THE EXPERIMENT
Billie Bradley awoke next morning with the same curious weight upon her
spirit. Her mental depression was augmented by bodily discomfort that
had grown no less overnight.
Every muscle in her body was strained and there were big, black bruises
on her arms and legs, some of them as big as the palm of her hand.
“You _will_ go picking goldenrod!” gibed Laura with sympathetic
interest, watching Billie’s painful effort to dress herself. “Next time
you feel in the humor to visit Goldenrod Point----”
“I’ll run the other way,” said Billie, with a grimace. “Bother! I
wanted to get out on the courts for practice to-day.”
“From the look of those arms and legs, it will be many a day before you
can swing a wicked racket, Billie,” observed Vi. “Here, I’ll help you
with that stocking. Give me a chance to show what an excellent lady’s
maid I’d make.”
Between them, they managed to get Billie dressed in time for breakfast.
It was not until the bell rang and there was a general exodus into the
corridors from the dormitory that Laura broached the subject that was
uppermost in the minds of them all.
“How about this lion cub from Arizona----”
“Oklahoma,” Billie corrected, a trifle frigidly.
“Well, Oklahoma, then. You aren’t really going to wish her on the
crowd, are you, Billie? If you insist, the girls will take her up for
your sake, but there will be trouble. I feel it in my bones.”
“I have no intention of wishing her on anyone,” retorted Billie coldly.
“The girl saved my life and I am going to help her to be happy here at
Three Towers Hall, if such a thing is possible. You girls may do as you
like.”
Vi put an arm about Billie’s shoulders.
“Don’t be sore, Billie. If I can’t share your enthusiasm for this wild
girl from the West, I am quite willing to admit that you are probably
right and I’m wrong. Anyway, perhaps it’s worth giving it a whirl.”
With such tepid support, Billie was forced to be content.
On the way to the breakfast hall they passed Amanda Peabody and Eliza
Dilks. The latter called to Billie and reminded her jeeringly not to
forget that she had a date with Debsy at ten o’clock that morning.
Billie flushed and pressed her lips tight together to prevent a sharp
retort.
“Some people never get enough,” she said in a low voice to Laura and Vi
as they entered the dining hall. “So far we have beaten Amanda and her
Shadow at every game they have ever tried to play with us, and still
they come around looking for more trouble.”
Across the length of the hall, Billie’s eyes sought and found Edina
Tooker. A look flashed between the two girls that was observed by more
than one curious pair of eyes in that room.
Billie’s look seemed to say:
“Hold on! Have courage. I am going to fulfill my promise.”
While Edina, still a figure of fun in her outrageous clothes, seemed to
respond:
“I’m depending on you. Don’t fail me. You’re my only hope.”
That was the beginning of a period of acute discomfort for Billie
Bradley.
It began with Miss Debbs’ decision to give Billie two demerits, instead
of one. Billie could never quite understand the reason, except that
Miss Debbs was thorough in everything she undertook, including her
methods of discipline.
Billie knew that the punishment was too severe, totally out of
proportion to her fault. For a time she even considered taking her
grievance to Miss Walters, the white-haired, gracious head of Three
Towers Hall, adored by the girls and universally respected for her fine
sense of justice.
Billie finally decided against this, however, accepting the unjust
punishment with mental reservations and the determination to earn no
more demerits during the remainder of the fall term.
To add to Billie’s discomfort, Edina took to following her about like
a humble and adoring shadow. Unpleasant Edina could be, and often
was--snappish and curt, even downright rude--but never so to Billie.
Her outspoken devotion was embarrassing; yet, in her secret heart,
Billie could not but be gratified by it.
Edina was known among the girls as “Billie’s little lamb,” or “Billie’s
lion cub.”
If Billie was sensitive to the only partially disguised amusement that
followed them wherever they went, Edina was even more so.
She noticed, even before Billie did, that subtle drawing off of the
other girls, even from their adored Billie. Edina spoke of this one
day, in her clumsy, blundering way.
“You’re gettin’ yourself in a heap of trouble, tryin’ to be nice to
me. I seem to make trouble for every one I--like. I’d best go back to
Oklahoma to Paw and Maw and leave you in peace.”
“Nonsense!” said Billie, eying her protégé sharply. “You aren’t getting
cold feet at this late date, are you?”
Edina shook her head.
“No, I’m willin’ to stick. The girls ain’t been so mean since you’ve
been nice to me. I’m gettin’ some book learnin’, too,” the round face
shone suddenly with eagerness. “I don’t do so bad in my classes.”
“You are doing splendidly,” Billie encouraged her. “I was speaking
to Miss Arbuckle about you yesterday, and she said that if all her
students were as eager to learn as you, her task would be much easier.
She was as pleased as punch with you, Edina.”
The girl’s face beamed with a sudden radiant happiness.
“That sort of makes up for all the rest,” she said eagerly.
Edina in this mood was very attractive to Billie. She eyed her with
sympathetic interest for a moment, then said curiously:
“You’ve something on your mind, Edina. Out with it!”
“I was thinkin’ about you,” returned the girl hesitantly, stammering
and flushing as she spoke. “The girls you go around with don’t like me.
Oh, it don’t take a microscope to see that,” with sudden bitterness,
as Billie made a negative gesture. “And because you’re nice to me
they--they are sort of drawing off from you, too.”
Billie was startled. In a vague way she had noticed some such thing
herself. Was her friendship for Edina Tooker imperiling her popularity?
When she did not speak, Edina continued:
“You’ve been the most popular girl up here. It didn’t take a
microscope for me to see that neither--either. There’s no use your
sp’ilin’--spoilin’--all that for me. I’d best go back to Oklahoma, like
I said.”
Billie roused herself. She laughed and her mouth compressed itself into
a rather fierce straight line. This was Billie Bradley’s “fighting
face.”
“I think you are wrong, Edina. I’m pretty sure you’re wrong. But if
there’s a chance in the world that you’re right--then I want to know
it. Don’t you see? I’d simply have to be sure!”
Edina was watching her with a half-fearful eagerness.
“Then you mean----”
“I mean we will go ahead with our plans just as we planned them!” said
Billie. She jumped to her feet with swift decision. “I have already
spoken to Miss Walters about a shopping tour to Fleetsburg.” Fleetsburg
was the next town to Molata, a fairly cosmopolitan place with several
large stores and a theater. “Some of the girls want to go to a matinée
and Miss Arbuckle is to chaperone them. We are to go in the school bus
and may have the whole day to spend as we like. We will buy clothes
and other pretties till we’re weary. You and I, Edina Tooker, are going
to have a very large time!”
Edina caught her breath. The wistful longing in her round, red face was
pitiful to Billie. She caught Billie’s hand and squeezed it hard.
“You’re awful good to me. Seems like I never thought anybody could be
so good.”
“No thanks, please!” cried Billie gaily. “Anyway, my work will bring
its own reward. When we return to Three Towers Hall to-morrow you are
going to be everybody’s ideal of what a perfect, modern schoolgirl
should be!”
Edina’s gratitude, her eager anticipation, warmed Billie’s heart. She
carried her mood of elation to bed with her and woke with it in the
morning.
“To-day is going to be one of the most interesting I have ever lived
through,” she thought. “The look on the girls’ faces when they see my
new edition of Edina will be worth all the trouble. Only,” her face
clouded, “I wish Laura and Vi could share the fun with me.”