“Maybe so,” Bess responded as unenthusiastically as she could, for she was afraid to let Nan even guess at her own excitement. “My only hope is that there is a good breakfast waiting downstairs in the dining hall. This being Sunday, I would like orange juice and pancakes and sausage and some good hot cocoa with whipped cream swimming around on top.”
“Ugh!” Nan made a wry face. “You and Laura Polk and your whipped cream. I don’t see how you can bear to have it for breakfast.”
“Don’t let it trouble you, darling,” Bess was in an extraordinarily pleasant mood, “we won’t get it. You’ll never catch Mrs. Cupp feeding us whipped cream at any time. Says it’s not good for our school-girl complexions.” With this, she went off to bathe and dress.
“You don’t mind,” Nan called after her, “do you, if I don’t wait for you this morning. I want to go to early chapel so that I can go down to the village on the bus.”
“Run along, and forget me,” Bess urged her. “I’m going to take my own lazy time about dressing this morning. I’m going to late breakfast and late chapel and late everything. I’ve got spring fever with a bang.”
So Nan went off and left a houseful of schemers behind her.
CHAPTER V
SURPRISE FOR EVERYONE!
At long last came four o’clock. Dr. Prescott walked down the big, winding stairway of the castle-like structure that she had transformed from a run-down neglected dwelling into a boarding school for girls. She was proud of the school, proud of the work she had done there. She looked up. Why, she was proud of every big beam that supported the high ceilings!