They met at the station the next morning--the girls and boys. Lottie Weaver was there, in the glory of a new maroon sweater, and Ed Foster was also on time.

The express for Crystal Bay was late, and as Cora and her motor girl chums marched up and down the platform, nervously waiting, Cora saw a girl coming from the waiting room.

"Why, Freda Lewis!" she exclaimed, hurrying up and putting her arms about her. "What are you doing here? I thought you were going back to Bar Harbor for the Summer."

"So we were! Oh, Cora! I'm so glad to see you. I had to change cars here--I got on the wrong train, it seems. I've been traveling all night."

"You look it, my dear! Oh, if I had only known you were here----"

"I haven't been waiting long. I'm to take the Sh.o.r.e Express."

"That's our train. But, Freda, you don't look at all well--not a bit as you did at school," for Freda was a chum Cora had made much of a year or so before, but had not seen of late.

"I'm not well, Cora," said Freda, earnestly.

"What is the trouble?"

"Anxiety, mostly. Oh, Cora, we've had such a dreadful time, mother and I!"

Her voice trembled pitifully.

"Freda, dear, what is the matter?" asked Cora in sympathetic tones, for she saw tears in the other's eyes.

"Oh, it's money matters. You know we own--or at least we thought we did--a large tract of land at Crystal Bay."

"Crystal Bay!" exclaimed Cora, in surprise.

"Yes. It was Grandfather Lewis's homestead. Well, most of our income has come from that since father's death, and now--Oh, I don't know all the details, but some land speculators--land sharks, mother calls them--are disputing our t.i.tle.

"Mother has just worried herself sick over it, and I'm afraid she is going into nervous prostration. I've been to see some distant relatives about the matter, but I can't do anything. I'm so sorry for dear little mother. If she should break down----"

Poor, worried Freda could not go on. Cora held her close and the thought came to her that Freda herself was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. The girl had changed very much from the happy, laughing chum of a year before.

"Freda, dear, tell me more about it," murmured Cora. "Perhaps I can help--I have friends--Jack and I----"

"Here comes the train!" interrupted Jack. "Come on, Cora!"

"I must see you again, Freda," said Cora, hastily. "I'll look for you on the train. I've got to get my party together. Don't forget--I'll see you again!" and, wondering what was the cause of her friend's worry, Cora hastened up the platform, toward her companions, while the train steamed noisily in.

CHAPTER II

FREDA'S STORY

"Well, are we all here?"

"Count noses!"

"Did anybody lose anything?"

"If it's a pocketbook it's mine!"

"Especially if it has money in it!"

Thus the motor girls, and their boy friends, sent merry quip and jest back and forth as they found seats in the coach, and settled down for the trip to Crystal Bay. Cora, after making sure that the girls had comfortable seats, and noting that Jack had pre-empted the place beside Marita, leaned over Bess and whispered:

"I'm going back in the next car for a little while."

"What for?"

"Did you lose anything?" asked Belle, who overheard what Cora said.

"No, but you saw me talking to that girl on the platform; didn't you?"

"Yes, and I wondered who she was," remarked Bess.

"She was Freda Lewis."

"Freda Lewis! Why, I never would have known her!"

"Nor I!" added Belle. "How she has changed! Of course you were more intimate with her than we were, Cora; but she certainly doesn't seem to be the same girl."

"She isn't," replied Cora. "She and her mother are in trouble--financial trouble. I'm going back and talk to her. I want to help her if I can."

And while Cora is thus bent on her errand of good cheer, it may not be out of place, for the benefit of my new readers, to tell a little something more about the characters of this story, and how they figured in the preceding books of this series.

To begin with the motor girls, there were three of them, though friends and guests added to the number at times. Somehow, in speaking of the motor girls, I always think of Cora Kimball first. Perhaps it is because she was rather of a commanding type. She was a splendid girl, tall and dark. Her mother was a wealthy widow, who for some years had made her home in the quiet New England town of Chelton, where she owned valuable property. And, while I am at it, I might mention that Jack was Cora's only brother, the three forming the Kimball household.

Bess and Belle Robinson were twins, the daughters of Mr. and Mrs.

Perry Robinson. Mr. Robinson was a wealthy railroad man, a.s.sociated with large metropolitan interests.

Bess, Belle and Cora had been chums since their motoring days began, when Cora had been given a car, and, after some persuasion, Mr.

Robinson also had bought one for his daughters.

I think I have already intimated that Bess was plump and rosy--a little too plump, she herself admitted at times. Her sister was just the opposite--tall and willowy, so that the two formed quite a contrast.

Marita Osborne was a newcomer in Chelton, who had soon won her way into the hearts of the motor girls, so much so that Cora had invited her to come to the bungalow at Crystal Bay.

Each year Cora and her chums sought some new form of Summer vacation pleasure, and this time they had decided on the seash.o.r.e, in a quiet rather old-fashioned resort, which the girls, on a preliminary inspection trip, had voted most charming. In fact they went into such raptures over it that Jack and his chums had decided to go there also.

So the boys and girls would be together.

Speaking of the boys, the two who will come in for the most consideration will be Walter Pennington and Ed Foster. Walter was perhaps a closer chum of Jack's than was Ed, the former attending Exmouth College with Jack, where, of late, Ed had taken a post-graduate course. Ed was considered quite a sportsman, and was fond of hunting and fishing.

The first book of this series, ent.i.tled "The Motor Girls," tells how Cora became possessed of her car, the _Whirlwind_, and what happened after she got it. In that powerful machine she and her girls chums unraveled a mystery of the road in a manner satisfactory to themselves and many others.