“Why?” Phyllis inquired.
Sally waved her hand at Gladys as if she were introducing a speaker.
“You tell it, Glad, and then we’ll be sure to be amused.”
“I accept the nomination, and I will do my best for the people under my care,” Gladys said grandly.
“Well, do start with the explanation of the ball room,” Janet begged. “I’m so curious.”
“That means the history of Hilltop, but I’ll do my best,” Gladys replied, and began:
“Fifty years ago, Colonel Hull lived in this house. He had lots of money and he lived like a king. He was famous throughout the countryside for his wonderful hunting, but, if you just go on spending money and never do anything to make it, it doesn’t last forever, so when Colonel Hull died and Miss Hull’s father had the house, he found he didn’t have any money to run it with. So for a long time Miss Hull and her father and mother lived in the old wing and were terribly poor.
“Then her parents died and the house was Miss Hull’s, but still there wasn’t any money. All her friends wanted her to sell it, but she wouldn’t do it. There had been six generations of Hulls on this place, and she wasn’t going to let her ancestors up in heaven see her beaten by a little thing like no money.”
“Oh, Glad!” Sally and Prue protested.
“Well, she wasn’t,” Gladys persisted. “Maybe that’s not a very elegant way of putting it, but it’s exactly as it was. She wouldn’t admit she was beaten, and, of course, she wasn’t.