"You cut "em?" repeated Ed.
"Sure," and Sid started toward his car, Ida following. "So long."
"Well, you"re not going away mad, are you?" asked Ed with a laugh, wondering the while over the ident.i.ty of the striking-looking girl whom Sid so obviously refrained from introducing to him.
"Oh, not"s so"s you could notice it," was Sid"s answer as he began to tuck the dust robe over Ida"s lap.
Then Sid cranked up his car, which he had named the Streak, though it didn"t always live up to the name, and soon he and the girl were out of sight around a turn in the road.
"Humph!" exclaimed Ed as he entered the store. "I wonder where he heard about my plan to take--bank stock? I wish he didn"t know of it. And I also wonder who that pretty girl was?" For Ida was pretty, in spite of her reddish hair and her rather jealous disposition, which was reflected in her face.
Ed shook his head. He was puzzled over something.
CHAPTER IV
TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS
"Say, Jack," remarked Ed a few days later, when the two were sprawled beside a brook, with rod and reel, "I believe I"ll have to get better acquainted with the young folks out here. Honestly, I feel wobbly when I get to talking to them. I"ve been out of touch with them so long that I"m afraid I"ll ask after some dead and gone aunt or uncle, or for some brother that has been in trouble and isn"t spoken of any more in polite society. For instance, who is Ida--Ida Giles? You know--the girl who was with Sid? He introduced me to her last night."
"Oh, Ida--why--she"s--just Ida. That"s all. But that"s a good idea of yours. I was thinking myself that you ought to begin studying up the blue-book of Chelton society. Now, as to Ida, the red-haired girl--"
"Not really red," corrected Ed slowly, "but that bright, carroty shade--so deliciously like lobster a la--"
"Oh, pardon me," and Jack a.s.sumed an affected manner. "Of course, Ida"s hair is not really red--not merely--carroty is the very word needed. Well, she is the daughter of the Reverend Mrs. Giles. Don"t you remember the woman who always scolded us for everything?
Wouldn"t let us even so much as take a turnip. And she wore such pious-looking spectacles that we dubbed her Reverend Mrs. Giles.
Well, she still is Ida"s mother."
"Then I don"t blame Ida a bit. I"d be Ida myself if I was brought up as she"s been, though I suppose her mother means all right. It"s curious what queer manners some people have. But I dare say we all have our own faults."
"And, with all of them, I hope the girls love us still--even Ida,"
added Jack quickly.
"Now, those others--the beautiful Robinson twins," pursued Ed.
"Oh, yes. Well, Bess and Belle are certainly the real thing in girls--right up to the minute. Besides, they have an immensely rich papa. You"ve heard of him--Perry Robinson, the railroad king?"
"Oh, yes. And their mother, if one may be permitted to ask?"
"Certainly, fair sir--Their mother is a wonderfully handsome woman, in a statuesque sort of way. Very dignified, and all that. Now, the twins are worth while."
"Exactly so," answered Ed. "Now I think--"
He stopped suddenly, and quickly jerked up his rod, but not quite speedily enough, for he had the pleasure of seeing a fish slip wrigglingly off the hook.
"Biggest one to-day," he murmured as he adjusted some fresh bait.
"Now, as to the Robinson twins. The only fault I have to find with them, from my limited acquaintance, is that they are not evenly divided. Bess is--er--well, not to be too delicate about it--too fat--"
"No, no, I beg of you!" exclaimed Jack. "Don"t use that word. Say too much adiposed."
"Sounds like indisposed," murmured Ed; "but let it go at that. Bess is too much adiposed, and Belle--"
"Well?"
"She is too un-adiposed, if you like it better. Not to put to fine a point upon it, as Mr. Snagsby used to say--she"s too thin."
"Not faults in either of them beyond repair," commented Jack. "Cora is very keen about them. Thinks they"re the best ever. She is very much interested in them."
"How about Jack?" teased Ed. "He might have a perfectly pardonable interest in being Interested in the twins--solely on his sister"s account, however--solely an the part of his sister."
"Um!" murmured Jack. "That"s neither here nor there. To carry it a little further, and still discussing the twins, there is Ed Foster, who is always at college when he is not fishing. He has money to burn, and so he"s going to set fire to some of it by entrusting it to the New City Bank.
"Not quite money to burn," said Ed as he carefully threw out the baited hook again. "I"ve about twenty thousand dollars that came from father"s estate, and it is stipulated that it must be most carefully secured. I think the new bank a good investment. But as for that being a drawing-card in my favor, why look to yourself.
Here"s Jack Kimball," went on Ed, "the best musician at Exmouth. The girls" pet, and, altogether, a very nice boy. I believe that"s all--no, hold on. I never said a word about your weakness for chicken potpie, although you did appropriate my dish the last day at college."
"I was hungry," pleaded Jack. "But I thank you for your considerate description. Do you think that you now have the Chelton folks to rights?"
"We haven"t touched on Walter Pennington. He seems to be the whole thing with the girls," and Ed did not try to disguise his tone of sarcasm.
"Oh, yes--Walter," said Jack. "Oh, Walter"s all right. He seems to have more time to spend fussing around the girls than the rest of us have."
"Is that it?" asked Ed. "I thought it was the other way about. That the girls had more time for Walter than for the rest of us."
"I don"t pretend to understand you," remarked Jack, pulling up quickly and looking in disgust at his empty hook. "But if you want anything--why, go in and win, as Priscilla said to John Alden. You can beat Walter--you"re handsomer."
"Drop that!" cried Ed, looking for a clod of earth to throw at Jack.
Then he ran his fingers through his thick, black hair. He was handsome, but he did not like it "cast up to him."
"Oh, I don"t know," he murmured after a pause. "Walter has a way with him. Girls "perfectly love" that uncertain shade of hair. It"s capable of being made over to suit--"
"Knocking!" cried Jack. "You"re knocking! I"ll tell Walter. You called him a--"
"A first-rate chap, and I mean it!" insisted Ed warmly. "That"s just what I think of Walter Pennington."
"Well, you know what I"ve always thought of him," and Jack was equally enthusiastic. "Walter is the kind of a fellow that will keep without canning."
"Meaning some others won"t--such as Sid, for example?"
"Well, he"s very "close" sometimes, so to speak. At least very hard to understand. But let"s talk about something else. When do you go over to the bank, to stand and deliver your good cash, bonds and securities for their stock?"
"This very afternoon, may it please the court. And, by the same token, I should be getting home now. Hope we won"t meet anyone, or they might ask, as Sid did, if I"d been clamming. I can"t seem to keep out of the mud."
They gathered up their fishing paraphernalia and walked out to the highway.
"Are you and your money going over in the machine?" asked Jack.