e.
Then what little common sense she had coming to her rescue, she sullenly
did as she was bid and Mr. Riggs began to ask a few casual questions of
Bess about how she liked Florida, if she had been there before, and
other questions, which Bess answered mechanically. Her eyes were upon
Linda as she stood at a window with her back to the room, her fingers
beating a nervous tattoo on the windowsill.

At last Bess managed to break away and was starting toward the door when
she was surprised to find that Linda was following her.

The girl stopped her at the door, and Bess thought she had never seen
any one as subdued and beaten as Linda looked at that moment.

"Please, Bess," she begged, lowering her voice so that her father would
not hear, "don't tell on me! No one at Lakeview Hall knows that I--I did
that. And no one will unless you tell them. Please, Bess!"

"N-no, I won't tell," said Bess hesitantly. "If was a horrible thing for
you to do, Linda, and Dr. Beulah ought to know. But I--I'm not a
tattle-tale."

Then she fled down the hall, down the stairs, and into her room again.

She told the story to the girls and Walter that night, and they listened
in amazement.

"Well!" said Grace. "And to think that Cora would be the one to give
Linda away."

"I don't know about promising not to tell Doctor Beulah," said Nan
thoughtfully. "It seems to me she ought to know----"

"Well, you tell her then," suggested Rhoda.

"Oh, I couldn't!" Nan flashed back indignantly, and Rhoda laughed at
her.

"You see!" she said.

"Well," sighed Grace, "it's of no use to worry about it now, anyway. We
can't do a thing till we get back to Lakeview Hall."

When Mr. Mason came in that night they questioned him eagerly, but he
had no real news to tell them. He had been able to prove nothing
definite against Jacob Pacomb, and as yet had found no trace of the men
who had so frightened Nan.

And Nan, away down in her heart, was still frightened, there could be no
doubt of that. The man had threatened her, had given her forty-eight
hours to turn over the papers, and more than twenty-four hours of that
time had already passed! If they did not succeed in tracing the
scoundrels and handing them over to justice in the next twenty-four
hours, what might not happen!

Both Rhoda and Grace shared her uneasiness, and lazy Bess grumbled
mightily at the loss of sleep consequent upon it. There is no doubt but
what the girls would have rested a grea