Fairy sat up in the hammock with a cry of surprise, but not vexation, when Gene's angry countenance appeared before her.
"Look here, Fairy," he began, "what's the joke? Are your fingers itching to get hold of that four thousand a year the twins are eternally bragging about? Are you trying to throw yourself into the old school-teacher's pocketbook, or what?"
"Don't be silly, Gene," she said, "come and sit down and—"
"Sit down, your grandmother!" he snapped still angrily. "Old Double D. D. will be bobbing up in a minute, and the twins'll drag me off to hear about a sick rooster, or something. He is coming, isn't he?"
"I—guess he is," she said confusedly.
"Let's cut and run, will you?" he suggested hopefully. "We can be out of sight before—Come on, Fairy, be good to me. I haven't had a glimpse or a touch of you the whole week. What do you reckon I came down here for? Come on. Let's beat it." He looked around with a worried air. "Hurry, or the twins'll get us."
Fairy hesitated, and was lost. Gene grabbed her hand, and the next instant, laughing, they were crawling under the fence at the south corner of the parsonage lawn just as the twins appeared at the barn door. They stopped. They gasped. They stared at each other in dismay.
"It was a put-up job," declared Carol.
"Now what'll we do? But Babbie's got more sense than I thought he had, I must confess. Do you suppose he was kidnaping her?"
Carol snorted derisively. "Kidnaping nothing! She was ahead when I saw 'em. What'll we tell the professor?"