“I ought not to care so much, perhaps,” said Jannet, almost ready to cry, “but I loved to think that Mother has worn them. I’d think it a dream, but Nell, I put them on my neck and loved to have them there,—don’t tell me that I’m quite crazy!” Jannet, smiling, was herself now.
“Of course you are not crazy. I believe that the pearls were there, and where could they have gone? They did not walk off by themselves certainly, and there isn’t another thing in the drawer. Could there be a crack in the bottom?” Nell tapped the delicate wood with her finger.
“Not big enough to lose a big case full of pearls, Nell. Well, it can’t be helped. I’ll examine the desk to-morrow and see if they could have been put in another drawer,—or something.” As she spoke, Jannet began to open the little drawers which she knew, while Nell exclaimed over the tiny springs and the skill with which the drawers had been hidden.
But Jannet did not want to make Nell have an unhappy time over her lost pearls. In a few moments she was her philosophical self again. “It can’t be helped, Nell, and as I never did have them before, I can get along without them now. Let’s get to bed. I’m glad that you think the room is pretty and the things nice. I’m wealthy enough in my mother’s things without the pearls. It seems now as if I have been waiting all my life to come to this room!”
It was as they settled down in bed, after putting the windows at the proper height and turning off the light, that Nell happened to think of something. “Jannet, you’ll find your pearls! Didn’t your fortune say that you would lose something and find it again?”
“‘You will find what you look for,’” replied Jannet, in such a good imitation of the old fortune-teller’s cracked tones that Nell laughed and Jannet apologized, saying that she ought not to have made fun of Grandma Meer.
“Poor old soul,” said Nell, drowsily. For a wonder the girls did not lie awake to talk. It had been a full day and soon they were asleep; for Nell was an easy-going girl, not nervous about fancied ghosts in a room as bright and pleasant as this, while Jannet, accustomed to share her room and often her bed with Lina Marcy or some other school-girl, felt it quite natural to have company.
What time it was when Jannet was suddenly wide awake, she did not know. A confused dream, the result, she well knew, of taffy and other good things to eat, was floating away from her. Nell was not stirring the least bit and she could not even hear her breathe. That was odd. Cautiously she turned, sighed, and reached over to touch her friend lightly, when suddenly Nell clutched Jannet’s hand and reached Jannet’s lips with her other hand to insure silence.
Jannet squeezed Nell’s hand to indicate understanding, but she was a little frightened. What was it? The same old ghost, a burglar, or was Nell only startled at some little sound? Jannet had bolted her door, but it would be possible for some one to climb up on the trellis and climb into the window which opened upon the little balcony, she remembered. That one she had not raised very high and the screen was in.
It was pitch dark. There were no glimmerings of lights outside as in a city. The night was cloudy, without star or moon visible. Quite a breeze was stirring. Perhaps there would be another storm, though there were no flashes of electricity.