Billie Bradley and the School Mystery: or, The Girl From Oklahoma

“We welcome you as one of ourselves,” added Connie, the sarcasm behind her words not too well disguised.

“I knew you would,” said Billie sweetly, wanting, privately, to slap them all. To her new protégé she said: “It’s only Tuesday, Edina. We will have to wait until Saturday, I guess, to get a day off and carry out our plans. Remember, we are going to make them all sit up and take notice. Until then, don’t forget our bargain.”

“I won’t,” returned Edina. She released her hand from Billie’s and without so much as a good-by to the other girls made her way through the beautiful grounds toward the first-year dormitories. In that beautiful setting, she looked grotesque enough, as much out of place as the proverbial bull in the china shop.

“Well, I see you’ve gone and done it, Billie,” sighed Vi. “I was afraid you would. But it’s no use. You can’t tame that girl.”

“Like making friends with a lion cub,” observed Laura. “You never can tell when it will turn and rend you with its fangs. That sounds a bit far-fetched, but I guess you catch my meaning.”

Billie shook her head.

“You’re dead wrong, all of you. Edina isn’t a bit like that. She is headstrong and untamed, I’ll admit; but at heart she’s very much like the rest of us, wanting what we want and desperately anxious for an education.”

Ray Carew’s mocking laugh floated on the darkness.

“I hadn’t an idea you were so credulous, Billie. The girl is nothing but a savage. If you try to help that sort of person you will only get your trouble for your pains. I’m warning you.”

It was being slowly borne in upon Billie Bradley that she was alone in her championship of the strange, lonely girl from Oklahoma. Her friends, the girls upon whom she depended for understanding and support in what she had come to regard as an interesting and even exciting experiment, were subtly, but none the less decidedly, ranging themselves against her.

She turned to Connie Danvers.

“Do you feel that way about it, too, Connie?” she asked.

“I’m willing to be nice to anybody, if you say so, Billie. But I can’t help thinking you are making a mistake, taking up this freak girl from Oklahoma. It seems to me you are letting yourself in for a heap of trouble.”

“You feel that way about it, too, Vi?”

“’Fraid I do, Billie. Though I’ll try to be nice to her, if you say so.”

“And you, Laura?”

“You will never be able to make anything of that sort of girl, Billie. She has nothing in common with the rest of us. If you try to take her up, you will be only wasting your time. I feel sure of it.”

Billie was silent for a moment. She was troubled and hurt, but the defection of her friends in no wise altered her determination to help the strange, wild, half-tamed girl from Oklahoma.

“Very well,” she said quietly. “I am glad to know how you all stand, anyway. From now on, it will be my business to prove you wrong!”

As Billie limped up the gravel path alone, there was a curious weight upon her spirit. The disapproval of her friends was a new experience to her. Even Vi and Laura had deserted.

“I’ll show them I can make something of Edina Tooker!” she told herself. “I’ll make them admit it! I’ve got to now, to justify myself.”

CHAPTER IX

THE EXPERIMENT

Billie Bradley awoke next morning with the same curious weight upon her spirit. Her mental depression was augmented by bodily discomfort that had grown no less overnight.

Every muscle in her body was strained and there were big, black bruises on her arms and legs, some of them as big as the palm of her hand.

“You will go picking goldenrod!” gibed Laura with sympathetic interest, watching Billie’s painful effort to dress herself. “Next time you feel in the humor to visit Goldenrod Point – ”

“I’ll run the other way,” said Billie, with a grimace. “Bother! I wanted to get out on the courts for practice to-day.”

“From the look of those arms and legs, it will be many a day before you can swing a wicked racket, Billie,” observed Vi. “Here, I’ll help you with that stocking. Give me a chance to show what an excellent lady’s maid I’d make.”

Between them, they managed to get Billie dressed in time for breakfast. It was not until the bell rang and there was a general exodus into the corridors from the dormitory that Laura broached the subject that was uppermost in the minds of them all.

“How about this lion cub from Arizona – ”

“Oklahoma,” Billie corrected, a trifle frigidly.

“Well, Oklahoma, then. You aren’t really going to wish her on the crowd, are you, Billie? If you insist, the girls will take her up for your sake, but there will be trouble. I feel it in my bones.”

“I have no intention of wishing her on anyone,” retorted Billie coldly. “The girl saved my life and I am going to help her to be happy here at Three Towers Hall, if such a thing is possible. You girls may do as you like.”

Vi put an arm about Billie’s shoulders.

“Don’t be sore, Billie. If I can’t share your enthusiasm for this wild girl from the West, I am quite willing to admit that you are probably right and I’m wrong. Anyway, perhaps it’s worth giving it a whirl.”

With such tepid support, Billie was forced to be content.

On the way to the breakfast hall they passed Amanda Peabody and Eliza Dilks. The latter called to Billie and reminded her jeeringly not to forget that she had a date with Debsy at ten o’clock that morning.

Billie flushed and pressed her lips tight together to prevent a sharp retort.

“Some people never get enough,” she said in a low voice to Laura and Vi as they entered the dining hall. “So far we have beaten Amanda and her Shadow at every game they have ever tried to play with us, and still they come around looking for more trouble.”

Across the length of the hall, Billie’s eyes sought and found Edina Tooker. A look flashed between the two girls that was observed by more than one curious pair of eyes in that room.

Billie’s look seemed to say:

“Hold on! Have courage. I am going to fulfill my promise.”

While Edina, still a figure of fun in her outrageous clothes, seemed to respond:

“I’m depending on you. Don’t fail me. You’re my only hope.”

That was the beginning of a period of acute discomfort for Billie Bradley.

It began with Miss Debbs’ decision to give Billie two demerits, instead of one. Billie could never quite understand the reason, except that Miss Debbs was thorough in everything she undertook, including her methods of discipline.

Billie knew that the punishment was too severe, totally out of proportion to her fault. For a time she even considered taking her grievance to Miss Walters, the white-haired, gracious head of Three Towers Hall, adored by the girls and universally respected for her fine sense of justice.

Billie finally decided against this, however, accepting the unjust punishment with mental reservations and the determination to earn no more demerits during the remainder of the fall term.

To add to Billie’s discomfort, Edina took to following her about like a humble and adoring shadow. Unpleasant Edina could be, and often was – snappish and curt, even downright rude – but never so to Billie. Her outspoken devotion was embarrassing; yet, in her secret heart, Billie could not but be gratified by it.

Edina was known among the girls as “Billie’s little lamb,” or “Billie’s lion cub.”