"Hide the letter! Quick, or she'll see you!" Glancing over her shoulder, Betty saw, not only the four girls she had run away from, but four others, running down the terraces, taking the flight of marble steps two at a time.

Gay's shoe-strings were tripping her at every leap, and Lloyd's hair had shaken down around her shoulders in a shining mass in the wild race from the orchard.
Lloyd reached the willow first.

Dropping down on the bench, almost breathless, she began fanning herself with her hat.
"Oh!" she gasped.

"Tell me quick, Betty! What is the mattah?
Cornie Dean said a messenger boy had just come out to the Hall on a bicycle with a special-delivery lettah from home.

I was so suah something awful had happened I could hardly run, it frightened me so." "And we thought maybe something had happened at 'The Beeches,'" interrupted Allison, "and that mamma had written to you to break the news to us." "Why, nothing at all is the matter," answered Betty, calmly, darting a quick look at Dora to see if her face was betraying anything.