TALKING IT OVER
"You haven't really sold out?" Ruth demanded incredulously.
"Going, going, going, gone!" sang back Nancy. "Manny is a wonder. She
just sells and goes on with her preparations, and girls, when my store
is all cleaned out I wouldn't wonder but we'll have a model class room,
instead of the Whatnot Shop." Nancy was flitting around like some full
grown elf. The three girls, Isabel was with them, were out on the broad
sloping grounds surrounding Ruth's home, and it was perfectly plain that
Nancy was already enjoying her freedom from business.
"I think it's splendid," Isabel joined in. "We took millinery last
August, you know, so we don't want any more hat making. Mother is simply
thrilled, as Vera would say, and you know, Nan, Vera is due back
Tuesday. I guess the stores ran out of post cards and she couldn't live
at Beverly without cards. I've got enough of mine to paper our attic
room."
"And you'd never guess," enthused Nancy, "that salesman who came in with
the fishing tackle for our big sale, you know, is going to send Manny a
gas range! Just think of it, a gas range for us to use, to practice
cooking on."
"For nothing?" Ruth inquired.
"For the advertising. It seems, a demonstrator for a special line of gas
ranges used to go to Raleigh, that's Manny's old school, and, of course,
when the salesman came in to sell and _we_ weren't buying," she was
drawling her words to assume an imposing air, "of course," she
continued, "he became deeply interested in our plans, and at once
offered to send his friend, the lady demonstrator, out to make plans
with Manny."
"And we're to be demonstrated," chimed in Isabel, imitating Nancy's
twang. "I choose pie. I want my picture 'took' curling the edge of a
lemon meringue," and she executed a few very 'curly' steps to
illustrate.
There was no denying it. Nancy was happy on these the first days of her
real vacation. It had been splendid, of course, to have twenty-five
dollars of her very own to offer to advance Miss Manners, to clear up
the rent worry, but the store had not been all fun, she was willing to
admit that.
"And do you know, girls," Nancy confided, "we, mother and I, had some
doubts about the way Miss Townsend would take the news? Do sit down,
Belle," she broke off. "How can I tell a story while you're doing
hand-springs?"
"These are flip-flaps," insisted Isabel. "Just watch this one."
She was leaning with both hands on a long low bench, and the "flip"
consisted of a violent spring of both feet from the ground. After
bringing the feet down again with the unavoidable jerk, she performed
the "flop" by pivoting around until she sat on the bench and stuck both
her feet out straight in front of her.
"It's very pretty," commented Nancy. "But if you want to hear my story
you have got to flop. I insist upon a sitting audience."
This demand restored comparative quiet and Nancy continued with her
narrative.
"I was telling you about Miss Townsend," she went on. "You just should
see that lady. She's all 'set up.' We understood she was a nervous
wreck--"
"She was," interrupted Ruth, "but I heard mother say her brother's
business affairs are being mysteriously adjusted. Maybe that's why she
has become rejuvenated."
"Yes, that's exactly it," snapped Nancy. "And how the great, grand trick
worked is one of the stories we have missed. I never saw such a place as
Long Leigh for floating stories that no one can explain. Miss Townsend
talked all around her good luck, but never touched it. Of course, I
couldn't be so rude--"
"Of course _you_ couldn't," mocked Isabel.
"Just the same," retorted Nancy, "I did ask right out straight, without
hint or apology, where--Mr. Sanders lived."
"And you got snubbed for your pains," flung in Ruth.
"Nothing of the kind, I became informed for my pains," asserted Nancy.
"Land sakes tell us!" pleaded Isabel. "First thing you know I'll hear
our car, and miss the--mystery."
"Well," began Nancy, deliberately and provokingly, "I asked her: 'Where
does Mr. Sanders live?' And just as I was gulping hard to control my
emoting emotions, Miss Townsend shook her necklace like a dinner bell,
and said softly--"
Nancy paused. The girls were threatening to throw her over the bench
into the flower bed but she seemed about ready to divulge the secret, so
presently they desisted.
"Well," she said, "Miss Townsend answered, 'Mr. Sanders lives right here
in this hotel. He moved in yesterday and the poor man needed the change
after all he's been through.' Now girls," pouted Nancy, "did you ever
see anything as mean as that? Just when I'm free to dig up the wild and
woolly mystery, our hero goes and rents a room in the Waterfall House,"
and she affected a pose intended to excite pity, but in reality causing
mirth.
"I see it all!" cried Isabel, jumping up on the bench and laying a
sprawled hand over the heart location. "All, girls, all." Her voice was
droning like a school boy reciting the Charge of the Light Brigade.
"What happened was this!"
"This!" interrupted Ruth, pinching Isabel's ankles until she literally
fell from her perch.
"Whow!" yelled Isabel. "Can't one elocute without being plucked by cruel
hands? I tell you, girls, we have lost a lot of fun in not keeping up
with our little brothers." This was said in a very different and quite
serious tone. "If you were to ask Ted, Nancy, very confidentially, what
is or was the secret of the hidden treasure place, I'm almost sure he
would tell you. He _knows_!" she declared loudly, "and so does my
brother Gerard know, but _he_ won't tell me."
"Then it is or was a question of hiding a treasure," reflected Nancy.
"I'm so sorry it is only that. I perfectly hate treasure mysteries,
they're so horribly common. I had in mind some sort of great, grand,
spooky, now-you-see-me and now-you-don't trick. That would have been
heaps more fun than just the old hidden treasure business. Well, at any
rate, _we_ seem to have missed it, for Mr. Sanders is really living at
the hotel," she wound up finally.
"Is that any reason why we shouldn't find out the secret?" demanded
Ruth. "It seems to me we would be better able to do so, now that every
one else has suddenly grown rich, and there's no more danger of getting
folks into trouble by prying into their business. I just wish Sibyl
Sanders would come up again. I fancy she would be just tickled to tell
us the whole thing," declared Ruth.
"I must trot along," Nancy suddenly announced. "And girls, please don't
forget about the first lesson in domestic science, to be held at the
residence of--"
A loud and insistent honking of a motor horn interrupted Nancy's
flattering announcement, and presently all three girls were scampering
down to the roadside to pile into Gerard's Duryea car, for Isabel's
brother was taking them for a ride into town, ostensibly to do some
important family errands, but really to have one of those unplanned
jolly times that go to make up the happy summer time.
"I must be back by five," warned Nancy. But her companions only pushed
her back further in the over crowded car-seat as they sailed along.