Briarwood Girls Part 3

"Was it about this?" Alison held up the folded paper. "I've been worried about it, too."

Rosalind pounced on the paper. "Oh, that's it. It's my essay. Where in the world did you find it?"

"It was in my English book. How it got there I can't imagine. It was certainly not there when I saw the book last. I lent it to Marcia. She said you had borrowed hers, and she didn't like to go and rummage in your room while you were out----"

"She wouldn't have had to rummage. It was right on the table," said Rosalind simply. "Did you read this, Alison? It's dreadful--"

"I couldn't help seeing the t.i.tle and the first few sentences, but of course I didn't read any further. Honestly, Rosalind, I am puzzled to guess how your essay could have got into my book. Can you think?"

Rosalind frowned and puckered up her sunny face in a great mental effort.

"I haven't any book, myself," she confessed. "Mine fell out of the window, and I forgot to pick it up, and it rained in the night, and ruined it. It was so sopping wet, it just fell to pieces. So I've been getting along by borrowing the other girls' books. I borrowed Marcia's the other day, and forgot to return it to her--"

"So a lot of the trouble is due to your bad habit of forgetting to do things," said Alison severely. But she smiled as she said it, and Rosalind took the reproof with her usual sweet temper. "I know it was.

But what then, Alison?"

"Then she borrowed mine, to study. She returned it to me, all right, but she forgot to explain what your essay was doing in it. I went out to track meet, and left Marcia studying for her essay. I hadn't looked through my book carefully, and if I saw any papers sticking out, I thought they were just my own notes. That is all I know about it, till I found your essay just now."

"Well, it's all right, now I've found it," said Rosalind easily. "They have to be handed in tomorrow. I'm so glad I'm on time, for once."

And with a relieved mind she danced lightly away, just as Marcia entered.

Alison looked up pleasantly. "Just in time, Marcia, to help solve a mystery, or straighten out a muddle."

Marcia stopped short and her face changed to the stony expression it wore when she was not pleased. "Well," she said, "What can _I_ do about it?"

"Rosalind was here just now," Alison explained patiently. "She came to ask if I knew anything about her essay, which she could not find. I had just found it inside my English book, and we were wondering how it got there. That was all. I thought perhaps you might be able to tell us."

Marcia grew paler than her wont, but she spoke clearly and coldly.

"Why, Rosalind lost her book I suppose, and borrowed yours, and left the essay in it. You know what a careless thing she is."

"No; she never had my book. She had finished her essay and put it away, that same afternoon, when you borrowed my book because she was out, and had left yours in her room."

"I don't know anything about it," said Marcia stolidly. "Are you trying to accuse me of anything?"

"Marcia! You are not in earnest?"

"Well, you seemed to imply it. I didn't think you would mind lending me your book--"

"Of course I didn't, Marcia. You know that."

"I put it back on your table that same afternoon. You can testify to finding it there. I haven't seen it since."

"I don't want to 'testify' to anything," said Alison, astonished. "I was only wondering how Rosalind's essay came to be in my book. Please don't think I meant to be personal, Marcia."

"I don't know anything about it," repeated Marcia, "and I'll thank you, Alison Fair, not to be hinting at anything, instead of saying out plainly what you think."

"I wasn't hinting," began Alison, wounded to the verge of tears; but to her relief, Marcia left the room, and she turned to the window, her hands pressed to her eyes, trying to recover her composure enough to think her way out of the tangle.

Entered Joan, excited and curious.

"Alison! We just saw Marcia stalking down the hall, looking like a thundercloud, or a tragedy queen, or something! She wouldn't look at us. Rosalind had just been in to tell us about your finding her essay, she had been mourning as lost. It ought to be a fine one, to cause so much excitement. So when I saw Marcia leaving the room in such offended dignity, I just came to get you to come and tell Kathy and me all about it before we burst with curiosity. You can't deny there's something, when I find you swallowing tears--"

The tears overflowed at the mention of them.

"Oh, Joan, I didn't mean to say anything about it, but since Rosalind has told you--Mind, I'm not accusing Marcia, though she said--she asked if I meant to hint--" Alison choked again.

"Nonsense," said Joan, briskly. "n.o.body would think it, unless she had a guilty conscience. I dare say she has. Wait till I call Kathy--or no, you come into our room, and tell us all about it."

An interested audience was a.s.sembled in the room across the hall, for Rosalind had not been reticent, and Evelyn, Polly and Rachel were all there to hear what was to be heard. So Alison was obliged to tell the facts of the finding of the essay in her book after it had been borrowed by Marcia.

"Truly, I did not mean to even imply that she was to blame in any way,"

she ended, almost apologetically, "but she seemed to think I was. I would never have spoken of it at all, if Rosalind had not told you while she was searching for her essay. n.o.body was more surprised than I was when I found it. And even now I don't--I can't understand what it all means."

"I can," said Joan, addressing the company at large. "It means that Marcia is trying to put on Alison the onus of a thing she did herself, and couldn't quite succeed."

"Oh, but I _couldn't_ think that of her," Alison cried, distressed.

"My dear Alison, the trouble is that you think everybody is as honest as yourself. People like that usually do get taken in."

"Well, we can't do anything about it now, and we had better not talk about it any more," p.r.o.nounced Katherine. "Let's forget it. Talk about something else. For instance--has anyone seen my ring? I've lost it again."

"Not that lovely pearl ring of yours, Kathy?"

"Yes. I've missed it for a week, but I kept thinking it would turn up. I generally remember to take it off when I wash my hands, but I can't remember--I wash my hands so often--"

"Kathy, you really are too careless--"

"Oh, the girls all recognize it and give it back to me when they find it; but they always find it in less than a week."

"There are the maids," suggested Polly.

"Oh, but I don't believe one of them would take anything."

"There you go again, Alison, with your 'everybody's honest.' I tell you everybody is not. There's a ghost or something in this school," insisted the incorrigible Joan. "Rachel lost her gold pencil a fortnight ago.

Ever find it, Ray?"

"No. But I do leave my things about. It may have slipped out of sight somewhere."

"So it may. Let me know when it returns of its own accord. This thing reminds me of the t.i.tle of a little French book I read once: _Les Pet.i.ts Mysteres de la Vie Humaine_. If I've made mistakes, Mademoiselle is not here to correct me, and the rest of you couldn't. Anyway, it means 'The Little Mysteries of Human Life,'" said Joan, looking defiantly about her.

"Well, I don't like mysteries," remarked Evelyn. "What we need is a clean-up day, to find all these missing valuables, and clear up all the mysteries."

The supper bell broke up the conclave.