Part 3 (1/2)

'You are revealing all the secrets of the prison-house, little girl,' he remarked.

Barbara looked from one to the other. 'Auntie Anna did ask me,' she said reproachfully.

'To be sure I did,' answered the old lady, recovering herself with an effort, 'and I am delighted to hear some of the things I am expected to do. But you must allow that even a fairy G.o.dmother has a hard time of it occasionally, and it is a little difficult to provide for all her G.o.dchildren at once, you know. However, you shall hear what is going to happen in a week's time, on the very day that this naughty father of yours takes himself off to America; and if you approve of it, we can see about the other things later on. Is that a bargain, eh?'

'Oh! What else is going to happen in a week's time?' asked Barbara, eagerly. By this time she was prepared for any dream to come true. Her faith in the old lady who was playing at fairy stories was complete.

Mr. Berkeley answered her. 'Auntie Anna is going to carry you all off to Crofts for the whole six months that I am away,' he told her; 'and you are going to Jill's school at Wootton Beeches, which is only ten miles off.

So Kit and Robin will be able to come over and see you sometimes, when the others have gone away, for they are going to have a tutor and stay at Crofts with Auntie Anna and Jill. Isn't that a fine idea?'

Barbara was speechless with rapture. The expression on her face made them laugh once more. Then she gave a kind of war-whoop that might have been heard in the schoolroom, and bounded again towards the door. 'I simply can't bear it another minute,' she gasped. 'I _must_ go and tell the boys.'

'Bear it just one more minute, and hear what else I have to say,' begged Auntie Anna, raising herself with the help of her stick, and walking slowly after her excited little niece. 'Can you ride bicycles, all of you?'

The child shook her head. 'Only Egbert,' she said; 'and that is because he stayed with a chap, last holidays, who lent him one. Bicycles are too jolly expensive for this family, you know,' she added quaintly.

Auntie Anna stood still and pointed the blue-k.n.o.bbed cane impressively at the child, who stood waiting. 'What do you say to a bicycle apiece all round,' she began, 'and----'

But Barbara did not wait to say anything. Back along the hall she scampered with all her might, and flung herself panting into the schoolroom. She burst out at once with a rapturous medley of news.

'Boys, boys!' she shouted at the top of her voice; 'the dragon isn't a dragon, she's like a fairy G.o.dmother out of a story-book! And she's going to send me to the adopted kid's school, and everybody is going to live at Crofts till father comes back, and there's going to be bicycles _all round_--no waiting 'cause you're the youngest, Bobbin!--and----'

Suddenly she paused and stammered, and paused again. Finally, she stood silent and uncomfortable, with the excitement and the thrill all gone out of her. She had quite forgotten Jill; and Jill, enthroned in the one arm-chair, with the one cus.h.i.+on at her back and the one footstool at her feet, was looking as though she was not there to be forgotten.

'I've just been telling the boys all about it,' she remarked.

Barbara stared. It put the finis.h.i.+ng touch to her distrust of Jill, that she should have told anything to the boys--_her_ boys--before she had time to tell them herself.

'I--I think it's a shame!' she exclaimed hotly, and she bit her lip to keep from crying.

'Hullo, Babe! What's up?' asked Peter, in surprise.

Jill slipped out of the arm-chair, and laid her hand on the child's shoulder. 'I'm so sorry, Babs,' she began softly; 'I really didn't know----'

Barbara looked up at her doubtfully. The tone was kind, but then, why did she go on smiling in that irritating way? 'You don't understand,'

she said, and twisted herself free from Jill's grasp, and did not speak again until she was gone.

The boys took no notice of her; they always left the Babe alone when she was in one of her odd moods. But Jill, who had really meant to be kind, went away feeling puzzled. She had got over her first shyness of the boys in a very few minutes, for they were evidently trying to be friendly in their blunt, boyish fas.h.i.+on; but Barbara baffled her. There was something antagonistic in the child's manner; and Jill, who had always been accustomed to meeting with affection wherever she went, did not quite know what to make of her. Of course it was ridiculous to worry herself about a tomboy of eleven who chose to be sulky; but it was the first time any one had refused to make friends with her, and Jill was a little hurt about it.

'You're spoiled, my dear,' remarked her mother, as they drove away from the Berkeleys' house; 'and it is I who have spoiled you. I'm a silly old woman, but I never could bear to deny you all the sympathy you asked. I was afraid, you see, that you might think the world was not a nice place to be in.'

'I'm glad you spoiled me, and I think the world _is_ a nice place to be in,' answered Jill, laughing. 'But what has that to do with Barbara's not liking me?'

'Well, you can't expect every one to like you,' said the old lady, in her brusque way. 'Babs will like you well enough when she finds that she is still the Babe of the family, in spite of your being there.'

'But--but I don't like to feel that there is anybody anywhere who doesn't like me,' complained Jill, with a little pout.

'No more does the Babe, I expect,' said Mrs. Crofton, smiling. 'However, do your best to understand the poor little soul; she has not had much spoiling, and I should like you two to be friends.'

'Oh!' cried Jill, laughing again as she recalled the funny little figure that had come bounding into the schoolroom with such a yell and a clatter.