CHAPTER XIX
BOB'S SOLUTION
"If you wanted twenty-five dollars and I had it," said Bettypersuasively, "I'd give it to you without asking a solitary question."
Rob's lips twitched.
"But, Betty--" he began. Then--"Oh, do play fair," he urged. "You'reyounger than I am. Uncle Dick expects me to look after you. Goodnessknows I don't want to pry into your affairs, but when you borrow fifteendollars and then want twenty-five the same week, what's a fellow tothink? If some one is borrowing from you, it's time to call a halt;you're not fair to yourself."
Betty looked startled. How could Bob possibly guess so near the truth?She began to think that the better part of wisdom was to confide in thiskeen young man.
"Come on, Betty, tell me what you want it for, and you shall have twicetwenty-five," said Bob earnestly. "I've most of my allowance in theschool bank. It's all yours, if you'll let me have an inkling of thereason you need money."
"Well," said Betty, slowly, "I didn't promise I wouldn't tell--onlythat I wouldn't tell Bobby or Mrs. Eustice. It's Libbie who has to havethe money."
She sketched Libbie's story for him rapidly, Bob listening in silence. Atthe end he asked a single question.
"Have you any of those notes asking for money?"
"Here's one." Betty thrust her hand into the pocket of her sweater andpulled out the crumpled paper that Libbie had shaken out of the bottlethat morning.
"Were they all written on this same kind of paper?" asked Bob,reading the note.
"Ye-s, that is, I think so," hesitated Betty. "I really haven'tnoticed. Why?"
"Because I don't think any man wrote this," announced Bob confidently."I think some girl at school has done it, either as a joke or totorment Libbie."
"But it's grown-up writing," protested Betty. "Though, come to think ofit, we don't know any of the girls' handwriting," she added thoughtfully.
"What girl would be likely to do it?" asked Bob. "Can you recall apractical joker? This is copy book paper torn from an ordinary themebook. Yes, I'll bet a cookie a girl wrote it."
"Ada Nansen or Ruth Gladys Royal might do it to plague Libbie," saidBetty slowly. "They don't like any of our crowd, and Libbie is so goodat French she turns Ada green with envy. The more I think of it, thesurer I am it is Ada. Ruth doesn't dislike any one actively enough toexert herself."
"Ada Nansen?" repeated Bob. "Isn't she that girl we saw on the train andwho plumped herself down in my seat? I thought so--I remember you toldme. Well, from the sidelight I have on her character, I believe she isthe one at the bottom of this. That will explain, too, why you nevercatch any one digging up the bottle--she knows exactly when you are busyand when you are not."
"Bottle!" said Betty explosively, to Bob's amazement. "Oh, Bob! thismorning Miss Jessup was talking to us about association of ideas, and sheasked Ada what bee meant to her. We thought she'd say 'honey,' of course,but she said 'bottle.' Doesn't that show--"
"I should say it did!" Bob's voice was eager. "She took it for the letter'B' and bottle was in her mind. You may depend upon it, that girl is atthe back of all this fuss! Gee, when I've nothing else to do, I'm goingto study up on this association of ideas stuff."
"You don't need it--you can get at things without a bit of trouble,"Betty assured him affectionately.
"How will you go about pinning down Ada?" Bob asked anxiously.
"I'll cut out Latin to-morrow afternoon when she has a study period,"planned Betty. "She'll think Libbie is reciting, and she'll not think ofme at all, and I'll slip out and watch to see if she goes near thebottle. But what can I do if she does prove to be the right one? She'lltell Mrs. Eustice, and poor Libbie will be in a peck of trouble. I reallythink Mrs. Eustice would send her home if she knew."
"And serve Libbie right for being such an idiot!" pronounced Bobseverely. "However, I think she has been pretty thoroughly punishedthrough fear. I only wish you'd told me this before, Betty, because Iknow exactly how you can deal with Ada."
"You do? Oh, Bob, what should I ever do without you!" cried Betty,forgetting that a few moments before she had berated him for hisinsistence. "Tell me, quick."
"Well, a crowd of us fellows happened to be over in Edentown last Fridaynight, and we saw Ada and Ruth at the movies," said Bob. "They didn't seeus, for we sat back. They were the only girls from Shadyside, and Tommyand I decided they had sneaked out after dinner and walked all thatdistance. Now threatening isn't a very nice performance, Betty, butsometimes you have to meet like with like. I think, if when you see Adadigging up the bottle, you go to her and say that unless she returns themoney and Libbie's first note to you and promises to let the matterdrop--forever--you will expose her Edentown trip to Mrs. Eustice, shewill listen to reason."
"So do I," agreed Betty. "I don't think she has touched the money--shehas plenty. But I must have the note so that Libbie can destroy it. Mrs.Eustice never lets us go to town at night, and I'm sure Ada and Ruth hadto go down the fire-escape. Goodness, didn't they take a chance of beingdiscovered!"
"Well, as I've already missed half an algebra recitation, and you knowyou have no business over here at this time of day, I move we begin ourpenance," suggested Bob. "Paddle home, Betsey, and if our hunch turns outwrong, we'll tackle another one."
"Oh, it won't--I'm sure you're right," said Betty gratefully. "Thank youever so much, Bob. And the next time I'll tell you everything at thevery first."
"Don't let me hear of another time," Bob called after her, withmock severity.
"Well, I never!" gasped Libbie, astonished, when Betty told her of Bob'ssuspicions. "Oh, Betty, wouldn't it be wonderful if it should be true!"
"I'm going to cut Latin this afternoon and find out," said Bettyvigorously. "If Miss Sharpe asks for me, you don't know where I am; shenever does anything but give you double lines to translate."
Betty knew that Ada had a study period, which she usually spent in herroom, directly after lunch.
Directly after she left the dining room that noon Betty sped away to thefoot of the hill. There were several stubby bushes about half-filled withwind-blown leaves and old rubbish and affording an excellent screen.Betty crouched down behind one of these.
She had not long to wait. Ada, in her beautiful mink furs, which sheclung to persistently, though the fall weather so far had been very mild,was presently seen coming across the grass. She walked straight to thespot where the bottle was buried, and, stooping down, brushed away theleaves and dirt. She lifted the bottle.
"Pshaw, it's empty!" she said aloud.
"Yes, it's empty," echoed Betty, stepping out from behind the bush. "Andyou are to give the money back to me, and Libbie's note with it."
"Is that so?" said Ada contemptuously. "I have something to sayabout that. I intend to see that that note reaches the properperson--Mrs. Eustice."
Betty took a step nearer, her dark eyes blazing.
"I can play the kind of game you play--if I must," she said in acuriously repressed tone. "What about the trip you and Ruth Gladys madeto Edentown last Friday night?"
Ada glared at her.
"Were you there? How did you know?" she stammered jerkily. "If you wereup to the same trick, you'll look nice tattle-telling on us, won't you?"
"I wasn't there, but I have witnesses whom I can summon to say youwere," declared Betty, wishing her voice did not tremble withnervousness. "You were the only girls from Shadyside, and you must haveclimbed down the fire--"
Ada raised her hand that held the bottle.
"You--you tell-tale!" she screamed threateningly.
Betty flung up her arm to knock the bottle aside, missed Ada's hand andhit her shoulder. Ada went down, Betty on top of her.
"Girls! For mercy's sake!" Miss Anderson stood beside them, scandalized."Betty, get up. Ada, what are you thinking of? I saw you from the gymwindows. You'll have the whole school out here presently. Betty, Ithought you had Latin at this period?"
"I have," admitted Betty, so meekly that Miss Anderson looked a
way lestshe laugh. "Only I had to see Ada."
"I don't know what you were quarreling about," said Miss Anderson, withcharacteristic frankness. "But I do know that both of you are old enoughto know better than to revert to small-boy tactics. You've a hole in yourstocking, Betty, that would do credit to a little brother."
"I ripped it on that stone," said Betty regretfully.
Ada stood sullenly, unconscious of two dead leaves hanging to her hatwhich completely destroyed her usual effect of studied elegance.
"Go on in, Betty," said the physical culture teacher, who labored underno delusions about the duties of a peacemaker. To tell the truth, she didnot believe in forced reconciliation. "Ada will come with me."
"Ada has something I want," said Betty stubbornly. "She has to promise togive it to me first."
Ada looked at the resolute little figure facing her. Betty, she knew, wascapable of doing exactly what she had said. Mrs. Eustice had no morerigid rule than the one against going to town, day or night, withoutpermission. Ada gave in.
"I'll leave it in your room before dinner--you didn't think I carried itwith me, did you?" she snapped.
"Both?" said Betty significantly, meaning the note and the money.
"Everything!" cried the exasperated Ada, on the verge of angry tears.
"Then you have my promise never to say a word," Betty assured herblithely.
"Do you want this bottle?" Miss Anderson called after her, as she startedfor the school.
Miss Anderson had been studying both girls as she waited quietly.
Now Betty turned, smiled radiantly, and took the bottle the teacher heldout to her. With careful aim, worthy of Bob's training, she fixed her eyeon a handy rock, hurled the bottle with all her strength, and had thesatisfaction of seeing it dashed into a thousand fragments as it struckthe target squarely.
Then she trotted sedately on to her delayed recitation, and Miss Andersonand the scowling Ada followed more slowly.
Just before dinner that night there came a knock on Betty's door, andVirgie Smith, one of Ada's friends, thrust a package at Bobby, who hadanswered the tap.
Betty managed to turn aside her chum's curiosity and to get away toLibbie and give her the note. They burned it in the flame of a candle,and counted the money. It was all there, folded just as Libbie hadplaced it in the bottle. Evidently Ada had never carried it.
Libbie paid Louise the money she had borrowed of her and gave Betty theamount she owed her, most of which was Bob's.
"Now do try to be more sensible, Libbie," pleaded Betty, turning to goback to Bobby. "When you want to do something romantic think twice andcount a hundred."
"I will!" promised Libbie fervently. "I'll never be so sillyagain, Betty."
But dear me, she was, a hundred times! But in a different way each time.Libbie would be Libbie to the end of the chapter.
Betty, rushing back to brush her hair for dinner, heard a soundsuspiciously like a sob as she passed Norma Guerin's door. It wasunlatched, and as no one answered when she tapped Betty gently pushed itopen and stepped into the room.
Norma lay on her bed crying as though her heart would break, and Alice,looking very forlorn and solemn, was holding a letter in her hand.
Betty Gordon at Boarding School; Or, The Treasure of Indian Chasm Page 19
