Nan Sherwood at Lakeview Hall Part 6

"There is plenty of room up front," said Bess, cheerfully.

Nan saw Linda Riggs' hat "up front," too. "No," she said firmly. "I shall sit here."

"Oh--well!" Bess drawled, pouting.

For the first time in her life Nan Sherwood felt that a friend was disloyal to her--in appearance, if not actually. She realized that Bess must have been put in an exceedingly mortifying position in the dining car when she found she was without money with which to pay her check; and Miss Riggs may have been quite accommodating to offer to pay. Nan, however, could not imagine herself in her chum's situation, accepting the offer.

Bess needed only to wait until the first half of the train backed down to the rear half, when she could either have found her mislaid bag, or got the money for her lunch from Nan.

And then--to be so eager to continue the acquaintances.h.i.+p with the uncivil girl! That was what pointed the dart.

"I don't care!" said the pouting Bess, at last. "I've got to pay her the forty-five cents. She'll think it funny."

"Pay her by all means," Nan said, striving not to show how hurt she was.

Bess briskly went up the aisle at this permission; but she did not return for an hour or more. Linda Riggs' conversation evidently quite charmed shallow, thoughtless Bess.

CHAPTER VI

HOW IT FEELS TO BE A HEROINE

Bess Harley came back to her chair facing Nan's quite full of a brand new subject of conversation.

"Do you know, Nan Sherwood," she cried, "that we've got a real, live heroine aboard this train?"

"Goodness!" exclaimed Nan. "What's she done?"

"They say she saved another girl's life back there where we stopped to take on the new car."

"At the Junction?" murmured Nan.

"Yes."

"Oh!" whispered her chum, and immediately became silent.

"My goodness!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Bess. "I never saw such a girl. Aren't you interested at all?"

"I--I don't know," her chum replied in a very small voice.

"I wonder at you, Nan Sherwood!" cried Bess, at last, after staring at Nan for some moments.

"Why?"

"You don't seem at all interested. And this girl was awfully brave.

Linda says she ought to have a purse of money given her--or a Carnegie medal--or something. Linda says----"

"Linda?" repeated Nan, in wonder.

"Why, yes," Bess said. "She's not at all a bad girl--nothing at all like what you said she was."

"_I_ said she was, Bess?" asked Nan, gently.

"Well! you don't like her," flared up Bess.

"I certainly do not," confessed Nan.

"You're prejudiced," pouted her chum.

"I certainly am prejudiced against anybody who calls me a thief," Nan declared firmly. "And so would you be, Bess."

"But she didn't know you, Nan."

"And I wish never to know her," said Nan, with spirit.

"But you'll have to," cried Bess. "She's going to the same school we do.

She's been there for two years, you see, and she knows everything,"

declared Bess.

"Everything except how to be kind and polite," suggested Nan.

"There you go again!" cried Bess. "It doesn't sound like you at all, Nan."

"I'm sorry," said her chum. "I thought you knew me pretty well by this time, Bess. But, it seems you know this Linda Riggs better."

"Oh, Nan! I don't," and Bess was almost ready to cry. "She, Linda, was mad when she spoke to you, of course. You ought to hear her speak of this brave girl back in the day coach, who saved the other one from the snake."

Nan was silent; but Bess was full of the topic and the pent up volume of her speech had to find an outlet. She rushed on with:

"It was just great of her, Nan! She reminds me of you when you saved Jacky Newcomb's life in the pond last winter--when he broke through the ice that evening."

Nan still was silent.

"This girl is just as brave as you were," declared Bess, with confidence. "She got off the train when it stopped. And she saw a little girl inside a house there by the railroad track. The little girl was in there and a great, big rattlesnake was coiled all ready to strike the poor little thing," went on Bess, breathlessly.

"The colored porter told Linda and me all about it. This brave girl threw a stone on the horrid snake and killed it before it could strike the child. And then she fainted and they carried her back to the car,"

pursued Bess. "And the colored man says the pa.s.sengers are going to get up a memorial to present to this girl. I want to see her--to know her.

Don't you, Nan?"

"Why!" gasped her chum, in much confusion, "I hope they won't do anything like _that_."

"Like what?" queried Bess, in amazement.

"Bother her with any memorial--or whatever you call it--about what she did."

"Why, Nan!"