Beverly was tall for a girl not yet sixteen, and as the result of having grown up with two active healthy boys, and having done every earthly thing which they had done, she was a living, vital bunch of energy and well-developed muscles, and fully as strong as Athol.
Never since tiny childhood when Mammy Riah had smacked her for some misdeed, or her mother had spanked her for some real transgression, had hand been laid upon her excepting in a caress. That any human being could so lose her self-control as to resort to such methods of correction she would not have believed possible.
Then in a flash all the fighting blood of the Ashbys and Seldons boiled, and with a cry of outraged feelings Beverly Ashby laid hold of Miss Woodhull’s flabby arms with a pair of slender muscular hands, backed her by main force against the chair which she had so hastily vacated, and plumped that dumbfounded lady down upon it with a force which made her teeth crack together, as she cried indignantly:
“How dare you touch me! How dare you!”
Then with a whirl she was across the room, out of the door and up the stairs to Study 10, which she entered like a cyclone and rushed across into her bedroom, slamming and locking the door.
What mental processes took place behind that locked door her astonished room-mates, who had been eagerly awaiting her return, could not even guess, and dared not venture to inquire. Not a sound came from the room.
“What do you suppose has happened?” asked Sally breathlessly.
“Something a good deal more serious than we have any idea of. Beverly Ashby is not the kind of girl to look or act like that without a mighty good cause. Did you notice her face? It frightened me,” was Aileen’s awed reply.
“What can we do?” asked Sally in deep distress.
“Not one single, solitary thing, and that’s the very worst of it. We don’t even know what has happened,” and the two girls began to prepare for bed in a bewildered sort of way.