“When she comes back you’d better put your cot near to hers, so she can reach out and wake you if she’s ever frightened again,” Betty advised. “It was selfish of you three to get into one bed and leave her alone.”
“She could have come if she’d wanted to,” the Smallest Sister defended herself. “We s’posed she wasn’t a bit afraid when she stayed where she was, instead of her being too afraid to move.”
“Well, next time be more thoughtful,” Betty cautioned, and the Smallest Sister promised, and prepared to hop-skip back to school.
“Frisky and I walk together this week”—she explained her brief visit—“so I don’t want to miss a single walk. I can go walking with you next week. Yes, I do hate two-and-two school walks ’most as much as ever I did, but it’s different when I can walk with Frisky. I’ll come again soon and tell you what we’ve discovered about the ghost,” she called over her shoulder, as she vanished.
That evening the Thorn appeared in Betty’s room, wearing her most provoking air—a combination of sympathy for Betty, offended dignity for herself, and a grim pleasure in showing up the shortcomings and inferiorities of her house mates.
“How did Mr. J. J. Morton make all his money?” she inquired, after a few moments’ acrid criticism of the Purple Indian play, which had just been successfully repeated, by request, for the benefit of the Student’s Aid treasury.
“Why, I don’t know exactly,” Betty answered idly. “Railroads, I think, and—and stocks and bonds. The same way other rich men have made their money, I suppose.”
“I guess it’s tainted millions, all right.” The Thorn’s thin lips shut tight, and her sharp eyes fixed Betty’s belligerently.
Betty only smiled at her good-humoredly. “Did you read Peggy Swift’s article in the last ‘Argus’ on that subject? She makes you see how all money is tainted, in a way. But Mr. Morton is as fair and upright as he can be. He is splendid to the men who work for him, Mr. Thayer says. And he spends most of his time nowadays in superintending his charities.”
“When he isn’t spending it squeezing some small competitor to the wall, or whitewashing a corner,” added the Thorn sententiously.