Laura was a very dark girl—as dark as Maude was fair. Instead of having Beth’s brilliant brunette coloring, however, Laura had a muddy complexion. Her straight hair was black and her sharp eyes suspicious. She had not a word to say for herself, but nodded to Beth rather sullenly.
“We’ve come to talk to you, Miss Baldwin,” said Maude Grimshaw, looking significantly at Molly.
“Cracky-me!” cried the latter. “Is anything you have to say ever a secret, Maude?”
“Not if you get hold of it, Molly,” said the other girl, promptly. “That is why I have inquired of Miss Baldwin if we may speak with her alone.”
“Well, I declare!” ejaculated Molly, and before Beth could interfere her chum had flounced into the passage between the two rooms and banged shut the door.
“Now that you have driven my friend away,” Beth said, rather sharply, “perhaps you will be kind enough to tell me what you want, Miss Grimshaw?”
“Shut that door behind you, Laura,” said Maude, looking at the hall door by which she and her friend had just entered. “She may come around to listen if it is open. Oh, Miss Baldwin, don’t look at me in that way. We know Molly Granger rather better than you do, I fancy. I understand that you only met her on the boat coming up to school?”
“That is true,” admitted Beth, quietly.
“So Brownie said. Well! we know Molly. Don’t we, Laura?”
“Oh! don’t we!” echoed the dark girl, and immediately Beth guessed that Laura Hedden must be one of the “Me toos” of whom Molly had spoken. She was Maude Grimshaw’s satellite.