CAUGHT

Nettie Meyers was there--Joe Badger's buxom friend. She stared hard at 'Phemie and her sister, and then tossed her head. But Mr. Badger came over particularly to speak to the girls.

Sairy Pritchett was very much in evidence. She sat with half a dozen other young women and by their looks and laughter they were evidently commenting unfavorably upon the Bray girls' appearance and character.

Lyddy bowed pleasantly to Mr. Badger and the other young men who spoke to her; but she gave her main attention to Harris. But 'Phemie noted all the sidelong glances, the secret whispering, the bold and harsh words.

She was very sorry they had come.

Alone, 'Phemie could have given these girls "as good as they sent." Young as she was, her experience among common-minded girls like these had prepared her to hold her own with them. There had been many unpleasant happenings in the millinery shop where she had worked, of which she had told Lyddy nothing.

Mr. Somers came down from the desk to speak to the party from Hillcrest before the meeting opened. But everybody turned around to stare when he did so, and the teacher grew red to his very ears and remained but a moment under fire.

"Hul-_lo_!" exclaimed Harris Colesworth, under his breath, and 'Phemie knew that he immediately realized the situation. The whole membership--at least, the female portion of it--was hostile to the party from Hillcrest.

While the entertainment was proceeding, however, the Bray girls and their escorts were left in peace. Sairy Pritchett sat where she could stare at Lyddy and 'Phemie, and they were conscious of her antagonistic gaze all the time.

But Lucas was quite undisturbed by his sister's ogling and when there came a break in the program he leaned over and demanded of her in a perfectly audible voice:

"I say, Sairy! You keep on starin' like that and you'll git suthin' wuss'n a squint--you'll git cross-eyed, and it'll stay fixed! Anything about _me_ you don't like the look of? Is my necktie crooked?"

Some of the others laughed--and at Sairy. It made the spinster furious.

"You're a perfect fool, Lucas Pritchett!" she snapped. "If you ever _did_ have any brains, you've addled 'em now over certain folks that I might mention."

"Go it, old gal!" said the slangy Lucas. "Ev'ry knock's a boost--don't forgit that!"

"Hush!" commanded 'Phemie, in a whisper.

"Huh! that cat's goin' to do somethin' mean. I can see it," growled Lucas.

"She is your sister," admonished 'Phemie.

"That's how I come to know her so well," returned Lucas, calmly. "If she'd only been a boy I'd licked her aout o' this afore naow!"

"About _what_?" asked the troubled 'Phemie.

"Oh, just over her 'tarnal meanness. And maw's so foolish, too; _she_ could stop her."

"I'm sorry we came here to-night, Lucas," 'Phemie whispered.

And at the same moment Lyddy was saying exactly the same thing to Harris Colesworth.

"Pshaw!" said the young chemist, in return, "don't give 'em the satisfaction of seeing we're disturbed. They know no better. I can't understand why they should be so nasty to us."

"It's Lucas's sister," sighed Lyddy. "She thinks she has reason for being offended with me. But I _did_ hope that feeling had died out by this time."

"You say the word and we'll get out of here, Miss Lydia," urged Harris.

"Sh! No," she whispered, for somebody was painfully playing a march on the tin-panny old piano, and Mr. Somers was scowling directly down upon the Hillcrest party to obtain silence.

"Say! what's the matter with that Somers chap, too?" muttered Harris.

But Lyddy feared that the teacher felt he had cause for offence, and she certainly _was_ uncomfortable.

The recess--or intermission--between the two halves of the literary and musical program, was announced. This was a time always given to social intercourse. The company broke up into groups and chattered and laughed in a friendly--if somewhat boisterous--way.

Newcomers and visitors were made welcome at this time. n.o.body now came near the Bray girls--not even Mr. Somers. Whether this was intentional neglect on his part or not they did not know, for the teacher seemed busy at the desk with first one and then another.

Sairy Pritchett and the club historian had their heads together, and the latter, Mayme Lowry, was evidently adding several items to her "Club Chronicles," which amused the two immensely. And there was a deal of nudging and t.i.ttering over this among the other girls who gathered about the arch-plotters.

"I'm glad they've got something besides us to giggle about," Lyddy confided to her sister.

But 'Phemie was not sure that the ill-natured girls were not hatching up some scheme to offend the Hillcrest party.

"I believe I'd like to go home," ventured 'Phemie.

"Aw! don't let 'em chase you away," exclaimed the young farmer.

"Oh, I know: 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me!' But being called names--or, even having names _looked_ at one--isn't pleasant."

Lyddy heard her and said quickly, her expression very decided indeed:

"We're not going--yet. Let us stay until the finish."

"Yes, by jove!" muttered Harris. "I'd just like to see what these Rubes would dare do!"

But girls are not like boys--at least, some girls are not. They won't fight fair.

The Hillcrest party need not have expected an attack in any way that could be openly answered--no, indeed. But they did not escape.

Mr. Somers rang his desk bell at last and called the company to order.

After a song from the school song-book, in which everybody joined, the "Club Chronicles" were announced.

This "history"--being mainly hits on what had happened in the community since the last meeting of the Temperance Club--was very popular. Mayme Lowry was a more than ordinarily bright girl, and had a gift for composition. It was whispered that she wrote the "Pounder's Brook Items"

for the Bridleburg _Weekly Clarion_.

Miss Lowry rose and unfolded her ma.n.u.script. It was written in a somewhat irreverent imitation of the scriptural "Chronicles;" but that seemed to please the young folks here gathered all the more. She began:

"And it came to pa.s.s in the reign of King Westerville Somers, who was likewise a seer and a prophet, and in the fourth month of the second year of his reign over the Pounder's School District, that a certain youth whose name rhymes with 'hitch it,' hitched himself to the ap.r.o.n-strings of a maid, who was at that time sojourning at the top of the hill--and was. .h.i.tched so tight that you couldn't have pried the two apart with a crowbar!"

"Oh, by cracky!" gasped the suddenly ruddy-faced Lucas. "What a wallop!"

The paragraph was punctuated with a general t.i.tter from the girls all over the room, while some of the boys hooted at Lucas in vast joy.

Lyddy turned pale; 'Phemie's countenance for once rivalled Lucas's own in hue. But Miss Lowry went on to the next paragraph, which was quite as severe a slap at somebody else.

"Don't get mad with _me_, Miss 'Phemie," begged Lucas, in a whisper.