The Automobile Girls at Newport; Or, Watching the Summer Parade

CHAPTER V—THE GLORIOUS START

The two girls talked in excited whispers. It wouldn’t do to waken mother any earlier than they must, for she was tired with their preparations, though her daughters had persuaded her to have a little country girl in to help with the work, now that she was to have so important a person as Mr. Stuart for “boarder.”

But at seven o’clock it was mother who called:

“Get up, girls. It is time for coffee and clothes, if you are to start off at ten as you promised. It will not do to keep Miss Stuart and the girls waiting. As for Mr. A. Bubble, I don’t believe he can stand still, even if he tries.”

Aunt Sallie having called on Sunday afternoon, had waived ceremony and stayed to tea in the tiny cottage, so impressed was she with Mrs. Thurston’s quiet charm and gentle manners.

The two girls hurried into their kimonos. Mother had suggested these garments for this morning, since they were to dress so soon afterwards in their “going away” clothes.

By the time that Barbara and Mollie had put on their pretty brown and blue serge suits, with their dust coats over them, they heard strange noises on the front porch, mingled with giggles and whispers. Barbara was putting the sixth hat pin into her hat, and tying the motor veil so tightly under her chin that it choked her, when Mollie peeped out the front window.

“It’s a surprise party, I do believe,” she whispered. “There’s Harold Smith, with a big bunch of pink roses. I know they are for you. The girls have little bundles in their hands. What fun! I didn’t know they had heard of our trip. How fast news does fly around this village.”

While Mollie and Barbara were saying their good-byes on their little veranda there was equal excitement at the big hotel.

Before breakfast Ruth had gone out to the garage with her arm in her father’s.

“I want to see with my own eyes, Dad,” she said, “that the machine is all right. Isn’t it well that I have a taste for mechanics, even though I am a girl? Suppose I hadn’t studied all those automobile books with you until I could say them backwards, and hadn’t helped you over all the accidents—you never would have let me go on this heavenly trip, would you? I am going to be as careful as can be, just to show you did right to trust me, also not to give Aunt Sallie a chance to say, ‘I told you so.’”

Ruth had pretty, sunny, red-gold hair and big, gray-blue eyes. Though she wasn’t exactly a beauty, her face was so frank, and her coloring so fresh and lovely, many people thought her very good-looking.

Mr. Stuart smiled at his daughter’s enthusiasm. “She’s ‘a chip of the old block,’” he said to himself. “She loves fun and adventure and ‘getting there,’ like a man. I am not going to stand in her way.”

Mr. Stuart was feeling rather nervous about the trip this morning, but he didn’t intend Ruth to know.

To judge by the looks of the automobile, the chauffeur must have been up all night. The machinery was cleaned and oiled. The extra tires, in their dark red leather cases, were strapped to the sides of the car. A great box of extra rugs and wraps, rubber covers for the machine and mackintoshes in case of rain, was tied on the back. Between the seats was an open hamper for lunch, with an English tea service in one compartment, and cups, saucers, a teapot and a hot-water jug and alcohol lamp, all complete. The luncheon was to be sent down later from the hotel.

“You are to take your meals at the inns along the way, when you prefer,” Mr. Stuart had explained, “but I don’t mean to have you run the risk of starving in case you are delayed, or an accident occurs. Be sure to take your picnic lunch along with you, when you start out each day. What you don’t eat, feed to the small boys along the road, who will insist on playing guide.”

Aunt Sallie was the only one of the hotel party who enjoyed breakfast. Grace had driven over early, and was breakfasting with Ruth in order to save delay. Both the girls and Mr. Stuart were too excited to take much interest in their bacon and eggs, but Aunt Sallie ate with a resigned expression that seemed to say: “Perhaps this is my last meal on earth.” Yet, secretly, she was almost as delighted as were the girls in the prospect of the trip.

“Now, Sallie, you are not to go if you don’t wish to,” Mr. Stuart had protested. “You must not let Ruth drag you into this trip against your will.”

But all he could persuade his sister to answer was: “If Ruth is going on such an extraordinary excursion, then, at least, I shall be along to see that nothing worse happens to her.”

Gladys Le Baron came into the dining-room, stopping in front of Ruth’s table. “You dear things,” she drawled in her most careful society manner, “how can you look so fresh so early in the morning? I hope you appreciate my getting up to see you off.” Gladys wore a lingerie frock more appropriate for a party than for the breakfast room.

But Ruth answered good naturedly. “I do appreciate it, if it is such an effort for you. Did you know Mr. Townsend is going to ride over to the Thurston’s with us to see us start? He tells me you and he are both to be in Newport while we are there.”

“Yes,” Gladys declared with more airs than before. “Mrs. Erwin has asked me to be one of the house-party she’s to have for her ball. She told me I could bring a friend along, and I have asked Mr. Townsend.”

“Wonderful! We won’t expect you to associate with us!” laughed Grace.

“Gladys,” Ruth asked, “would you like to drive over to Mrs. Thurston’s with us? Father is going, and the carriage will be there to bring him back.”

“I would like to go,” murmured Gladys, “if I didn’t have on this old frock. I don’t know Mollie and Barbara very well, but I suppose I shall have to see a great deal of them, now you have taken them up. I wonder how they will behave at Newport? They have hardly been out of Kingsbridge before.”

Grace and Ruth both looked angry, and Mr. Stuart broke in, quite curtly: “I am sure we can depend on their behaving becomingly, which is all that is necessary at Newport or any other place.” Ruth’s father was a business acquaintance of Gladys’s father, and had known her mother when the latter was a girl, but the airs of Mrs. Le Baron and her society daughter were too much for his western common sense. Only Aunt Sallie was impressed by their imposing manner.

Ruth was very popular at the big summer hotel, and a number of the guests had assembled to see her off. But Ruth let her father run the car and sat quietly by his side. “You’ll turn over the command to me, captain, won’t you, when the trip really commences?” and she squeezed his arm with a little movement of affection.

“Yes, lieutenant,” Mr. Stuart said quietly.

“Oh, Miss Ruth,” called Mr. Townsend from the back seat, “do show all these people how you can handle your car!” But she only shook her head.

“Goodness me, what are all those people doing on Mrs. Thurston’s porch?” Ruth asked, in alarm. “I hope nothing has happened.” But, as the car neared the quiet little house, which stood midway between the hotel and the New York high road, she saw the party of young people gathered on the front lawn.

“It’s only their friends, come to say good-bye to them,” Harry volunteered. In answer to “What a bore!” from Gladys, he continued: “I don’t know why you should think it a bore. Miss Stuart enjoys her friends’s popularity.” Mr. Townsend had been trying, for several weeks, to make himself equally agreeable to Ruth and Gladys. They were both very wealthy, and it seemed wise to him to associate with rich people. But as Ruth was not easily impressed with what she called “just foolishness,” he had become very intimate with Gladys Le Baron.

When Mr. Stuart tooted the horn to announce their approach to the cottage a chorus of tin horns answered him from Mrs. Thurston’s front garden. As the car drew up to the gate, the boys and girls began to sing, “See the Conquering Hero Comes,” while Barbara ran down to the car and Mollie urged her friends to be quieter. “I just don’t know what Miss Stuart and Mr. Stuart will think of us!” she blushingly remonstrated.

But Aunt Sallie and Mr. Stuart were in for all the fun going this morning. Barbara was invited to call her seven friends who had come to give the girls a send-off, down to meet the occupants of the car. Even Gladys, as she was forced to get out of the automobile to let the other travelers in, was condescending enough to permit Harold Smith to assist her. Harold was an old friend of Barbara’s, and one of the cleverest boys in the village.

Mr. Stuart went into the house for the suit cases and satchels, which were all the girls were to take with them, as they were to manage with as few clothes as possible. It had been arranged that extra luggage was to be expressed to them along the way.

Barbara had caught Mollie storing away a sample package of cold cream among her most treasured possessions.

“I am sure I don’t see why you should laugh so,” Mollie urged quite seriously. “It reads on the label ‘especially adapted for automobile travelers to remove dust and tan from the face after the drive.’ Aren’t we going to be automobile travelers?”

“Sure and we a’ire,” said Bab, imitating the old Irish washerwoman, “and it shall put grease on its nose if it likes.”

“Come, daughter,” said Mr. Stuart finally, as Ruth was trying to explain to a group of admiring boys the first principles of running an automobile. She talked as familiarly of an emergency brake and a steering wheel, of horse power and speed-transmission, as most girls talk of frills and furbelows.

“It’s ten-thirty,” Mr. Stuart continued, “and, if this party is to be a strictly on time affair, you must be off! You couldn’t have a more wonderful day.”

It was late in the month of June. The summer clouds were sailing overhead, great bubbles of white foam thrown up into the blue depth of the sky. The sun shone brightly and the whole atmosphere was perfumed with the bloom of the honeysuckle, that hung in yellow clusters from Mrs. Thurston’s porch.

Barbara and Mollie flung their arms around their mother until she was completely enveloped in their embrace. Ruth kissed her father, and put her hand to her trim leather cap with a military salute. “It’s all right, captain,” she said; “I’ll bring my crew and good ship ‘Bubble’ safely into port.”

Aunt Sallie was anxious to be off. She could see that Mrs. Thurston was on the verge of tears at the thought of parting with her daughters. Still the young people were laughing and talking, and storing their little gifts under the seats in the car, as though they had all day before them.

“Hurry, child,” Aunt Sallie urged, reaching out a hand to Mollie. “Jump up on the back seat with Grace and me. We will let Mistress Barbara sit with Ruth for the first of the journey.” Aunt Sallie was very imposing in a violet silk traveling coat, with a veil and hat of the same shade; indeed, Miss Sallie had a fancy for a “touch of lavender” in everything she wore. With her snow-white hair, and commanding appearance, she would add prestige to the party, Mollie thought, no matter how dusty and wind-blown the rest of them might appear.

The girls hopped gayly in. Toot, toot, toot! the horn blew three times. Chug-chug-chug! and the great machine began to breathe with deep, muffled roars. Mr. Stuart gave the starting crank a strong turn, and the car slid gracefully along the road, red, blue, pink and violet motor veils floating behind in the breeze.

“Here’s good luck to you!” shouted Harold Smith, and roses and flowers of every kind were flung after them. Mollie and Grace picked up those that fell into their laps, and turned to wave their hands and throw kisses for good-bye.

“They look like a rainbow,” said Mr. Stuart, turning to Mrs. Thurston, who was no longer trying to hide her tears. Then he smiled at her gently. She was such a tiny, girlish-looking little woman, it was hard to think of her as the mother of two nearly grown-up daughters. “I expect,” he continued, “that that rainbow holds most of our promise of sunshine.”

They were still watching the car!

Down to the gate, at the furthest end of the road, a baby boy, chubby and fat, had crawled on two round, turned-in legs. There was something unusual going on down the street. He could hear strange noises, but, though he stuck his small nose through the fence, he was still unable to see. Just as Ruth’s car was almost in front of the house, open flew the stubborn old gate, and the child flung himself out in the middle of the road, just in front of the wonderful red thing he could see flying toward him. The baby was too young to understand the danger.

From the watchers at Mrs. Thurston’s came a cry of horror. A thrill of terror passed through the occupants of the car. Ruth’s face turned white. Like a flash, she slowed a little, turned her steering wheel and with a wide sweep drove her motor to the far side of the road, then straight on out of the path of the wondering baby.

Mr. Stuart’s, “Bravo, daughter!” was lost in his throat. But the little group of waiting friends gave three cheers for the girl chauffeur, which Ruth heard even at such a distance. Truly “The Automobile Girls” were fairly started on their adventures.

CHAPTER VI—WHAT HAPPENED THE FIRST DAY

Ruth glanced out of the corner of her eye at Barbara. Miss Stuart was a good little chauffeur who never allowed her attention to be distracted from running her car, no matter what was being talked of around her, nor how much she was interested, but she couldn’t help laughing at Barbara’s expression; it told so plainly all that was going on inside her head.

“I do assure you, Miss Barbara Thurston, that a roof garden may be a fairly respectable thing, quite well suited to entertaining, without shocking either Miss Sallie Stuart or her four charming protégées.” Ruth called back: “Aunt Sallie, will you take us up on the Waldorf roof to-night? You know we are going to stay at the Waldorf Hotel, girls. Father said we might enjoy the experience, and it would be all right with Aunt Sallie for chaperon.”

Grace pinched Mollie’s arm to express her rapture, and that little maiden simply gasped with delight. It was Mollie, not Barbara, of the two sisters, who had the greatest yearning for wealth and society, and the beautiful clothes and wonderful people that she believed went along with it. Barbara was an out-door girl, who loved tennis and all the sports, and could swim like a fish. An artist who spent his summers at Kingsbridge, once called her a brown sea-gull, when he saw her lithe brown body dart off the great pier to dive deep into the water.

Aunt Sallie had been taking a brief cat-nap, before Ruth’s question, and awakened in high good humor. “Why, yes, children,” she answered, “it will be very pleasant to go up on the roof to-night, after we have had our baths and our dinners. I am quite disposed to let you do just what you like, so long as you behave yourselves.”

Grace Carter pressed Aunt Sallie’s fat hand, as a message of thanks. Grace was Aunt Sallie’s favorite among Ruth’s friends. “She is a quiet, lady-like girl, who does not do unexpected things that get on one’s nerves,” Miss Sallie had once explained to Ruth. “Now, Aunt Sallie,” Ruth had protested, “I know I do get on your nerves sometimes, but you know you need me to stir you up. Think how dull you would be without me!” And Aunt Sallie had answered, with unexpected feeling: “I would be very dull, indeed, my dear.”

The girls were full of their plans for the evening.

“That is why Ruth told us each to put a muslin dress in our suit cases! Ruth, are you going to think up a fresh surprise every day! It’s just too splendid!” Mollie spoke in a tone of such fervent emotion that everyone in the car laughed.

“I don’t suppose I can manage a surprise every day, Molliekins,” Ruth called back over her shoulder, “but I mean to think up as many as I possibly can. We are going to have the time of our lives, you know, and something must happen to make it.”

All this time the car had been flying faster than the girls could talk. “This is ‘going some,’” commented Ruth, laughing.

When they came into Lakewood Ruth slowed up, as she had promised her father not to go any faster than the law allowed. “I cross my heart and body, Dad,” she had said. “Think of four lovely maidens and their handsome duenna languishing in jail instead of flying along the road to Newport. Honest Injun! father, I’ll read every automobile sign from here to Jehosaphat, if we ever decide to travel that way.”

In Lakewood, Ruth drove her car around the wonderful pine shaded lake.

“It’s a winter resort,” she explained to her companions. “Nearly all the cottages and hotels are closed in the summer, but I wanted you to have a smell of the pines. It will give you strength for the rest of the trip.”

Silence fell on the party as they skimmed out of Lakewood. After so much excitement it was pleasant to look at things without having to talk.

Mollie had begun, once in a while, to tap the lunch basket with her foot. The fresh air and the long ride had made her desperately hungry. She really couldn’t remember having eaten any breakfast in the excitement of getting off. But nobody said f-o-o-d! She felt she was the youngest member of the party and should not make suggestions before Miss Sallie.

Ruth turned into a narrow lane; a sign post pointed the way to a deserted village.

“Oh, dear me!” sighed Mollie to herself. “Why are we going to a deserted village, just as we are dying of hunger!”

Ruth said never a word. She passed some tumble-down old cottages of a century ago, then an old iron foundry, and drew up with a great flourish before an old stone house, green with moss and ivy and fragrant with a “lovely” odor of cooking! There were little tables set out on the lawn and on the old-fashioned veranda, and soon the party was reveling in lunch.

“I didn’t know food could be so heavenly,” whispered Mollie in Bab’s ear, when they were back in the car, for Grace had begged for a seat by the chauffeur for the afternoon trip.

Soon Ruth left the country behind, and came out on the sea-coast road that ran through Long Branch, Deal Beach, Monmouth and Seabright.

From carriages and other automobiles, and along the promenades, everyone smiled at the crimson car full of happy, laughing girls.

Ruth was driving in her best fashion, making all the speed she could, with the thought of town fifty miles or more ahead. “It is a sight to see,” quoth Barbara, “the way the fairy princess handles her chariot of fire.”

It was a little after four o’clock when the car boarded the Staten Island ferry and finally crossed to the New York shore.

“You see, Bab,” Mollie said, trying to stuff her curls under her motor cap and to rub the dust from her rosy cheeks with a tiny pocket handkerchief as they sped up Broadway, “I might be dreadfully embarrassed arriving at the Waldorf looking the way I do, if I were not in a motor car, but riding in an automobile makes one feel so awfully swell that nothing matters. Isn’t it lovely just to feel important for once? You know it is, Bab, and you needn’t say no! It’s silly to pretend.”

Miss Sallie was again on the border of slumberland, so that Mollie and Barbara could have their low-voiced talk.

“Does Ruth know I have never even been to New York before?” asked Mollie. “I hope I won’t seem very green about things. You must tell me if I do, Bab.”

But Bab only laughed and shook her head. “You are a foolish baby,” she said.

Two respectful porters at the Waldorf helped a dusty, crumpled party out of the big red touring car.

The girls, a little dazed, followed Miss Sallie through a maze of palms and servants in livery, with handsomely dressed people strolling through the halls, until their suite of rooms, which Mr. Stuart had engaged by telegraph a few days before, was reached.

The three rooms adjoined, only separated by white tile bathrooms. Miss Sallie, naturally, had a room to herself, and it was decided that Ruth and Grace were to sleep together, leaving the sisters to themselves.

“Isn’t it too beautiful!” sighed Mollie, standing in the midst of their luxurious chamber, gazing around at the single brass beds, with their rose-colored draperies, and the ivory-striped satin wall paper, garlanded in pink flowers. Ruth and Grace were equally fine in a room decorated in blue, and, even in the Waldorf, Miss Sallie’s taste seemed to have been consulted, as her room was in her favorite violet shade.

In some mysterious way the crumpled muslin dresses were taken downstairs by a maid, and came back smooth and fresh. Even Miss Sallie’s elaborate chiffon gown looked as though it had just come home from the modiste’s.

“O Ruth! Ruth!” Mollie exclaimed, as the four girls made their way to the dining-room, Miss Sallie in the lead, “I didn’t know there could be such a magnificent place in the world as this. I don’t know what I can ever do to repay you, except to love you and be grateful my whole life long.”

“Well, I am sure that is all the gratitude I should ever want, Mollie,” laughed Ruth. “But wait until you see the houses at Newport.”

All eyes near the door turned to see the little automobile party enter the “palm room.” Miss Sallie swept ahead in her black lace and chiffon, looking very handsome and impressive. Barbara and Grace came next; Barbara with her red-brown hair breaking into willful curves and waves, her big brown eyes glowing with pleasure, and the deep red showing in her olive cheeks; Grace with her look of refinement and gentle dignity. The blond maidens came in last. Ruth’s bright gold hair and fresh coloring showed to best advantage in a dainty white muslin and lace frock. She was half a head taller than dainty Mollie, who looked like a flower with her yellow curls gathered in a soft cluster at the back of her neck and tied with a black velvet ribbon.

On the Waldorf roof, Miss Stuart and the girls sat under an orange tree, hung in some mysterious way with golden oranges. The whole place was decorated with palms and evergreens and beautiful flowers. The soft, shaded yellow lights rivaled the moonlight that glowed above.

“It’s like the enchanted garden in the French fairy story, isn’t it, Miss Sallie? Where the flowers and fruits bloomed all the year round?” whispered Barbara, who sat next their chaperon.

Miss Sallie smiled very kindly at her enthusiasm.

“I expect it is, but I am afraid I have forgotten the story. It has been a long time, remember, Barbara, since fairies and I have had much to say to each other.”

Barbara blushed. “Oh, I am not so young as all that, Miss Sallie; but I have never forgotten the fairy tales I read when I was a little girl. Though I must confess I liked boys’ stories better. I just love adventures!” And Barbara’s eyes shone. In a little while the music commenced, and she forgot everything but that.

Mollie was differently occupied. What she liked best was to gaze around her at the women in their jewels and wonderful gowns.

Just across from her on the other side of the aisle was a rarely beautiful woman in a white lace gown, with a string of pearls round her throat, and a pearl and diamond butterfly that glowed and sparkled in her hair.

Mollie was so fascinated by her beauty that she couldn’t help watching this stranger, and even overhearing a little of her conversation. “It isn’t exactly eavesdropping,” Mollie apologized to herself, “because I don’t know them and they can never possibly know me.” So nobody noticed, but Mollie, that when the woman gave a laughing toss of her head in answer to some question from her husband, who sat back of her, that the beautiful, jeweled butterfly slipped softly out of her hair, fell into the softer lace folds of her gown and then down—down—to the floor!

The little girl waited half a minute. No one else had noticed the loss. At any time an usher might come down the aisle and crush the exquisite jewel. Mollie forgot herself and her shyness. If it had been Barbara she would not have minded, but Mollie was timid before strangers. She slipped quietly across the aisle and picked up the butterfly.

“I beg your pardon,” her soft voice explained, “but I saw this fall from your hair, and, as you did not notice it, I was afraid it might be crushed.”

The lovely woman turned in surprise. It is just as well to call her “the lovely lady,” now, for that was Mollie’s name for her ever afterwards.

“My dear,” she said, “I am very grateful to you. How could I have failed to see it? I am especially obliged to you, because I am very fond of this ornament.”

Mollie blushed rosy-red, as the people close to them had observed what had happened and were watching her. As she tried to slip over to her seat, the lady reached out and gave the child’s hand a gentle squeeze of thanks, glancing across as she did so to see what friends the little girl was with, and so caught Ruth Stuart’s eye.

The intermission came at this minute.

“Why, Ruth Stuart!” Mollie, to her surprise, heard her friend’s name called in a low voice, and Ruth came across to them.

“It’s Mrs. Cartwright,” she said. “I am so pleased! I didn’t suppose you would remember me.”

“Of course I remember you, Ruth,” Mrs. Cartwright protested. “It has been only two years since I saw you at my own wedding in Chicago. My memory is surely longer than that. Isn’t that your aunt, Miss Stuart?” Mrs. Cartwright moved across the aisle to speak to Miss Sallie and to introduce her husband. When they had shaken hands, Mrs. Cartwright asked: “May I know what you are doing in this part of the world at this season?”

“I am playing chaperon to my madcap niece and her three friends, who are doing an automobile trip to Newport without a man. Ruth is her own chauffeur,” Miss Sallie explained, laughing.

“How jolly of you, Ruth, and how clever! I am so glad you are going to Newport. Did you know my summer place is down there? I am only in town for a day or two. My husband had to come on business and I am with him. We shall be motoring home, soon, and may pass you if you are to take things slowly. Why not join me at New Haven? My husband’s brother is a junior at Yale, and we’ve promised to stop there for a day. There is a dance on at Alumni Hall. I’d be too popular for words if I could take you four pretty girls along with me!”

Ruth turned to her aunt with glowing eyes. “We did want to see the college dreadfully,” she said. “I have never seen a big Eastern university. We didn’t dream of knowing anybody who would show us around. Wouldn’t it be too much for you to have us all on your hands?”

“Certainly not,” said Mrs. Cartwright, “but a most decided pleasure. I shall meet you in New Haven, say, day after to-morrow, and I’ll telegraph to-night to my brother, whose name is Donald Cartwright, by the way, to expect us.”

The music was about to begin again, but, before Mrs. Cartwright went over to her seat, she put her hand on Mollie’s curls. “I must see this little girl often at Newport. Then I can thank her better for saving my lovely butterfly for me. I hope to make all of you have a beautiful time.” She put the jewel into her hair again, and Mollie looked at it thoughtfully. She was to know it again some day, under stranger circumstances.

CHAPTER VII—SHOWING THEIR METTLE

“Oh, Aunt Sallie!” Ruth’s hand was already on the spark of her steering wheel, and she was bouncing up and down on her seat in her impatience to be off. “It’s simply a splendid day! Look at the sun!” She leaned over to Mr. Cartwright. “Do say something to cheer Aunt Sallie up. If she loses her nerve now, we’ll never have our trip.”

Mr. and Mrs. Cartwright both reassured her. “The paper says clear weather and light winds, Miss Stuart. You’ll have a beautiful day of it. Remember we shall meet you in New Haven to-morrow, and you have promised to wait for us.”

Aunt Sallie settled herself resignedly into her violet cushions, holding her smelling bottle to her nose. “Very well, young people, have it your own way,” she relented. “But, mark my words, it will rain before night. I have a shoulderblade that is a better weather prophet than all your bureaus.”

“You’re much too handsome a woman,” laughed Ruth, the other girls joining her, “to talk like Katisha, in the ‘Mikado,’ who had the famous shoulderblade that people came miles to see.”

Ruth was steering her car through Fifth Avenue, so Aunt Sallie merely smiled at her own expense, adding: “You’re a very disrespectful niece, Ruth.”

“I’d get on my knees to apologize, Auntie,” declared Ruth, “only there isn’t room, and we’d certainly be run into, if I did.”

Barbara was poring over the route book. Her duty as guide to the automobile party really began to-day, and she was studying every inch of the road map. What would she do if they were lost?

“You may look up from that book just once in every fifteen minutes, Guide Thurston,” Ruth said, pretending to be serious over Barbara’s worried look. “We promise not to eat you if you do get us a little out of our way. The roads are well posted. What shall we do if we meet some bandits?”

“Leave them to me,” boasted Barbara. “I suppose it’s my fate to play man of the party.”

“And what of the chauffeur?” Ruth protested. “I wonder what any of us could do if we got into danger.”

The day was apparently lovely. The girls were in the wildest spirits.

“I never believed until this minute,” announced Mollie, “that we were actually going on the trip to Newport. I felt every moment something would happen to stop us. I even dreamed, last night, that we met a great giant in the road, and he roared at us, ‘I never allow red motor cars with brass trimmings to pass along this road!’ Ruth wouldn’t pay the least attention to him, but kept straight ahead, until he picked up the car and started to pitch us over in a ditch. Then Ruth cried: ‘Hold on there! If you won’t let a red car pass, I’ll go back to town and have mine painted green. I must have my trip.’ Just as she turned around and started back, I woke up. Wasn’t it awful?”

“You are a goose,” said Grace, rather nervously. “It isn’t a sign of anything, is it? You ought not to tell your dreams after breakfast. You may make them come true.”

Barbara and Ruth both shouted with laughter, for Mollie answered just as seriously: “You’re wrong, Grace; it’s telling dreams before breakfast that makes them come true. I was particularly careful to wait.”

The car passed swiftly through the town in the early morning. Soon the spires and towers of the city were no longer visible.

“Hurrah for the Boston Post Road!” sang Barbara, as the car swung into the famous old highway.

“And hurrah for Barbara for discovering it!” teased Ruth. “Now, clear the track, fellow autoists and slow coach drivers! We know where we’re going, and we’re on the way!”

It had been decided to make a straight trip through to New Haven, and to wait there for Mrs. Cartwright. Miss Sallie had insisted on some rest, and the girls were wild to see the college—and the college men.

“It will be sure enough sport,” Ruth confided, “to have one dance with all the partners needed to go round.” Men were as scarce at the Kingsbridge Hotel as they were in other summer resorts, and Ruth was tired of Harry Townsend and his kind, who liked to stay around the hotel, making eyes at all the girls they saw.

“Yes,” said Barbara thoughtfully, “it will be fun. Yet, Ruth, suppose we are sticks and no one dances with us?” Barbara didn’t like the thought of being a wall-flower. Ruth laughed and quickly replied, “Oh, Mrs. Cartwright is awfully jolly and popular, so we will have plenty of invitations to dance.”

“Ruth,” said Miss Sallie, a little after noon, when they had passed, without a hitch, through a number of beautiful Connecticut towns, and were speeding along an open road, with a view of the waters of Long Island Sound to the right of them, “I have not looked at my watch lately, but I’ve an impression I am hungry. As long as we have made up our minds to eat the luncheon the hotel has put up for us, why not stop along the road here, and have a picnic?”

“Good for you, Aunt Sallie!” said Grace, emphatically. “This is a beauty place. Ruth can leave the car right here, and we can go up under that elm and make tea. What larks!”

The girls all piled out, carrying the big lunch hamper between them. On the stump of an old tree the alcohol lamp was set up and tea was quickly brewed. Then the girls formed a circle on the ground, while Miss Sallie, from her throne of violet silk pillows, gave directions about setting the lunch table.

No one noticed how the time passed. No one could notice, all were having such a jolly time; even Miss Sallie was now in excellent spirits. She had been in Newport several times before, and the girls were full of questions.

Mollie leaned her head against Miss Sallie’s knee, so intimate had she grown in a day and a half with that awe-inspiring person. “Is it true,” she inquired in a voice of reverence, “that every person who lives in Newport is a millionaire?”

“And are the streets paved with gold, Miss Sallie?” queried Grace. She was Mollie’s special friend, and fond of teasing her. “I read that the water at Bailey’s Beach is perfumed every morning before the ladies go in bathing, and that all the fish that come from near there taste like cologne.”

Miss Sallie laughed. “There are some people at Newport who are not summer people,” she explained. “You must remember that it is an old New England town, and there are thousands of people who live there the year around. My brother has persuaded some old friends of ours, who used to be very wealthy when I was a girl, to take us to board with them. There are very few hotels.”

Several times during their talk Ruth’s eyes had wandered a little anxiously to the sky above them. Every now and then the shadows darkened under the old elm where they were eating their luncheon, bringing a sudden coolness to the summer atmosphere.

“Aunt Sallie made me nervous about the weather with that story of her shoulderblade,” Ruth argued with herself. So she was the first to say: “Come, we had better be off. What a lot of time we’ve wasted!”

“No hurry, Ruth,” Aunt Sallie answered, placidly. “New Haven is no great distance. We shall be there before dark.”

It was fully half after two before the automobile girls had gathered up their belongings and were again comfortably disposed in the car.

“It certainly is great, Ruth, the way you crank up your own car,” Grace declared. “It must take an awful lot of strength, doesn’t it?”

“Yes,” admitted Ruth, as she jumped back into her automobile and the car plunged on ahead. “But I’ve a strong right arm. I don’t row and play tennis for nothing. Father says it takes skill and courage, as well as strength, to drive a car. I hope I’m not boasting; it’s only that father believes girls should attempt to do things as well as boys. Girls could do a lot more if they tried harder. ‘Sometimes,’ Dad says, ‘gumption counts for more than brute force.’”

“Whew, Ruth! You talk like a suffragette,” objected Grace.

“Well, maybe I am one,” said Ruth. “I’m from the West, where they raise strong-minded women. What do you say, Barbara?”

“I don’t know,” replied Barbara. “I would not like to go to war, and I’m awfully afraid I’d run from a burglar in the dark.”

“Who’d have thought Barbara would confess to being a coward?” Grace broke in, just to see what Bab would say. But Bab wouldn’t answer. “I don’t know what I would do,” she ended.

“Anyhow,” said Miss Ruth, from her position of dignity on the chauffeur’s seat, “I should be allowed to vote on laws for motor cars, as long as I can run a machine without a man.”

“My dear Ruth,” interposed Miss Sallie at last, “I beg of you, don’t vote in my lifetime. Girls, in my day, would never have dreamed of such a thing.”

“Oh, well, Auntie,” answered Ruth, “I wouldn’t worry about it now. Who knows when I may have a chance to vote?”

Ruth was worried by the clouds overhead, so she ran her machine at full speed. It took some time and ingenuity to make their way through Bridgeport, a big, bustling town with crowded streets. By this time the clouds had lifted, and, for the next hour, Ruth forgot the rain. She and Barbara were having a serious talk on the front seat. Mollie and Grace, with their arms around each other, were almost as quiet as Aunt Sallie; indeed, they were more so, for that good soul was gently snoring.

“If we should have any adventures, Bab,” said Ruth, “I wonder if we’d be equal to them? I’ll wager you would be. Father says that when people are not too sure of themselves before a thing happens, they are likely to be brave at the critical minute.”

The car was going down a hill with a steep incline. Ruth’s hand was on the brake. Biff! Biff! Bang! Bang! A cannon ball seemed to have exploded under them. Miss Sallie sat up very straight, with an expression of great dignity; Grace and Mollie gave little screams, and Barbara looked as though she were willing to be defended if anything very dreadful had happened.

Only Ruth dared laugh. “You’re not killed, girls,” she said. “You might as well get used to that racket; it happens to the best regulated motor cars. It is only a bursted tire; but it might have been kind enough to have happened in town, instead of on this deserted country road. Oh, dear me!” she next ejaculated, for, before she could stop her car, it had skidded, and the front wheel was imbedded in a deep hole in the road.

“Get out, please,” Ruth ordered. “Grace, will you find a stone for me? I must try to brace this wheel. Did I say something about skill, instead of strength, and not needing a man?” Ruth had taken off her coat and rolled up her sleeves in a business-like fashion.

“I have helped father with a punctured tire before.” She tugged at the old tire, which hung limp and useless by this time. She was talking very cheerfully, though Aunt Sallie’s woeful expression would have made any girl nervous. At the same time dark clouds had begun to appear overhead.

“You’d better get out the rain things,” Ruth conceded. “I can’t get this fixed very soon. Queer no one passes along this way. It’s a lonesome kind of road. I wonder if we are off the main track?”

“It is a country lane, not a main road. I saw that at once,” said Miss Sallie.

“Then why didn’t you tell us, Aunt Sallie?”

“My eyes were closed to avoid the dust,” replied Aunt Sallie firmly.

Poor Ruth had a task on her hands. If only the car had not skidded into that ugly hole, she could have managed; but it was impossible for her, with the help of all the girls, to lift the car enough to slip the new tire over the rim.

Mollie and Grace were taking Miss Sallie a little walk through the woods at the side of the road to try to make the time pass and to give Ruth a chance. Grace had winked at her slyly as they departed.

“Barbara,” Ruth said finally, in tragic tones, “I’m in a fix and I might as well confess it. I know it all comes of my boasting that I didn’t need a man. My kingdom for one just for a few minutes! Do you suppose there is a farmhouse near where we could find some one to help me get this wheel out of the rut? I’d surrender this job to a man with pleasure.”

“I don’t believe we are on the right road, Ruth, dear.” Barbara felt so responsible that she was almost in tears. Ominous thunder clouds were rolling overhead, and Bab tried not to notice the large splash of rain that had fallen on her nose.

“Don’t worry Bab, dear,” urged Ruth. “I should have looked out for the road, too. It can’t be helped.”

“But I am going to help. You can just rely on that,” announced Barbara, shaking her brown curls defiantly. She had taken off her hat in the exertion of trying to help Ruth. “We passed a sleepy-looking old farm a little way back, but I am going to wake it up!”

She heard Miss Sallie and the girls returning to the shelter of the car, for the rain had suddenly come down in torrents. Down the road sped Bab, shaking her head like a little brown Shetland pony.

Miss Sallie was in the depths of despair.

“Child,” she said sternly to Ruth, “get into the car out of that mud. We will remain here, under the shelter of the covers until morning. Then, if we are alive, I myself will walk to the nearest town and telegraph your father. We will take the next train back to New York.” Miss Sallie spoke with the extreme severity due to a rheumatic shoulder that had been disregarded.

“Please let me keep on trying, Aunt Sallie,” pleaded Ruth. “I’ll get the tire on, or some one will come along to help me. I am so sorry, for I know it is all my fault.”

“Never mind, Ruth; but you are to come into this car.” And Ruth, covered with mud, was obliged to give in.

“Where, I should like to know,” demanded Miss Sallie, “is Barbara?”

Through the rain they could hear the patter, patter of a horse’s hoofs.