“Not because that feather-top Percy is with you, but because Ben is here, I suppose I might as well consent,” said Miss Campbell.
“Old Ben is just as much of a feather-top as I am, Miss Campbell,” protested Percy. “He deceives people because he looks like an Indian. I’ve got a serious mind underneath all this curl and color.”
“I don’t believe it,” answered Miss Campbell. “But I wouldn’t have you changed, my boy. I like you as you are.”
After this two-sided compliment, they took it for granted that consent had been given and Billie rushed off to see Mrs. Lupo about the lunch.
They had come to learn during that first week in camp that Mrs. Lupo was a law unto herself. For one thing, the blackberries that Billie had purchased of the mountain girl had never come to the table, although the girls kept looking for them to appear in the form of a cobbler or a roly-poly pudding. What had become of them they never learned, but Billie had an uncomfortable suspicion that they had been tossed into the garbage pail.
“We can’t do anything about it, my dear,” Miss Campbell had informed Billie. “The woman certainly holds us in the hollow of her hand unless we want to do our own cooking.”
Billie smiled. Miss Campbell was never known to boil a kettleful of water, let alone cook a meal. If there was any culinary work to be done the Motor Maids would do it, and Miss Campbell might possibly arrange the salt cellars or offer to go over the silver with a polishing cloth.
Mrs. Lupo dumbly acquiesced to the lunch.
“We will be glad to make the sandwiches, Mrs. Lupo,” said Billie timidly. “Please let us have some cold meat. I suppose there is plenty of bread? Will you hard-boil a dozen eggs?”
Mrs. Lupo rarely replied to any question addressed to her, but she went about getting the things for the lunch and Billie breathed a sigh of silent thanks.