“Batty,” finished Amy Brooks. “It’s slang, but I know of no English word into which the explicit ‘batty’ may be translated.”
“And Tavia of all girls,” added Ned, ponderingly.
“But it seems to agree with her,” declared Cologne. “Haven’t you noticed her petal complexion?”
“Too much like the drug store variety,” objected Nita. “I like something more substantial.”
“Sour grapes,” fired back Ned, who could always be depended on to take Tavia’s part. “Yours is so perfect—”
“Oh, I know—freckles,” admitted the confused Nita with a pout. “Fair skins always freckle.”
“Then why don’t you close the ‘fair’ and raffle off,” suggested Dick. “Much easier than sleeping in lemon juice every night.”
“Molly Richards, you’re too smart!” snapped the abused one.
“Not altogether so,” replied Dick. “At least this abominable French can’t prove it. I have always believed that the only way to acquire a good French accent would be to get acute tonsilitis. Then one might choke out the gutterals beautifully.”
The girls of Glenwood school were supposed to be busy preparing for examinations. They had congregated in little knots, out of doors, scattering under the leafing oaks, and the temptation to gossip was evidently more than mere girls could withstand amid such surroundings.