant for you. Get me?" And, with a quick movement, he +started his motor and leaped on his machine. + +Betty sprang forward and desperately clutched the handle bars, calling on +the girls for assistance, but he roughly pushed her aside. At the same +moment the machine leapt forward and Betty knew that he would get away +again. + +Then it was the first miracle happened. Sergeant Mullins, out on a hike +with some of the rookies from the camp, the sound of his approach +deadened by the putting of the machine, appeared around the turn in the +road, coming toward them. To keep from running into the men, which would +have meant a nasty spill, the motorcyclist was forced to put on his brake. + +The men would have gathered to one side of the road to let him pass, but +Betty's shrill cry arrested them. + +"Don't let him pass," she implored them desperately. "It's our criminal, +Sergeant Mullins! Don't you see? The gambler!" + +But Sergeant Mullins, in one swift glance, had already taken in the +situation, and as the man tried to start his machine he sprang forward and +grasped the handle bars, at the same time shouting orders to his men. + +"Surround him, fellows!" he cried. "This man is under arrest!" + +"What do you mean?" cried the gambler, his eyes glaring with the rage of a +cornered animal. + +"Don't waste your breath, Denham," retorted Sergeant Mullins coolly, "your +reputation isn't any too good around these parts, you know, and you'll +have plenty of chance to do your shouting to the judge. + +"Never mind your machine," he added sharply, as the fellow's mean eyes +glanced about desperately for means of escape. "The boys will take care +of that. And," he added meaningly, "I have rather a life-sized impression +that you won't be needing it again for some time to come!" + +Denham shot him a vicious glance, and got off sullenly from his machine +while a group of soldiers stepped up smartly to take charge of it. + +With his prisoner safely guarded, Sergeant Mullins ordered the march back +to camp, then drew in a long breath and looked at the girls. + +"Well," he said, with his slow smile, "you did it that time." + +"We!" cried Betty, her cheeks flushed with excitement and the exhilaration +of success. "I should say you did the work while we looked on. Oh, I'm so +happy--and so grateful to you." + +"But I didn't do anything," he protested, smiling whimsically, as they +turned to follow the soldiers and their prisoner. "I simply let the boys +do the work while I looked on." + +"Goodness! what do we care how it happened as long as it did?" cried +Mollie happily. "Maybe now he'll see that he can't run down old ladies +promiscuously and get away with it." + +"Not with girls like you on his trail," said the sergeant admiringly. + +"But what are you going to do with him, now you've got him?" asked Grace, +repeating almost word for word the question Mollie had put only a few +minutes before. "I suppose we've got to get out some sort of definite +charge against him." + +"Yes," said the sergeant thoughtfully. "We can put him in the guardhouse +up at camp till we have a chance to get the township authorities up here. +And," he added, turning to Betty, "I'd like to have an interview with that +old lady of yours, if you can manage it. We'll have to have her evidence, +you know." + +"Oh, and isn't it lucky?" cried Betty, executing a little skip in her +excitement. "She told us only this morning that she was feeling perfectly +well again and would go away to-morrow. We were worrying ourselves sick +about it, but couldn't think up a single plan to keep her with us. And if +she had gone before this happened--" she stopped, overwhelmed by the mere +contemplation of the tragedy. + +"I still feel as if I were dreaming," said Amy, as they entered the camp +gate. "It all happened so suddenly, and just when we were feeling so +awfully blue." + +"Well, I know I wasn't dreaming," said Grace plaintively, "because in my +excitement I dropped two perfectly good candies in the road and forgot to +pick 'em up." + +They laughed at her, and Betty added whimsically: + +"Perhaps it was just as well for your digestion that you did. I suppose +you'll have to go to the guardhouse to explain about the prisoner," she +rather stated than asked, turning to Sergeant Mullins. + +"Yes," he said, adding, with a trace of hesitation: "It won't take long +though, and if you don't mind waiting till I get back I'd like to have +that talk with the old lady he knocked down. It's necessary to see her as +soon as possible." + +"Goodness, we don't mind waiting," cried Betty. "And you can't see her too +quickly to suit us. We're just crazy to see the whole thing settled--" + +"And that brute behind the bars," finished Mollie vindictively. + +Sergeant Mullins laughed boyishly, saluted smartly, and turned on his heel +to follow the boys who were fast bearing the prisoner to the guardhouse +and from there to the just punishment that had been so long in overtaking +him. + +"Well," said Mollie, as she flopped down on the steps and favored the +girls with a beaming smile, "now what have you got to say for yourselves?" + +"More in truth than in modesty," twinkled the Little Captain, "I should +say that we are pretty good." + +"My! don't we love us?" queried Grace, fishing up from her pocket a +much-mangled and sadly worn chocolate and calmly inserting it between two +very pretty rows of white teeth. "It's really touching--" + +"Oh, Grace, how can you think of candies at a time like this?" cried +Mollie impatiently. + +"Don't know," returned Grace, calmly nibbling. "It's a gift, I guess." + +"Gracie, you're an awful goose," cried Betty, hugging her impulsively. +"But I'm so happy, I'll forgive you even that--" + +"It's you that ought to be forgiven for calling me names," returned Grace, +in an injured tone of voice. "Goodness," she cried, a moment later, +pointing a moist and tired chocolate in the direction of the horizon. "Am +I mistaken, or is that the stalwart figure of our sergeant approaching in +the distance?" + +"Oh, it is, it is!" cried Betty, springing to her feet and fairly dancing +in her excitement and impatience. "Oh, I can't wait! Why doesn't he +hurry?" + +As a matter of fact, the sergeant was hurrying very much indeed, for he +was almost as eager as the girls to see the old lady and collect the +evidence in the case against the motorcyclist. + +He was panting as he sprang up the steps toward them and his eyes were +bright with anticipation. + +"I got back as soon as I could," he cried. "Now, if you can take me--" + +The girls wasted no time in words, and led him swiftly up the stairs, +pausing before Mrs. Sanderson's door. + +"What shall we do if she's gone?" whispered Betty, a sudden panic seizing +her. Then, without further delay, rapped smartly on the door. + +At the answering "come in" they tumbled into the room, followed by +Sergeant Mullins. Then it was the second miracle happened! + +Mrs. Sanderson started, stared, then rose tremblingly to her feet. + +"My Willie boy!" she cried, groping toward him, dazed, unbelieving, +incredulous. "It's my boy, my little son--my--baby--" + +Then Sergeant Mullins, with a hoarse cry, rushed across the room and +gathered the little figure in his arms--strong, man's arms that crushed +and hurt. + +"Mother!" he cried. "Oh, my mother!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +MYSTERY EXPLAINED + + +The girls stared for a moment, dazed, bewildered. Stared at the dark head +bent in such passionate tenderness over the gray one, stared at the old +hands patting the broad young shoulders, tremblingly, joyfully, +incredulously, then, with a stifled gasp, turned and fled. + +Betty closed the door softly and followed the girls into their own room +where they sank down on arms of chairs or tables or the edge of the +bed--any place--and went on staring, only this time at each other. + +"Betty Nelson," Mollie broke out at last, her eyes dark and wide, her +voice awed, "did you ever in your life hear of such a thing?" + +"Of course I never did," answered Betty, her lips trembling, her eyes +shining and wet. "Not since my fairy-story days, anyway," she added +softly. + +"But how," Grace demanded, still too dazed to think clearly, "can Mrs. +Sanderson's son be William Mullins?" + +"Goodness! how do we know?" returned Mollie, wiping two tears from the end +of her nose. "It's all the biggest kind of a m-mystery, anyway. Oh, dear, +has anybody got a handkerchief?" as two other tears threatened to make +their appearance. "I didn't know I had it in me to be such a goose." + +"We seldom do realize our possibilities," drawled Grace, but Mollie was +too busy wiping away the traces of her weakness to notice the insult. + +"And to think," Amy murmured softly, "that if that old motorcyclist hadn't +knocked Mrs. Sanderson down, she would have gone away without finding her +son, and the chances are she would never have seen him again." + +"I suppose you think we ought to send the motorcyclist a vote of thanks," +remarked Mollie dryly, recovering herself a little. "If he keeps on +knocking old ladies down in the middle of the road and then gets himself +arrested, he may be counted on to do a lot of good in the world." + +"I don't see how you can say such silly things," Amy began hotly, when +Betty broke in pleadingly: + +"Please, please, girls!" she said, smiling as only Betty knew how to +smile. "What is the use of quarreling about miracles? The most wonderful +thing in all the world has happened, and what do we care how it happened? +Just think of it!" she added, leaning forward eagerly. "Only this morning +we were feeling discouraged and down-hearted because Mrs. Sanderson was +going away to-morrow and we couldn't think of a thing to do to help her. +Then all in one day, in an hour, really, we capture the motorcyclist and +find her son for her. It's no wonder I can't seem to make myself believe I +haven't dreamed it all," she finished, with such a look of utter happiness +on her face that Mollie slipped an arm about her and hugged her fondly. + +"You know, Betty," she said solemnly, "I'm almost beginning to have a +superstitious belief in you." + +"Goodness! Why?" cried Betty, while the other two looked at Mollie +wonderingly. "What have I done now that you should say such things and +treat me thus?" + +"Why, I was just thinking," Mollie replied with rare earnestness, "that, +as usual, if it hadn't been for you we probably wouldn't have arrested the +gambler--or rather, given Sergeant Mullins a chance to--and so wouldn't +have brought him here to find out he belonged to our little old lady." + +"But I don't see how--" Betty was beginning in real bewilderment when +Mollie interrupted her impatiently. + +"I don't suppose you do," she said, with fond severity. "You never do give +yourself credit for anything, anyway, Betty Nelson. But who was it, I'd +like to know, that first had courage to go up and speak to that criminal?" + +"Oh, that!" said Betty, sinking back relievedly. "Anybody could have done +that." + +"Perhaps anybody could," retorted Mollie practically. "But you notice +nobody else did, don't you, Betty Nelson?" + +"Well, I know, but that didn't have anything to do with capturing him," +argued Betty, determined not to take any more than her share of the +credit--and not that, if she could help it. "If Sergeant Mullins hadn't +happened along just at that moment, he'd have gotten away from us the way +he did those other times." + +"Yes, but who delayed him, I'd like to know," Mollie flung back +triumphantly, "and gave the Sergeant time to come along and finish up the +work?" + +"All right," laughed Betty. "I'll admit that much, since you insist. But +what earthly difference does it make, anyway, as long as it's done?" she +cried. "Just think," her voice trembled a little, "how happy those two +must be in there! I--I--oh, I can't believe it yet." + +"Well, but that's still troubling me," said Grace, so apropos of nothing +at all that they just stared at her. + +"Goodness, don't look at me like that," she cried irritably, getting up +and walking round the room. "You know I always did hate mysteries." + +"We should be very much obliged," said Mollie, with forced politeness, "if +you would tell us what you're raving about." + +"Goodness, don't you even see there is a mystery?" she cried, facing them +impatiently. "How in the world could Sergeant Mullins ever be Mrs. +Sanderson's son?" + +"You'd better ask 'em," chuckled Mollie. "They both seemed so tolerably +sure of it that we've taken it for granted. What's the deep, dark +mystery?" + +"Grace means," it was Amy who acted the peacemaker this time, "that it's +strange about the name." + +"And, of course, it is," Betty added gravely. "Sergeant Mullins should by +all rights be Sergeant Sanderson." + +"And Mrs. Sanderson couldn't have known about his being called Mullins," +Grace broke in eagerly, "because we've spoken to her of Sergeant Mullins +more than once, and she never acted as though more than casually +interested." + +"Well, but I suppose that's easily enough explained," said Mollie, who was +in no mood for details--the actual occurrences being wonderful enough in +themselves to occupy her attention for some time to come. "People often +enough change their last names for some reason or other." + +"Then you mean," said Grace, "that William Mullins is really William +Sanderson?" + +"A fair assumption," returned Mollie dryly. "Unless Mrs. Sanderson's name +is Mullins." + +"Perhaps the best way," suggested Betty peaceably, "would be to wait and +let Mrs. Sanderson tell us about it." + +"Wait--" Grace was beginning, when a gentle tap sounded on the door and +Betty flew to open it. + +On the threshold stood Mrs. Sanderson, her eyes red with weeping, yet her +whole face so transformed with joy that the girls would hardly have +recognized her as the Mrs. Sanderson of that morning. Instinctively they +glanced over her shoulder, expecting to see the tall figure of Sergeant +Mullins looming in the background, but he was nowhere to be seen. + +"He's--he's gone," said the little old lady tremulously, seeming to +interpret their glances, at the same time coming timidly into the room. +"He told me to tell you," her face lighted up still more with that +wonderful inward joy, "that he would have stayed and thanked you young +ladies, but he'd made sort of an idiot of himself--so he said--an' would +be around later, instead." + +"And is he really--really--_really_ your son?" cried Betty, unable to +contain herself longer, pressing the old lady into a chair and kneeling +down before her eagerly. "Oh, we knew you'd come and tell us! We've been +so very happy for you." + +"Yes, he's my Willie boy," answered the little old lady, speaking dreamily +as though even yet she was not able to grasp the wonderful thing that had +happened to her. "It's strange when I come to think of it how I knew him +right away because, you see, I've always sort o' thought of him as my +little son, my baby, and in my mind I've always seen him as he was that +day he ran away. But he's really just the same--my little Willie boy--only +taller and sort o' broader in the shoulders an' handsomer--" her voice +broke and Betty slipped a sympathetic little hand in hers while the girls +gathered closer. + +"You see, I've been prayin' for this thing for a good many years," she +went on quaintly, "an' it looks like Providence sort o' saw fit to answer +me at last. An' He jest picked out the sweetes' little ladies He could +find to be His instruments." + +The girls laughed unsteadily and Betty's young hand tightened on the old +one. + +"We feel as if it all must be a fairy story," she said softly. + +"That's jest what it is--a fairy story," cried the little old lady, +turning those wonder-filled eyes upon them. + +"It must have seemed sort o' strange to you about the name," she added, +after a short pause. + +Betty saw that Grace was about to interrupt, but a warning glance stopped +her. + +"You see, his real name is William Mullins Sanderson. But when he ran away +he dropped the Sanderson so's they couldn't arrest him for somethin' he +didn't do--poor little lad." Her voice was very soft and her eyes +tender. "He would have come back to me, only he heard that I was dead and +thought 'twasn't any use. He said he'd jest been eatin' his heart out, +thinkin' of old days an' how he'd promised to make a fortune for us both +an' buy a big house where I wouldn't ever have to work again 'less I +wanted to. An' now he says," she straightened up and her eyes flashed with +pride in him, "he says, soon's the war is over he's goin' to make that old +dream come true. + +"He'd been studyin' to be a lawyer, an' had jest passed his 'bar +exams'--so he called 'em--when the war broke out, an' he jes' couldn't +resist the call o' the bugle. O' course he couldn't!" Once more was heard +that thrill of pride. "Wasn't he my Willie boy, who had the blood of +fightin' ancestors in his veins as well as brains an' a love o' book +larnin' from his pa? + +"But he says when the war's over he's goin' back to his books an' make +good, an'," with simple assurance; "I know he will. Jest think," she added +dreamily, "my little son, a lawyer! + +"But I ain't never goin' to forget," she cried, flinging her head up with +a martial gesture, "that first of all, he was a soldier!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +TO "CARRY ON" + + +"I could be completely happy," sighed Betty, "if it weren't for just one +thing." + +It was more than a week after the wonderful discovery in their Sergeant +Mullins as Mrs. Sanderson's long lost son, and until this afternoon the +girls had hardly been able to find a minute to get together and discuss +the remarkable affair. + +But to-day they had secured very reliable substitutes to fill their places +for a few hours and the Outdoor Girls had decided to make the most of this +rare holiday. + +Mollie had suggested a spin in the machine, and the girls had eagerly +assented, anxious to blow the cobwebs of hard work and confinement from +their brains and get out on the open road where they could think clearly +and freely. + +Exhilarated by the rushing air and the sunshine, Mollie put on extra +speed, then gazed side-wise and wickedly at Amy. + +"'Oh, Mollie, do be careful,'" she mimicked. + +"'I don't care about dying, but I'd rather choose a neater death!'" + +But for once Amy refused to bite. She simply smiled calmly and helped +herself to another of Grace's fast disappearing chocolates. + +"Go as far as you like, dear," was her surprising comment. "I feel rather +wild and woolly myself to-day. Nothing you could do would bother me." + +The girls looked surprised--Mollie anxious. + +"Goodness," she said disconsolately, "that takes away half the fun. What's +the use of teasing you when you won't tease?" + +"Does seem rather a waste of time," remarked Amy, and they gaped anew. + +"Goodness, what has come over the child?" asked Grace of Betty, adding +with sudden suspicion, "She must have had a letter." + +"Did you?" they cried all at once, fixing accusing eyes upon her. + +"You must be joking," Amy answered plaintively. "I haven't had a letter +for so long I don't know what it would look like." + +"It is just about time we heard from the boys again," said Betty +thoughtfully. "Has anybody been to the post-office to-day?" + +It seemed nobody had, for everybody had been too busy; so Mollie made an +abrupt turn, almost sending the car into a ditch, and headed back for +town. + +"Now what are you doing?" queried Amy plaintively. + +"Going to remedy an awful mistake," Mollie replied shortly. "I couldn't +enjoy my holiday if I thought there might be letters waiting for us." + +Amy and Grace protested. + +But they were not disappointed. There were not only letters from the boys, +but several fat and interesting epistles from friends and relatives in +Deepdale, including two from Paul and Dodo, Mollie's small and mischievous +brother and sister. + +"Let's drive away out of town where we can be by ourselves," Betty +suggested, face radiant, fingers fairly aching to tear the precious +missives from their envelopes. "Then we can stop the car and Mollie can +read hers, too." + +"You always have the right idea, Betty honey," said Mollie, with fond +emphasis, as she swung the car at breakneck speed down the street and +headed for the open country. "Now aren't you glad," she flung at Grace and +Amy, "that we made you go back with us and take a chance?" + +"Don't rub it in, Mollie dear," purred Grace, too happy at the prospect +before them to contradict anything or anybody on earth. "We are deeply +appreciative and inordinately grateful to you for your wonderful +foresight and insistence." + +"Is she calling me names?" cried Mollie threateningly. "For if she is, I +should like to remark for the benefit of each and every one that I am +still in possession of the wheel, and a swift and terrible doom shall +overtake--" + +"Rave on, rave on, Macbeth," chuckled Betty, adding with a whimsical smile +and a quickened heart beat as she fingered the letter she had so carefully +placed under the rest: "There's no use, Mollie dear--you can't start a +rumpus now. It can't be done. We're all too good-natured." + +"That's the way Frank talks after a particularly good meal," chuckled +Mollie. + +"And I never saw boys who were so absolutely crazy about hot biscuits," +sighed Amy. "If you gave them enough hot biscuits, they didn't seem to +know or care whether they had anything else or not." + +"Yes, somebody was always stirring up biscuit dough when we were at Pine +Island," agreed Grace, her eyes dreamy. "I think one of us should have +invented a patent stirrer--just in self-defense!" + +"Just the same, I'd wager anything," cried Betty, with a thrill in her +voice and the hint of tears behind the brightness of her eyes, "that there +isn't one of us who wouldn't be willing to make biscuits from morning +till night if we only had the boys here to eat them." + +"Oh, wouldn't we!" cried Amy hungrily. "I shouldn't care if I turned into +a biscuit!" + +They laughed at that, but the laugh was not scornful, for their hearts +were very full and tender. + +"Sha'n't we stop here?" Mollie asked, after they had ridden a long, long +way in silence. "It's private enough--" + +"Oh, yes, yes," the others interrupted her eagerly, and as Mollie guided +the car over to the side of the road, Betty sprang the news she had been +bursting to tell ever since they started. + +"Girls," she cried, and quickly they turned to her, sensing something +unusual in her tone, "I have a surprise for you." + +"Yes?" they cried eagerly. + +"It's about our Sergeant William Mullins Sanderson," she announced, her +eyes sparkling. + +"Yes?" they cried again, and Mollie added impatiently: + +"Oh, Betty, don't keep us waiting. What about him?" + +"Only," said Betty, speaking very slowly and distinctly, "that he's got +the thing he wanted most in the world--besides his mother. This morning he +received his overseas orders." + +"Oh, Betty!" cried Mollie, her eyes big and round. "Isn't he simply wild +about it?" + +"He's delirious," said Betty simply, adding, with the ring of pride in her +voice: "He seemed two inches taller when he told me about it. Oh, the +spirit of our boys--the wonderful spirit of them! It can't take them long, +it can't, when they once get started!" + +"But Mrs. Sanderson," put in Amy gently. "How is she taking it?" + +"I haven't seen her yet," said Betty, her face sobering a little. But it +brightened again as she added with conviction: "I think we know enough +about that little lady to be sure she'll take it standing up and be +prouder than ever of her 'Willie boy.'" + +"Of course she will," said Grace softly, her eyes following the red disc +of the sun as it sank slowly in the west. "We're all awfully proud of +them, but I don't think any of us can help wishing that it were all over +instead of just beginning, and that the boys were coming home to us +victorious." + +"We shouldn't be human if we didn't feel that way," said Betty soberly. +"But we haven't come to the joyful part, yet. Just now we've got to keep +cheerful and hold on hard to our hope and faith in the future. We owe that +to the boys, the boys who are fighting, perhaps dying for us, more than +we owe it to ourselves. + +"But now," she added, forcing a lighter tone, "we've got a big treat +before us and we're not going to think of anything but just that. Our +letters, girls--we've been forgetting them." + +The girls started, looked surprised, then instantly responded to the +challenge of her lighter tone. + +"Goodness, it's you who made us forget them, Betty Nelson," cried Grace, +squeezing the Little Captain's hand fondly, then falling to with a will on +her own momentarily neglected mail. "Just see," she added wickedly, +holding up two letters with the coveted foreign postmark before their +envious eyes, "what an advantage it is to have a brother in the army as +well as a--a--" + +"Well, go ahead," Betty teased, while the others laughed delightedly at +her flaming color. "What is that other thing you've got besides a brother, +the mere mention of whose name makes you the color of a beet?--I should +say," correcting herself with a demure little smile, "the color of a +flaming sunset--" + +"That would be more poetic," agreed Mollie soberly, while her eyes danced. +"But either description would be correct." + +"You geese," cried Grace, trying vainly to hide her flushed face behind +the letter she had opened. "I'm sure I don't know what you're talking +about." + +"She remindeth me of the graceful ostrich," chanted Mollie cruelly, "who +hideth his head and thinks thereby--" + +"Now I know you're calling me names," cried Grace, raising the flushed +face and glaring threateningly at the back of the mischievous Mollie. + +"Well, she at least said you were graceful," chuckled Betty, tearing open +a letter from Deepdale and still reserving the best till the last. +"Anyway," she added, "we have better things to do than to engage in +useless controversy." + +"I don't know what it's all about," said Mollie, settling herself +luxuriously to enjoy her own small pile of letters. "But I'll take your +word for it, Betty, just the same." + +And while they read the dusk came down upon them softly like a mantle, and +the setting sun sent ruddy rays to touch their young, bowed heads. + +The last paragraph of Allen's letter Betty read and reread, finally +through a mist of tears that blurred the words and ran them in together. + +"It won't be long," he wrote, "before we fellows will receive the orders +that we've all been crazy for--the orders that will take us to the front. +And then, Betty, there's not a Hun that can stand before me. For I've a +memory, little girl, that will make me carry on to victory--and you. Will +you be waiting for me, Betty, when it's over? Will you want me then? For +I'm coming to you, little girl. As surely as the sun rises every morning +and sets again at night, I'm coming to you. Betty, dear, I'm loving you--" + +And Betty, raising a transfigured, tremulous face, gazed straight into the +heart of the setting sun. + +"Yes, I'll be waiting," she whispered to herself. "Oh, Allen, come back to +me--come back to me--soon--" + +And so, in the midst of stirring scenes, with martial music always ringing +in their ears, with pride in the past and courage in the future, we once +more wave farewell to our Outdoor Girls. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14136 *** |