The Outdoor Girls at the Hostess House Part 28

"Goodness! now isn't that the limit?" cried Betty suddenly, and they looked at her in surprise. She, in her turn, having thought aloud, flushed and turned back to the letter. "I'm sorry," she stammered. "I really didn't mean to interrupt you."

"No you don't, Betty Nelson!" cried Mollie, slipping a hand over Allen's letter and forcing Betty to meet her eyes. "We won't any of us read another word till you tell us what you were going to say."

"Well, you don't need to," Betty was beginning when she met Mollie's eyes and laughed resignedly.

"Oh, all right," she capitulated. "I was simply going to say that the nosy old censor crossed out a whole line just at the most interesting part."

"What was it?" coaxed Amy teasingly. "Come, Betty dear, tell us what he said."

"Goodness!" cried Betty crossly, getting redder every moment, and knowing it, "didn't I tell you the censor crossed it out?"

"You know very well that wasn't what we meant," cried Mollie, with a frightful frown. "Amy was referring to the sentiments on both sides of the censored part."

"Oh well, you could hardly expect," Betty was beginning, when Amy, who had been peeping over her shoulder clapped a hand to her mouth too late to check a sudden exclamation.

"Oh girls!" she cried gleefully. "What I saw! What I saw!"

"Amy Blackford," Betty's eyes were black with real anger now, "I don't know how you could do such a thing. I didn't think it of you!"

Not only Amy, but the other girls were frightened by this sudden change in their usually good-natured Little Captain, and Amy hastened to make amends.

"I'm sorry, Betty dear," she said, flushing with real shame beneath Betty's accusing eyes. "I didn't mean it--truly I didn't. And I'll never do it again, never!"

"Oh, all right," replied Betty, controlling herself with an effort and turning back to the letter. "I'm sorry I said anything, Amy, if you didn't mean it."

There was a little constrained silence after that, no one knowing just how to clear the rather electric atmosphere. They went on reading absorbedly, only the crackling of the paper as they turned a page breaking the deep stillness of the room.

It was Betty who finally relieved the tension.

"If that doesn't sound just like Roy," she said, and they looked up expectantly, relieved at the naturalness of her tone. "Allen says that he--Roy, that is--was very much impressed with his first sight of a camouflaged ship. Said he had devised a fine scheme of killing off the German army in a hurry. He'd disguise himself as a piece of Limburger cheese, and when the Huns came running to him, he'd simply give them a gentle little tap on the head."

"Humph," snorted Mollie contemptuously, "how long do you suppose he'd be able to keep that up?"

"He says they'd never suspect the truth," Betty chuckled. "They'd simply think it was a particularly husky piece of cheese!"

CHAPTER XXIII

THE MIRACLE

It was only a few days later that the wonderful, the incredible thing happened!

The girls were returning from a rather hurried excursion to a near-by town when they came face to face with the motorcyclist. His motor had evidently stalled, and he was standing in the middle of the road tinkering with it.

Paralyzed by the suddenness of the thing, the girls just stood still and stared until the man, evidently feeling their eyes upon him, turned slowly about and faced them.

He seemed to recognize them immediately, for his first look of bewilderment was followed quickly by one of fear, and with an abrupt motion he turned back to his machine.

"Now we have him, what are we going to do with him?" whispered Mollie, a comical look of chagrin on her face. "We can't capture him all by ourselves, and we can hardly expect him to wait while we get some one."

"He is huskier than I thought," admitted Grace, adding suddenly, "Betty, what are you going to do?"

But Betty either did not hear or did not want to, for she was approaching the man without a backward glance in their direction. Though not knowing just what was about to happen, the girls followed loyally, close at her heels.

As for Betty, she simply stepped up close to the man and stood looking at him steadily, finally forcing him by sheer concentration to straighten up and meet her eyes.

"Well, who are you?" he demanded at last, gruffly.

"That was just the question I was about to put to you," Betty replied, and by her outward composure no one could possibly have guessed how hard her heart was beating. "We are really quite desirous of knowing all about you."

"May I ask," he said, his cruel mouth sneering under the absurd moustache, "what has happened to arouse this sudden interest?"

The sneer brought a flush to Betty's face and made her eyes glow angrily.

"You ought to know that without my telling you," she said coldly. "Perhaps you will remember, if I recall it to you, the day you knocked an old woman down in the middle of the road and then rode away without finding out how seriously you had injured her."

"I really don't know what you're talking about," the man replied, with an attempt to appear frank, which made his face more sinister than before.

"You must have mistaken me for some one else."

"That's impossible." Mollie's voice was crisp and clear cut, and the man glanced with surprise and a shadow of alarm at this new a.s.sailant.

Then suddenly his manner of cool insolence changed, and he shot them a look that remained quiveringly in their memories long after the man himself had pa.s.sed forever out of their lives.

"Whoever you are, you're fools," he said gruffly, menacingly. "And if you don't forget all about this thing you've been spouting about, I'll make it pretty darned unpleasant for you. Get me?" And, with a quick movement, he started his motor and leaped on his machine.

Betty sprang forward and desperately clutched the handle bars, calling on the girls for a.s.sistance, but he roughly pushed her aside. At the same moment the machine leapt forward and Betty knew that he would get away again.

Then it was the first miracle happened. Sergeant Mullins, out on a hike with some of the rookies from the camp, the sound of his approach deadened by the putting of the machine, appeared around the turn in the road, coming toward them. To keep from running into the men, which would have meant a nasty spill, the motorcyclist was forced to put on his brake.

The men would have gathered to one side of the road to let him pa.s.s, but Betty's shrill cry arrested them.

"Don't let him pa.s.s," she implored them desperately. "It's our criminal, Sergeant Mullins! Don't you see? The gambler!"

But Sergeant Mullins, in one swift glance, had already taken in the situation, and as the man tried to start his machine he sprang forward and grasped the handle bars, at the same time shouting orders to his men.

"Surround him, fellows!" he cried. "This man is under arrest!"

"What do you mean?" cried the gambler, his eyes glaring with the rage of a cornered animal.

"Don't waste your breath, Denham," retorted Sergeant Mullins coolly, "your reputation isn't any too good around these parts, you know, and you'll have plenty of chance to do your shouting to the judge.

"Never mind your machine," he added sharply, as the fellow's mean eyes glanced about desperately for means of escape. "The boys will take care of that. And," he added meaningly, "I have rather a life-sized impression that you won't be needing it again for some time to come!"

Denham shot him a vicious glance, and got off sullenly from his machine while a group of soldiers stepped up smartly to take charge of it.

With his prisoner safely guarded, Sergeant Mullins ordered the march back to camp, then drew in a long breath and looked at the girls.