will let us know on Friday.”
“Say,” interrupted Frances, leaning forward to look at Patricia, “does anybody know why she goes over to Mrs. Brock’s early in the morning?”
Patricia glanced at Jane and Ruth before she replied with a laugh, “I’m sure I don’t.”
“How do you know she does go?” demanded Lucile quickly.
“Saw her, this very morning.”
“What were you doing, awake before the bell rang?” inquired Anne.
“My shade was flapping; and if there’s anything I can’t stand, it’s a flapping shade. I got up to fix it.”
“What time was it?” queried Ruth.
“Five o’clock.”
“You dreamed it,” jeered Lucile.
“I did not!”
“Maybe she was just coming home from a party,” suggested Mary’s mild voice.
“I saw her one morning, too,” admitted Hazel. “I got up at five to study, wrapped a blanket around me, and was curled up in a chair beside the window cramming French verbs—”
“Now I know that you were asleep, too,” interrupted Lucile.
“When I saw Rhoda,” continued Hazel, throwing a pillow at Lucile, “she was coming out of the back door of Big House. When she passed our window, I said ‘Hello!’ and she jumped a foot.”
“What did she say?” asked Jane.
“Nothing; she just glanced up, put her finger on her lips, and hurried into the Hall. She is always so smiling and good-natured, but she didn’t look at all pleased to see me.”
“How did she get in without ringing the bell?” inquired Clarice eagerly.
Everybody laughed.
“That interests you most, doesn’t it?” inquired Lucile sweetly.
“She went around to the laundry door,” explained Hazel. “I think she has a key for it.”
“That’s an idea!” cried Clarice. “Why can’t we borrow that key some night when we want to go out?”
Four stone steps led down from the path on the east side of the dormitory to a small door which opened directly into the laundry, located under Frances’ and Katharine’s room.
“And spend the rest of the night in the laundry?” exclaimed Hazel. “An ironing board for a bed doesn’t appeal to me.”
“Why not come up?” inquired Anne idly.
“Because, darling, Dolly herself locks that door at the head of the stairs on her eleven o’clock round every night,” replied Ruth.
“Then I don’t see how Rhoda gets up,” said Frances, frowning in perplexity.
“Oh, bother Rhoda!” cried Hazel impatiently. “Let’s plan how we’re all of us and our luggage going to get out to Green Lake and back, when we’ve only two cars available.”
“Pat and I can take the eats and a couple of girls to guard them, and then come back for the rest of you,” proposed Mary, who owned the only other car in the Gang.
“That’s a good idea,” approved Anne; and so the matter was settled.
Saturday proved to be one of those warm, sunny days which often usher in an early summer.
“See that haze on the hills?” said Katharine, as they were packing the cars in the driveway. “That means heat. We’ll be able to swim after all. Isn’t it fine that we all passed the test, even Clarice?”
“Didn’t look much like a picnic at this time yesterday,” observed Patricia with a shiver at the recollection. “Wasn’t it a cold, dismal day?”
“It sure was! Who’s going on this load?” inquired Anne, turning to the girls who were bossing the job of loading.
“Katharine and Frances will go with Pat,” responded Jane, “and I’ll keep Mary company. Don’t any of the rest of you wander off and have us hunting all over for you when we come back. All aboard who’s going aboard!”
By eleven o’clock the whole Gang, including Rhoda, was swarming over the picnic grounds situated on a wooded hill overlooking Green Lake, an oblong body of very deep water. At one end, the lake was bordered by flat, treeless meadows, and the low shore line provided a fairly good sandy beach. At the other end, heavily wooded land sloped down to the water on all sides, giving it a gloomy, deep green cast. A rough path followed the irregular stretch of water on the east side, and wound on up the hill into the woods where a depression between two steep slopes formed a small picnic ground. The few tables, benches, and stone ovens which occupied the space were unclaimed today; so the girls had their choice. They decided on a table from which they could look through an opening in the trees, directly down onto the still, green water.
“Swim first,” announced Katharine, after the food had been placed upon one table, and the extra wraps upon another.
“Will our things be safe here alone?” inquired Betty doubtfully, when they were ready to go down to the lower end of the lake.
“I’ll stay with it,” offered Rhoda.
“Oh, no,” protested Anne. “Come on down with us and swim.”
“I can’t swim,” replied Rhoda, “and I don’t care for bathing. I brought a book along, and I’d just as soon as not stay here and read until you come back.”
Seeing that the maid really meant what she said, Anne followed the rest of the girls who were already half way down the hill.
“Where’s Rhoda?” asked Patricia, looking around, when they reached the beach and were about to dive into the water.
“I should think she’d like at least to come and watch us,” said Patricia, when Anne had explained. “I’ll go up after a while and bring her down.”
Swimming in the open was very different from swimming in a tank, and after fifteen minutes of strenuous exercise the girls came out to lie on the sand in the warm sun for a little rest.
“Lend me your cloak, Anne,” requested Patricia, “and I’ll run up for Rhoda.”
“Don’t believe she’ll come,” replied Anne, handing Patricia her woolly bath cape.
“I’ll make her. The things will be all right. There isn’t a soul here today, except us.”
Wrapping the cape closely around her, Patricia started briskly along the path toward the picnic grounds. Rhoda was sitting on a big stone, half way down one of the sloping sides of the depression, in a pool of sunlight which some broken branches let through. So deeply interested was she in her book, that she did not see Patricia until the girl stood right in front of her.
“I
