CHAPTER XXI

AN UNUSUAL PROCEDURE

“I don’t like to speak of it, but Ronald will be here directly after breakfast and I am afraid he expects a definite answer about the loan. We dislike to rush you but the dear boy is so impatient and—”

Azalea allowed her words to trail off and smiled apologetically at Doris, who sat opposite her at the breakfast table. Iris looked down at her plate to hide her embarrassment. Both ladies were very proud and found it difficult to bring up the subject of money.

“If only we had something of our own that we could sell, we wouldn’t think of asking you for this favor,” Iris murmured.

Doris had been awaiting an opportunity to bring up the subject of the paper which Cora and Henry Sully had mentioned. The housekeeper had returned to the kitchen and she decided to risk being overheard.

“Of course you don’t want to mortgage your house,” she declared. “What a pity you haven’t any land or stock of any kind.”

Azalea laughed.

“As it happens, we have some oil company bonds but they aren’t worth anything. Iris and I were very gullible to buy them. Millions have been lost in the oil fields but we didn’t realize it until too late.”

“Oil bonds, did you say?” Doris demanded eagerly.

Iris nodded.

“Yes, we lost several thousand dollars.”

“And you still have the certificates?”

Iris did not reply, for just at that moment Cora Sully appeared to remove the dishes and the Misses Gates made it a point never to discuss personal affairs or business before their servants. Upon leaving the dining room Doris started to bring up the subject again but before she could do so, Ronald Trent was announced.

He appeared less affable than usual and lost no time in bringing up the matter of the loan. The Misses Gates looked doubtfully at Doris.

“I have already sent for the money,” she told them. “It should be here tomorrow or the next day.”

“Sent?” Ronald asked blankly. “You didn’t get the bank draft the way I told you to?”

“Why, no,” Doris returned innocently. “I thought it would be so much easier to have Jake bring the money.”

“And who is Jake?” the man questioned suspiciously.

“Oh, he works for my uncle.”

Ronald Trent seemed to relax at this, but it was evident to both Kitty and Doris that he was far from pleased at the way the matter had been handled.

“Well, all right,” he said grumpily, “but he’d better get here with the money tomorrow.”

“Why Ronald!” Azalea reproved gently. “I think it’s lovely of Doris to offer her money, and we mustn’t seem ungrateful.”

“Humph! It’s just a straight business deal. She knows she’ll get every cent of it back and with interest! Come on, if you’re going with me! I can’t wait around much longer!”

Azalea and Iris looked a trifle crushed at this abrupt statement, but they hurried away to get their coats and hats.

“We must leave you alone for awhile,” Azalea said apologetically to the girls. “We have a little business to attend to at the bank.”

“Come on, let’s get going!” Ronald urged. In the doorway he turned back toward Doris. “Don’t fail to let that fellow Jake know he’s to bring the money tomorrow. Understand?”

“I think so,” Doris returned dryly.

After the three had left the mansion, she and Kitty took stock of affairs. They were amazed that the Misses Gates had gone with Ronald, for it was only on very rare occasions that they ever set foot beyond the high hedge which surrounded Locked Gates.

“They’re under that man’s influence entirely,” Kitty declared.

Doris nodded soberly.

“And he’s getting more sure of himself every minute. Why, he spoke positively mean to them.”

“I wonder why they went to the bank?”

“Most likely to give him more money, though from what they said, I’m sure they’re practically destitute. Oh, it’s a shame!”

“What can we do, Doris?”

“I don’t know, but I have a feeling things are about to reach a climax. Let’s go for a walk and perhaps we can think of some way to show Ronald up in his true light.”

As the girls went to their room for their hats, they met Cora and Henry just starting up the stairway with broom, dustpan and mop. Since it was an unusual sight to see the two working together unless the Misses Gates were at hand to watch them, Kitty and Doris could not hide their surprise.

“Thought we’d do some housecleanin’,” Cora murmured, though the girls had asked for no explanation. “Thinkin’ of going out, were you?”

“Why, yes,” Doris replied. “We’re going for a walk.”

They found their hats and left the house. However, they had walked but a short distance when Doris stopped short.

“Kit, I have an idea!”

“Spill it!”

“We’ll never have a better opportunity than this to visit that little crippled girl on the attic floor. The twins are away and the Sullys are cleaning the wing on the other side of the house.”

“Do we dare?”

“Why not? After all, it’s no crime to visit a little girl. I feel dreadfully sorry for her, and then I’d like to ask her a few questions, too.”

“All right,” Kitty agreed.

Returning to the mansion, they quietly entered by the side door and stole softly up the stairway. They could hear Henry and Cora cleaning the rooms occupied by the Misses Gates. The doors were closed so they knew they had not been seen. Turning into their own wing they moved noiselessly down the hall until they came to the stairway leading to the third floor. Glancing back to make certain they were not being observed, they crept up the stairs and paused before the Sully suite.

Hesitating an instant, they pushed open the door and stepped into the sitting room. As they moved over toward the bedroom, they heard some one crying and knew that it was Etta.

Doris and Kitty quietly opened the door and entered. At first the girl on the bed did not hear them, but as they took a step toward her, she turned her head.

The girls were shocked at her appearance. She was not an ugly child, but her face was pinched and drawn. The hands which rested above the soiled comforter were thin and scrawny. Her hair did not look as though it had been combed that day.

The girls did not know just what to do or say, so stunned were they upon seeing this strange little creature gazing so pitifully and wonderingly at them. She was not frightened, but she was very much amazed. Why, these girls were among the few persons she had seen in all her years of seclusion.

Her great eyes looked out upon them—pleading, tragic, wounded eyes, like those of a timid, shy young animal. The girls held their breath!

“I never expected this,” awesomely whispered Kitty.

“How dreadful!” responded Doris.

A hush fell over the two young girls.

The old mansion itself furnished the background and what a melodramatic setting! The mighty Locked Gates, surrounded by the weird trees that sighed and moaned in the night as they swayed and tossed restlessly as though exhausted from their unceasing vigil!

The vivacious chums from Barry Manor were suddenly confronted with a side of life which they were unable to understand. Could this child be the neglected daughter of Cora and Henry Sully?

As Kitty and Doris advanced to the bedside, Etta stared at them in astonishment. Shut up in one room for nearly twenty years she had never seen any one her own age. Only Azalea and Iris had ever visited her and so she had come to think of a world peopled only by adults. Her parents, Henry and Cora Sully, had never taken the trouble to educate her and the only lessons she had ever received were taken from the Bible passages which the Misses Gates read aloud. Though in actual age she was older than either Doris or Kitty, mentally she remained a child. Now, as she viewed the girls and noticed their white dresses, it seemed to her that surely she must be gazing upon two angels.

Too moved for words, an expression of awe and rapture came over her face; she stretched out her thin hand toward Doris.

The two girls took a step nearer toward the bed. The coverlet of the quaint patch-work pattern was faded from many washings and the muslin was yellowed. A twisted, knotted handkerchief had dropped carelessly on a narrow strip of well-worn rag carpet. The whole picture was a far cry from anything that the two girls from boarding school had ever seen or expected to find at Locked Gates.

The poor, unfortunate girl was gowned in an old-fashioned, high-necked night-dress. A bit of yellowed crocheting finished the neck-line, no doubt the work of her grandmother, the dressmaker, who had been the seamstress for the Gates family.

“How do you do?” said Doris, smiling sweetly in an effort to be friendly at once.

“We are visiting here,” added Kitty, also making an effort to be cheerful and to put the cripple at ease with her most charming manner.

“It is a lovely sunny day, my dear. Let me raise the shade so that the light can come in and cheer up the room.” Doris raised the curtain which crinkled and creaked as the sunlight streamed into the bedroom in the attic.

“Now you can see the fleecy clouds,” chirped Doris, “and pretend you are floating and resting, honey, on one of those billowy boats up there in that deep, blue sea.”

Kitty laughed in a silvery, tinkling tone.

“I believe we could almost see Barry Manor today, the air is so clear and there is no sign of haze or fog to obstruct one’s view. I should have brought my field-glasses with me, Dory, and then we could see our Alma Mater, maybe!”

Doris could not restrain a laugh, so impossible did it appear to her that one could see miles and miles, even though the air were clear as crystal.

A smile, a bit wavering and uncertain, flickered about the crippled girl’s mouth, as she listened to these two young girls, dressed in white, smiling happily, and the sunlight touching their hair with gold.

“Won’t you talk to us, dear?” asked Kitty, moving closer toward the bedside.

“Yes, dearie,” urged Doris. “Tell us about yourself. We want to be your friends, and we want to make you happy.”

“You must be an angel,” she whispered in a tense voice. “Can you make me well? Can you give me new limbs?”

Gently Doris stroked the little hand and pushed the tangled hair from her face.

“We aren’t angels,” she said kindly. “We’re just girls and very human ones at that.”

“Girls?” Etta echoed blankly.

The word had no significance to her. All her life she had been shut away having been associated entirely with her parents and the Misses Gates. Her bed was not even by the window. Consequently, she had never been able to look down upon the street where children played.

“Don’t you get lonesome here all by yourself?” Doris asked the girl.

Etta nodded.

“Sometimes it seems as though I can’t stand it.”

“Perhaps we can arrange to take you downstairs some afternoon,” suggested Kitty hopefully.

“But I cannot walk!” Tears came into the sad eyes of Etta.

“Oh, don’t cry, dearie,” soothed Doris. “We easily could manage to take you down.”

“It would be fun, Etta.”

“And we have the cutest little dog we found. We call him Wags because he is so good-natured and wags his tail so much.”

Etta’s tears were gone, almost instantly, as this new world of cheer was opened to her by the girls.

“We’ll be your guardian angels. Would you be willing to have us come and help while away the lonesome hours?”

There was no time for further questions, for suddenly Doris and Kitty heard footsteps on the stairway.

Some one was coming!

“We’ll be caught!” Kitty whispered, starting quickly toward the door.

Doris caught her by the hand.

“We can’t make it! We must hide!”

Frantically, the girls looked about the room. They felt that they were trapped.

“The closet,” Doris hissed.

As they moved on tiptoe toward it, Etta held out her hands toward them.

“Don’t go away,” she begged, almost tearfully.

“Sh!” Doris warned. “Just be patient and your ‘angels’ will come back to see you again.”

With that she closed the door of the closet and the two girls crouched against the wall.

“She’ll be almost certain to give us away,” Kitty whispered fearfully. “What a mess we’re in now! Fancy trying to explain our way out of it!”