“Oh, we are a mess,” said Laura, balancing nicely between the curb and the gutter. “We’ve got on our oldest dresses because everything we own is packed except the things we’re going to wear to-morrow.”
“To-morrow!” That was the magic word that unlocked the gates and let through a flood of conversation consisting of excited questions and answers and joyful exclamations that lasted until they reached Billie’s house.
Billie asked Laura and Vi in, but they reluctantly refused, saying that their mothers had expressly ordered them to be home that day in time for dinner.
“We can’t come over to-night,” Vi called back to them, as she and Laura started on arm in arm. “Mother says I have to get to bed early.”
“But we’ll see you the first thing in the morning,” added Laura. “The very first thing, remember that!”
“I’ll say so,” Billie sang back gayly, and then led her guest up the porch steps and into the house, where her mother was waiting to receive them. Mrs. Bradley and Connie fell in love with each other at first sight—which was the last thing needed to make Billie absolutely happy.
They went to bed early that night, the two girls snuggled in Billie’s pretty bird’s-eye maple bed in Billie’s pretty bird’s-eye maple room.
They went to bed, but neither of the girls had either the desire or the intention of going to sleep. They felt as if they never wanted to go to sleep again.
And so they talked. They talked of the next day and the vacation before them until they could not think of another thing to say about it.
Then they talked of the things that had happened at Three Towers Hall—of the “Dill Pickles” and of Amanda Peabody and Eliza Dilks. And last, but not least, they talked in hushed tones of the mysterious little hut in the woods and the strange man who lived there and wove fern baskets and other things for a living.