CHAPTER V--BEARDING THE LION
The one word "adventure" was enough to make the girls all interest atonce. Caroline Brant wedged herself into a square inch of space on thebed between Connie and the bedpost, and as Rose Belser came in at thatmoment the girls motioned her to join them.
"What's up?" asked Rose, flinging off her cap and scarf as she came."Billie been getting into mischief again? Or is it only trouble thistime?"
"Trouble, I guess," said Billie, and then she told them the astonishingtale of what had happened that afternoon. But instead of beinginterested as she had expected them to be, the girls actually seemeddisappointed.
"Well, was that all you had to tell us?" asked Connie, when she hadfinished. "I'm surprised at you, Billie. I thought you had really donesomething exciting."
"Yes," added Rose, in her aggravating little drawl, as she rose to getready for dinner, "it was awfully good of you to rescue those threeannoying little brats and return them to their distracted mother and allthat. But I don't see anything dreadfully hair-raising about it."
Rose read books that were too old for her and ran with girls who weretoo old for her and so she herself contrived to seem much older than shewas. And sometimes Billie found this manner extremely irritating, inspite of the fact that she and Rose were friends--now.
"I suppose it doesn't seem very exciting to you," she said, as shepulled off her cap and unwound the muffler from about her neck. "But Ipresume you would be a little bit more interested if it was _you_ whodidn't have enough to eat."
"Don't be mad at us, Billie," Connie begged, patting Billie's handsoothingly. "Of course we all feel sorry for the poor little kiddies andtheir mother and we want to help them all we can. But you can't blame usfor being disappointed when you said you had had an adventure."
"I wonder if you would call it an adventure," mused Billie, more toherself than to them, "if one of us should find that stolen inventionand claim the twenty thousand dollars reward for it!"
Her classmates stopped what they were doing and stared at her.
"Wh--what did you say?" demanded Connie.
"You heard me," said Billie, with a grin.
"But, Billie, you know that's absurd," said Rose, in her best drawl."How could we possibly hope to find a thing that has been missing for acouple of years?"
"It may be absurd," said Billie good-naturedly, pulling the ribbon fromher curls and brushing them vigorously. "I think it sounds foolishmyself. But while there's life, there's hope. Hand me that comb, willyou, Vi?"
A few minutes later the big gong sounded through the halls, announcinggratefully to the hungry girls that dinner was ready. And now that thevinegary Misses Dill had gone, delight reigned supreme in the dininghall.
The girls had all they could possibly eat of good satisfying food andthey were allowed to chatter as much as they would as long as they didnot become too noisy.
But although they had chicken for dinner and cranberry sauce and creamedcauliflower, things all of which she especially liked, Billie enjoyed itless than any meal she had ever eaten.
Again and again before her eyes arose the reproachful images of thethree little Haddons, undersized, undernourished, half-starved.
She could hardly wait until dessert had been served, and then, with amurmured word to Laura and Vi, she excused herself from the table andwent in search of Miss Walters.
She found that lady in the act of drinking her after-dinner coffee inthe privacy of her own little domain.
Miss Walters had a suite of three rooms all to herself: a bedroom, adressing-room and a sitting-room, and all three of the rooms were fittedup in a manner that befitted a queen.
The sitting-room was done in mahogany and blue. An exquisite Persian rugof dull blue covered the floor and the rich mahogany furniture was allupholstered in blue velour. The curtain draperies were all of this samerich blue over cream-colored lace. In the center of the room was a hugemahogany library table upon which stood a handsome reading lamp with ablue silk shade.
Billie, who had never been in this sanctum before and who had seen MissWalters only in her office, was amazed when, in reply to her timidknock, the principal invited her to enter.
For a moment she stood dumbly staring, while Miss Walters set down hercup and looked up with a smile. The smile changed to a look of surpriseand then to annoyance as the principal saw who the intruder was.
"It must be something very important to bring you here at this hour,Beatrice," said Miss Walters, while poor Billie began to wish herselfback in the security of dormitory C. She was too frightened to explainher presence, and yet she knew that Miss Walters expected anexplanation. "What is it you wish?" asked the latter, impatiently.
"I--I'm sorry," said Billie at last, backing away toward the door. "Ishouldn't have come--but I thought--that is, I thought it wasimportant." She was half through the door by this time, and MissWalters, her annoyance changing to amusement, took pity on her.
"What was important?" she asked, adding, as Billie still continued toback away: "Come in here, Billie Bradley, and shut that door. There's adraft in the hall."
Relieved at the use of the familiar name Billie, the girl obeyed,shutting the door softly, then turned imploringly to the teacher.
"Sit down," commanded the latter, pointing to one of the blue velourarmchairs near by. "Now tell me the 'important thing' you came aboutwhile I finish my coffee."
Billie made poor work of her story at first, for she was still wonderinghow she had ever had the courage to approach Miss Walters in the privacyof her sanctum sanctorum, but as she went on she became lessself-conscious and was encouraged by Miss Walters' unfeigned interest.
And when, at the end of the recital, Miss Walters reached over andpatted her hand and told her she had been quite right in coming to heras she had, Billie was in the seventh heaven of delight.
"With poverty behind them, fortune and comfort ahead, and then again,desolation!" Miss Walters mused, talking more to herself than Billie."How the human mind can stand up under the strain is a mystery to me.Poor, starving little mites and pitiful, noble mother, fighting for heryoung with the only weapons she has. Lucky mother to have come to thenotice of a girl like you, Billie Bradley," she added, turning uponBillie so warm and bright a smile that the girl's heart swelled withpride and adoration.
"Then you will let us help the Haddons?" she asked breathlessly.
"More than that," smiled Miss Walters. "I will _help_ you to help them.I think it is too late to follow out your plan of taking them somethingto-night." But she added as she saw Billie's bright face fall: "But wewill pack a basket full to the brim with good things early to-morrowmorning and you and Laura and Violet may take them to the cottage afterbreakfast. Only, you must walk around the lake. I could not take thechance of your skating after what happened this afternoon."
Billie stammered out some incoherent words of thanks, Miss Walterspatted her cheek, and in another moment she found herself standingoutside in the hall in a sort of happy daze.
A girl passed her, eyed her curiously, went on a few steps and then cameback. It was Eliza Dilks.
"In Miss Walters' room at night," said the sneering voice that Billieknew only too well. "No wonder you get away with everything--teacher'spet."
Billie started to retort angrily, but knowing that silence was the veryworst punishment one could inflict upon Eliza she merely shrugged hershoulders, turned up her straight little nose as far as it would go andwalked off, leaving Eliza fuming helplessly.
When Billie reached the dormitory she found the girls waiting for her inan agitated group. There was not one of them who would have dared toapproach Miss Walters after school hours unless it had been about amatter of life and death importance, and they had more than halfexpected that Billie would be carried back on a stretcher.
When they found out what had really happened they welcomed Billie as ahero should be welcomed. They lifted her on their shoulders and carriedher round the dormitory, chanting school songs till a warn
ing hiss fromone of the girls near the door sent them scuttling. By the time MissArbuckle reached the dormitory, they were bent decorously over theirtext-books, seeking what knowledge they might discover!
Next morning, true to her word, Miss Walters herself superintended thepacking of an immense basket with all the dainties at her command. Therewere chicken and roast beef sandwiches, half of a leg of lamb, two orthree different kinds of jelly, some rice pudding left over from thenight before, a big slab of cake, two quarts of fresh milk, and somebeef tea made especially for the Haddons.
And the girls, feeling more important than they had ever felt before intheir lives, marched off after breakfast, during school hours--MissWalters having personally excused them from class--joyfully bent uponplaying the good Samaritan.
"I never knew," said Laura, as if she were making a great discovery,"that it could make you so happy to be kind to somebody else!"