"Wait!" gasped Betty. "I want to ask you—I wanted to ask Ida Bellethorne if she saw me drop anything here in the store yesterday?"
"I am sorry she is not here to answer that question," said Mrs. Staples. "I was not here when you came, Miss."
"No, I know you weren't. But somewhere while I was shopping yesterday I lost something out of my bag. If it dropped out here——"
"I can assure you I picked up nothing, Miss," declared the shop woman.
"If Ida——"
"If Ida Bellethorne did, she is not here, unfortunately, to tell you," said Mrs. Staples in her same manner and without a change of expression on her hard face.
"Oh, dear!" sighed Betty.
"But you don't know that you dropped it here," Bobby said to encourage her. But perhaps it encouraged Mrs. Staples more!
"I have nothing more to say, Miss," the woman declared. "Ida not being here——"
"Oh, well," said Betty, trying to speak more cheerfully, "it is true I do not remember having seen it while I was here at all. So—so we will go to the other places. Of course, if Ida had found anything she would have told you?"