the two girls sat rigid with terror, mary louise holding tightly to silky. in the darkness they could see nothing, for the denseness of the trees blotted even the sky from view. the silence of the woods was broken only by a faint rustle in the undergrowth, as something—they didn’t know what—came nearer.
silky’s ears were alert, his body as tense with watching, and jane was actually trembling.
“got your flashlight, mary lou?” she whispered.
“yes, but i’m afraid to put it on till harry grant gets away. he might see it from the road.”
the sudden roar of the motor almost drowned out her words. the noise startled whatever it was that was near them, and the girls felt a little animal pass so close that it nearly touched them. they almost laughed out loud at their fear: the cause of their terror was only an innocent little white rabbit!
mary louise took a tighter grip upon her dog.
[91]
“you mustn’t leave us, silky! you don’t want that bunny! we need you with us.”
the engine continued to roar; the girls heard the car start, and drive away. jane uttered a sigh of relief.
“i wonder whether he missed his satchel,” she remarked.
“probably he didn’t care if he did,” returned her chum. “i don’t believe it has anything in it but a toothbrush and a change of linen.”
“let’s open it and see.”
mary louise turned on her flashlight and looked at the small brown bag beside them.
“shucks!” she exclaimed in disappointment. “it’s locked.”
“it would be. well, so long as we have to carry it home, maybe we’ll be glad that it’s so light.”
“i’ve got my penknife. i’m going to cut the leather.”
“but, mary lou, it doesn’t belong to us!”
“can’t help that. we’ll buy harry grant a new one if he’s innocent.”
“o.k. you’re the boss. be careful not to cut yourself.”
“you hold the flashlight, jane,” said mary louise. “while i make the slit.”
[92]
the operation was not so easy, for the leather was tough, but mary louise always kept her knife as sharp as a boy’s, and she succeeded at last in making an opening.
excitedly both girls peered into the bag, and jane reached her hand into its depths. she drew it out again with an expression of disappointment.
“an old turkish towel!” she exclaimed in dismay.
but mary louise’s search proved more fruitful. her hand came upon a bulky paper wad, encircled by a rubber band. she drew her hand out quickly and flashed the light upon her find.
it was a fat roll of money!
the girls gazed at her discovery in speechless joy. it seemed more like a dream than reality: one of those strange dreams where you find money everywhere, in all sorts of queer, dark places.
“hide it in your sweater, mary lou!” whispered jane. “now let’s make tracks for home.”
her companion concealed it carefully and then took another look into the satchel to make sure that none of the gold was there. she even inserted the flashlight into the bag, to confirm her belief. but there was nothing more.
both girls got to their feet, jane with the satchel still in her hands.
[93]
“i wish we were home,” she remarked after the flashlight had been turned off, making the darkness seem blacker than before.
“we can pick up a bus along this road, i think,” returned mary louise reassuringly. “they ought to run along here about every half hour.”
“shall we use some of this money for carfare?”
“no, we don’t have to. i have my purse with me.”
choosing their way carefully through the bushes and undergrowth, the two girls proceeded slowly towards the road. but their adventures in the wood were not over. they heard another rustle of twigs in front of them, and footsteps. human footsteps, this time!
“hands up!” snarled a gruff voice.
the reactions of the two girls and the dog were instantaneous—and utterly different. jane clutched her chum’s arm in terror; mary louise flashed her light upon the man—a rough, uncouth character, without even a mask—and silky flew at his legs. the dog’s bite was quick and sharp: the bully cried out in pain. mary louise chuckled and, pulling jane by the hand, dashed out to the road, towards the lights of the gas station in the distance. as the girls retreated, they could hear groans and swearing from their tormentor.
[94]
when they slowed down across the road from the gas station, mary louise looked around and whistled for silky. jane, noticing that she still clutched the empty bag in her hand, hurled it as far as she could in the direction from which they had come.
in another moment the brave little dog came bounding to them. mary louise stooped over and picked him up in her arms.
“you wonderful silky!” she cried, as she led the way across the road. “you saved our lives!”
“suppose we hadn’t taken him!” said jane in horror. “we’d be dead now.”
“let’s go ask the attendant about buses,” suggested mary louise, still stroking her dog’s head.
“we better not!” cautioned jane. “he may suspect us, if harry grant told him about his loss of the satchel.”
“oh no, he won’t,” replied mary louise. “because we’ll tell him about the tramp, or the bandit, or whatever he is—and he’ll suspect him.”
they walked confidently up to the man inside the station.
[95]
“we’re sort of lost,” announced mary louise. “we want to get to riverside. there was a tramp back there about fifty yards who tried to make trouble for us. can we stay here until a bus comes along—they do run along here, don’t they?”
“yes, certainly,” replied the man, answering both questions at once. “about fifty yards back, you say? did he have a brown satchel with him?”
“i saw a brown satchel lying in the road,” replied mary louise innocently. “why?”
“because a motorist stopped there a few minutes ago with engine trouble, and while he came to me for help his grip was stolen.”
“did it have anything valuable in it?” inquired jane, trying to keep her tone casual.
“yes. i believe there was about eight hundred dollars in it.”
mary louise gasped in delight. that meant that practically all of miss grant’s paper money was there—in her sweater! all but one fifty-dollar bill!
“well, i wouldn’t go back there for eight thousand dollars!” said jane.
[96]
“you can be sure there ain’t any money in the bag now,” returned the attendant shrewdly. “here comes your bus. you’re lucky: they only run every half hour.... i’ll go stop it for you.”
mary louise kept silky in her arms, and the two girls followed their protector to the middle of the road. the bus stopped, and the driver looked doubtfully at silky.
“don’t allow no dogs,” he announced firmly.
“oh, please!” begged mary louise in her sweetest tone. “silky is such a good, brave dog! he just saved our lives when we were held up by a highwayman. and we have to get home—our mothers will be so worried.”
“it’s agin’ the rules——”
“please let us this time! i’ll hold him in my lap.” her brown eyes looked into his; for a moment the man thought mary louise was going to cry. then he turned to the half a dozen passengers in his car.
“i’ll leave it up to youse. would any of youse people report me if i let this here lady’s dog in the bus?”
“we’d report you if you didn’t,” replied a good-natured woman with gray hair. “these girls must get home as quickly as possible. it’s not safe for them to be out on a lonely road like this at night.”
[97]
“oh, thank you so much!” exclaimed mary louise, smiling radiantly at the kind woman. “it’s so good of you to help us out.”
the door closed; the girls waved good-bye to the attendant, and the bus started. mary louise gazed dismally at her watch.
“even now we’ll be an hour late,” she remarked. “we promised our mothers we’d be home by half-past nine!”
“girls your age shouldn’t go lonely places after dark,” observed the motherly woman. “let this be a lesson to you!”
“oh, it will be, we assure you!” jane told her. “one experience like this is enough for us.”
the bus rumbled on for twenty minutes or so and finally deposited the girls in riverside, half a block from their homes.
“still have the money?” whispered jane, as they ran the short distance to their gates.
“yes, i can feel the wad here. i was so afraid somebody in the bus would notice it. but having silky in my lap helped.”
“it seems we have company,” remarked jane, recognizing a familiar roadster parked in front of their houses.
“now what can max want at this time of night?” demanded mary louise impatiently. she longed so terribly to get into her room by herself and count the money.
[98]
“here they are, mrs. gay!” called a masculine voice from the porch. “they’re all right, apparently.”
the two mothers appeared on mary louise’s porch.
“what in the world happened?” demanded mrs. patterson. “mrs. gay and i have been worried to death.”
“not to mention us,” added norman wilder from the doorstep. “we phoned all your friends, and nobody had seen a thing of you.”
“i wish we could tell you all about it,” answered mary louise slowly. “but we aren’t allowed to. all i can say is, it’s something in connection with elsie grant—the orphan, you know, mother, whom we told you about.”
mrs. gay looked relieved but not entirely satisfied.
“i can’t have you two girls going up that lonely road at night, dear,” she said. “to the grants’ place, i mean. it isn’t safe.”
“oh, we weren’t there tonight,” jane assured her, not going on to explain that they had gone somewhere far more dangerous.
“well, if you do have to go there, let max or norman drive you,” suggested mrs. patterson. “the boys are willing, aren’t you?”
“sure thing!” they both replied.
[99]
“let’s all come inside and have some chocolate cake,” said mrs. gay, delighted that everything had turned out all right. “you girls must be hungry.”
they were, of course; but mary louise was more anxious to be alone to count her treasure than to eat. however, she could not refuse, and the party lasted until after eleven.
her mother followed her upstairs after the company had gone home.
“you must be tired, dear,” she said tenderly. “just step out of your clothes, and i’ll hang them up for you.”
“oh, no, thanks, mother. i’m not so tired. we rode home in the bus.... please don’t bother. i’m all right.”
“just as you say, dear,” agreed mrs. gay, kissing her daughter good-night. “but don’t get up for breakfast. try to get some sleep!”
mary louise smiled.
(“not if i know it,” she thought to herself. “i’m going after the rest of that treasure! the gold! maybe if i get that back for miss grant, she’ll consent to let elsie go to high school in the fall.”)
[100]
very carefully she drew off her sweater and laid the bills under the pillow on her bed. then, while she ran the shower in the bathroom, behind a locked door, she counted the money and checked the numbers engraved on the paper.
the attendant was right! there were eight hundred dollars in all, in fifty-dollar notes. and the best part about it was the fact that the numbers proved that the money belonged to miss mattie grant!
