“Make sure it’s still being shown,” said the practical Zizi.
“I’ll telegraph and ask her,” cried Rodney; his face alight at the thought of doing some real work himself.
“Oh, don’t go, Rod,” Minna said; “I can’t get along without you,—and what good will it do? You know a picture isn’t the real people, and—oh, it’s all too vague and hazy——”
“No, it isn’t,” Granniss insisted. “It’s the first real clue. Why didn’t that girl notice what the girl in the picture looked like? Oh, of course I must go! I can get to Portland and back in three days, and—why, I’ve got to go!”
And go he did.
The picture was still on at the theater, and with a beating heart Rodney took his seat to watch it.
He could scarce wait for the preliminary scenes, he knew no bit of the plot or what happened to the characters: he sat tense and watchful for the appearance of the crowd on the meadow.
At last it came,—and, he nearly sprang from his seat,—it was Betty! Betty Varian herself,—he could not be mistaken! She wore a simple gingham frock, a plain straw hat, and had no sign of the smartness that always characterized Betty’s clothes, but he could not be deceived in that face, that dear, lovely face of Betty herself!
And he saw her lips were moving. He could not read them, as the girl who told of it had done, but he imagined she said, “I am Betty Varian,—I am Betty Varian.”
Yet her face was expressionless,—no eager air of imparting information, no apparent interest in the scene about her,—the face in the screen seemed like that of an automaton saying the words as if from a lesson.