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The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island, a novel by Laura Lee Hope |
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Chapter 7. Closed For Repairs |
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_ CHAPTER VII. CLOSED FOR REPAIRS "Grace, Grace, do wake up!" Betty looked at her sleeping chum in absolute amazement. How could anybody sleep so soundly on this, the day of days, when one should have been awake at six o'clock thinking over the delights in store! Grace had come over the night before to talk over some minor details of the outing, bringing with her a new and, she declared, a specially delicious brand of chocolates. It had been so late when she had started to leave that she had been prevailed upon to spend the night with Betty. And so it was that on that eventful morning she lay slumbering peacefully in the Little Captain's bed, defying all that impatient young person's efforts to rouse her. "Grace! Grace!" Betty cried again. "Won't you please wake up? Why, it's seven o'clock this minute! We have to be out of the house in an hour." Grace groaned dismally. "Oh, Betty, I will have to have some more sleep," she wailed, pitifully. "If I don't I won't be fit for a thing the rest of the day. Don't you suppose we could make it if we started by nine?" she added hopefully. Betty paused in the act of putting on a shoe and held it poised in the air while she gazed at her friend incredulously. "Grace Ford, of all the----" she almost stuttered. Then, as a thought flashed before her mind she laughed delightedly. "Can't you see them, Grace," she chuckled, putting on one shoe and picking up the other. "Can't you see the boys when I tell them they will have to walk around the block while Grace gets her beauty sleep. Oh! oh!" and even Grace had to laugh at the picture. "They probably wouldn't wait anyway," Betty continued, with the tact of a diplomat. "They would go on to The Shadows and let you follow later at your leisure. It will be a nice, dusty, hot ride in the train, too," she added, examining the lace on her handkerchief with the air of a connoisseur. Grace sat up on the edge of the bed and regarded her chum reproachfully. "Nobody has any heart at all, and you least of all, Betty Nelson," she complained. "Oh, where did I put my slippers? I was so excited last night I don't remember what I did with them," and she began a listless search under the bed. "They are over by that chair," said Betty patiently. Then went on: "Oh, Grace, dear, please wake up. You will give me the blues if you don't shake off that dead and alive air. Imagine Betty Nelson with the blues to-day." "It _is_ rather impossible," remarked Grace, regarding Betty's flushed cheeks and dancing eyes with admiration. "I wish I didn't need any more sleep than you, Betty. Oh, well, the worst part of getting up is over now and I'll feel fine when I get some breakfast. You just watch me." "That's something like," Betty said approvingly. "Oh, Grace, we are going to have one of the most glorious times we ever had in our lives to-day." "Shouldn't wonder," Grace agreed. "What does that clock say, half-past seven? Oh, Betty, now I _will_ have to hurry!" "If you glare at the clock like that it is apt to develop palpitation of the heart and stop altogether," laughed Betty. "It can't help the time, you know." "Well, that is the very first time I have ever been accused of stopping a clock," said Grace with dignity. Then added plaintively: "And by my best friend, too! Oh, well, I suppose you can get used to anything if you try hard enough." "Oh, Grace, you're a dear when you look resigned like that," said Betty, dancing over to her friend and hugging her ecstatically. "If you weren't so pretty, I wouldn't dare talk about stopping clocks," she added, and peace was restored, and soon both hurried down to breakfast. "Oh, there they are now," cried Betty, hastily swallowing the last of her cocoa. "I knew they would be here before we were half ready. Oh, Gracy, dear, hurry, will you!" "I am all ready," Grace answered. "Suppose you go out and speak to them while I get the luggage. I'll bring down your hat and coat, too, if you want me to." "You _are_ a dear," said Betty, for the second time this morning. "Goodness, they are making enough noise with their old horns. Anybody would think there were ten automobiles instead of two," and while she ran out to greet the newcomers, Grace hurried--yes, actually _hurried_--up the stairs to get the small bags they were to take with them for immediate use, in case the trunks, which had been sent on before, did not arrive in time. Betty found the others all radiant. Roy was at the wheel in Mollie's car--she had invited him to act as chauffeur and he had gleefully accepted--with Mollie herself beside him and Will and Amy in the tonneau. The others--Mrs. Irving, their young and jolly chaperon, and the four girls and boys--were to make the journey in Frank's big car, with Frank, of course, at the wheel. "Hello, Betty!" Will shouted. "You are looking as sweet and fresh as a daisy! Jump in! Where's that runaway sister of mine? I hope you succeeded in getting her up in time." "I did--after considerable persuasion," laughed Betty. "I came out to tell you we just have to get our outside things on and we shall be ready. I can see Grace beckoning now--just a minute," and she ran toward the house. "Can't we carry the luggage--and the chocolates?" said Frank and Allen together. "If you insist," Betty flung the answer over her shoulder as she joined Grace. The boys had tumbled out of the automobile and were racing up the drive as if their lives depended on their reaching the porch at the same second. The girls adjusted their pretty panamas before the wide mirror while the boys picked up the bags and waited. "Is my hat on right, Allen, or should it be tilted a little more over the left eye?" mimicked Frank, as they watched the girls. "Or, perhaps it should be made to cover my face entirely?" "I think the latter--with places for the eyes and nose," said Allen in the same tone of voice. "Anybody who invented such a hat would be a benefactor to the world at large, Frank," said Betty, as she swept past him--her nose in the air. "Oof! That was an awful one," returned Frank, while Grace chuckled at his discomfiture. "A few more of those, Betty, and I am afraid I shall have to stay at home!" "That sounds just like Percy," Betty remarked, as the boys deposited the luggage in the car and opened the door for the girls. "For goodness' sake, don't take him for a model, Frank." "I wonder where the dear old chappie is, anyway," remarked Allen as he took his seat between Betty and Mrs. Irving in the tonneau. Grace was to sit with Frank. "I haven't seen him about town lately. I wonder if mother has taken her darling boy to the seashore," he added, as the car moved off. "I hope so. If she would only take him to Kalamazoo it would suit me better," said Betty. "It's a wonder he didn't invite himself to come along." "Nothing doing!" laughed Frank. "I can just imagine darling Percy sleeping in a tent and cooking his own meals. Can't you, Allen? Oh, what a circus!" "It is rather hard to imagine the immaculate Percy in those surroundings," drawled Grace. "He would be running down to the river to wash his hands every two minutes. How do we get over to the island from the mainland, Betty, do you remember?" she added. "I know Mollie said something about a steamer, but I didn't get a very good idea of it." "Oh, we will have lots of fun on it," Betty answered, enjoying the prospect immensely. "Mollie says it is an old, rickety thing that looks as if it were going to pieces any minute. She thinks it must be at least two hundred years old, if what her aunt says is true. It will be awfully interesting." "Yes, especially if it fulfills its promise and goes to pieces in the middle of the lake," Grace remarked dryly. "I wouldn't mind the dip in weather like this, but I would rather choose the time and place." "Well, perhaps it _would_ be better if we put on our bathing suits first," Betty admitted. "Then we would at least be prepared for the worst." "I wouldn't call that the worst thing that could happen to us," said Allen; and when the girls looked to him for an explanation he added: "It would be no end of fun to be dumped in the river with a boatful of pretty girls. Think of the good time we could have rescuing you." "Well, maybe you call that fun, but I should say it was pretty hard work," said Frank, ungallantly. "Especially if the girls should lose their heads and begin to choke you. All hail, for Davy Jones' locker!" "You needn't worry," said Betty, with dignity. "In the first place we wouldn't have to be rescued. We can swim just as well as you boys can----" "Now, now, Betty," Frank protested laughingly, "don't exaggerate." "I'm not," she denied indignantly. "We haven't lived in the outdoors for nothing, you know." "Well, we shall have a chance to settle all disputes when we get to Pine Island," said Allen. "To change the subject--has anybody noticed that the sun has gone under a cloud and that there is a stiff little breeze coming up? I shouldn't wonder if we were in for a storm." "Yes, we may need our bathing suits even before we get to the island," said Betty, ruefully. "I hope you didn't forget to bring your suit, Mrs. Irving," she added, turning to the chaperon, who had been singularly silent during the ride. Perhaps she was realizing for the first time the great responsibility she had taken upon herself. However, she spoke now, accompanying her words with a bright smile. "Indeed I did," she said. "There is nothing I enjoy quite so much as a good swim. From what you girls say of the island we ought to have as many as we want." "I am very much afraid we won't leave to wait till we get there," said Frank, regarding the sky anxiously. "Unless I am a pretty poor prophet we are in for a considerable spell of bad weather. What do you say, Allen?" "I say you are right and then some," Allen answered emphatically. "I think it would be a pretty good stunt to get the top up, Frank, before the girls are deluged." Accordingly Frank slowed down and waited for Mollie's trim little machine to catch up with them. "What do you make of the weather?" asked Will, as they came up alongside. "Looks pretty threatening, don't you think?" "If you don't want to get wet, you had better do what we are going to," Frank advised them. "Put your top up." "Oh, hurry, Frank, I felt a drop then!" exclaimed Grace. "And there's another! Oh, do hurry!" The boys worked quickly and in a few moments had raised the tops and were ready to let down the waterproof sides that would make them comfortable in almost any weather. "We are going to speed up some," Frank shouted to those in the other car. "When the roads get muddy it's going to be pretty hard going, so we want to make good time now." "Aye, aye, Captain!" Roy answered. "Lead, and we follow." For a short distance all went well. In fact, the girls rather liked riding in the rain. Then suddenly, without any warning, Frank stopped the car. "What is it, Frank?" cried Grace in alarm. "Did you run over somebody?" "No, it's worse than that," he answered gloomily. "Look, the road's closed for repairs!" _ |
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