But Linda fairly exulted over the information which the letter gave.
“Isn’t that great,” she demanded excitedly. “Now we’ll fix that Nan Sherwood! Got to leave, and her folks aren’t going to be rich, after all! I don’t suppose there was ever any chance of it, anyway. It was just talk. Ha! the nasty little thing. This will just fix her!”
And Nan, all that last day of silence, went about wondering why many of the girls looked so oddly at her, and especially Linda Riggs’ group. They laughed, and made supposedly funny speeches which were evidently aimed at Nan, but which she did not understand.
Rumor was blowing about, and before Bess Harley had any of the particulars from her chum of the calamity that had befallen, the whole school practically knew that Nan Sherwood’s folks “were poor as church mice.”
CHAPTER XXVI
THE GRAND GUARD BALL
Bess was in a terrible state of mind when the news was told to her. She told Nan before suppertime that the girls were saying awful things, and she wanted to know what it meant. The fact that Nan was still bound by Dr. Prescott’s sentence of silence made no difference to Bess.
“You’ve got to tell me what it means, or I’ll never speak to you again, so there!” cried Bess. “How is it your own chum never knows anything about your secrets, and other girls do? It’s a horrid shame!”
Nan, much troubled herself now, having discovered the loss of her unfinished letter, ran off to the principal and begged to be relieved of her sentence of silence. “Else I shall lose my dearest friend!” she told Dr. Prescott, quite wildly. “Something has happened that I must tell her about, dear Dr. Prescott! I must!”
“‘Must’ is a hard master, Nancy,” said the principal, softly. “Are you in trouble?”