Madge Morton's Trust

by Amy D. V. Chalmers

"What is it now?" Miss Jenny Ann inquired teasingly.

The little captain's face sobered. "It isn't a little thing this time, like my putting the sheet on Miss Betsey's bed wrong side up. It's very important. Miss Betsey says," whispered Madge in Miss Jenny Ann's ear, although they were standing some distance away from any one else, "that nearly every day for the past week some of her money has disappeared out of her wretched old money bag. Not very much at a time. First she noticed that three dollars had gone, then five, and now it's ten. She seems to think that I ought to know how it happens. She doesn't want to worry you about it. Of course, I know she is mistaken," cried Madge indignantly. "She just does not know how much money she had. There hasn't been a single person on this boat this whole week except our party."

Miss Jenny Ann looked serious. "Does Miss Taylor suspect any one?" she asked carelessly, not glancing at Madge.

Madge's cheeks reddened. "Miss Betsey says she does not suspect any one, but she spoke darkly of poor David Brewster. She says he never took anything that she knows of when he was on her farm, but that his father was almost a tramp. He came up to New England from goodness-knows-where, and every now and then he disappears and is gone for months at a time. Miss Taylor believes that when Tom ties up our boats in the afternoons, and David goes off and leaves everybody, it is his vagabond blood showing in him. Isn't it cruel to make the poor fellow responsible for his father's sins? I am going to stand up for him through thick and thin. Coming, Miss Betsey," answered Madge cheerfully, in response to a call from the tyrannical old spinster.

Miss Jenny Ann remained by herself a few moments longer. She wondered why Miss Taylor required more attention from poor Madge than she did from any of the other girls. It was certain that she liked her least. But Miss Jenny Ann shrewdly suspected that prim Miss Betsey thought that their impetuous captain needed discipline and had set herself to administer it to her. About David Brewster Miss Jenny Ann was more worried. She did not like the lad. No one did. He was the discordant element in their whole party. Lillian and Eleanor fought shy of him. Phyllis was kind to him but had little to say to him, and the boys in the motor launch, except Tom, treated him with a kind of scornful coolness. The boy was neither a gentleman nor a servant. It was small wonder that generous-hearted Madge championed him. Miss Jenny Ann understood, from Madge's allusion to David's father, one reason why Madge was kind to the boy.

Miss Jenny Ann Jones and Miss Betsey Taylor shared one of the houseboat staterooms. The four girls, to their great joy, bunked together in the other.

It was exactly a half hour before Miss Betsey would let Madge come out on deck again. She wished her money carefully counted and a new place discovered for concealing it. Madge was strangely patient, for she had had a long talk with Dr. Alden before she left Hartford. He had told her that she would have a good deal to bear from Miss Betsey. Yet, if she wished to give the pleasure of the houseboat trip to her friends and to herself, she must remember the tiresome old adage, "What is worth having is worth paying for." So far Madge had paid with little grumbling.

This afternoon, as she reappeared on deck, her red lips were pouting and her cheeks were a deeper color. Her resentment against Miss Betsey was at its height.

No one noticed the little captain standing alone on deck. Usually she would have thought nothing of it, but this evening she was tired and cross. It did not seem fair for her to have to take all the trouble with their houseboat boarder on her shoulders. She could hear Lillian, Nellie, Harry Sears and George Robinson singing on the upper deck of the little houseboat. Phyllis was talking busily to Jack Bolling and did not even glance over toward Madge from her seat on the launch. Madge knew that Tom was angry because she had not joined him in the motor boat earlier in the afternoon, when the boats had put in to the shore. She had not been able to go on account of Miss Betsey, but she certainly had no intention of explaining anything to Tom. He could think what he chose.

The two boats were in the habit of landing several times during a day's cruise. Ordinarily they went ashore just before sunset, and the boys and girls had their dinner together in some sequestered place. They then spent the night with the houseboat and motor boat at anchor. But this evening it was so lovely, gliding along the face of the river, with its hills on one side and meadows and orchards on the other, that Miss Jenny Ann requested Tom not to land until just about bed-time.