CHAPTER XII.
A RECKLESS DRIVER.
"The Sans have certainly had one beautiful day for their picnic, but if they don't put in an appearance pretty soon they will be caught in a rain." Seated beside Marjorie and Lucy Warner in the big porch swing, Jerry squinted at the rapidly clouding sky.
While the day had been warm and moderately sunny, dark clouds had been looming up here and there in the sky since four o'clock. Scattered at first, they had gradually banked solidly in the west, obscuring the sunset and promising rain before nightfall.
"What time is it, Jeremiah?" asked Lucy. "I promised to meet Katherine here on the veranda at five-thirty. She left her handbag at Lillian's last night and we are going to walk over there before dinner."
"Why, Luciferous!" Jerry fixed Lucy with an amazed eye. "Can I believe that you and your precious watch have parted company even for a brief half hour!"
Lucy giggled. Her extreme fondness for the wrist watch Ronny had given her was well known to her chums.
"I broke the crystal," she confessed. "It dropped from my hand the other night on the lavatory floor. I miss it terribly you had better believe. It will be fixed tomorrow, thank goodness."