Ruth, and Jane going out for moss for botany class,” answered Jane. “We’ll be back before breakfast time.”
“Don’t go far away.”
“Does she think we can find moss on the fire escape?” demanded Jane scornfully.
“Just where are we going?” asked Patricia.
“I think we’ll cut through the back yard here into Foth Road and head out toward the country.”
They went around the side of the dormitory, and, to their surprise, saw Rhoda coming toward them across the back yard.
“Aren’t you up pretty early, Rhoda?” asked Jane casually, as the girl flushed and looked embarrassed.
“Not so very,” was the low reply. “I often run out here for a breath of fresh air before starting my work.”
“How fussed she acted,” commented Ruth, “just as if she’d been caught doing something she didn’t want anybody to know about.”
“Yes, I noticed that too,” said Patricia, carefully following her companions down the treacherous, broken stone ledges into the yard behind Arnold Hall.
“Why, Ruth,” cried Jane, “‘Big House’ is occupied! I didn’t know that; did you?” The girl regarded in surprise the three-story brick house across a narrow stretch of green lawn.
“No, I didn’t”—adding softly, “Come on; somebody is watching us from that bay window on the second floor.”
“How do you know?” demanded Jane, hurrying after her room mate.
“I saw a woman’s hand pull the curtain aside a little while we were waiting for Pat to come down the steps.”
“It’s a shame to spoil our short cut to Foth Road; for I suppose we can’t go through there any more. That house was empty all last year,” explained Jane, turning to Patricia, “which made it rather nice for us because, besides using the yard as a thoroughfare, we sometimes had little parties there or met our boy friends when we didn’t want to go out the front way with them. Oh, I assure you it was useful in lots of ways.”
They were out on the road by then, and walking briskly toward the country.
“We’ll never find any moss if we keep to the road,” objected Ruth, after they had walked a mile in vain. “I should think we’d have to go into the woods, see, over there.”
“Not I!” replied Jane. “I’m too afraid of snakes.”
Patricia laughed. “There aren’t any snakes in a pine woods. They’re mostly where there are lots of rocks.”
“Well, anyway we’ll go a little farther and then I, for one, take to the woods,” decided Ruth. “We’ve got to find some moss soon, and go home; and I won’t face Yates again with no specimens.”
“Isn’t he the old pill, though?” said Jane to Patricia. “Did you ever see anybody so cold and stone-like? Even when he says unpleasant things—and, oh, boy! can’t he be disagreeable when he likes!—his face never changes from that set, gloomy expression.”
“He certainly is most peculiar,” agreed Patricia, “and I don’t like him even any! For that matter, no love at all is lost between us; something in the way he looks at me tells me that.”
“Ah, here we are!” exclaimed Jane, pointing to an old shed a few feet from the road. On its roof, near the ridge pole, was a luxuriant growth of bright green moss.
“How can we get at it?” asked Ruth, as they scrambled across a wire fence and crossed a stretch of rough, coarse grass. “I’m no good at climbing.”
“Nor I,” said Ruth. “How about you, Pat?”
“I think I could get up far enough to reach it, if you girls will boost a bit,” replied Patricia.
“It’s O. K. with us, but for Heaven’s sake be as quiet as possible. We don’t want the dog set on us.”
“Oh, nobody’s around so early as this; there’s no window on this side of the shed, and the door is on the other. The farm house is back of that clump of trees.”
“Easy telling you don’t know anything about the country,” said Jane scornfully; “these farmers get up early.”
Stepping up on a log, which happened to lie conveniently close to the building, Patricia, with the aid of the girls, got a firm grip on the edge of the roof and drew herself up to a point where she could lie flat on its weather-worn boards and stretch her long arms up toward the coveted plants. With much effort, she succeeded in reaching the moss and in tearing up two big handfuls. Resting on her elbows for a moment to ease the strain on her arms, she was horrified to feel the boards underneath them begin to sag; and, with a dull splintering of ancient wood, her hands and lower arms disappeared into a yawning cavity. Simultaneously, the moss dropped from her fingers into the depths below.
A snort, a gasp, and a forceful exclamation from within the shed mingled with Patricia’s startled cry of “Girls, I’m falling in.”
“What shall we do? What shall we do?” demanded Ruth excitedly as Patricia, speechless with horror, gazed down through the hole over which she hung, and met the cold, grey eyes of Professor Yates! His immaculate shoulders and smooth black hair were covered with bits of moss.
“Pull me down, quick!” cried the horrified Patricia, finally recovering the power of speech.
“It will spoil your dress,” warned Jane.
“I don’t care! Get me down, for Pete’s sake!” retorted Patricia wildly.
With their united efforts, the two girls succeeded in dragging Patricia safely to the ground, minus the moss, and with several long scratches on her arms.
“Where’s the moss?” demanded Ruth in surprise.
“All over Professor Yates!” gasped Patricia, hysterically.
“What?” cried Ruth, while Jane looked as if she feared Patricia had lost her mind.
“He’s in that shed!”
“You’re crazy!” retorted Jane, feeling her pulse.
“Honest to goodness! Cross my heart!”
At that moment, the object of their discussion strolled around the corner of the shed. He had brushed himself off, and now looked as calm and neat as if he were in his classroom. His gaze traveled coldly from one to another, then, looking directly at Patricia, he drawled: “To what am I indebted for this most unconventional call?”
“To your demand for specimens of moss today ‘without fail,’” quoted Jane glibly.
“A most novel situation, stealing it from my own roof, and ruining the roof in the bargain.”
“We had no idea it was your roof,” retorted Patricia hotly, “and I had no intention of breaking through it. It was anything but a pleasant experience, I assure you.”
“Of
