Part 8 (1/2)
”No, I haven't. Are you selling them?”
”No, but Ted is.”
”I'm awfully sorry, but Carolyn told me that if I hadn't promised, one of the girls wanted to sell me one, so I promised.”
”Oh, that's all right. It was probably one of the girls on a pep squad.”
”What's a pep squad?” laughed Betty. ”That must be one of the things that I haven't heard about yet.”
”You'll hear a lot about it, then. Why, they have them in the G. A. A., girls that talk it all up and make 'enthusiasm' and support the athletics, you know.”
”What is the G. A. A., please? I must be terribly dense, but remember all the things I've tried to take in. You're not a freshman, are you?”
”Why, nowhat makes you think that?” Chet was privately thinking that there must be something after all in experience, though as he was no larger than a very dear freshman friend, who had been left a little behind in the race for high school, he had been ”insulted” more than once by being considered a freshman.
”Well, I did think that you were one, since your brother is a junior”Betty had almost said that he looked so much younger than Ted the tall, but she halted in time. ”But you seem to know all about everything, and even the fres.h.i.+es who live here don't always remember everything.”
”I could get all that from hearing Ted talk, you know; but of course, there isn't much about the school that I haven't _heard_ aboutI wouldn't say _know_, of course.”
”It must be nice,” said Betty, thereupon pleasing her escort, who immediately began to enlighten her upon the workings of the athletic a.s.sociation and the girls' share in it. The G. A. A. was the Girls'
Athletic a.s.sociation.
”Oh, yes! Of course. I hear them call it a _club_. I've even had it explained to mebut not the pep squads. I only wish I had time for everything!”
”You don't have to do everything your freshman year, Betty.”
”That is what Father saidso I'm not. But that doesn't keep you from wanting to do things.”
”You're right it doesn't!” Chet was thinking of several things that he had wanted to do and still wanted.
A great gla.s.s bowl just inside the screened porch on the side of the house away from the sun, supplied a cool drink of oranges and lemons, whose slices floated about pieces of ice. A maid in cap and ap.r.o.n served them and fished out a whole red cherry to put in Betty's gla.s.s. And didn't it taste good!
Then, in the s.h.i.+fting of position and accidental meetings of this one and that one, Betty found herself with Mary Emma Howland and another freshman boy whom she recognized as the brightest lad in the algebra cla.s.s. ”Oh, yes,” she said, in answer to Mary Emma's question whether or not she knew ”Sim,” and brightly she smiled at him.
”We never were introduced,” said Betty, ”but when you recite every day together you can't help but know people, and whenever Mr. Matthews calls on 'James Simmonds' he looks as if he expected to have a recitation.”
”There, Sim!” laughed Mary Emma. ”I told you you were the teacher's pet!”
”Much I am!” and James Simmonds looked as if he did not appreciate being complimented, even by two merry girls. He was a tall, thin boy, with light, sandy hair, thin face and light eyes, but eyes that were keen with intelligence when they did not twinkle with mischief. ”And I'm usually called 'Simmonds' by the men teachers.”
”So you are,” acknowledged Betty. ”But I didn't know they called you 'Sim'I thought it was 'Jim.'”
”I'm generally known as Sim,” said the boy, ”but sometimes it's 'Jim', or 'Carrotts.'”
Sim exchanged a look with Mary Emma, who giggled. ”Sim's my fourth or fifth cousin,” Mary Emma explained. ”He lives at our house to go to school while his father and mother are away this year.”
As Betty looked inquiringly at Sim, he explained that his father was an engineer and was in South America with his mother for the year. ”I'm going there some day,” said he. ”Say, they have mosquitoes and snakes and all sorts of queer things, and there are some man-eaters down there, cannibals, you knowoh, it's a wild country all right!”
”That doesn't sound so very good to me,” smiled Betty. ”Do you really want to go where there are snakes and things like that!”