Page:Betty Gordon at Boarding School.djvu/179

Rh It was the work of a moment to tie one end of the rope to a heavy staple driven under the window sill, and then, closing her eyes to the pitch black void beneath her, Betty let herself slide down to the roof. Her hands were cruelly scratched by the rope fibres and she was too tired to care about the evidences of her flight.

"If anybody wants to know about that rope and the locked door, let 'em!" she sighed defiantly.

Bobby woke up as Betty came in the door, and then there were questions galore to be answered. Betty was covered with dust and her clothing was torn and rumpled. Bobby declared she looked as if she had been to war.

"I feel it," admitted Betty. "Let me take a hot bath and get into bed. And, Bobby, promise me on your word of honor that you'll call me in the morning. Whoever locked me in expects me to stay there till I'm missed, and I want to walk into breakfast as usual."

She half regretted her instructions when Bobby called her at seven the next morning, but Betty was nothing if not gritty, and she sleepily struggled into her clothes. Ada Nansen's look of utter astonishment when she saw Betty come into the dining room with the rest for breakfast told those in the secret what they had already suspected.

"Bobby must have heard her listening at our