CHAPTER XV
THE TRUMP CARD
It so happened that the presence of the two strange girls had aroused the curiosity of someone else, and that this somebody being of a suspicious nature at all times required but little to set her fancies a-galloping. She had watched the girls all through the game, and at its end sped away to the dressing room and changed her clothes with remarkable expedition. Then, instead of joining her companions in Miss Woodhull’s reception room, where tea was to be served to pupils and guests, she hurried into her outdoor garments, and slipped out of a side door, made her way around the house to a clump of fir trees in which she could watch undetected all who left the main entrance of Leslie Manor.
She did not have to wait long. The two girls were among the first to leave, but instead of following the broad main walk as the other guests did, they turned into a side path as though wishing to stroll about the grounds. The moment they were out of sight the suspicious one was hot-foot upon their trail, and Miss Eleanor Allen was compelled to do some lively stepping out in order to overtake her quarry. Only they were certainly most athletic young women if one might judge from the manner in which they strode forward.
Naturally at that season of the year the outskirts of the grounds were entirely deserted. The elegantly dressed young ladies hurried toward a dense clump of cedars which grew near the prickly holly hedge, and, to Eleanor’s amazement, the wearer of the big chiffon veil began to tug and haul at it until it came loose, while the taller girl began to divest herself of her handsome fur collar and coat. Eleanor gasped, and the next moment nearly passed away, for now Miss “Chiffon-Veil’s” skirts fell from her, and Miss “Tall-Blonde” began to wriggle out of her garments as a boy might wriggle out of his coat and vest.... It was all Eleanor could do to repress a cry of horror. Then off fell the big hat, the hair coming with it, and before her stood a tall, fair boy in his trousers and shirt.
“Gee Whiz! Ath, pitch me my coat quick! Those girl’s togs nearly smothered me and now I’m freezing,” he cried.
The garments desired were picked out of a bundle of things hidden in the cedars, and flung at the shivering blonde, who promptly scrambled into it, and drew from one of the pockets a cap, which he jammed down upon his curly pate. Then swooping down he caught up the feminine gear lying upon the ground, jammed it pell mell into a laundry bag, and heaved it over the hedge into the road beyond, his companion, now having cast his outer raiment, doing precisely the same thing. Then both shinned up a tall tree whose branches overhung the road, walked like rope-walkers along a branch which topped the hedge, and dropped lightly to the ground. Eleanor ran to the hedge in time to see the laundry bags pitched upon the backs of two waiting horses, the boys scramble upon their mounts and with a whoop of triumph go pelting off down the road.
“Well, I never! Well, I never!” gasped Miss Paulina Pry, which was unquestionably the absolute truth, though not characteristic. “That was Beverly Ashby’s brother and her beau!” Eleanor’s selection of common nouns was at times decidedly common. “Now, Miss High-and-Mighty, we will see what happens to girls who are so very superior to other girls but can read their letters and sneak boys into our school against rules,” and back she sped to the house, filled to the brim with knowledge, but with such a paucity of wisdom in her brain that it was a wonder she kept to the path. It was a pity that no one was at hand to quote for her benefit: “Knowledge is haughty that she knows so much, but Wisdom is humble that she knows no more.”
From the moment Eleanor Allen entered Leslie Manor, she had been Petty Gaylord’s slave, and a more complete “crush” never was known. Flowers, candy, books, and what not were lavished upon her adored one. Everything that Petty would accept, and since Petty’s discrimination was not of the nicest order all proved fish which fell into her net. Eleanor lived in the atmosphere of Petty’s thrilling romance until she almost felt it to be her own. She had seen the lost letter flutter to the schoolroom floor, and had also seen Beverly pick it up. Her first impulse was to run and tell Petty, but had no opportunity to do so in the classroom. Then she decided to effect its rescue herself, and while the others were at luncheon had slipped into Beverly’s room and extracted the note from her history. She never dreamed that Beverly meant to return it to Petty and did not know that she had gone to her the following morning to explain its loss as well as she was able. Eleanor intended to give Petty the note at once, but when circumstances had prevented her from doing so for several hours, she made up her mind to keep it in her own possession in order to use it to Beverly’s undoing. Just how this was to be compassed she had no very clear idea, and now had come a fine opening. She hated Beverly because she had laughed at Petty’s love affair, and ignored completely the one who worshipped at Petty’s shrine. The scene in Professor Sautelle’s room had nearly thrown Beverly into hysterics, and Eleanor had also witnessed that. Oh, she had a long score against Beverly Ashby.