“And of course,” drawled Laura Polk, she
of the irrepressible spirits and what Mrs. Cupp called
“flamboyant” hair, “she will come
riding up to the Hall on her trusty pinto pony (whatever
kind of pony that is), with a gun at her belt and
swinging a lariat. She will yell for Dr. Beulah
to come forth, and the minute the darling appears
this Rude Rhoda from the Rolling Prairie will proceed
to rope our dear preceptress and bear her off captive
to her lair—”
“My—goodness—gracious—Agnes!”
exclaimed Amelia Boggs, more frequently addressed
as ‘Procrastination Boggs’, “you
are getting your metaphors dreadfully mixed.
It is a four-legged beast of prey that bears its victim
away to its ‘lair.’”
“How do you know Rollicking Rhoda from Crimson
Gulch hasn’t four legs?” demanded the
red-haired girl earnestly. “You know very
well from what we see in the movies that there are
more wonders in the ‘Wild and Woolly West’
than are dreamed of in your philosophy, Horatio-Amelia.”
“One thing I say,” said a very much overdressed
girl who had evidently just arrived, for she had not
removed her furs and coat, and was warming herself
before the open fire in the beautiful reception hall
where this conversation was going on, “I think
Lakeview Hall is getting to be dreadfully common, when
all sorts and conditions of girls are allowed to come
here.”
“Oh, I guess this Rhododendron-girl from Dead
Man’s Den has money enough to suit even you,
Linda,” Laura Polk said carelessly.
“Money isn’t everything, I hope,”
said the girl in furs, tossing her head.
“Hear! Hear!” exclaimed Laura, and
some of the other girls laughed. “Linda’s
had a change of heart.”
“Dear me!” sniffed Linda Riggs, “how
smart you are, Polk. Just as though I was not
used to anything but money—”
“True. You are. But you have never
talked about much of anything else before this particular
occasion,” said the red-haired girl. “What
has happened to you, Linda mine, since you separated
from us all at the beginning of the winter holidays?”
Linda merely sniffed again and turned to speak to
her particular chum, Cora Courtney.
“You should have been with me in Chicago, Cora—at
my cousin, Pearl Graves’, house. I tried
to get Pearl—she’s just about our
age—to come to Lakeview Hall; but she goes
to a private school right in her neighborhood—oh!
a very select place. No girl like this
wild Western person Polk is talking about, would be
received there. No, indeed!”
“Hi, Linda!” broke in the irrepressible
red-haired girl, “why didn’t you try to
enter that wonderful school?”
“I did ask to. But my father is so
old-fashioned,” complained Linda. “He
would not hear of it. Said it would not be treating
Dr. Beulah right.”
“Oh, oh!” groaned Laura. “How
the dear doctor would have suffered, Linda, if you
had not come back to her sheltering arms.”
