"Well----"
"You--you are perfectly horrid!" her chum declared. "She's a heroine!
Think of it! We ought to do something for her, Linda says."
"We ought to let her alone," Nan declared vigorously.
"I--I never knew you to speak so, Nan," gasped Bess. "This brave girl----"
"How do you know she's brave?" snapped Nan, who was really getting cross. "She probably was scared half to death."
"Why! she's a heroine," declared Bess again.
"Well! how do we know how a heroine feels?" Nan asked, exasperated.
"Oh, Nan!"
"One thing I am sure of," went on Nan Sherwood, rather wildly. "She doesn't want a memorial--or a medal--or a purse----"
"Perhaps she's poor," put in Bess, obstinately.
"She's not!"
"Why--do you know who she is?" gasped Bess.
Nan was silent. She saw she had gone too far. If Bess should suspect----
The door at the rear of the car banged open. The conductor, leading a committee of passengers from the other coach, entered. He was smiling and the ladies and gentlemen with him were smiling, too. When their gaze fell upon Nan they marched directly toward her.
Nan got up. She looked all about for some means of escape. Behind her, coming down the aisle, were several other people headed by Professor Krenner. And with them came the haughty girl, Linda Riggs.
"Oh! what's the matter?" cried Bess, starting up, too.
Nan was speechless, and red with confusion. Professor Krenner was smiling, as though he rather enjoyed Nan Sherwood's position.
"Oh, Miss Harley!" Linda Riggs cried to her new acquaintance. "They say that dear, brave girl is in this car."
"Is she?" asked Bess, feebly. "Oh, Nan! what do all these people want?"
"We want your friend, Miss Harley," Professor Krenner said drily. "I expect Linda did not know that. Nancy Sherwood, does she call herself?
Well, Nancy Sherwood is a very brave girl, and we have all come to tell her so."
"Nan!" shrieked Bess, seeing a great light suddenly. "It was _you_!
_You_ are the heroine!"
"She most certainly is the girl, Miss," the conductor laughingly said.
"And she has been trying to hide her light under a bushel, has she?"
Bess was stunned. The flushed countenance of Linda Riggs was a study.
Professor Krenner seemed to be secretly enjoying the unpleasant girl's amazement.
Linda seized Bess by the shoulder with a fierce grip--a grip that made the girl from Tillbury wince.
"Why didn't you tell me you knew her?" she hissed in Bess' ear as the passengers crowded about the much troubled Nan.
"I--I didn't know I knew her," gasped Bess. "How should I know Nan Sherwood was the girl who killed the rattlesnake?"
"I don't care anything about that!" cried the enraged girl. "You knew she was the one who stole my bag----"
"Stole your bag?" repeated Bess, her own wrath rising. "She didn't!"
"She did!"
"Nan Sherwood would not do such a thing. It was all a mistake, Linda, and you know it. She didn't have to steal your bag! She has one of her own quite as good----"
"And where did she get it?" sneered the railroad magnate's daughter, her face deeply flushed and her eyes fairly aflame.
"She bought it," declared Bess.
"Yes--she--did!" sneered Linda.
"She did! she did! I was with her yesterday when she bought it! So there!"
"And who are _you_?" responded the enraged girl. "I don't know why I should believe you any more than that other one. You couldn't pay for your lunch just now, and I had to pay for you----"
"Oh!" gasped Bess, now quite in tears. "I paid you back--you horrid girl!"
"Dear me! did you?" responded Linda, airily.
"Yes, I did! You know I did!" Bess cried stormily.
"Perhaps. I never pay attention to such small matters," and the other tossed her head.
Of course, all this was very foolish, and Bess should not have paid Linda the compliment of attention. But she did, and Linda saw that her words stung--so she went on with her ill-natured tirade:
"There is one matter that I _shall_ pay attention to," and she laughed, sneeringly. "I shall see to it that the girls of Lakeview Hall are informed of the character of you and your friend. One of you stealing my bag----"
"She didn't!" gasped Bess.
"Oh, she was stopped before she got very far, I grant you," laughed Linda, sarcastically. "And the other obliged to borrow forty-five cents to pay for her luncheon in the dining car. It will amuse my friends at the Hall, I assure you."
Nan had heard none of this conversation between her chum and Linda Riggs. Her own ears were actually burning because of the complimentary speeches the conductor and the passengers were making. Poor Nan was backed up against her chair, blushing furiously and almost in tears of confusion, while Bess was carrying on her wordy battle with Linda, a few steps up the aisle.
But suddenly Nan, as well as those about her, were quite startled by Bess Harley's shrill outburst.
"Linda Riggs!" she cried. "You are the very meanest girl I ever saw! If you say another mean thing about Nan Sherwood I'll box your ears for you!" and the superheated Bess advanced upon her antagonist, her hand raised, prepared to put her threat into execution.