The older girl turned and smiled at her questioner. “Because Betsy, if I must confess it, I am heaps more eager to find someone who can contribute a good story for our first edition of The Manuscript Magazine then I am to solve the supposed mystery of your haunted house. I’ve looked at every girl in the dining room hoping to recall some composition that I have heard read in the assembly that might suggest a story-writing talent, but I don’t believe I can and since the really good story writers have gone over to the enemy’s side, I may have to confess that as an editor, I am a failure.”
“Cheer up, belovedest! You may find a genius in a most unexpected place.” Betsy was eager to steer the conversation back to channels of greater interest. “What I would like to know,” she continued, “is how, and when can we again visit the old Burgess place?”
“Hush!” Margaret whispered. “Mrs. Martin is coming in.” Instantly the chairs were pushed back, the forty-four girls rose, courtesied and then listened expectantly, for, as this was a whole holiday, they believed, and rightly, that the kindly principal had a treat in store for them.
“Young ladies,” she said, “I have planned a sleigh ride party for you. Pat O’Brien and his son Micky will each drive a team and by a little crowding you can all go in the two sleighs. Every January we send a barrel of apples to the poorhouse and I thought perhaps, you would all enjoy the ride.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Martin,” was the enthusiastic response. Then, when they were again seated, Betsy said, “Oh, girls, how I hope I’ll have a chance to slip off at the Burgess place. I’d like to prowl around there until the sleighs return.”
“I’m with you,” Babs told her pal.
CHAPTER V
THE MYSTERIOUS OLD HOUSE
Micky O’ Brien drove the school bus that was now on runners and twenty-five of the warmly wrapped, hilariously joyful girls were crowded in.
A barrel of apples was strapped to each side of the bus where baggage was often placed. The big, rough farm wagon, which had been converted into a sleigh, with straw deep on the bottom of it, was filled with the primary pupils. Betsy had so arranged things that she and her particular friends were the last to enter the bus and so they were nearest the door. Too, she had asked Micky to drive very slowly when he reached the woods on the County Farm road.
Luckily Mr. O’Brien was in the lead with his load and so he did not notice when Betsy and Babs slipped out at the edge of the woods.