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

“I only come a few days ago,” the girl explained. “And after the first day I – I kep’ close to my own room.”

That explained it, thought Billie. She had heard of the new girl from the wild open spaces who dressed like a freak, talked worse, and kept to her dormitory as though it were a burrow from which she seldom emerged except to attend classes. Characteristically, these uncomplimentary rumors had come to her through Amanda Peabody. Billie had intended vaguely to look up the new girl to see if she could be of any help. Instead, the new girl had looked her up – and in a most dramatic fashion!

“I know who you are,” Billie said, friendly eyes on the sullen face of Edina Tooker. “I’m glad you introduced yourself. I was going to look you up, anyway.”

The sullen expression on Edina Tooker’s face did not lift. She regarded Billie suspiciously.

“What for?” she demanded. “So you could see what a freak I am and laugh at me behind my back?”

This accusation was almost too much for even Billie’s good nature. A sharp retort rose to her lips – but got no further. She realized in time how much this strange girl must have suffered to make her so bitter and resentful. She was showing tooth and claw because that was her only method of defense. Like some wild creature of the woods, she was backed up against a wall, unable to distinguish friend from foe, fighting valiantly and indiscriminately, fearing nothing but surrender.

Billie, holding a firm check upon her temper, replied gently:

“My main – in fact, my only idea in deciding to look you up was to see if I could help you.”

“Why should you think I needed help?” retorted Edina Tooker harshly. “I suppose you’d been hearin’ things about me – what a freak I am and all.”

“No one ever said you were a freak,” Billie pursued patiently. “But you were a new girl from a distant city and I thought you might be glad to have someone sort of – well, show you the ropes.”

The corners of Edina’s straight young mouth turned downward in a sneer.

“Sounds good, the way you tell it. But you can’t fool me. You’re all alike up to that school, with your highfallutin’ manners and uppity ways. You’d come to see me, yes, so that you could laugh at me and talk about me afterward. ‘Native,’ ‘barbarian,’ that’s a couple o’ the names I’ve heard your swell friends call me. Mebbe you could add some to the string.”

“If Billie can’t, I will!” cried Laura, with sudden fury. “You’re nothing but a heathen and an ungrateful wretch! You don’t know who Billie Bradley is, maybe, but I’ll teach you!”

“Hush, Laura, please! Come away!”

Laura would not be silenced. She brushed the interruption aside impatiently and rushed on, her words pouring forth in a torrent:

“Billie Bradley is the most popular girl at Three Towers Hall. She does almost everything better than anybody else and yet the girls love her just the same. Maybe you’ve got sense enough to know what that means. She’s a perfect peach and any girl she takes up may count herself in luck. You just think of that when you are all alone and try to realize what you’ve lost. Come on Billie, let’s get away from here!”

Laura turned away with one last, inimical look at Edina Tooker. Vi joined her, but Billie still lingered behind.

“I’m sorry you feel this way,” she said to the girl who had saved her life. “I owe you a debt and I’d like to be friends.” Billie paused but as Edina remained silent with sullenly averted face, Billie went on to join Laura and Vi.

She did not know that the strange girl looked after her with eyes suddenly blurred by tears.

CHAPTER V

A PUBLIC REBUKE

Laura Jordon’s resentment against Edina Tooker and her attitude toward Billie did not abate at once. For the greater part of the return walk to Three Towers Hall she sputtered and fumed, mentioning dire forms of punishment that should be meted out to the girl from the West if she, Laura, could have her way.

“Never saw such an ungrateful wretch in my life. Talk about throwing pearls before swine! She never even knew what it meant to be taken up by Billie Bradley.”

“I doubt if she knows now.” Billie paused and said “ouch” as a stretched ligament protested sharply.

“Well, she will before she has been at Three Towers much longer,” prophesied Vi. “Personally, I can’t bear the girl and I hope she gets everything that’s coming to her.”

Billie frowned, partly with pain at her cuts and bruises, partly in disapproval of Vi’s uncompromising attitude.

“I’m sure I can’t feel that way about her. The girl saved my life and I owe her something for that.”

“So do we,” said Laura promptly. “But did you notice how she flung my thanks back in my face?”

“Appears to be a habit with her,” remarked Vi flippantly.

“It looks to me as though the girl had been hurt past bearing by the persecution and ridicule of some of the girls at the Hall. She has pride and spirit and is ready to strike out at everybody.”

“It seems to me I detect Amanda Peabody’s fine hand in this,” observed Laura. “Amanda would enjoy nothing better than a cat-and-mouse game with a girl like Edina Tooker.”

“She seems to be poor – ”

“I’ve heard differently,” said Billie. “One of the girls told me her father was getting rich fast – struck oil on an Oklahoma ranch, or something of the sort.”

“Well, she may be rich; but, if she looks it, I’m an Indian,” returned Laura skeptically. “Never saw a girl dressed like that who was anything but poverty-stricken.”

“She probably hasn’t the slightest idea how to dress,” observed Billie. “I can imagine Edina Tooker in riding breeches or middy and skirt doing a movie on some rocky mountain trail. In that sort of setting she would be very much a part of the picture. But transplant her to a fashionable girls’ school and she – well, she just doesn’t fit.”

“A round peg in a very square hole,” observed Vi.

“Exactly. I feel sorry for the poor girl. She’s in for a hard time.”

Toward the end of the tramp back to Three Towers, Billie found herself becoming very weary. She paused often to rest and was finally forced to accept the help of her chums. An arm about the shoulders of each of the girls, she hobbled on, acutely conscious of all her cuts and bruises and the strained and aching ligaments in her arms and legs.

They were on the last steep slope that ended at the boathouse in front of the Hall when they heard the deep-toned gong that announced supper in the dining hall.

Billie cried out in alarm and tried to hobble on more swiftly.

“I’ll make you girls late and Debsy has charge of the dining hall this week.” “Debsy” was the nickname for Miss Debbs, teacher of elocution. “You know what that means!”

“One whole afternoon of imprisonment in the dorm and a discredit mark besides,” Vi interpreted. “Debsy sure is death on tardiness.”

“You girls go ahead and leave me,” Billie begged. “You can make it even now if you run. I’ll get along all right.”

“Never!” said Laura dramatically. “I am with you to the death!”

“Don’t be silly!” cried Billie. “Please go on, girls. It won’t do me a bit of good for you all to get into trouble.”

“We will never leave you until death – or Debsy – do us part,” chuckled Vi. “You’d better save your breath, Billie. You will need it for this last wild dash up the hill.”

By the time they reached the Hall Billie was painfully out of breath and aching in every muscle.

“You go on – in,” she gasped. “I’ve got to – wash up a little – and change my dress. I’m a sight.”

“We’ll help you,” decided Laura.

Despite Billie’s protests, her two chums rushed her up the stairs to the dormitory. There Vi ran water into a bowl while Laura invaded the closet to get down a fresh frock.