Part 3 (1/2)
”Got everything?” Adair MacKenzie repeated the question with which he greeted the girls as they all approached the customs office. ”Baggage checks? Tourist cards?”
At this, they all opened their purses and rummaged around in them.
”Shades of Glasgow.” Laura murmured into Nan's ears. ”Seems good to be going through this red tape again, doesn't it?”
Nan nodded. She felt much the same as she did the day they had first stepped foot on foreign soil, an unforgettable experience that they all had talked over again and again since that morning in May when the great boat had been moored to the dock and they had walked, one after the other, down the gangplank to set their feet in Scotland for the first time. The adventures that had followed had made their vacation the most exciting of their lives as those who have read ”Nan Sherwood's Summer Holidays” all agree. Now, as they all walked forward toward the offices of the Mexican officials, Nan wondered idly what further adventures were in store for her.
”Senorita, your bag, senorita.”
”Why don't you answer when you are called?” Walker Jamieson dropped back into step beside Nan. ”Lady,” he prodded Nan with his elbow, ”the handsome young Mexican with the neat little mustache that is running after us, is calling you.”
”Me?” Nan's voice had a surprised ring to it. ”Am I Senorita?”
”None other, for months to come, now.” Walker Jamieson answered. ”You are Senorita Sherwood and you had better answer when these Senores call or they will be so much insulted that they will never recover.”
”Oh, I'm sorry,” Nan looked genuinely regretful as she turned to the tall thin native that had been following her.
”It is nothing,” he dismissed her concern with a wave of his hands, ”but the Senorita has dropped her purse. May I give it to her?” He bowed gracefully as he presented it, and Nan felt that he couldn't possibly have presented the finest gift in the world with more grace.
However, before she could possibly thank him, he disappeared. She turned to follow the others into the offices, rummaging through her purse, even as they had done, as she went.
”Why, it's gone!” Nan looked first at her purse and then in the direction in which the obliging young Mexican had vanished.
”Uh-huh, we should have guessed,” Walker Jamieson shook his head sadly.
”Dumb of me. What did he get?”
”My visitor's pa.s.s!” Nan exclaimed. ”Now, what will I do?”
Involuntarily, they both looked toward Adair MacKenzie who was just disappearing through the door. Then they laughed.
”I don't know, kid,” Walker liked this youngster that Alice had already filled his ears with tales about. ”But you're in for it. It's tough, these days, getting duplicates of the things. Shall I break the news to the ogre,” he nodded in Adair MacKenzie's direction. ”He'll explode, but you've just got to take it.”
CHAPTER IV
TROUBLE AT THE BORDER
”Here, here, what's eating you two?” Adair MacKenzie came bursting forth from the door he had entered just a few moments before Nan's encounter with the Mexican. ”H-m-m, lost your pa.s.s, I'll wager.” With the uncanny instinct of many peppery old gentlemen, Adair MacKenzie as soon as he saw the baffled expression on Nan's face, jumped immediately to the right conclusion.
”Might have known that would happen. Should have taken care of them all myself. Can't depend on women and girls. Always tell Alice that. Ought to have a safe place to keep things. Old pouch my mother used to strap around her waist was a good idea.”
Nan couldn't restrain the smile that came to her eyes at this. She had known one person in her life who tied a bag around her waist. That was grim old Mrs. Cupp, a.s.sistant to Dr. Beulah Prescott, princ.i.p.al at Lakeview Hall. Legend had it that Mrs. Cupp had a dark secret the key to which she carried in the black bag which someone, in days long before Nan and Bess descended on Lakeview Hall, had seen. Whether or not it was so, Nan didn't know, but at Lakeview Hall, the words ”Keep it a secret”
were generally expressed by saying ”Put it in the black bag.”
”Laughing at me, Miss!” Adair's roar brought Nan out of her reveries.
She jumped, and looking up into his face, she winged her way from Lakeview Hall on the sh.o.r.es of the Great Lakes back to Laredo, Texas and the immediate problem of the lost visitor's pa.s.s.
”I said you should take care of your things the way I do,” he roared again. ”See,” he pushed his hand inside his topcoat pocket, ”Always know where my things--” the end of the sentence was lost in a sputter, as Adair MacKenzie searched frantically in pocket after pocket for his visitor's pa.s.s. It was gone!
”W-w-why, somebody's picked my pockets. Can't allow this. Where's a policeman? You, you, why don't you do something instead of standing there and laughing?” Adair shook his cane at Walker Jamieson who was grinning broadly at the spectacle of the old man fuming and sputtering now, not at his own negligence, but at the inefficiency of a government that would allow such things to happen. His tirade against Nan and her carelessness were utterly forgotten.