The Girls of Central High on Track and Field

CHAPTER XVIII – THE CONSCIENCE OF PRETTYMAN SWEET

Prettyman Sweet would never have played such a contemptible trick on Bobby Hargrew and her comrades had he not been goaded to it by Lily Pendleton. Purt had what the girls called “a dreadful crush” on Lily, and she had made fun of him because he took Bobby’s jokes so tamely.

“If you had a spark of pluck you’d get square with that Hargrew girl,” Lily Pendleton had told him, and Purt thought that he was getting square with Bobby and her friends when he turned the key in the lock at the foot of the tower stairs.

At first as he ran out of the school building into the rain that was still falling a little, his only fear was that he had been seen by somebody. But once away from the school building he began to giggle over the joke he had played on the girls.

“They won’t laugh at me so much next time,” he thought.

And then he remembered, with something of a shock, that he could not afford to tell anybody about what he had done. If he owned up to having locked the girls into the tower, he knew very well what would happen to him.

If Chet Belding, or Lance Darby, did not get hold of him, one of the other boys would most certainly take him to task for the trick. And Purt Sweet was no fighter.

He wouldn’t get much fun out of the trick he had played on the girls, after all! Now he wished he had not done it. What was the fun, when he had to keep it a secret?

So Purt continued on this way home with lagging feet. And every yard, the possibilities that might follow his trick grew plainer in his mind. He saw, as he went on, that instead of having done something to create a laugh, he might have been guilty of an act that would start a whole lot’ of trouble.

He knew, as well as did the girls shut up in the tower, that old John, the janitor, would go home to supper soon. And at this time of year, when there were no fires to see to, except the hot water heater, the old man might not come back at all.

For, as far as Purt knew, there were no meetings in the building that evening. At least, he had heard none announced. The girls were likely to be left in the tower until the next day, while their friends were searching the city for them.

Purt went into the square, from which point he could gaze up at the tower. But it was so far away, and so tall, that he could see nothing at the narrow slits of windows up there at the top.

“If – if those girls waved a handkerchief out of the openings, nobody could see it down here,” thought the conscience-stricken youth.

He had never been up in the tower himself, for it was forbidden territory. So he did not know how wide the windows were. It just struck home to Master Purt Sweet that the girls would be unable to signal their situation to anybody.

But he had reached home before these thoughts so troubled him that he felt as though he must undo what he had done. Perhaps John had not gone home yet. He might still be able to get into the building, creep upstairs, unlock the door of the tower, and then run out before the girls could catch and identify him.

For Purt had a very strong desire not to be suspected in this matter. Chet Belding would take up cudgels for his sister in a minute; and Chet would, Purt was sure, thrash him most soundly!

Any of the teachers would have a pass-key to the building. Purt remembered that fact, too. Could he prevail upon one of them to lend him a key so that he could go into the building? Of course, he must have some good excuse, and he feared to appear before Professor Dimp with any such request unless he could back it with sound reason. And Mr. Sharp was entirely out of the question. Purt knew that the principal of Central. High would see right through him instantly.

As for the lady teachers, Purt was more afraid of them than of Mr. Dimp and the principal. As it grew dark the boy sat cowering in his room at home, from the window of which he could see dimly the outlines of the schoolhouse tower, and he wept a few tears.

He would have given a good deal had he not turned the key in that lock!

Purt didn’t feel that he could appear at the dinner table; so he gave an excuse to his mother’s maid, and went out again. Perhaps somebody had discovered the girls up in the tower and released them. He walked up Whiffle Street and saw Chet Belding hanging over the front gate.

“Hullo, Purt!” exclaimed the big fellow. “What’s doing?”

“No – nothing,” stammered Purt.

“Well, don’t be so scared about it. What’s got you now?”

“No – nothing,” stammered Purt again.

“Haven’t seen Lance, have you?”

“No.”

“Nor the girls?”

The question scared Purt Sweet through and through. But he plucked up courage to ask:

“How should I know anything about them? Hasn’t your sister come home yet?”

“No. Down to that gym., I expect. Say, these girls are getting altogether too athletic. Didn’t see Jess, either, did you?”

Purt shook his head and went on. He was afraid to stop longer with Chet – afraid that the latter would learn something about what he had done. It did seem to the culprit as though knowledge of the trick played on Laura Belding and her friends stuck out all over him.

It was deep dusk now. Purt came within a block of the school building and looked slily about the corners, as though he were bent on mischief, instead of desirous of undoing the mischief he had already done.

Had old John gone home yet? Would all the lower doors of Central High be locked? These were the questions that puzzled him.

Purt ran into the side gate of the boys’ recreation ground and fumbled at the basement door, by which he knew the janitor usually left. It was locked; yet, as he rattled the knob, he thought he heard an answering sound within.

He scuttled away to the corner and there waited to watch the door. Nobody came out.

After half a minute of uncertainty the lad crept on to the boys’ entrance. The outside doors were closed and locked. He ran around to the street and entered the girls’ yard. The outer vestibule door was opened here and he ventured in, creeping along in the darkness and fumbling for the doorknob.

And just then Purt Sweet got the scare of his life. A strong hand clasped his wrist and a sharp voice demanded:

“What do you want here? Are you waiting for those girls, too?”

“Oh, dear me!” gasped Prettyman Sweet, his knees trembling. “Now I’m in a fix, sure enough!”

CHAPTER XIX – MARGIT AND MISS CARRINGTON MEET

It was several seconds before Purt realized just what manner of person had seized him by the arm in the vestibule at the girls’ entrance of Central High. It was so dark that Purt only knew it was a girl.

“Who – who are you?” he stammered.

“Oh! It’s only a boy,” said the girl, in a tone of disgust. “What do you want here?”

“I – I was trying to get in,” murmured Purt.

“What for? Isn’t this the girls’ entrance? They told me it was.”

Then Purt knew that she did not belong at Central High. Indeed, she was a different kind of girl from any the youth had ever met.

“Who are you, and what do you want?” asked Purt, plucking up courage. “I guess you don’t go to Central High.”

“I never went to any school – not like this, anyway.”

“But what do you want here? I – I left something in the building and wanted to get back and find it,” stammered Purt.

“I was waiting to see those girls,” said the stranger.

“What girls?” demanded the boy, in a panic again.

“Some that I know. I waited and watched down by that place where they play – ”

“The athletic field?” suggested Purt.

“Perhaps. And I asked another girl. She said they had not come down from the school yet. They were kept in. So I came up here – ”

“Who were the girls you want to see?”

“One is named Evangeline, and she-comes from Switzerland. I am Austrian myself. And there is another girl – a little girl who always laughs. Her name is like a boy’s name.”

“Bobby Hargrew,” said Purt, with a stifled groan. “And neither of those girls have come out of the building yet?”

“No,” said the girl. “I have watched and waited for more than an hour.”

Purt rattled the knob of the inner door desperately; but it was locked and evidently there was nobody within to hear him.

“They must be away upstairs and cannot hear you,” said the strange girl.

And that scared Purt, too. It seemed to him that this girl must know just what he had done to those girls whom she was waiting for. He started to leave the vestibule.

“Hold on! Isn’t there any other door we can get in by?” asked the stranger.

“I’m – I’m going to try the main entrance. Perhaps that is unlocked,” Purt replied.

“I’ll go with you,” volunteered the other, and followed him down the steps.

Purt wanted to get rid of her, whoever she was. He wished now that he hadn’t come back to the schoolhouse. He had read somewhere that criminals are driven by some mysterious power to haunt the scenes of their crimes. And it must be a fact, Purt told himself, for he had certainly been foolish to come back here to Central High – and go without his supper.

He decided to slip out of the girls’ yard and run away. But when he reached the street there was the strange girl right at his elbow. And he remembered that she had a grip as firm as Chet Belding’s own.

So nothing would do but try the front entrance. Of course, he knew it was ridiculous to go to that door. Even by day it was kept locked and visitors had to ring; only the teachers had pass-keys.

But they went in at the main gate and mounted the steps of the portico. It was indeed black under here, for the street lights were too far away to cast any of their radiance into the place. Purt fumbled around, found the doorknob, and tried it. To his amazement it turned in his hand and the door swung open into the dark corridor.

“They’re here, then,” whispered the girl. “Where do you suppose they are?” she continued.

Now Purt had very good reason for believing that he knew just where the girls were whom this stranger wished to see; but he only said, gruffly:

“I’m sure I don’t know. I don’t believe they’re in the building now.”

“Oh, yes, they are. They have not come out. There are several beside those I named. So I was told at the athletic field.”

“Well, I don’t know anything about them!” denied Purt, hurriedly. “I – I just want to go up for my book – ”

He shook himself free and ran for the front stairway. He knew his way in the dark and hoped to leave the girl behind. Once let him reach the foot of the tower stairs, he would unlock the door, fling it open so that the prisoners would hear him above, and then dart down the boys’ stairway and so out of the school building again.

But before he reached the top of the first flight he heard the patter of the strange girl’s footsteps beside him. Through the long windows enough light filtered to show him her figure. And she ran better than he did, and without panting.

Purt was scared now worse than he had been before.

“She’ll tell them who unlocked the door,” he thought, “and so they’ll know right away who imprisoned them in the first place. Then Laura will tell her brother and Chet will thrash me – I know he will!”

The lad was almost ready to cry now. It seemed to him as though every step he took got him deeper and deeper into trouble.

He dashed up the other flight two steps at a time; but the girl kept on equal terms with him. What good wind she had! She could beat many of the girls of Central High in running, that was sure.

“I don’t know what has become of Eve Sitz and that other girl you want to see,” exclaimed Purt, stopping suddenly. “And I don’t see why you are sticking so close to me.”

“You know your way around this building; I don’t,” declared the girl, shortly.

“I can’t help you find them – ”

“You seem afraid of something,” remarked the girl, shrewdly. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Well, I go to school here,” complained Purt. “You don’t. You’ll get into trouble, coming into the building at night.”

“I guess you’re afraid of getting into trouble yourself,” returned the other, quite unshaken.

“Well, if one of the teachers is here and finds us – ”

“I’ll tell them just what I came for. Will you?” demanded the girl, quickly, and thrusting her face into Purt’s so as to see him better.

She had him there! Purt knew it – and he knew she knew it. This strange girl was laughing softly to herself in the darkness.

“Go on – if you’re going anywhere,” said she, after a minute. “I believe you know where those girls are. I want to see that Evangeline and that Hargrew girl. You show me.”

“I – I don’t know!” wailed Purt, under his breath.

Then he was sure he heard somebody’s step. It was in one of the classrooms opening into this corridor.

At the sound, spurred by sudden terror, the boy leaped away. He was half-way down the corridor. Around the corner was the door of the tower.

And then, just as he dashed past a door on his right, it opened. A broad band of light streamed out, and to Purt’s ears came the quick demand:

“What’s this? Who are you?”

“It’s Gee Gee!” thought the boy, but he never stopped. In a moment he realized that Miss Carrington had not addressed her question to him, but to the girl.

He ran on, as softly as possible, and rounded the corner, knowing that the strange girl had been caught by the teacher, who repeated her demand in a louder and more emphatic tone.

“Who are you? What are you doing here in the schoolhouse?” Then Miss Carrington saw that the girl was not one of her scholars – indeed, no girl of Central High was ever dressed so gaily, unless it was at a masquerade.

“For goodness sake, child!” exclaimed the teacher, still more sharply. “Come in here and explain yourself.”

She drew her inside the classroom and closed the door. In the full light the strange girl was revealed in a purple velvet skirt, a green bodice, a yellow silk scarf, or handkerchief, around her neck, and with a net, on which steel beads were sewed, over her hair. With her dark complexion and high color she was indeed a striking figure as she stood there, hands on her hips, and panting slightly as she gazed back bravely into Miss Carrington’s spectacled eyes.

“For goodness sake, child!” repeated the teacher. “Who and what are you?”

“My name is Margit Salgo,” said the Gypsy girl, watching Miss Carrington, with her sharp black eyes.

“Salgo?” whispered the teacher, and for a moment the girl thought that Miss Carrington would sink into the nearest chair. Then she drew herself up and, although her pallor remained, her eyes sparkled behind the thick lenses of her spectacles.

“I suppose you are here to tell me your father was Belas Salgo?” demanded the lady, harshly.

“I don’t know who you are, Madam,” said the Gypsy girl. “Are you the lady whom the Vareys say knows all about me?”

“Who are the Vareys?” returned Miss Carrington, quickly.

“They are English Gypsies. I was placed in their care when my father’s friends brought me to this country. They have held me prisoner but I have got away from them – ”

“I do not understand you – I do not understand you,” insisted Miss Carrington, weakly. And now she did grope her way to a seat.

“Are you the teacher here whose name has in it eighteen letters?” asked the girl, anxiously. “I do not read your English, although I speak it. I learn to speak languages easily – it is a gift. My father had it.”

“True,” murmured Miss Carrington. “Belas Salgo was a wonderful linguist.”

“Does your name have the eighteen letters?” pursued Margit, eagerly. She repeated her story about the card on which was printed, or written, the name of the lady whom the Vareys had come to Centerport to see. Miss Carrington listened more quietly, and finally bowed.

“Yes. I am the lady. I am Miss Carrington,” she admitted.

“That is what those girls called you,” muttered Margit, but the teacher did not hear.

“You claim to be Belas Salgo’s daughter?” repeated Miss Carrington, at last.

“I am his daughter. I cannot remember my mother – much. But my father I remember very well. Why, I traveled everywhere with him! All over southern Europe we went. And to Algiers, and the other north coast cities. He played everywhere about the Mediterranean until he died. And then,” said the girl, simply, “I lost all happiness – and I was brought to this great, cold country.”

Miss Carrington had listened with her head resting on her hand and her eyes watching the girl from behind her glasses. Now she said:

“Well, I do not believe you are Belas Salgo’s child – not the Belas Salgo I have good reason to remember. No. But I will take you home with me and we will talk this matter over.

“I was correcting some examination papers,” she added, going to the desk and turning out the student lamp. “But they may go until another time,” and with a sigh she put on her hat and cloak, and taking the Gypsy girl’s hand led her out of the school building, the darkened corridors of which she knew so well.

CHAPTER XX – INTER-CLASS RIVALRY

If Eve Sitz had been outside of the schoolhouse tower, being held by the girls all of this time, she must certainly have been by now at the point of exhaustion, and so must they.

But Eve had dropped just right, had caught the wire with her gloved hands just as she had expected to, and then swung down and hung from the steel strand for a few seconds to get her breath.

Nellie and Bobby, leaning out of neighboring windows, cheered her on.

“Hurrah, girls!” declared the irrepressible. “She’s going to do it. There she goes – hand under hand!”

“Oh, if she doesn’t slip,” wailed Nellie.

“She’s not going to slip,” cried Bobby. “Hurrah! She’s on the roof.”

Once on the main building Eve did not waste time. She ran to the door, which she knew would be open, and so darted down the stairs to the corridor out of which the tower stairway opened. There was the key in the lock as they had expected, and in a few moments she was calling the other four girls down.

“My goodness!” exclaimed Nellie, kissing Eve when she reached the foot of the stairs. “Aren’t you just the brave, brave girl! And whatever should we have done without you?”

“I guess one of the others would have done the same had I not first thought of it,” returned Eve, modestly.

“Hush!” exclaimed Laura, suddenly. “I hear somebody.”

A door opened below, and then somebody came up stairs. The girls crowded back into the corner and waited.

“I know that step,” whispered Jess.

“Fee, fi, fo, fum!” murmured Bobby.

“And well may you say it is your ‘foe,’ Bobby,” giggled Jess. “It’s Miss Carrington.”

“Never!” gasped Nell.

“Yes, it is. I am sure,” agreed Laura.

“Oh, dear! if she catches us here we’ll have to tell where we have been and all about it,” groaned Eve.

“And demerits to work off to-morrow,” moaned Bobby.

“Back into the stairway and keep still,” whispered Laura.

They all crowded back. Miss Carrington came along the gloomy corridor and entered a classroom. She did not turn the corner.

“Good! Now let’s creep down and make our escape,” whispered Bobby.

“But not by the front door. She came in that way.”

“But the other doors will be locked – both the boys’ and ours,” urged Jess.

“I know the way out through the basement,” spoke Bobby, with determination. “I can open John’s door. Come on.”

So, at the very moment Prettyman Sweet tried the basement door, the girls on whom he had played his trick were about to come out. Purt was scared and ran away. Later, when he escaped from Margit, the Gypsy girl, and ran to the foot of the tower stairs, Purt was scared again.

He found the door open and the girls gone. Who could have released them? He slunk home in the darkness, taking the back alleys instead of Whiffle Street, and the next day he scarcely dared go to school for fear the girls had found out who played the trick on them.

But Laura and her mates all thought that either John, the janitor, or one of the teachers had chanced to close the tower door and lock it. And, as they had been where they were forbidden to go, they said very little about their fright and anxiety.

But Eve was quite a heroine among them. The girl from the farm was a deal more muscular than most of her mates; perhaps no girl at Central High could have climbed out of that tower window and worked her way down the wire in just that manner.

And Eve was showing herself, as time went on, to be the best girl at the broad jump and at putting the twelve-pound shot, too. Lou Potter, of the senior class, did well; but after a time she seemed to have reached her limit in both the jumping and shot-putting.

Then it was that Eve took a spurt and went ahead. She left all other competitors but Lou far behind.

Mrs. Case did not approve of inter-class competition in athletics; but the managing committee of the June meet had made such competition necessary to a degree. The upper classes of Central High had to choose their champions, and those champions in the foot races, from the 100-yard dash to the quarter-mile, had to compete the first week in June to arrange which should represent the school on the big day.

In other trials it was the same – broad jump, shot-putting, relay race teams, and all the rest. There was developed in the freshman class a sprinter who almost bested Bobby Hargrew at first; but the freshmen had little, after all, to do when the big day came.

The main contestants for athletic honors were bound to be drawn from the junior and sophomore classes. It was a fact that the present senior class of Central High had not been as imbued with the spirit of after-hour athletics, or with loyalty to the school, as had the younger classes.

And the seniors had awakened too late to the importance of leaving a good record in athletics behind them when they were graduated. There was not a girl in the class the equal of Mary O’Rourke, or Celia Prime, who had been graduated the year before.

Lou Potter, however, had many supporters, not alone among her own class. The freshies and sophs of course were jealous of the prominence of the juniors in athletics, so they centered their loyalty upon Lou.

Eve could do nothing that Lou Potter couldn’t do! That was the cry, and the feeling ran quite high for a while. Besides, another thing came to make Eve rather unpopular with a certain class of girls.

“Touch Day” – that famous occasion when candidates for membership in the M. O. R.’s were chosen – came in May, and Eve was one of the lucky girls to receive the magic “touch.” The fact that she had not been attending Central High a year aroused bitter feeling, although Eve was a junior in good standing.

“Say!” cried Bobby Hargrew, “if they had kicked about me being an M. O. R. there would have been some sense in it. For I never really thought I’d arrive at such an honor.”

For Bobby had really been drawn as a member of the secret society, and she never ceased to be surprised at the fact. But this school year – especially since early spring – Bobby Hargrew had been much changed. Not that she was not cheerful, and full of fun; but she had settled down to better work in her classes, and there was a steadiness about her that had been missing in the old Bobby Hargrew.

They were talking this change over one evening around the Belding dinner table.

“Bobby wouldn’t be herself if she got too strait-laced,” remarked Chetwood. “That’s the main good thing about her – the ginger in her.”

“Chetwood!” exclaimed his mother, admonishingly. “You speak of the girl as though she were a horse – or a dog. ‘Ginger’ indeed!”

“Well, Little Mum,” said her big son. “That’s exactly what I mean. She’s no namby-pamby, Miss Sissy kind of a girl; but a good fellow – ”

“I cannot allow you to talk that way about one of your young lady friends,” declared Mrs. Belding, with heat. “I am surprised, Chetwood.”

Mr. Belding began to chuckle, and she turned on him now with some exasperation.

“James!” she said, warmly. “I believe you support these children in their careless use of English, and in their other crimes against the niceties of our existence. Chet is as boisterous and rough as – as a street boy. And Laura uses most shocking language at times, I declare.”

“Oh, Mother Mine! why drag me into it?” laughed Laura, while her father added:

“Isn’t ‘crimes’ a rather strong word in this instance, Mother?”

“I do not care!” cried the good lady, much disturbed. “Chetwood uses language that I know my mother would never have allowed at Her table. And Laura is so taken up with these dreadful athletics that she cares nothing for the things which used to interest me when I was a girl. She really doesn’t like to pour tea for me Wednesday afternoons.”

“I admit it,” said Laura, sotto voce.

“Do you blame her?” added Chet, grumblingly.

“Thank goodness! I was brought up differently,” declared Mrs. Belding, sternly. “We girls were not allowed to do such awful things-even in private – as you do, Laura, in your gymnasium – ”

“Hear! hear!” cried Father Belding, finally rapping on the table with the handle of his knife. “I must say a word here. Mother, you are too hard on the young folks.”

“No I am not, James,” said the good lady, bridling.

“You force me to say something that may hurt your feelings; but I believe you have forgotten it. You complain of Laura’s athletics and gymnasium work. Don’t you see that it is an escape valve for the overflow of animal spirits that the girls of our generation, Mother, missed?”

“I deny that the girls of my day possessed such ‘animal spirits,’ as you call them,” declared Mrs. Belding, vehemently.

“You force me,” said Mr. Belding, gravely, yet with a twinkle in his eyes, “to prove my case. Children! did I ever tell you about the first view I had of your dear mother?”

“No, Pop! Tell us,” urged Chet, who kept on eating despite his interest in the discussion.

“Mr. Belding!” gasped his wife, suddenly. “What are you – ”

“Sorry, my dear; you force me to it,” said her husband, with continued gravity. “But the first sight I ever had of your mother, children, was when she was six or seven years old. I was working for old Mr. Cummings, whose business I finally bought out, and I came to your mother’s house on an errand.”

“James!” cried Mrs. Belding. “I cannot allow you to tell that foolish thing. It – it is disgraceful.”

“It is indeed,” admitted her husband, nodding. “But if you and your school girl friends had been as much devoted to athletics as Laura and her little friends, I doubt if you would have needed the front stairs bannisters as an escape valve for your animal spirits.

“For, children,” added Mr. Belding, as his wife, her face very rosy, got up to come around the table to him, “my first view of your mother was her coming down stairs at express train speed, a-straddle of the bannisters!”

Mrs. Belding reached him then, and any further particulars of this “disgraceful” story, were smothered promptly. But Laura and Chet enjoyed immensely the fact that – once upon a time, at least – there had been some little element of tomboyishness in their mother’s character.