Meg of Mystery Mountain

Meg of Mystery Mountain
Grace North

Grace May North

Meg of Mystery Mountain

CHAPTER I

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL GIRL

Jane Abbott, tall, graceful and languidly beautiful, passed through the bevy of girls on the wharf below Highacres Seminary with scarcely a nod for any of them. Closely following her came three other girls, each carrying a satchel and wearing a tailored gown of the latest cut.

Although Esther Ballard and Barbara Morris called gaily to many of their friends, it was around Marion Starr that all of the girls crowded until her passage way to the small boat, even then getting up steam, was completely blocked.

Jane, when she had crossed the gang plank, turned to find only Esther and Barbara at her side. A slight sneer curled her lips as she watched the adulation which Merry was receiving. Then, with a shrug of her slender shoulders that was more eloquent than words, the proud girl seated herself in one of the reclining deck chairs and imperiously motioned her friends to do likewise.

“It’s so silly of Merry to make such a fuss over all those girls. She’ll miss the boat if she doesn’t hurry.”

Marion had evidently thought of the same thing, for she laughingly ran up the gang plank, her arms filled with candy boxes, boquets and magazines, gifts of her admiring friends. Depositing these on a chair, she leaned over the rail to call: “Good-bye, girls! Of course I’ll write to you, Sally, reams and reams; a sort of a round-robin letter to be sent to the whole crowd.

“Sure thing, Betty Ann. I’ll tell my handsome brother Bob that you don’t want him to ever forget you.” Then as there was a protest from the wharf, the girl laughingly added: “But you wished to be remembered to him. Isn’t that the same thing?”

Noticing a small girl who had put her handkerchief to her eyes, Merry remonstrated. “Tessie, don’t cry, child! This isn’t a funeral or a wedding. Of course you’ll see us again. We four intend to come back to Highacres to watch you graduate just as you watched us today. Work hard, Little One, and carry off the honors. I’ve been your big-sister coach all this year, and I want you to make the goal. I know you will! Goodbye!” Marion Starr could say no more for the small river steamer gave a warning whistle – the rope was drawn in, and, as the boat churned the water noisily in starting, the chorus of goodbyes from the throng of girls on the wharf could be heard but faintly.

Marion remained standing at the rail, waving her handkerchief, smiling and nodding until the small steamer rounded a jutting-out point of land, then she turned about and faced the three other girls, who had made themselves comfortable in the reclining steamer chairs.

“What a fuss you make over all those undergrads, Merry,” Jane Abbott remarked languidly. “A casual observer might suppose that each one of them was a very best friend, while we three, who are here present, have that honor. For myself, I much prefer to conserve my enthusiasm.”

Marion sat down in a vacant steamer chair, and merely smiled her reply, but the youngest among them, Esther Ballard, flashed a defense for her ideal among girls. “That’s the very reason why Merry was unanimously voted the most popular girl in Highacres during the entire four years that we have been at the seminary. Nothing was ever too much trouble, and no girl was too unimportant for Merry’s loving consideration.”

“Listen! Listen!” laughed good natured Barbara Morris. “All salute Saint Marion Starr.”

But Esther, flushed and eager, did not stop. “While you, Jane Abbott” – she could not keep the scorn out of her voice – “while you were only voted the most beautiful.”

“Only?” there was a rising inflection in Barbara’s voice, and she also lifted her eyebrows questioningly. “I think our queen is quite satisfied with her laurels.”

Jane merely shrugged her shoulders, then turning her dark, shapely head on the small cherry colored pillow with which she always traveled, she asked in her usual languid manner, “Marion, let’s forget the past and plan for the future.”

“You said you had a wonderful vacation trip to suggest, and that you would reveal it when we were on the boat. Well, this is the time and the place.”

“And the girls?” chimed in Barbara. “Do hurry and tell us, Merry. Your plans are always jolly.”

And so with a smile of pleasurable anticipation, Merry began to unfold her scheme.

“Aunt Belle is going to one of those adorable cottage hotels at Newport. She is just past-perfect as a chaperone and she said that she thought a party of four girls would be ideal. It will only cost each of us about $100 a month.”

“A mere mite,” Jane Abbott commented, “and the plan, as far as I’m concerned, is simply inspirational. I’ve always had a wild desire to live at one of those fashionable cottage-hotels, but not having a mother to take me, I have never been. I know my father will be glad to have me go, since your Aunt Belle is to be there, and I shall ask for $150 a month, so that we may have plenty of ice cream and not feel stinted.”

The usually indolent Jane was so interested in Merry’s plan that she was actually sitting erect, the small cherry-colored pillow in her lap.

“I’m not so sure that I can go,” Esther Ballard said ruefully. “My father is not a Wall Street magnate as is your father, Jane, and $100 a month may seem a good deal to him, following so closely the vast sum that he has had to spend on my four years’ tuition at Highacres.”

“Nonsense,” Jane flashed at their youngest. “You are the idol of your artist-father’s existence. He’d give you anything you needed to make you happy.”

Then, before Esther could voice her retort, the older girl had continued: “As for me, I shall need an additional $500 for clothes. Since we are going to so fashionable a place, we ought to have the smartest and latest summer styles from Paris. Let’s all make note of the wardrobe we’d like to take.”

Out came four small leather notebooks and with tiny pencils suspended above them, the girls thought for a moment.

Then Merry scribbled something as she remarked, “My first is a bathing suit. Green, the color mermaids wear.”

“Mine shall be cherry colored. It best suits my style of beauty,” Jane said complacently.

“You surely do look peachy in it,” Barbara remarked admirably. “It doesn’t matter what I put on, my squint and my freckled pug nose spoil it all.”

“Oh, you’re not so bad!” Esther said generously. “I heard one of the cadets at our closing dance say that he thought your squint was adorable.”

“Lead me to him!” Barbara jumped up as though about to start in search of her unknown admirer, but sank back again when she recalled that she was on a steamer which was chugging down the Hudson at its best speed.

“Do be serious, girls. See, I’ve made out a long list of things that I shall need.” Jane held up her notebook for inspection. But Esther closed hers and replaced it in her natty alligator traveling bag. “I’ll select my wardrobe after I have had my father’s consent,” she said. “You might as well stop planning now, Jane, as we are nearly to the Battery.”

Esther was right and in another five moments all was confusion on the small steamer. When they had safely crossed the gang plank, Merry detained them long enough to say, “Girls, before we part, let’s plan to meet at my home next Friday. Since you will all have to travel so far, suppose you come early and stay to lunch. Then we can make our final plans. How I do hope that we can all go.”

“I know that I can,” Jane replied confidently. “I always do as I wish, and nothing could induce me to spend another summer with my young brother and sister. They’re so boisterous and bothersome. As for Dan, he’s so eager to make high grades at college that he always is deep in a book.”

“Why Jane Abbott,” rebuked Esther. “I think your little sister is adorable. I’d give anything if I were not an only child.” Jane merely shrugged. “Au revoir,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ve got to catch the ferry.”

CHAPTER II

THE MOST SELFISH GIRL

The girls who had been inseparable friends during the four years at the fashionable Highacres Seminary parted at the Battery to go in as many different directions.

Marion Starr’s home was far up on Riverside Drive, while Barbara Morris’ millionaire father had an extensive estate on Long Island. Esther Ballard, the only daughter of devoted parents, resided in the house of her grandfather, Colonel Ballard, on Washington Square, while Jane Abbott’s family of four lived in the same rambling, picturesque wooden house that Mr. Abbott’s father had built for his bride long before his name had become so well known on Wall Street. Edgemere, a pretty little town among the Jersey hills, Mr. Abbott deemed a good place to bring up his younger girl and boy, and so, although Jane often pleaded that they move to a more fashionable suburb, in Edgemere they had remained. Nor would her father tear down the old home to replace it with one finer, for his beloved wife, who had died at the birth of little Julie, had planned it and had chosen all of the furnishings. “Some day you will have a home of your own, Jane,” he had told his proud older daughter, “and then you may have it as fine as you wish.”

But in all other things, Mr. Abbott humored her, for she was so like her mother in appearance. It was with sorrow that the father had to confess in his heart that there the resemblance ceased, for the mother, who had been equally beautiful, had been neither proud nor selfish. Little Julie, though not so beautiful, was far more like the mother in nature, and so, too, was Daniel, the nineteen-year-old lad upon whom the father placed so much reliance.

Regrettable as it may seem, Jane Abbott, as she stood on the deck of the ferry that was to convey her to the Jersey shore, was actually dreading the two weeks that she would have to spend in her own home. Marion had suggested that they plan going to Newport by the middle of July and it was now the first.

It was late afternoon, and there were many working girls on the huge ferry, who were returning to their Jersey homes after a long hot day in the New York offices. As they crowded against her, Jane drew herself away from them haughtily, thankful, indeed, that her father was so wealthy that she would never have to earn her own way in the world, nor wear such unattractive ready-made dresses. Unconsciously her lips curled scornfully until she chanced to catch a glimpse of her own trim tailored figure in one of the panel mirrors; then she smiled complacently and seated herself somewhat apart from the working girls, who, from time to time, glanced at her, as she supposed, with admiration. But she was disabused of this satisfying thought when one of them spoke loud enough for her to hear. “See that stiff-necked snob! She thinks she’s made of different clay from the rest of us. I wish her pa’d lose his money, so she’d have to scrub for a living.”

This remark merely caused Jane to sneer slightly, but what she heard next filled her heart with terrified foreboding, for another girl had turned to look at her and replied:

“Well, if she’s who I think she is, her father’s already gone bankrupt, and she’s poor enough, all right.”

The working girls then moved to another part of the ferry and Jane was left alone. It was ridiculous, of course. Her father could not lose his vast fortune. Jane determined to think no more about it. The ferry had reached its destination, and the proud girl hurried away. Never before had she so longed to reach her home.

“Of course it is not true,” her panicky thought kept repeating. “But what could it mean? What could it mean?”

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