CHAPTER VIII
AN INVITATION
The girls could never have told exactly why, but they kept the mystery ofthe album and Miss Arbuckle's strange actions to themselves, with oneexception.
They did confide their secret to fluffy-haired, blue-eyed Connie Danvers.For they had long ago adopted Connie as one of themselves and werebeginning to feel that they had known her all their lives.
Connie had been interested enough in their story to satisfy even thechums and had urged Billie to describe the pretty children in the albumover whom Miss Arbuckle had cried.
Billie tried, but, having seen the pictures but once, it was hardly to beexpected that she would be able to give the girls a very cleardescription of them.
It was good enough to satisfy Connie, however, who, in her enthusiasm,went so far as to suggest that they form a Detective Club.
This the girls might have done if it had not been for an interruption inthe form of Chet Bradley, Teddy Jordon and their chum, Ferd Stowing.
The boys had entered Boxton Military Academy at the time the girls hadentered Three Towers Hall, and the boys were as enthusiastic about theiracademy as the girls were about their beloved school.
The head of Boxton Military Academy was Captain Shelling, a splendidexample of army officer whom all the students loved and admired. They didnot know it, but there was not one of the boys in the school who did nothope that some day he might be like Captain Shelling.
Now, as the spring term was drawing to a close, there were greatpreparations being made at the Academy for the annual parade of cadets.
The girls knew that visitors were allowed, and they were beginning towonder a little uneasily whether they were to be invited or not when oneafternoon the boys turned up and settled the question for them verysatisfactorily.
It was Saturday afternoon, just a week after the finding of MissArbuckle's album, and the girls, Laura, Billie, Vi and Connie, werewandering arm in arm about the beautiful campus of Three Towers Hall whena familiar hail came to them from the direction of the road.
"It's Chet," said Billie.
"No, it isn't--it's Teddy," contradicted Laura.
"It's both of 'em," added Vi.
"No, you are both wrong," said Connie, gazing eagerly through the trees."Here they come, girls. Look, there are four of them."
"Yes, there are four of them," mocked Laura, mischievous eyes on Connie'sreddening face. "The third is Ferd Stowing, of course. And I wonder, oh,I wonder, who the fourth can be!"
"Don't be so silly! I think you're horrid!" cried Connie, which only madeLaura chuckle the more.
For while they had been at the Academy, the boys had made a friend. Hisname was Paul Martinson, and he was tall and strongly built and--yes,even Billie had to admit it--almost as good looking as Teddy!
If Billie said that about any one it was pretty sure to be true. ForBillie and Teddy Jordon had been chums and playmates since they couldremember, and Billie had always been sure that Teddy must be the verybest looking boy in the world, not even excepting her brother Chet, ofwhom she was very fond.
But Billie was not the only one who had found Paul Martinson goodlooking. Connie had liked him, and had said innocently one day after theboys had gone that Paul Martinson looked like the hero in a story bookshe was reading.
The girls had giggled, and since then Laura had made poor Connie's lifemiserable--or so Connie declared. She could not have forgotten PaulMartinson, even if she had wanted to.
As for Paul Martinson, he had shown a liking for Billie that somehow madeTeddy uncomfortable. Teddy was very much surprised to find howuncomfortable it did make him. Billie was a "good little chum and allthat, but that didn't say that another fellow couldn't speak to her." Butjust the same he had acted so queerly two or three times lately thatBillie had bothered him exceedingly asking him what the matter with himwas and telling him to "cheer up, it wasn't somebody's funeral, youknow." Billie had been puzzled over his answer to that. He had mutteredsomething about "it's not anybody's funeral yet, maybe, but everythinghad to start sometime."
When Billie had innocently told Laura about it she was still more puzzledat the way Laura had acted. Instead of being sensible, she had suddenlyburied her face in the pillow--they had been sitting on Billie's bed,exchanging confidences--and fairly shook with laughter.
"Well, what in the world----" Billie had begun rather resentfully, whenLaura had interrupted her with an hysterical: "For goodness sake, Billie,I never thought you could be so dense. But you are. You're absolutelycrazy, and so is Teddy, and so is everybody!"
And after that Billie never confided any of Teddy's sayings to Lauraagain.
On this particular afternoon it did not take the girls long to find outthat the boys had some good news to tell them.
"Come on down to the dock," Teddy said, taking hold of Billie's arm andurging her down toward the lake as he spoke. "Maybe we can find somecanoes and rowboats that aren't working."
But when they reached the dock there was never a craft of any kind to beseen except those far out upon the glistening water of the lake. Ofcourse the beautiful weather was responsible for this, for all the girlswho had not lessons to do or errands in town had made a bee line--as FerdStowing expressed it--straight down to the lake.
"Oh, well, this will do," said Teddy, sitting down on the edge of thelittle dock so that his feet could hang over and reaching up a hand forBillie. "Come along, everybody. We can look at the water, anyway."
The girls and boys scrambled down obediently and there was greatexcitement when Connie's foot slipped and she very nearly tumbled intothe lake. Paul Martinson steadied her, and she thanked him with a littleblush that made Laura look at her wickedly.
"How beautifully pink your complexion is in the warm weather, Connie,"she said innocently, adding with a little look that made Connie want toshake her: "It can't be anything _but_ the heat, can it? You haven't afever, or something?"
"No. But you'll have something beside a fever," threatened Connie, "ifyou don't keep still."
"Say, stop your rowing, girls, and listen to me," Teddy interrupted,picking a pebble from the dock and throwing it far out into the gleamingwater, where it dropped with a little splash. "Our famous parade ofcadets comes off next week. You're going to be on deck, aren't you?"
"We might," said Billie, with a demure little glance at him, "if somebodywould only ask us!"