“Mr. Morton originally suggested asking you,” he wrote, “but I heartily second him. We both feel sure that the ingenuity of the young woman who made the Tally-ho Tea-Shop out of a barn will devise some valuable features for the new dormitory, thereby fitting it more completely to the needs of its future occupants.”
Morton Hall was the result of a suggestion Betty had made to her friend Mr. Morton, the millionaire. It was to give the poorer girls at Harding an opportunity to live on the campus and share in the college life.
“Gracious!” sighed Betty. “He thinks I thought up all the tea-room features. It’s Madeline that they want. But Madeline’s in Maine with the Enderbys, and wouldn’t come. And then of course Mr. Morton may need to be pacified about something. I can do that part all right. Anyway, I shall have to go, so long as they have sent a ticket—right away too, or Mr. Morton will be sure to need pacifying most awfully. I wonder what in the world that postscript means.”
The postscript said, “I had intended to write you in regard to another matter, connected not so much with the architecture of the new hall as with its management; but talking it over together will be much more satisfactory.”
Betty lay awake a long while wondering about that postscript. When she finally went to sleep she dreamed that Prexy had hired her to cook for Morton Hall, and that she scorched the ice-cream, put salt in the jelly-roll, and water on the fire. She burned her fingers doing that and screamed, and it was Will calling to remind her that he wanted breakfast and his bag packed in time for the eight-sixteen.
At the breakfast table the cook—she ate with the family—gave notice. She was going away that very afternoon.
“Most unbusinesslike,” Mr. Wales assured her solemnly, but with a twinkle in his eyes.
“Most absurd,” Betty twinkled back at him. “I can’t suggest a thing to those architects, of course, and they’ll just laugh at me, and Prexy and Mr. Morton will be perfectly disgusted.”
“You’ve got to make good somehow,” Will assured her soberly. “It isn’t every girl that gets her expenses paid for a long trip like that, just to go and advise about things. You’re what they call a consulting expert, Betty. I’ll look up your trains and telephone you from town.”
“And I’ll help you pack a bag,” announced the Smallest Sister. “You’re just going in a bag, like Will, and coming back for Sunday, aren’t you, Betty dear?”