“You bet!” agreed Rosa. “That’s one thing we must never try to do; we must not try to run across that lake, for it’s awfully wet.”
“Is that a boat I hear? Maybe it’s Orilla,” suggested Nancy, listening to the distant purr of a motor boat.
“No, I don’t believe it is,” replied Rosa. “You see, she keeps awfully busy, and I suppose it didn’t worry her any to leave poor Pixley to swim ashore.”
“What a very odd girl she must be,” continued Nancy, almost against her will.
“Perhaps she is, but then--oh, well, don’t let’s bother about her. Dad is sure to be watching the moon rise from the East porch,” said Rosa, as they started back toward the house. “Let’s go talk to him.”
“Oh, Betty will be bossing the packing,” interrupted Rosa, anticipating the words of Nancy’s objections. “Come on. I’m going to miss dad and I want to be with him all I can--now.”
“Then _you_ go talk to him, Rosa,” urged Nancy, considerately. “I’ve got some things to do. You won’t mind. You see, I must write mother at once, so that she’ll get it almost as soon as she reaches London.”
“Give her my love,” said Rosa, as the cousins parted on the porch.
On the little table in her room Nancy found a gift from Betty, a beautiful rainbow chiffon scarf, and also a big box of candy from her Uncle Frederic. She loved the scarf; it was beautiful, and would blend with any and every costume. The candy, of course, was equally welcome, for she had no doubt that her uncle himself had thought of it.
Standing before the broad mirror of her dresser she tried on the scarf. Her simple powder-blue dress was made much more attractive beneath its colorful folds, and it delighted Nancy to vision its possibilities as an adjunct to her limited outfit. It would be lovely over her apple green--the black shadows in it would be wonderful over green, she reflected, and her gray dress--the one she wanted so much and her mother objected to because of its somberness--that would be perfect with the rainbow scarf.
Throwing the filmy ends first over one shoulder and then over the other, stepping this way and that to suit the pose and get just the correct lighting on the scarf, Nancy was quite unconscious of a light step approaching her open door.
Then, as she turned once more to try just one more swing of the silken tie, she found herself facing the smiling Lady Betty.
