Betty Lee, Freshman Part 8

"No, I haven't. Are you selling them?"

"No, but Ted is."

"I'm awfully sorry, but Carolyn told me that if I hadn't promised, one of the girls wanted to sell me one, so I promised."

"Oh, that's all right. It was probably one of the girls on a pep squad."

"What's a pep squad?" laughed Betty. "That must be one of the things that I haven't heard about yet."

"You'll hear a lot about it, then. Why, they have them in the G. A. A., girls that talk it all up and make 'enthusiasm' and support the athletics, you know."

"What is the G. A. A., please? I must be terribly dense, but remember all the things I've tried to take in. You're not a freshman, are you?"

"Why, nowhat makes you think that?" Chet was privately thinking that there must be something after all in experience, though as he was no larger than a very dear freshman friend, who had been left a little behind in the race for high school, he had been "insulted" more than once by being considered a freshman.

"Well, I did think that you were one, since your brother is a junior"Betty had almost said that he looked so much younger than Ted the tall, but she halted in time. "But you seem to know all about everything, and even the fres.h.i.+es who live here don't always remember everything."

"I could get all that from hearing Ted talk, you know; but of course, there isn't much about the school that I haven't _heard_ aboutI wouldn't say _know_, of course."

"It must be nice," said Betty, thereupon pleasing her escort, who immediately began to enlighten her upon the workings of the athletic a.s.sociation and the girls' share in it. The G. A. A. was the Girls'

Athletic a.s.sociation.

"Oh, yes! Of course. I hear them call it a _club_. I've even had it explained to mebut not the pep squads. I only wish I had time for everything!"

"You don't have to do everything your freshman year, Betty."

"That is what Father saidso I'm not. But that doesn't keep you from wanting to do things."

"You're right it doesn't!" Chet was thinking of several things that he had wanted to do and still wanted.

A great gla.s.s bowl just inside the screened porch on the side of the house away from the sun, supplied a cool drink of oranges and lemons, whose slices floated about pieces of ice. A maid in cap and ap.r.o.n served them and fished out a whole red cherry to put in Betty's gla.s.s. And didn't it taste good!

Then, in the s.h.i.+fting of position and accidental meetings of this one and that one, Betty found herself with Mary Emma Howland and another freshman boy whom she recognized as the brightest lad in the algebra cla.s.s. "Oh, yes," she said, in answer to Mary Emma's question whether or not she knew "Sim," and brightly she smiled at him.

"We never were introduced," said Betty, "but when you recite every day together you can't help but know people, and whenever Mr. Matthews calls on 'James Simmonds' he looks as if he expected to have a recitation."

"There, Sim!" laughed Mary Emma. "I told you you were the teacher's pet!"

"Much I am!" and James Simmonds looked as if he did not appreciate being complimented, even by two merry girls. He was a tall, thin boy, with light, sandy hair, thin face and light eyes, but eyes that were keen with intelligence when they did not twinkle with mischief. "And I'm usually called 'Simmonds' by the men teachers."

"So you are," acknowledged Betty. "But I didn't know they called you 'Sim'I thought it was 'Jim.'"

"I'm generally known as Sim," said the boy, "but sometimes it's 'Jim', or 'Carrotts.'"

Sim exchanged a look with Mary Emma, who giggled. "Sim's my fourth or fifth cousin," Mary Emma explained. "He lives at our house to go to school while his father and mother are away this year."

As Betty looked inquiringly at Sim, he explained that his father was an engineer and was in South America with his mother for the year. "I'm going there some day," said he. "Say, they have mosquitoes and snakes and all sorts of queer things, and there are some man-eaters down there, cannibals, you knowoh, it's a wild country all right!"

"That doesn't sound so very good to me," smiled Betty. "Do you really want to go where there are snakes and things like that!"

"Certainly! Mary Emma you bring Betty Lee out some time and I'll show her the things they've sent us."

"We really have some beautiful things from South America, Betty," said Mary Emma, and Betty was thinking how interesting it would be to see them. My, she was getting acquainted fast! But just as Mary Emma was beginning to tell her about a handsome purse that had come for her mother, Peggy came running out of the house door and stopped before the porch bench upon which the three were seated. Peggy was wearing something funny on her head and carried something, a straight piece of pasteboard, in her hand. Large black letters said something or other.

"Oh, here you are, Betty. I was looking for you. Carolyn wants you to be one of the social engineers. We're going to have games for everybody on the lawn now and you'll have to help. Come on! 'Scuse Betty, please, Mary Emmaand Sim."

Betty rose to follow Peggy inside. There were several girls, all adjusting these pasteboard caps or hats, that looked like short stove-pipes. Carolyn was apologizing, though Betty thought the idea clever. "I didn't have time, girls, to make caps, anything pretty, you know, and I went to a picnic where they had these. They looked cute and I thought they'd do."

"Of course they'll do," said Peggy, adjusting the cap to Betty's head, merely by wrapping the two ends about and fastening them, top and bottom, with ordinary clips. So that was what the big black letters on the plain gray pasteboard said, "SOCIAL ENGINEER."

"But Carolyn," protested Betty, "I don't know everybody and how can I be a 'social engineer'? I suppose you're going to have games to manage?"

"That's it, and it doesn't make a bit of difference whether you know people or not. Your head-gear makes it perfectly proper to speak to anybody. I'm sure you're good at things like thisfrom your looks, you know!"

"Thanks for the confidence," laughed Betty. "All right, I'll do the best I can."

For the next hour the lawn looked pretty with the groups that played the old-fas.h.i.+oned games as well as those of a later date. Here were flowers and shrubbery, light dresses, darting figures, much laughter and little shrieks in the midst of excitement, when some one was caught or some one became "It." Then tables were brought out upon the lawn. Carolyn and Peggy pressed several of the boys into service to help place them, but after they were set, with silver, napkins and flowers, a pretty vase in the center of each table, the "banquet," as Betty later reported at home, was served them as perfectly "as if they were grown up" by persons whom Betty supposed to be the servants of the house. Mercy, she would never dare invite Carolyn to their apartment! And she did _love_ Carolyn!

Not that Betty was ashamed of simple livingBetty was trying to think why she had such a thought about Carolynbut that could be puzzled out later on. The present was too pleasant for a single disturbing thought.

It was cool now and seemed more like the time of year it really was.

Sunset hues were showing. And they were to stay till the j.a.panese lanterns all about were lit, with some hiding game or treasure hunt that Carolyn had mentioned to the "social engineers" as their last effort and fun. And now, after the pretty ice-cream in the freshman colors and the delicious cake with the double frosting, lovely baskets of grapes and peaches were being pa.s.sed.

Betty slowly ate the juicy grapes of her bunch, one by one, as she talked to Peggy on one side of her, or Chet Dorrance on the other. One of the junior boys had been "fired," according to Chet, for "cutting cla.s.ses, disorderly conduct and disrespectful behaviour." Oh, no, he couldn't come back now. His parents had been over to see the princ.i.p.al and they might get the "kid" into some other schoolChet did not know.

And Betty was to watch Freddy Fisher carry the ball at the first football game in the stadium. "If you go with Carolyn and Peggy," said he, "they'll tell you who everybody is that's doing things. You've seen 'em all, though, haven't you?"

"Yes, but I'm not sure I'll know them on the field. I guess I am going with Carolyn and Peggy."

"Of course you are," decidedly remarked Peggy, who had turned from her other neighbor in time to hear Betty's last sentence. "What is it you're going to?"

CHAPTER VIII: BETTY HEARS THE LIONS ROAR

Nothing could have been more appropriate for exciting athletic affairs than the name which had been given to this high school in honor of a distinguished public servant, interested in education. It scarcely needs to be explained that the football team of Lyon High was called the lions, on and off the gridiron, or that posters and the school paper carried fierce-looking drawings and cartoons of the King of Beasts in action. A golden yellow, relieved by black, in the costumes of the Lyon High band and in the sweaters of the team was supposed to suggest the tawny coat of what could "eat up" any other team in short order. Lions figured largely in various badges and insignia of all sorts. Betty Lee had early decided that she must some day wear one of the pins or rings that bore the "Lyon High Lion."

Oh, it was good to stow away books in the freshman lockers and hurry with the rest of the big crowd to find seats in the stadium, seats where one could see everything!

The girls lost little time at their lockers. "Come on, Betty," called Carolyn. "I've got some newspapers to sit on. Yes, I should _say_ bring your coat! Your sweater won't be enough. I promised Mother to wear a coat and wouldn't have needed to promise, either. I don't care to freeze myself."

This was not the first game. That had been duly played in the home stadium, not so long after Carolyn's garden party, and Betty had felt all the thrills of seeing the great stadium come to life for the first time in her experience. After this big school, college could not bring her more! Yet thrills could be repeated. Never would this place become so accustomed, Betty was sure, that she would not have them. Then, this was the GREAT GAME. It was the one between the two largest high schools of the city and was an annual occurrence, long heralded, the great game for which the teams prepared. There had been a lively meeting in the auditorium beforehand, that very morning. The champions.h.i.+p was at stake!

"Oh," said Betty, "I don't see how I can _stand_ it if the Lions don't beat!"

"Don't suggest such a thing," Peggy called back. "Of course we'll beat!"

There was a large crowd, parents and friends included, as well as many alumni of the high school, who were interested enough and loyal enough to see at least this one chief contest every year. But Carolyn, Betty and Peggy, with some of the other girls, were among the first among those dismissed from the last Friday cla.s.ses. Their season tickets were punched at the stadium entrance before the stadium was appreciably filled.

"We've a grand choice, girls. Hurry!" Carolyn tripped rapidly down the steps in the lead.