“I feel as if I had it hidden about me,” said Nancy, giggling, as she helped in the search.
The others laughed, too, which somewhat relieved the situation. Nothing is more uncomfortable than for money to be lost mysteriously in a company of people.
“We do look as guilty as the forty thieves,” ejaculated Rosomond McLane, a fat, funny girl, who was popular with the whole class.
No one was more active in the search than Belle Rogers. She shook Fannie’s text books violently and scattered the papers about, to Fannie’s intense annoyance. She felt in Fannie’s pockets, examined the lining of her hat, and made herself so officious and numerous that Fannie herself exclaimed with much irritation:
“Please do not, Belle. You know it is not there.”
Only Elinor sat quietly on the window sill watching the search, with just the faintest shadow of scornful incredulity on her handsome face.
“Elinor Butler, do you believe I have been telling a falsehood?” Fannie finally exclaimed in exasperation.
“What a little spitfire you are, Fannie,” answered Elinor. “Just because I don’t choose to grovel on the floor looking for your money. I can help you quite as much by thinking, and I am thinking very hard, I can assure you.”
At last the search was abandoned. The pocketbook containing the money could not be found, and the young girls, swinging their book straps,—bags were too childish for High School girls,—strolled up the street in groups discussing the strange disappearance of Fannie’s twenty dollars.
In the meantime, the Motor Maids, laughing and talking together, tossed their books into the red car and then climbed in themselves. Somehow, Fannie’s loss did not seem very real. Billie had cranked up the machine and was about to back out when Fannie’s voice called from the locker room: