Then Missy, feeling that financial responsibility must be recognized in a class president, began to put her case with a formal dignity that impressed every one but the conductor.
“We're the Junior class of the Cherryvale High School—we wish to go to Osawatomie. Couldn't we—maybe—?”
Formal dignity broke down, her voice stuck in her throat, but her eyes ought to have been enough. They were big and shining eyes, and when she made them appealing they had been known to work wonders with father and mother and other grown-ups, even with the austere Professor Sutton. But this burly figure in the baggy blue uniform had a face more like a wooden Indian than a human grown-up—and an old, dyspeptic wooden Indian at that. Missy's eyes were to avail her nothing that hour.
“Off you get at the watering-tank,” he ordained. “The whole pack of you.”
And at the watering-tank off they got.
And then, as often follows a mood of high adventure, there fell upon the festive group a moment of pause, of unnatural quiet, of “let down.”
“Well, what're we going to do now?” queried somebody.
“We'll do whatever Missy says,” said Raymond, just as if he were Sir Walter Raleigh speaking of the Virgin Queen. It was a wonder someone didn't start teasing him about her; but everyone was too taken up waiting for Missy to proclaim. She set her very soul vibrating; shut her eyes tightly a moment to think; and, as if in proof that Providence helps them who must help others, almost instantly she opened them again.
“Rocky Ford!”
Just like that, out of the blue, a quick, unfaltering, almost unconscious cry of the inspired. And, with resounding acclaim, her followers caught it up: