CHAPTER VI DEBBIE DESERTS

CHAPTER VI

DEBBIE DESERTS

Billy Bradley really tried to be cheerful in the days that followed, but try as she would she could not altogether keep out the vision of Three Towers Hall, the boarding school to which she had wanted to go ever since--well, almost since she had wanted anything.

Laura and Violet would go without her. They would have to go, even in spite of their loyal determination not to. Their parents would have something to say about that.

And Chet was in just as bad a fix, for Boxton Military Academy had been his dream even as Three Towers Hall had been Billie's. Oh, if only they could all go what a wonderful time they could have! Oh, well--

And Mr. and Mrs. Bradley, sensing something of all this, were very unhappy and cast about desperately for some way to give their boy and girl the advantages that the others would have. But money was very tight. Mr. Bradley had all his cash tied up in several real estate transactions.

So for a little while the Bradleys were not a happy family--although they tried bravely not to show it, even to each other.

Then one morning came a long, businesslike envelope, with a typewritten address, that caused a stir in the family circle.

Mrs. Bradley opened it with a puzzled frown between her brows, then uttered a startled exclamation.

"What is it, dear?" asked Mr. Bradley, while Billie and Chet crowded closer to her chair.

"Aunt Beatrice Powerson is dead," Mrs. Bradley announced with a look more of shocked surprise than of grief. "She died in Canada quite suddenly, and this is from her attorney asking us," she looked across at her husband, "to be present at the reading of the will."

"Well, well," said Mr. Bradley slowly, "poor Beatrice Powerson dead at last. I suppose she got as much out of life as any of us, though, in her eccentric way."

"It was strange," remarked Billie slowly, "that I should have been speaking of Aunt Beatrice only the other day. Violet wanted to know if she was wealthy."

"Was she, Dad?" asked Chet, with interest.

"I imagine nobody knew," his father answered. "As you know, she was queer, and as tight as a clam when it came to talking about her personal affairs. The only thing we're sure of is that she had plenty of money to travel anywhere she wanted to, and that's saying something these days."

"I say, Billie," cried Chet, his eyes shining with the thought--dear, unselfish Chet, his first hope even then was more for Billie than himself, "you are Aunt Beatrice's namesake, you know. Maybe she left you something in her will."

"Chet," his mother chided gently, "don't you think it is rather heartless to be counting on what Aunt Beatrice has left when we have just heard of her death?"

"I suppose so," said Chet, rather abashed. "But then you know we only saw her about once in every three years, and then she wasn't very friendly."

"Are you really going, Mother, you and Dad?" asked Billie, for it seemed impossible to her that her father and mother should go off on such a long journey and leave her and Chet behind. "Are you?" she asked again anxiously.

"Yes, I suppose we must," said Mrs. Bradley, looking across at her husband, who answered her with a smile.

"I don't see what else we can do," he replied, as he looked at his young daughter. "You can keep house while we're gone, Billie, just to see how you like it."

"Me keep house!" cried Billie, dismayed. "Why, I don't know the first thing about it!"

"That's the best way to learn," returned her father, while Mrs. Bradley began to smile. "Experience is the very best teacher, you know."

"That's all right, but you don't seem to realize that she will be learning at my expense," groaned Chet, adding as a horrible thought struck him: "Billie won't have to cook anything, will she?"

"Of course not," laughed Mrs. Bradley, and Chet sighed with relief. "Debbie will be here as usual to do the cooking. And, of course," she added to Billie, putting an arm about her and drawing her close, "Debbie will help you with anything you want to know. We probably won't be gone more than a week, anyway."

So it was arranged, and a couple of days later, with a wildly beating heart and a rueful smile upon her lips, Billie stood with Chet upon the station platform and waved good-bye to her father and mother.

When the train had rounded the curve and disappeared with one last challenging blast of the whistle, Billie and Chet turned to each other, feeling as lost and forlorn as the babes in the wood.

"Now, what do we do next?" breathed Billie, breaking the silence at last. "I feel helpless, Chet."

"Well, I don't think you have anything on me," admitted Chet slangily. "I suppose the most sensible thing to do would be to go home and see how Debbie is getting on with the lunch."

"Goodness, that's the first time I ever had to be reminded that I was hungry," said Billie, and with that they laughed and felt more natural.

The rest of that day went off beautifully, and Billie was beginning to feel very confident when suddenly Debbie threw a suggestion bomb-like in the midst of her contentment.

"I hate to bother you, miss," said the black cook, approaching her mistress the next morning--Billie, by the way, was busily dusting the living-room with a very becoming dust cap perched on top of her pretty hair, "but this is mah day out."

"Your--day--out!" gasped Billie, sitting down hard on the chair she had been dusting and regarding Debbie's black face with dismay. "You never can mean that you are going to desert me, Debbie? Leave me to do all the cooking and--and--everything--" The awful vision was too much for her and her voice died down to a whisper.

"I'm tur'ble sorry, Miss Billie," said Debbie, gently but very, very firmly, "but mah young man and me we has a mos' awful impo'tant in-gagement fo' dis aft'noon, an' I couldn't break it--no'm, much as I want to." She added that last in the evident hope of appeasing her young mistress, who was still regarding her with horrified eyes.

"But, Debbie," gasped Billie when she could find her voice, "I don't know a thing in the world about cooking. Have you--have you--ordered anything?"

"Yas, indeed," Debbie assured her, going on to explain that the meal was virtually prepared anyway. "I done made a salad for you and Chet, an' the butter beans am in de pan. Dere is some stew too, which all you has to do is to warm up, Miss Billie. An' I done make a big peach pie, an' dere's some whipped cream in de 'frig'rater. So I reckons you-all won't starve to death," she added, with a broad smile that showed all her strong white teeth back to the last molar.

As for Billie, she could have hugged the mountainous black figure in the relief she felt. Why, with the dinner all prepared like this it would be just a lark to put it on the table--for just her and Chet alone.

"Debbie, you're a darling and I love you!" she cried, joyfully. "But you know you really shouldn't have scared me so--it wasn't fair."

For answer Debbie grinned again and began to get her bulky figure up the stairs, preparatory to dressing for the "in-gagement" with her "young man."

Billie watched her go, and then with a little chuckle resumed her dusting.

"I'd like to see Debbie's young man," she mused, a smile twisting the corners of her mouth. "He ought to be a giant. Anyway, I feel sorry for him if he isn't. Dear funny old Debbie--won't Chet and I have a picnic to-night?"

And as she had predicted, they did have the time of their lives. Chet refused to sit in the dining-room in lonely state, and in masterly fashion invaded the kitchen.

"Say, that smells good, Billie, old girl," and he sniffed hungrily at the stew. "Give me an apron and I'll help."

"Oh, look who wants to help," cried Billie, finding an apron nevertheless and tying it around his waist so that he looked like a butcher's assistant. "You will probably only get under my feet and bother me to death, but I suppose I'll have to humor you. There, if you must do something, set the table."

Now Chet did not want to set the table--it took him too far from the appetizing aromas in the kitchen. However, he obeyed grumblingly and was finally rewarded by being given a steaming dish of stew to carry in.

"Chet," screamed Billie, following him in and checking him just as he was in the act of putting the hot dish on the tablecloth, "put a protector under it. Don't you know," as Chet started and looked reproachfully at her, "that you are apt to ruin the table? And it's almost a brand new one at that."

"Well, you needn't scare a fellow to death," grumbled Chet. "I thought I'd stepped on the cat." But he obeyed instructions.

"My! but doesn't everything look good?" cried Billie, sniffing hungrily. "Hurry up, Chet, take off your apron and dish up the stew while I pour the coffee. What do you know about that? _I_ made the coffee. And doesn't it smell good?"

It was the jolliest of meals and finished up in royal fashion with the peach pie and whipped cream.

In a very gale of merriment Chet and Billie cleared away the dinner dishes, and then, being tired by the unusual exertion, decided to go early to bed.

For the first part of the night Billie slept soundly, but just as the clock downstairs was striking two, she awakened suddenly and lay still in bed listening. She was frightened, though she could not have told why.

Rigidly she lay there hardly daring to breathe.

“One work. Many languages. One reading experience.”