CHAPTER II
NORMA'S LETTER
This was not Betty Gordon's first experience with an oil well setoff prematurely, and while she was naturally excited, she was not atall afraid.
"Get on Clover!" shouted Bob. "I do wish you'd ever wear a hat--"
Betty laughed a little as she scrambled into her saddle. Bob, mountinghis own horse, wore no hat, but it was a pet grievance of his that Bettypersistently scorned headgear whether riding or walking.
"Gallop!" cried Bob. "Shut your eyes if you want to--Clover willfollow Reuben."
The white horse set off, his awkward lunge carrying him over the groundswiftly, and the little bay Clover cantered obediently after him. Oilcontinued to rain down as they headed toward the north.
Betty closed her eyes, clutching her letter and candy box tightly in bothhands and letting the reins lie idle on her horse's neck. Clover,galloping now, could be trusted to follow the leading horse.
"Getting better now!" Bob shouted back, turning in his saddle to see thatBetty was safe.
Betty's dark eyes opened and she shook back her hair, making a littleface at the taste of oil in her mouth. She slipped Norma Guerin's letterinto her pocket, glancing down at her blouse as she did so.
"I'm a perfect sight!" she called to Bob dolorously. "I don't believe Ican ever get the oil spots out of this silk."
"Sue the company!" Bob cried, with a grin. "Don't let Clover go to sleeptill we're nearer home, Betty."
The girl urged the little bay forward with a whispered word ofencouragement, and gradually, very gradually, they began to draw out ofthe rain of oil.
Betty Gordon was not an Oklahoma girl, though she rode with theeffortless ease of a Westerner. She was an orphan, of New England stock,and had come from the East to the oil fields to join her one livingrelative, a beloved uncle whose interest in oil holdings made anincessant traveler of him.
This Richard Gordon, "Uncle Dick" to Bob Henderson as well as to Betty,had found himself unexpectedly made guardian of his little niece at atime when it was impassible for him to establish a home for her. His timeand skill pledged to the oil company he represented, Mr. Gordon hadsolved the problem of what to do with Betty by sending her to spend thesummer with an old childhood friend of his, a Mrs. Peabody who hadmarried a farmer, reputed well-to-do. Betty's experiences, pleasant andotherwise, as a member of the Peabody household, have been told in thefirst book of this series entitled "Betty Gordon at Bramble Farm; or TheMystery of a Nobody."
She made some true friends during the months she spent with the Peabodys,and perhaps the closest, and certainly the most loyal, was Bob Henderson.A year older than Betty, the fourteen year old Bob, whose life at BrambleFarm had been harsh and unlovely and preceded by nothing brighter than adrab existence at the county poor farm, became the champion of thedark-eyed girl who had smiled at him and suggested that because they wereboth orphans they had a common bond of friendship.
How Bob Henderson got track of his mother's people and what steps werenecessary before he could discover a definite clue, have been related inthe second volume of the series, entitled, "Betty Gordon in Washington;or Strange Adventures in a Great City."
In this book Bob and Betty came together again in the Capitol City, andBetty acquired a second "Uncle Dick" in the person of Richard Littell,the father of three lively daughters who innocently kidnapped Betty, onlyto have the entire family become her firm friends. While in WashingtonBob and Betty each received good news that sent them trustfully toOklahoma, there to meet Uncle Dick Gordon, and later, Bob's own aunts.
The story of the "Saunders' place" and of the unscrupulous sharpers whotried to cheat the old ladies who were the sisters of Bob's dead mother,has been told in the third book about Betty Gordon. This book, "BettyGordon in the Land of Oil; or The Farm that Was Worth a Fortune," relatesthe varied experiences of Bob and Betty in the oil section of Oklahomaand the long train of events that culminated in the sale of the Saundersfarm for ninety thousand dollars. Uncle Dick had been made guardian ofBob, at his own and the aunts' request, so Bob was now a ward with Betty.
The possession of money, though it meant the difference betweenpoverty and debt and great comfort, had, to date, made very littlechange in the mode of living of Miss Faith and Miss Charity Saunders,or of their nephew.
This morning he had been delayed by some extra work on the farm, for theoil company did not take possession till the first of the month, now aweek away, and Betty had ridden to the oil fields ahead of him. Shedivided her time between the Saunders' place and the Watterby farm, whereshe and Bob had stayed when they first came to Flame City.
"Whew!" gasped Bob as they finally emerged from the black curtain of oil."Of all the messy stuff! Betty, you look as though an oil lamp hadexploded in your face."
"Now I'll have to wash my hair again," mourned Betty. "You'd better cometo Grandma Watterby's and get tidied up, Bob. It's nearer than youraunts', taking this road; and they always have the stove tank full ofhot water."
Bob took this advice, and the sympathetic Watterby family came to theoil-spotted pair's assistance with copious supplies of hot water, soapand towels and liberal handfuls of borax, for the water was very hard.Fortunately, Betty had a clean blouse and skirt at hand (most of herwardrobe was in the guest room at the Saunders farm), and Bob borrowed aclean shirt from Will Watterby, in which the boy, being much smaller thanthe man, looked a little absurd.
"I'm clean, anyway, and that makes me feel good, so why should I care howI look?" was Bob's defense when his appearance was commented on.
"I'm so hungry," announced Betty, coming out of her room, once more trimand neat, and sniffing the delicious odor of hot waffles. "I wonder if Icould pin my hair up in a towel and dry it after lunch?"
"Of course you may," said Mrs. Will Watterby warmly. "Did you fix a placefor Betty, Grandma?"
"What a silly question, Emma," reproved old Grandma Watterbyseverely. "Here, Betty, you sit next to me, and Bob can have Will'splace. He's gone over to Flame City with a bolt he wants theblacksmith to tinker up."
Ki, the Indian who helped with the farm work, smiled at Betty but saidnothing more than the single "Howdy," which was his stock form ofsalutation. Mrs. Watterby's waffles were quite as good as they smelled,and she apparently had mixed an inexhaustible quantity of batter. Everyone ate rapidly and in comparative silence, a habit to which Bob andBetty were by now quite accustomed. When Mr. Gordon was present heinsisted on a little conversation, but his presence was lacking to-day.
"You go right out in the sun and dry your hair, Betty," said Mrs.Watterby, when the meal was over. "No, I don't need any help withthe dishes. Grandma and me, we're going over to town in the carthis afternoon and I don't care whether I do the dishes till I comeback or not."
This, for Mrs. Watterby, was a great step forward. Before the purchase ofthe automobile, bought with a legacy inherited by Grandma Watterby,dishes and housework had been the sum total of Mrs. Will Watterby'sexistence. Now that she could drive the car and get away from her kitchensink at will, she seemed another woman.
Betty voiced something of this to Bob as she unfastened the towel and lether heavy dark hair fall over her shoulders. She was sitting on the backporch where the afternoon sun shone unobstructed.
"Yes, I guess automobiles are a good thing," admitted Bob absently. "Iwant Aunt Faith to get one. A runabout would be handy for them--one likeDoctor Guerin's. Remember, Betty?"
"My goodness, I haven't read Norma's letter!" said Betty hastily. "I leftit in my other blouse. Wait a minute, and I'll get it."
She dashed into the house and was back again in a moment, the letter Bobhad handed her just before the shower of oil, in her hand.
Bob, in his favorite attitude of lying on his back and staring at thesky, was startled by an exclamation before Betty had finished the firstpage of the closely written missive.
"What's the matter?" he demanded, sitting up. "Anybody sick?"
"Oh, Bob, such fun!" Betty's eyes danced wi
th pleasure. "What do youthink! Norma and Alice Guerin are going to Shadyside!"
"Well, I'm willing to jump with joy, but could you tell me whatShadyside is, and where?" said Bob humbly. "Why do the Guerin girls wantto go there?"
"I forgot you didn't know," apologized Betty. "Shadyside is the boardingschool, Bob. That's the name of the station, too. It's five hours' ridefrom Washington. Let's see, there's Bobby and Louise Littell and Libbie,and now Norma and Alice--five girls I know already! I guess I won't behomesick or lonely."
But as she said it she glanced uncertainly at Bob.
That young man snickered, turned it into a cough, and that failing,essayed to whistle.
"Bob, you act too funny for anything!" This time Betty's glance was notone of approval. "What does ail you?"
"Nothing, nothing at all, Betsey," Bob assured her. "I'm my usualcharming self. Are Norma and Alice going to Washington first?"
"No. I wish they were," answered Betty, taking up the letter again."Bob, I'm afraid they're having a hard time with money matters. You knowDr. Guerin is so easy-going he never collects one-third of the bills hesends out, and any one can get his services free if they tell him a hardluck story. Norma writes that she and Alice have always wanted to go toShadyside because their mother graduated from there when it was only aday school. Mrs. Guerin's people lived around there somewhere. And lastyear, you know, Norma went to an awfully ordinary school--good enough, Isuppose, but not very thorough. She couldn't prepare for college there."
"Well, couldn't we fix it some way for them?" asked Bob interestedly."I'd do anything in the world for Doctor Guerin. Didn't he row me thattime he found us out in the fields at two o'clock in the morning? Youthink up some way to make him accept some money, Betty."
Doctor Hal Guerin and his wife and daughters had been good friends to Boband Betty in the Bramble Farm days. The doctor, with a large countrypractice that brought him more affection and esteem than ready cash, hadmanaged to look after the boy and girl more or less effectively, andNorma, his daughter, had supplied Bob with orders from her school friendsfor little carved pendants that he made with no better tools than an oldknife. This money had been the first Bob had ever earned and had givenhim his first taste of independence.
"I don't think you could make Doctor Guerin take money, even as aloan," said Betty slowly, in answer to Bob's proposal. "Norma wouldn'tlike it if she thought her letter had suggested such a thing. Whatmakes it hard for them, I think, is that Mrs. Guerin expected to havequite a fortune some day. Her mother was really wealthy, and she was anonly child. I don't know where the money went, but I do know theGuerins never had any of it."
Bob jumped to his feet as she finished the sentence.
"Here's Uncle Dick!" he cried. "Did you see the new well come in, sir?"