It Was Impossible To Climb the Wall
Finally Bettina concluded that she must expect to remain inside the secret garden for the night. There was nothing to do save to accept the situation philosophically. She would be cold and hungry and lonely, but many persons had lived through far greater misfortunes. The worst of her present situation was the anxiety her failure to return home would occasion her friends.
During the long hours before morning she must amuse herself by peopling the little garden with the picturesque ghosts of its past.
A little after eight o’clock, having by this time decided that she could not hope for rescue until the next day, Bettina searched until she found the best possible shelter for the night on a little bench within a clump of evergreens.
CHAPTER VII
Next Morning
It must have been between nine and ten o’clock the next day when Bettina heard voices in the garden.
She was not fully awake; having slept but little during the night and only dozing fitfully since daybreak.
Except for the cold she had not suffered especial discomfort. During the early hours of the evening, accepting the inevitable result of her own action, Bettina had refused to allow herself to become frightened or miserable, as many girls would have done under the same circumstances. This was partly due to her own temperament, but perhaps more to her father’s influence and training. A poor boy, who had made his own way to a distinguished position, Senator Graham had long discussed with Bettina, with whom he was peculiarly intimate, the futility of wasting one’s energy against a set of unimportant circumstances which cannot be overcome.
So when darkness fell and the stars came out and Bettina found herself becoming lonely and unhappy, deliberately she had set about to overcome her mood. This could best be accomplished by thinking not of herself and the uneasiness she was causing Mrs. Burton and her Camp Fire friends, but by entertaining herself with an imaginary story. Having read so many stories recently the effort was not difficult.