The Outdoor Girls at the Hostess House Part 15

"Mollie," cried Amy, shocked, while the others laughed merrily, "what did Frank say? Did he stand for that?"

"Most decidedly not," chuckled Mollie. "The last I saw of them, Frank was leaping a fence, hanging on to Roy's coat tails. It was awfully funny. I think I laughed for an hour afterward,"

"It was a wonder there was enough of poor Roy left to come home," giggled Betty. "Frank isn't what you might call gentle, when his temper is roused."

"Oh, I believe I know when that was now!" exclaimed Grace, with sudden animation. "It must have been that evening when I was baking biscuits and I looked out of the window and saw Roy. He looked like a tramp, hair all disheveled and face as red as a beat.

"I called to him and asked him if he'd been in a fight or something, and he just got redder than ever and backed off into the woods.

"I concluded he'd gone suddenly and violently insane, and as the aroma of nearly burned biscuits filled the air I promptly forgot all about him."

Mollie chuckled.

"There was probably a very good reason for his _backing_ off," she said.

"I shouldn't wonder if after that he kept his meditations to himself."

"Yes," said Grace, with gentle malice, "I've long since concluded that it's better to keep still about personal matters, no matter what you think."

"Well, perhaps you have," said gentle Amy with sudden spirit: "But I must say I never noticed it."

Grace struck a dramatic att.i.tude.

"And you too, Amy?" she cried. "Ah, this is too much--"

"Yes, it's all right, dear," soothed Betty, hastily rescuing a basket.

"But please don't step on the lunch. These baskets cost four dollars and ninety-eight cents at a bargain sale."

"Oh, how sordid of you, Betty," chuckled Mollie. "As if Grace cared for a mere little five-dollar bill."

"Goodness, I don't know whether I do or not," remarked Grace plaintively.

"It's so long since I've seen one I can't tell."

"As Allen remarks," laughed Betty, as she gathered up the remains of the lunch, "'money must think you're dead.'"

They laughed at her, and then suddenly Betty changed the subject.

"You know, I overheard something the other day," she said, "that's just made me terribly blue whenever I've let myself think of it."

"Oh, Betty," gasped Mollie, jumping unerringly to the catastrophe they had been dreading all these months, "do you mean the boys have got their orders?"

"Oh, no, I don't actually know a thing," Betty hastened to a.s.sure her, but there was a brilliant light of excitement in her eyes that did not rea.s.sure the girls.

"Then what do you mean?" cried Mollie impatiently. "Oh, Betty dear, I just haven't realized how awful it will be until this minute. When, those boys have actually gone, I'll lie down and die, that's all."

"Well, for goodness sake, don't tell them that," beseeched Grace. "Then they will think they can dictate."

"Well, let 'em," said Mollie recklessly. "They can, for all I care."

"Go on, Betty, do," urged Amy, her hands clasping and unclasping nervously. "Tell us what it was you heard."

"Well, Major Adams was talking with the colonel," Betty complied, her color bright, "and I just happened to catch a couple of phrases as I pa.s.sed.

"'In a week!' the major was saying eagerly. 'The boys will be glad of that, Colonel. I've had all I could do to keep them pacified at all. Once let them get at the Huns and it will be all over but the shouting.'

"'Yes, they're a fine bunch of young fighters,' the colonel answered. And, oh girls, I wish you could have seen the way he looked, so splendidly straight and martial and proud. 'I tell you, Major,' he said, 'it's a great thing to have the leadership of such lads as those. They're the pick of the nation.'

"And then I went on and my heart was beating so hard I had to hold on to it," Betty finished. "It seemed to me I could almost hear the cannon and see the boys--our boys--"

Her voice trailed off into silence, and for a long time no one spoke. Each one of these young girls, who, a few short months before, had scarcely known the meaning of the word war except as they had read about it in their histories, was striving desperately to visualize the battle front--the trenches, great guns belching forth a deadly hail of sh.e.l.ls, the roar of cannon, the moans of dying men--

And there, perhaps, in the mire and horror of it all--the boys--their boys--

CHAPTER XIII

THE COPPERHEAD

Betty was the first to break the silence.

"But, of course," she said, and they started at the sound of her voice--so far away had their thoughts been wandering, "it may only be one more of those rumors the boys are always talking about."

"I suppose so," said Grace, with a sigh. "Anyway, it won't do any good to worry about it till the time comes."

"Well, I don't know," said Mollie a little irritably. "It's like having a sword hanging over your head all the time. I'd just as soon have it cut me in two now and get it over with."

"Yes, it is something like cutting the poor dog's tail off an inch at a time," sighed Amy, and at the comparison and her sober countenance they had to laugh despite the very real trouble at their hearts.

"I wish," said Betty wistfully after a while, "the boys could have gotten leave to-day. I should like to have just one more picnic with them. We've had such good times together. And we're going to have lots more," she added, springing to her feet with a sudden, swift smile. "That's our part of the business from now on. Just to keep smiling and make up our minds that they're coming back to us just as they went--only better."

"They couldn't be," declared Amy, and once more the other Outdoor Girls laughed and hugged her.

"Anyway, they've got one good backer in you, Amy dear," said Betty fondly.

"You've no idea how fond all the boys are of you. I declare, sometimes I'm almost jealous."

"You," cried Amy incredulously, looking at the flushed face and shining eyes. "You'll never need to be jealous of anybody in your life Betty Nelson--and especially of me," she added modestly.

Betty laughed and hugged her again.

"Girls, it's getting late," she said suddenly, with another of her swift changes of subject. "I guess perhaps it's time we were starting back. Oh, I forgot," she added, in consternation, "I, or rather, Amy and I, promised Mrs. Sanderson we'd gather some flowers for her, and now we've got to do it, even if it is late--"

"Of course we have," agreed Mollie, rising with alacrity. "It wouldn't do at all to disappoint her."

"It must have been a pretty lonely day for her," said Amy thoughtfully, as she snapped the lid of a basket shut. "I wish she had come with us."

"Well, we're pretty much in the same boat as she is--or will be soon,"

mused Mollie, as the girls scattered to make good Betty's promise.