“Twenty-three minutes late, Miss B. A.,” he panted, rushing up to her. He had always called her that. It stood for Benevolent Adventurer, and some other things. Grasping her bag and her arm, he pulled her down the stairs to his big red touring car. “The way these railroads are run is abominable—a disgrace to the country, in my opinion. Now when I say I’ll get to a place at four P. M.—I mean it. And very likely I arrive at six by train—most unbusinesslike. Well, it’s not exactly your fault that idiots run our railroads, is it, Miss B. A.? I thought of that without your telling me—give me a long credit mark for once. Well, I certainly am glad to see you, and to find you looking so brown and jolly. No bothers and worries these days, Miss B. A.?”
“Except the responsibility of having to think up enough good suggestions for Morton Hall to pay you for asking me to come and for taking the time to be here to meet me,” Betty told him laughingly.
Mr. Morton snorted his indignation. “That responsibility may worry you, but it doesn’t me—not one particle. Now, by the way, don’t be upset by any idiotic remarks of the young architect chap that has this job in charge. Whatever a person wants, he says you can’t have it—that seems to be his idea of doing business. Then after you’ve shown him that your idea of doing business is to do it or know the reason why, he sits down and figures the thing out in great shape. He’s a very smart young fellow, but he hates to give in. I presume that’s why Parsons and Cope put him on this job—they’ve done work for me before, and they know that I have ideas of my own and won’t be argued out of them except by a fellow who can convince me he really knows more about the job than I do. Just the same, don’t you pay much attention to his obstruction game. Remember that you’re here because I want this dormitory to be the way you want it.”
Betty promised just as the car drew up in front of the Tally-ho. “Thought you’d like a cup of your own tea,” explained Mr. Morton, “and a sight of your new electric fixtures, and so forth. Miss Davis is expecting you. Let’s see.” He consulted his watch, comparing it carefully with Betty’s and with the clock in the automobile, which aroused his intense irritation by being two minutes slow. “It’s now three forty-one. I’ll be back in nineteen minutes. If I can find that architect chap, I’ll bring him along. He knows all the main features of the building better than I do, and he’s a pretty glib talker, so I guess we’ll let him take you over the place the first time.”
Exactly nineteen minutes later, just as Betty and Emily Davis had “begun to get ready to start to commence,” according to Emily’s favorite formula, the inspection of the tea-shop and the exchange of summer experiences, the big red car came snorting back and stopped with a jerk to let out a tall young man, who ran across the lawn and in at the Tally-ho’s hospitably opened door.
“Mr. Morton wishes to know if Miss Wales——” he began. Then he rushed up to Betty. “By all that’s amazing, the great Miss Wales is the one I used to know! How are you, Betty?”
“Why, Jim Watson, where did you come from?” demanded Betty in amazement.
Jim’s eyes twinkled. “From the Morton Mercedes most recently, and until I get back to it with you I’m afraid we’d better defer further explanations.”
Betty nodded. “Only you must just meet Emily Davis—Miss Davis, Mr. Watson. She’s a friend of Eleanor’s too. And you must tell me one thing. Is the architect out there with Mr. Morton?”
“No,” said Jim solemnly, “he isn’t, naturally, since he’s in here with you. Architect Watson, with Parsons and Cope, at your service, Miss Wales.”