“It’s so dark, we can hardly see.”
“Well, I vote we keep close to them, and next time we get near a lantern, we’ll turn the tables and bump into them, and try to see who they are.”
It was easier said than done, however; the strangers seemed to have changed their tactics, and instead of pursuing Ingred and Verity now endeavored to avoid them. No “elusive Pimpernels” could have been more difficult to follow. They would come quite close and then suddenly dodge and glide away, only to reappear and repeat the same tantalizing performance. Ingred and Verity began to get on their mettle. It was so evidently done on purpose that they were fully determined to catch the errant pair. After a long game at hide-and-seek they at last managed to dance along side them, and laying violent hands upon them, to drag them into the light of a lantern. As Ingred gazed for a moment in perplexity, the Early Victorian lady gave a most un-Early Victorian wink inside the poke bonnet.
“Hereward! How dare you!” gasped his sister.
A firm hand drew her away from the light, and in the shelter of a laurel bush, a voice, choking with laughter, proclaimed:
“Done you, old girl! Done you brown! What about that bet? I told you you’d never know me!”
“You abominable young wretch,” replied Ingred, laughing in spite of herself. “How did you manage it? And who is your friend?”
“Allow me to introduce Vashti, Queen of Persia!”
“Bunkum! It’s a boy! I know it is!”
The explosive sounds issuing from under the shimmering veil of Queen Vashti certainly sounded more masculine than feminine, and that Persian princess confessed presently to the name of Franklin.
“He’s a chum of mine,” explained Hereward, “and he lives close by, so we made it up to come together. His sister lent us the clothes and dressed us. I say, your Prioress never found us out, did she? What about that prize?”
“There isn’t going to be a prize, and you certainly wouldn’t have deserved it! Look here, you’d better wangle yourselves off before it gets about who you are. I should get into a row, not you!”
“Would the Prioress kick up rough?”
“She’d probably think I’d planned the whole business, and encouraged you to come.”
“Even if we apologized?”
“She wouldn’t accept an apology. If you want me to have any tennis next week, you had better clear out.”
“Just a round with you first, and Franklin can take your friend, or vice versa if you prefer it!”
“You impudent boy! Certainly not. I daren’t risk it. Look, Miss Strong is bringing out the lamp, and putting it on the sundial, and I believe Miss Perry is going to take a flashlight photo presently. If you want to disgrace me forever—”
“We’ll go!” sighed a mournful voice. “Though it’s Adam and Eve turned out of Paradise. I say, Franklin, they don’t want us, after all our trouble! We’d better be getting on, I suppose. Our deepest respects to the Prioress. She’s given us a delightful evening, if she only knew it. We’d like to come again some time. Ta-ta!”
XXI
The Abbey Recital
Now that Ingred had at last made friends with Bess, she found they had innumerable subjects of interest in common. They were both keen tennis players, dabbled a little in art, pursued Nature study, liked acting, when they had any opportunity of showing their talents in that line, and were enthusiastic over music. Bess was making as good progress on the violin as Ingred on the piano, so there seemed great possibilities of playing together. Sometimes when Bess brought her instrument to school for her lesson, she and Ingred would try over a few pieces, and other girls who chanced to be near would collect and act audience.
“I vote we get up a musical society next year,” suggested Ingred. “It’s impossible this term—we’ve too much on our hands already—but if the societies are rearranged in September, we’ll agitate to let music take a much bigger place than it has done so far.”
“Yes, that would be glorious!” agreed Bess, with visions of a school choir, and even a school orchestra, dancing before her eyes. “Signor Chianti is leaving Grovebury, so if we have a new violin master next term, I hope it will be somebody who’s enthusiastic and able and willing to organize things.”
“That’s the point, of course. Dr. Linton is very able, but not willing to bother with us beyond our lessons—he’s so frightfully busy. I suppose he feels that after training the Abbey choir, and conducting choral societies to sing his cantatas, he doesn’t care to trouble himself over schoolgirls.”
“He’s a real musician, though. I often wish I could study under him. I’d love to play something with him, just once, to see how it feels to have him accompany me. I think it would be so inspiring, it would just make one let oneself go! I stay every Sunday evening after service at the Abbey to hear his recitals. Occasionally somebody plays the violin, and his accompaniment is simply gorgeous. He manages to make it sound like a whole orchestra. I’ve never played with an organ. It’s so much fuller than a piano.”
“Yes,” agreed Ingred contemplatively.
Bess’s remarks had given her an idea, but she did not want to communicate it at once to her friend. It was nothing more or less than that she should ask Dr. Linton to allow Bess to play with him some time in the Abbey. She wondered whether she dared. His temper was still decidedly irritable, and it was quite uncertain whether he would receive the suggestion graciously, or snap her head off. She thought, however, it was worth venturing.
“I’ll try to catch him in an amiable mood,” she decided.
In order not to arouse any grounds for irritation, she practiced particularly well, and took her next work to him at a high stage of excellence.
“Bravo!” he said, when she had finished her “Serenade.” “I believe you’ve really got some music in you! You brought out
