Billie Bradley and Her Classmates: or, The Secret of the Locked Tower

It would have been hard enough if the ground had been clear, but with the snow rapidly obliterating every landmark, it was well-nigh impossible.

“I wish Teddy were here,” she said, half to herself, and her voice was very wistful.

“Don’t you though!” echoed Laura, heartily. “It seems an age since we’ve seen any of the boys.”

“Say, Billie,” broke in Vi, who was shivering in the bitter cold despite her warm furs, “are you sure you are going right? It wouldn’t be any fun to be lost in these lonely woods with maybe a blizzard coming on.”

At this observation Billie stopped and turned to Miss Walters and Polly Haddon, who were following close behind.

“I’m sorry,” she said, looking up at Miss Walters appealingly. “If it weren’t snowing I might be able to find the way, but as it is I’m afraid I would only get you all lost. I’m lost myself now.”

“All right, honey. Don’t look so distressed about it,” said Miss Walters, patting her kindly on the shoulder. “You would have to know the way pretty well to be able to find it in this storm. We shall have to give it up to-day, and try again as soon as we can.”

“Yes, that will be best,” said Polly Haddon, through chattering teeth. Her thin shawl formed scarcely any protection against the freezing weather. “Thank you all so much for bothering with my affairs. Now I must get back to the children. Good-bye.”

Before they had fairly realized she was going, she was gone, and the girls and Miss Walters turned back to the Hall.

“Bother the old snow,” said Laura crossly. “I always liked it before, but now I hate it.”

They were all glad when the warmth of Three Towers Hall closed in about them again. Miss Walters said a few words to them about saying nothing of this affair to any one. Then she dismissed them to the dormitory while she herself hurried off to do a little work that she had neglected all day. For around examination time, Miss Walters was not always free, even on Sunday.

Some of the girls had seen Billie and Laura and Vi come in with Miss Walters, and they demanded to know what “all the excitement was about.” And the fact that the girls would not talk made their classmates all the more curious.

Connie was the only one to whom they would tell the story, for they knew that they could trust her as they trusted themselves.

“And it’s still snowing,” mourned Billie, as she cleared a space on the misted window and looked out at the snow-covered world. “It looks as if we shouldn’t get out of here for weeks!”

Billie’s gloomy prophecy was fulfilled. The storm developed into one of the worst blizzards that part of the country had ever known, and for almost two weeks the occupants of Three Towers were practically house-bound.

It was good that the school boasted a well-stocked larder. Otherwise the girls might actually have gone hungry. And they wondered a great deal about Polly Haddon and her little brood.

“Suppose she hasn’t enough in the house to eat?” worried Vi. “Why, they may starve!”

“Maybe she used the gold pieces we left her to stock up when she saw the blizzard coming on,” suggested Billie, and the suggestion comforted them a great deal.

The day was approaching when those competing for the composition prize were to hand in their essays. Billie and Laura and Connie and Rose Belser and the half dozen other girls who had entered the lists were writing like mad – and biting their pens to bits – in an effort to get their essays in on time.

And in the heart of each was the fervent hope that she would be the winner. Only Amanda had no need to hope. She was sure! The prize was hers!

She had carried out her intention of copying her essay straight from the little musty book. So sure was she that her ruse would not be detected that she had not bothered to alter a word. And while the others worked, she smiled.

At last came the day when the finished essays were to be handed in, and all day long Miss Walters was closeted in her office with Miss Race and one or two of the other teachers, reading and tabulating the manuscripts as they came to her.

So busy had Billie been in rewriting a phrase here, changing a word there, that she handed in her essay the very last of all – just a scant half hour before the time was up. But she was happy, because she knew that she had given her best effort.

“I imagine we shall enjoy reading this,” Miss Walters remarked to her associates, tapping Billie’s manuscript with a thoughtful finger. “Billie Bradley has real literary talent.”

The result of the contest was to be announced the next morning in the auditorium and the prizes to be awarded to the winners.

When the longed-for, yet dreaded, moment arrived, the girls filed into the auditorium, the contestants near the front, and almost the entire school occupying the seats behind them.

Billie’s heart was hammering so loudly that she glanced about her to see if anybody else seemed to notice it. But the majority of the girls were babbling away too excitedly to hear anything but themselves.

Billie was surprised to see that even the girls who were expecting to hear their fate within the next few moments were talking – chattering away excitedly, to be sure – but still talking. As for herself, she was sure she could not have uttered a word just then if her life had depended upon it. She did want that prize so dreadfully!

“Cheer up, Billie,” whispered Vi, slipping a loyal hand into hers. “You’re not afraid of missing the prize, are you? Why, you couldn’t miss it if you tried.”

Billie did not say anything, but she gripped Vi’s hand hard. And she was still holding on to it when Miss Walters ascended the platform and a deep hush spread over the room.

“As you all know,” came the clear, sweet voice of the head of Three Towers Hall, “I have come here this morning to announce the winners of the composition prize.

“I and my associates have had difficulty in choosing the winning essays, for the reason that they are all so excellent. We are only sorry that we have not a prize to attach to each.”

A buzz broke out in the audience, but when Miss Walters raised her hand it instantly died down again.

“And now,” she said, “not to keep you any longer in suspense, we will announce the winners.”

Billie’s grip on Vi’s hand tightened till it hurt.

Then into the tense silence Miss Walters threw the bomb of her announcement.

“The first prize goes to Amanda Peabody,” she said. “Will she please step up upon the platform?”

CHAPTER XXIII – DISGRACED

For a moment there was intense silence while Amanda rose triumphantly and flounced up to the platform.

Then an amazed, angry buzz rose from the audience of indignant girls. Amanda, who was proverbially stupid, to have taken the prize from some of the brightest girls in the school! It was impossible – incredible! And yet it was only too true!

Miss Walters, with a few words of congratulation, handed the prize – a fine set of books – to Amanda, and the latter swept haughtily back to her seat, triumph in every line of her figure as she passed the other pupils.

She had beaten Billie Bradley at last! And her revenge was sweeter than even she had dreamed it would be.

But Billie, tears of anger and disappointment stinging her eyes, felt sure that she had not been beaten fairly. Amanda had played a trick on her, on the rest of the contestants for the prize, on Miss Walters herself. But, in Teddy’s vocabulary, Amanda had “gotten away with it.” The prize was in her possession.

“It’s a shame,” she heard in angry protest all about her.

“She never did it honestly.”

“Somebody ought to tell Miss Walters. She doesn’t know Amanda as well as we do.”

But Miss Walters had raised her hand for silence, and in a few seconds the angry murmurs died down again.

“I have the pleasure of awarding the second prize,” the principal announced, “to Beatrice Bradley. Will you step up on the platform, Billie?”

The second prize! She didn’t want the second prize, Billie told herself, when Amanda had come in first. To march up there on the platform with that girl’s gloating eyes upon her —

But Vi and Laura were pulling her out of her seat, pushing her out into the aisle – and while Billie hesitated Miss Walters had impatiently repeated her summons.