Betsy’s mother came to the door again.
“A little less noise would be very good,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Betsy.
But it was such fun putting stones in their bags. They grew naughtier and naughtier.
Tacy picked a bouquet of her mother’s zinnias. Betsy filled the pockets of her red plaid dress with mud. Tib jumped into the seat of the baker’s wagon, which was standing in front of Mrs. Benson’s house while the baker’s boy offered his tray of jelly rolls and doughnuts at Mrs. Benson’s back door. She took up the reins and took up the whip and pretended she was going to drive off. She scared the baker’s boy almost to death.
Betsy’s mother came to the door again and said that she thought they were possessed. Tacy’s mother came to her door and told Tacy to be a good girl. And Tib’s mother would have come to her door too, only Tib’s house was so far away that her mother didn’t know a thing about what was going on.
The bags on their chests grew bigger and bigger. At last they were almost full.
Tacy sat down on the hitching block, red-faced from laughing.
“Gol darn!” she said distinctly.
“Tacy!” cried Betsy. “That’s swearing. That earns you three stones.”
Tacy was proud to be the first to get three stones. The three stones filled her bag.
Betsy looked around for something she could do to earn three stones. She saw her mother’s golf cape airing on the line, and she took it down and put it on and walked to the corner and back.
“That earns me three stones too,” she said, taking it off quickly.
“I know how I can earn three stones,” cried Tib. “Just watch me!”
She ran out into Betsy’s father’s garden and began to pick tomatoes.
“That’s three stones all right,” said Betsy, when Tib returned with the red tomatoes in her skirt.
Now all this time Margaret and Hobbie had been just as bad as they knew how. They had screamed and yelled and kicked and jumped, but no one had given them a single stone. Perhaps Margaret and Hobbie thought that they hadn’t been bad enough. Or perhaps they just liked the looks of the ripe red tomatoes. At any rate Hobbie took a tomato and threw it at Margaret.
Margaret was delighted when the soft tomato broke in a big red splotch on her dress. She threw one at Hobbie. Hobbie threw one at Tacy and Margaret threw one at Betsy and they both threw one at Tib.
“’tone! ’tone!” cried Hobbie, smearing tomato into his pale yellow hair.
“’tone! ’tone!” shrieked Margaret, rubbing the red juice into her chubby cheeks.
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” cried Betsy and Tacy and Tib. Betsy’s mother came out just then. And after that the Club wasn’t much fun for a while. Betsy and Margaret were motioned into the house in a terrible silence, and the door closed behind them. Tacy was called home, and the door closed behind her too. And Tib took Hobbie home, but she cleaned him up first, the best she could, at Tacy’s pump.
Down on the back fence behind Tacy’s barn that night, Betsy, Tacy and Tib counted their stones. Tib had the most. But when they were counted she threw them away.
“I think,” she said, “that we’d better use these bags for marbles again. We seem to get into trouble when we tie things around our necks.”
“That’s right. We do,” said Tacy. And she threw away her stones too.
“Maybe we’d better change our Club a little,” Tacy said, “have our meetings up on the Big Hill.”
“Have refreshments,” said Tib.
“Take lunch baskets up,” said Tacy.
“And a stick and a package, maybe,” said Tib.
“What do you think, Betsy?” Tacy asked. For Betsy had not yet thrown away her stones. She was looking up at the western sky where a pale green lake was surrounded by peach-colored mountains, distant and mysterious.
“All right,” said Betsy, and she threw away her stones. “But of course we must keep on being good.”
“Oh, of course!” said Tacy.
“That’s what our Club is for,” added Betsy.
“It’s a Being Good Club,” Tacy said.
“Well, it didn’t make us good today,” said Tib. “It made us bad.”
Neither Betsy nor Tacy would have mentioned that. But they didn’t mind Tib’s mentioning it. They understood Tib.
In silence the three of them looked at the sunset and thought about God.
9
The Secret Lane
ROM THAT time on T.C.K.C. meetings were held on the Big Hill. Every Tuesday Julia and Katie went up on the Big Hill for a meeting of their B.H.M. Club. And every Tuesday Betsy and Tacy and Tib climbed the hill for T.C.K.C. meetings. Yet not once had Betsy and Tacy and Tib caught a glimpse of Julia and Katie. That shows how big the Big Hill was.
Betsy and Tacy and Tib did different things at their meetings…. They always took a picnic lunch, of course; but they didn’t take a stick and a package, for they didn’t know what Julia and Katie did at their Club with a stick and a package. They couldn’t imagine. Sometimes Betsy and Tacy and Tib called on Mrs. Ekstrom and laughed about that day when they had pretended they were beggars. And sometimes they turned left at the top of the hill and walked to that lofty rim from which they had a view over the town and the river. But one day they turned right.
Here the Big Hill stretched away to the south. Flat and grassy and dotted with trees, the top of the Big Hill stretched to they didn’t know where. Betsy and Tacy and Tib decided to walk in that direction. They walked and they walked and they walked.
They were carrying a picnic basket; and although they took turns carrying it, it grew heavy at last. The day was warm and they were almost ready to stop and eat their lunch beneath the shade of the trees when Tib made a discovery.
“Look!” she said. “These trees aren’t just scattered every which way any more.”
“They’re going in two rows,” said Tacy.
“It’s a lane!” cried Betsy. She stopped still. They all stopped, and they looked before and behind them.
Sure enough, it was a lane. The trees were no longer scattered oaks and elms and maples; they were all beech trees and they were planted in two rows. The rows ran as straight as though they had been laid down with a ruler. They ran like two lines of marching soldiers … where?
“Where do you suppose this lane leads to?” Tacy asked.
“There isn’t any house up on the Big Hill, except the Ekstroms’,” Tib said.
Betsy peered down the mysterious shadowy lane.
“Maybe Aunt Dolly lives up here,” she said.
“Oh no,” said Tib. “She lives in Milwaukee.”
“She used to live in Milwaukee,” said Tacy. “That doesn’t mean she will live there forever.”
“Well, she lives in Milwaukee now,” said Tib. “Because my mamma had a letter from her. She’s coming to visit us.”
“What?” cried Betsy.
“You never told us!” cried Tacy.
“I was going to tell you,” said Tib. “But this Aunt Dolly who’s coming to visit us … she’s just Aunt Dolly. She doesn’t live in a mirror or up in the sky or here in this lane or anything. Does she, Betsy?” Tib looked puzzled.
“Wait and see,” said Betsy. “When’s she coming?”
“Next week,” said Tib.
“Tib!” cried Betsy and Tacy.
They could hardly believe their good luck.
“We can see her!” cried Betsy.
“We’ll come over and peek,” said Tacy.
“Oh, I’ll invite you in,” said Tib. “You can come in and talk to her.”
“I’d be scared to,” said Tacy.
“Why, she’s very nice,” said Tib. “Would you be scared, Betsy?”
“Yes, a little,” Betsy said.
“I don’t see why,” said Tib.
“Well,” said Betsy. “Let’s investigate this lane. And then we can talk some more.”
The lane was like a tunnel, green and dim. No c
lover or butter-and-eggs or daisies grew beneath the beeches. Tacy found some clammy Indian pipes but mostly the grass was empty now. There were traces of a path.
“There’s a path here,” Betsy said.
“There used to be,” said Tib. “But nobody uses it much any more.”
“I wonder why not,” said Tacy. She said it in a whisper.
“It’s leading to something,” said Tib excitedly.
“It’s so stately,” said Betsy looking overhead. “It seems as though it should lead to a Palace.”
“It’s scary,” whispered Tacy. “I’m almost scared to go on.”
Betsy was scared too, but she wouldn’t admit it. Tib wasn’t scared though. Tib was tiny but she was never scared.
“Come on,” she said. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.” And she flew ahead like a little yellow feather. Betsy and Tacy followed, and they came to the end of the lane.
At the end of the lane was the beginning of a house. Just the foundation walls of a house, and it seemed to have been built a long time ago. Tall woolly mullein stalks and blue vervain and sunflowers crowded around the low stone wall which was crumbling and falling away.
“Who do you suppose started that house?” asked Betsy, staring at it.
“And why didn’t they finish it?” asked Tacy.
“I’ll ask my father,” said Tib. “He knows all about houses.”
“Oh, no!” cried Betsy. “Let’s have this for a secret. We’ll call it the Secret Lane.”
“We’ll say S.L.,” said Tacy, “so no one will know what we mean.”
“If anyone asks us where we’ve been today, we’ll say we’ve been to the S.L.,” said Tib, dancing about in delight.
“And sometimes we’ll say, ‘Let’s go up to the S.L.,’” said Tacy.
“We’ll drive Julia and Katie nearly crazy,” Betsy said.
And they all began to laugh, and they scrambled up on the wall. Tib started to walk around it.
“Don’t do that, Tib,” said Betsy. “These stones are pretty wiggly.”
“And this cellar’s deep,” said Tacy, looking down into the weed-grown soggy place.
But Tib didn’t listen to them, and she didn’t fall either. She ran on light toes to the back of the cellar wall. When she got there she turned around and came back, so swiftly, so eagerly, that Betsy and Tacy knew she had news.
“Ssh! Ssh!” she said as they drew near.
“What is it?” whispered Betsy and Tacy.
“Just wait ’til you see,” Tib replied.
“Do we have to walk on the wall?” asked Betsy.
“No,” said Tib. “We can go this way.” And she took hold of their hands.
She led them softly around to the back of the house. Reddening sumac bushes crowded close, almost concealing the wall. Tib motioned Betsy and Tacy to pause. They hid themselves in the bushes.
At the back of the house a wing jutted out. A plum tree shaded a little square of ground. And there beneath the plum tree, which was covered with small red balls, sat Julia and Katie.
A fringed blue and white cloth was spread out on the grass. And each girl had a hard-boiled egg in front of her, and a sandwich, and a chunk of cake. Stuck up beside them was a stick and on the stick was a big square card, the same size and shape as that package they always carried to their meetings. It was lettered in large red letters:
BIG HILL MYSTERY CLUB
“Big Hill Mystery! That’s B.H.M.” Betsy whispered. Tacy and Tib nodded excitedly.
Julia and Katie peeled and salted their eggs. They were having a very serious conversation. They were talking about what they would be when they grew up. Julia thought she would be an opera singer, and Katie thought she would be a nurse.
“Either a nurse or a …” began Katie. But just then Betsy moved, and a branch crackled.
“Ssh!” said Julia. “What’s that I hear?”
She and Katie looked around.
Behind the sumac bushes Betsy and Tacy and Tib hardly dared to breathe. They scrunched down and waited until Julia and Katie had turned back to their lunch. Then they put their fingers to their lips and pointed to the front of the house. Saying “Ssh! Ssh! Ssh!” and lifting their feet very high, they crept away.
Back in the Secret Lane they hugged one another for joy.
“We know their secret,” Betsy said.
“We know where their Club meets,” Tacy added.
“We know what B.H.M. means,” cried Tib.
They jumped and danced … but softly.
“Where shall we eat our lunch?” asked Tacy.
“Right here,” said Betsy. “And when they come out from their Club they will see us, and they’ll know that we know where their Club meets.”
So they sat down and spread out a red and white fringed cloth; and a hard-boiled egg apiece, and a sandwich apiece, and a chunk of cake apiece.
“What’s that noise I hear?” asked Tacy as they peeled and salted their eggs.
“Nothing,” said Betsy. “They wouldn’t be through with their lunch. Let’s print the name of our Club on a card and stick it up whenever we meet.”
“The Christian Kindness Club! It would look fine,” Tacy said.
“I’ll print it,” said Tib.
While they ate their lunch they had a very serious conversation.
“What shall we do when we grow up?” asked Betsy.
“I’m going to get married and have babies,” said Tacy without even thinking.
“I’m going to be a dancer,” said Tib, “or else an architect. I haven’t made up my mind.”
“I’m going to be an author,” said Betsy. “And I’m going to look exactly like Aunt Dolly.”
“You’ll have to get different colored hair,” said Tib.
“I know it,” said Betsy. “But people do.”
“Ssh! Ssh! I hear something,” Tacy said.
This time Betsy and Tib heard it too. And they caught the flash of red and blue dresses around the corner of the wall.
“We see you!” they cried, jumping up.
Julia and Katie started to run, and Betsy and Tacy and Tib started to chase them. Tib remembered, though, to pick up the basket and the red and white fringed cloth.
They chased Julia and Katie through the Secret Lane and past Mrs. Ekstrom’s house and down the Big Hill. Nobody caught anybody but it was very exciting. Shouting, feet pounding, skirts flying, they ran into Betsy’s yard.
Betsy’s mother was sitting there with Margaret playing beside her.
“Mercy! What’s the matter?” she asked, as they dropped in a heap of waving arms and legs.
“We know where your B.H.M. Club meets!” shouted Betsy, Tacy and Tib.
“We know where your T.C.K.C. meets,” Julia and Katie shouted back.
“Big Hill Mystery!” yelled Betsy, Tacy and Tib.
“The Christian Kindness Club!” yelled Julia and Katie.
“You see,” said Tacy to Betsy and Tib, “I told you someone was there.”
Betsy’s mother took Margaret on her lap to be out of the way of the waving arms and legs.
“I have a suggestion to make,” she said, smiling. “Since you know all about one another’s clubs, and since they both meet up on the Big Hill, why don’t you have your meetings together?”
“Together!” cried Julia and Katie and Betsy and Tacy and Tib.
“Go up on the Big Hill together and eat your picnics together. I think it would be fun,” Betsy’s mother said.
Julia and Katie looked at each other in horror, and Betsy and Tacy and Tib exchanged horrified glances too.
Wasn’t that just like a grown-up, thought Betsy, to think that that would be fun?
“You think it over,” said Betsy’s mother, smiling.
“Yes ma’am,” said Julia and Katie and Betsy and Tacy and Tib.
And they thought it over. But the B.H.M. and the T.C.K.C. never met together. Not once.
10
Aunt Dolly
AUNT
DOLLY’S train was to reach Deep Valley at night. Betsy and Tacy would be in bed and asleep when she arrived. They wanted to be at Tib’s house early the next morning. So they worked out a plan.
That night when Tacy went to bed, she was to tie a string to her big toe. She was to let the string hang out the window. In the morning Betsy would come over and pull the string to wake her up.
“But maybe you won’t wake up first, Betsy,” Tacy said as she and Betsy climbed the stairs to the little room Tacy shared with Katie.
“That’s right,” said Betsy. “Maybe I won’t. Maybe we’d better tie a string to my toe too.”
So after they had poked a string … with a stone on one end to make it fall to the ground … through a hole in the screen, and tied the other end of the string to the bedpost, awaiting night and Tacy’s toe, they crossed the street to Betsy’s house. They climbed the stairs to the little room Betsy shared with Julia and poked a string through a hole in that screen and tied the other end to a post of that bed, awaiting night and Betsy’s toe. And that night Julia and Katie helped them tie the strings to their big toes. (Julia and Katie were nice sometimes.)
But, as it happened, neither string got pulled.
Tacy had bad dreams and twisted and turned in the night so that the string was wound around her leg and Betsy would have had to stand on stilts to reach it. And Betsy’s string came off her toe in the night. But both of them woke up early just the same. They met in the middle of the road.
It was very early; the sky was the color of Betsy’s mother’s opal ring. The air was cold, and up on the Hill Street Hill where Betsy and Tacy went to pick flowers for Aunt Dolly, the grass was wet with dew. When their arms were full of goldenrod and bright purple asters, they went down to Hill Street and sat on Tacy’s hitching block. It was too early yet to go to Tib’s.
“I imagine she’ll be beautiful,” said Tacy.
“Of course she will,” said Betsy. “Remember how her picture looked?”
“It looked like a grown-up doll,” said Tacy.
The sun came up higher and higher, and the sky turned a bright gay blue. Smoke began to pour from chimneys, and Grandpa Williams came out to mow his lawn.