CHAPTER X
TWO OF A KIND
Several days had passed, and the girls were at last actually lookingforward to the end of the school term and to the Danvers bungalow onLighthouse Island!
The graduates were running around excitedly in the last preparations forgraduation with the strange look on their young faces that most graduateshave, half exultation at the thought of their success, half grief atbeing forced to leave the school, the friends they had made, the scenesthey had loved.
Just the day before the one set for graduation Teddy ran over to tell thegirls some wonderful news. He was able to see only Billie, for the othergirls had been busy with their lessons. But that was very satisfactory toTeddy.
As soon as the lunch gong rang Billie had called the girls together andeagerly she told them what Teddy had told her.
"Paul Martinson's father gave him a beautiful big motor boat--a cruisingmotor boat," she told the girls. "Paul got the highest average in hisclass this term, you know, and his father has given him the motor boat asa sort of prize."
"A motor boat!" cried Vi, breathlessly. "That's some prize."
"But, Billie, what's that got to do with us?" asked Laura practically.
"It hasn't much to do with us," said Billie, her face pink withexcitement. "But it has a great deal to do with the boys. Paul Martinsonhas asked Chet and Ferd and Teddy to go with him and his father on acruise this summer."
She paused from lack of breath, and the girls looked at her in amazement.
"My, that's wonderful for them," said Laura after a minute, adding alittle regretfully: "But I suppose it means that we won't see very muchof the boys this summer."
"Oh, but that's just what it doesn't mean!" Billie interrupted eagerly."Don't you see? Why, Teddy said that it would be the easiest thing in theworld to stop off at Lighthouse Island some time and see us girls."
The girls agreed that it was all perfectly wonderful, that everything wasworking just for them, and that this couldn't possibly help being themost wonderful summer they had ever spent.
They did not have as much time to think about it as they would haveliked, however, in the busy excited hours that followed. Right after thegraduating exercises all the girls were to start for their homes, exceptthe few who expected to spend the summer at Three Towers Hall.
Many of the relatives and friends of the graduates were expected, so thatpreparations had to be made for them also. The graduating exercises wereto be held earlier at Boxton Military Academy than at Three Towers Hall,so that the three North Bend boys hoped to get away in time toattend--not the exercises themselves--but the singing on the steps ofThree Towers Hall by all the students of the school, which was one of themost important parts of the ceremony.
Then, of course, the boys would be able to go with the girls all the wayto North Bend.
The exercises that had been looked forward to for so long and that hadtaken weeks of preparation to perfect, were over at last. The graduatesrealized with a sinking of the heart that they were no longer students ofThree Towers Hall.
There was still the mass singing on the steps, to be sure, but that wassimply the last barrier to be crossed before they stepped out on the openroad, leaving Three Towers Hall with its pleasing associations behindthem forever.
As the girls, in their simple white dresses, gathered on the steps of theschool with the visitors, fathers and mothers and boys in uniform,scattered about on the campus below them, and began to sing in theirclear, girlish voices, there was hardly a dry eye anywhere.
At last it was over, and the girls rushed upstairs again to change theirdresses for traveling clothes and say a last good-bye to their teachersand to Miss Walters.
As Billie was hurrying down the corridor, bag in hand, toward the frontdoor a hand was laid gently on her arm, and, turning, she found herselfface to face with Miss Arbuckle.
"Billie," said the teacher hurriedly, "I have never thanked you rightlyfor the great favor you did in returning my album to me. But I love youfor it, dear. God bless you," and before Billie could think of a word tosay in reply, the teacher had turned, slipped through one of the doorsand disappeared.
Billie stood staring after Miss Arbuckle, lost in thought about her,until Laura and Vi, hurrying up, caught her by the arm and hustled herthrough the front door, down the steps and into the waiting carryall. Thecarryall, by the way, was to make many trips that day, even though agreat many of the girls had automobiles belonging to their relatives orfriends which would take them straight to their destination.
When the girls had climbed inside, the boys jumped in after them, and thecarryall, having by this time all that it could hold, started down thelong, winding driveway to the road.
"Good-bye, Three Towers, for a little time, at least," cried Billie,while she felt a curious lump in her throat. She was terribly afraid shewas going to cry, so she stopped talking and turned to stare out of thewindow.
"We've had a wonderful time there," said Laura in, for her, a very sobertone. "Better than we expected."
"Which is going _some_," finished Vi slangily, and as slang from Visomehow always made them laugh, they laughed now and felt better for it.
"Well, we didn't have such a very slow time ourselves," said Billie'sbrother Chet, his good looking face lighting up with eagerness.
"And it's something to have made a friend like Paul Martinson," spoke upFerd Stowing from where he was squeezed in between Laura and Vi.
"You bet--he's some boy," added Teddy heartily, forgetting for the momentthat there had been times when he had longed to throw Paul Martinson intothe lake--or some deeper place--because he had talked too much to Billie.
But here was a beautiful long train ride before him when he could talk toBillie--or any one else--all he liked without having any Paul Martinsontrying to "butt in" all the time. No wonder he was friends with all theworld.
"Where is Paul? Why didn't he come with us?" asked Billie.
"He went home with his dad," Chet explained. "Of course he was crazy tosee his motor boat, and then he had to make arrangements for our cruise.Oh boy, think of cruising around the coast in a motor boat!"
"We wanted Connie to come along with us," said Billie. "But she said shewould have to go home first."
"When are you girls going to start for Lighthouse Island?" Ferd askedwith interest. "Have you set any time yet?"
"Not a regular date," answered Laura. "But it will be in a week or two Ithink. We'll have to have time to get acquainted with the folks again andhave our clothes fixed up----"
"And then Connie's coming on to North Bend," Vi added eagerly. "And we'llall go together from there to the coast. Oh dear, I can't wait to start."
"Well, I guess you'll have to," said Billie, with a sigh, "since wehaven't even reached home yet."
"That reminds me," said Laura, turning upon Billie accusingly. "What wereyou doing standing in the hall just now and looking as though you hadlost your last friend when Vi and I came along and woke you up? Come on,'fess up."
Billie could not think for a moment what she had been doing, then sheremembered Miss Arbuckle and the rather peculiar way the teacher hadthanked her for the return of the album.
She told the girls about it, and they listened with interest while theboys looked as if they would like to have known what it was all about.
"Now I wonder----" Laura was beginning when Billie suddenly caught herhand and pointed to the road.
"Look!" she cried. "It's Hugo Billings, our sad, faced man again. Oh,girls, I wish we could do something for him."
She leaned far out the window, smiled and waved her hand to the man, whowas standing moodily by the roadside. At sight of her he straightened upand an answering smile flashed across his thin face, making him look sodifferent that the girls were amazed.
But when they looked back at him again a few seconds later his smile hadgone and he was staring after them gloomily.
"Goodness, I nev
er saw a person look so sad in all my life," murmured Vi,as a turn in the road hid the man from view.
"Well, I have," said Billie. "And that's Miss Arbuckle!"
"There must be some sort of mystery about them both," remarked Laura."Maybe that man has a whole lot on his mind."
"And maybe Miss Arbuckle isn't miss at all," added Vi. "Perhaps she'sMrs. Arbuckle and those children were her own."
Billie did not reply to this. She heaved something of a sigh. She wasunable to explain it, but she felt very sorry for both the teacher andthe queer man. Would the queer mystery ever be explained?
Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island; Or, The Mystery of the Wreck Page 10