CHAPTER III

PREPARATIONS

Something like a portentous influence seemed to have fallen suddenly over the little party of girls that had been making so merry but a moment before. Sylvia read the telegram again.

"Any answer, Miss Pursell?" asked the butler. "I told the boy to wait."

"No, James. At least not now. I must talk with mother. This came to me--I wonder why?"

"Perhaps your brother did not want to alarm your mother," suggested Alice.

"I suppose so--but----"

"I didn't know Roy was ill," said Rose, and there was that in her tone which showed that she had a good right to know--a right that Sylvia seemed to acknowledge, for she answered:

"We didn't write and tell you, dear, for we kept hoping that it would pass, and that he would be all right. But it hasn't, and--oh, dear!" For a moment Sylvia seemed about to give way, and Hazel tightened her clasp about her chum.

"I--I'll be all right in--in a moment," said Sylvia. "It was just--just the disappointment. I did hope he was going to get along at the sanitarium."

"Sanitarium!" fairly gasped Rose. "Is he--has he----"

"It isn't any real disease," Sylvia made haste to say.

"Why, he didn't even hint anything to me the last time he wrote," said Rose, the colour gradually coming back to her cheeks. That she and Sylvia's big brother, Roy, corresponded was no secret, since it was generally accepted that they would become engaged some day. Just now the little affair was in that most delightful of all states, one of perfect understanding.

"No, I fancy he didn't want you to know, my dear," replied Sylvia, gently. "It was, at first, just a breakdown from overwork. You know," she went on to the other girls, "after Roy graduated from Yale he was given a fine position with the Hosmore Chemical Company, here in New York.

"Roy was just in love with his work, and so enthusiastic. I fear his very enthusiasm told against him, for he had worked hard at college, and really overtrained on the football eleven. But he was getting along splendidly, until the breakdown came."

"A breakdown," murmured Rose. "He only wrote me that he was tired, and wanted a rest, but that he would not take it until he had completed his discovery."

"That's what did it--the discovery," sighed Rose. "Roy had some ideas about a new chemical combination that was destined to work wonders. It had something to do with colouring fabrics, I believe. He told me the details, but I have forgotten."

"It was for dyeing silk," explained Rose. "You know since the European war chemicals and dye-stuffs from Germany, the centre of the trade, have been dreadfully hard to get over here. So Roy discovered a new way of utilising some of the coal-tar products, and he hoped to make a big thing of it."

"You know more than I do," said Sylvia, but there was not the least hint of sisterly jealousy in her voice. "I believe it was that, though, which Roy was working on. Well, he made his discovery----"

"How nice!" murmured Alice.

"No! It wasn't at all nice!" and Sylvia's voice took on rather a fierce and indignant tone. "For poor Roy worked so hard over it that he suffered a mental breakdown. It was complete, added to a sort of physical going to pieces, and he couldn't remember the proper chemical combination--the one he worked so hard over. It went from his mind completely and was as lost to him as though he had never worked it out during long nights of study. He tried and tried to recall it, and I suppose that did him no good, mentally or physically. Then he gave up, and broke down completely. It was terrible, but we hoped for the best. Then he went away----"

"Went away?" echoed Rose.

"Well, rather, he was sent. His firm was very nice to him, granted him a leave of absence and all that, and even sent one of their young men from the office away with Roy. Mother wanted to go herself, but the doctor said she had better not."

"She must have felt that terribly," commented Hazel. "She was so chummy with Roy, and he with her."

"Yes," assented Sylvia. "It was terrible. But mamma saw that it was for the best. Papa simply could not leave. His business is so complicated since the war, that he fairly lives at the office. So Roy went off with Harry Montray, and he was more than kind to my brother and all of us."

"Harry Montray?" murmured Alice, questioningly.

"I don't believe you know him," Sylvia said. "He was a Stevens boy, and he and Roy were real chums. I grew to like Harry very much in the short time I knew him. He went away with my brother."

"But where?" asked Rose. "You haven't told me where yet?"

You notice she did not say "us." But the reason is not far to seek.

"Oh, I thought I mentioned it," said Sylvia. "Pardon me. Roy is at Loneberg Camp, Saranac Lake."

"Saranac Lake!" cried Rose. "Why, that's where we----"

"Yes, that's where we are going," Sylvia took up the remark. "That was one reason that made me keep to my original resolution to make the Adirondacks our first outing objective. For a time, after we tentatively selected that, I was inclined to change to Bar Harbor, or Martha's Vineyard, but when I learned Roy had to go to the mountains for a complete rest and cure, I was glad I had not made other plans. We can see him there, and we may do him good."

"I am not so sure that, collectively, we shall help him to improve, as I am that, _individually_, we may," murmured Alice.

"What do you mean?" asked Sylvia, her eyes opening wide.

"Say, rather, _whom_ do I mean," retorted Alice, nodding at Rose, who was reading the telegram Sylvia had handed her.

"Why," said Rose, not hearing, or perhaps not heeding, the remark made about herself, "this message is from that Harry Montray."

"Yes," assented Sylvia. "He is looking after Roy. He promised to wire every day as to how my brother was. Up to now Roy has been very well, considering. He showed little improvement, to be sure, and worrying over the forgotten chemical formula was not beneficial. But this is the first time we have had really unpleasant news concerning him. I suppose that is why Harry sent the wire to me. I think I must tell mother----"

"Don't!" interrupted Alice. "At least not yet awhile," she went on. "Your mother will have enough to worry about, with a house full of company, and this will only add to it. As long as it isn't dangerous, and as long as nothing can be done right away, wait until to-morrow to tell her, Sylvia."

"I wonder if I ought?"

"I think so," agreed Rose. "We may have better news to-morrow. If we don't, well, there will be time enough to get up there in a hurry, even if it is necessary."

"I suppose so," assented Sylvia. "Yes, I'll not say anything to her about it. I must bring her in to meet you. She is anxious to know you all, for she has heard so much about you, and she has only seen your pictures. I'll just keep the unpleasant news from her. I'll see if she is in her room," and Sylvia lost no time in stepping to the private telephone with which the large apartment was equipped.

"Will this make any change in our plans?" asked Hazel. "If it does----"

"Not in the least, my dear," answered Sylvia, as she was making the necessary connection, a central being dispensed with. "We may go a bit earlier, that is all."

"Couldn't we go direct to Saranac Lake?" asked Rose.

"We can, if we find it necessary," answered her hostess. "But it will rather spoil our plans, and can do no good, I fear. The doctor said it would take time for Roy to get strong enough physically so that his mental powers would return. But if we get any more disquieting news we will go direct to Saranac, and not make tours and trips along the route, as I planned. Hello!" she interrupted, to speak into the telephone.

Mrs. Pursell was in her room, and said she would be in directly to meet her daughter's girl chums.

"Hadn't you better tell your butler not to mention the telegram?" suggested Rose.

"Perhaps I had," agreed Sylvia, slipping out, but returning in time to present the three girls to her mother. Mrs. Pursell greeted them warmly.

"You are all just as I pictured you," she said. "Of course I have seen your photographs. But I think I expected Hazel to be just a trifle smaller. I think she isn't such a baby!"

"Well, that's what they all call me," sighed Hazel of the brown eyes. "I wear high-heeled shoes, and everything to make me look larger, but I'm in despair of growing taller."

"Never mind, my dear," Sylvia consoled her, "you are perfectly all right and charming as you are. Mother, you will go with us to-night; will you not?"

"Where, daughter; to another dance? I think not."

"No, the theatre. I planned to have the girls see that new Shaw play."

"Oh, I adore Bernard Shaw!" exclaimed Alice. "He is so sarcastic when you least expect it. He wakes you up--like a dash of cold water in your face."

"And about as unpleasantly, at times," commented Rose. "I like a different sort of alarm clock."

"We can pick some other play," Sylvia said.

"Oh, no indeed! I like Shaw. It gives you something to think about afterward, and that's what we need nowadays."

"Quite an idea, calling your club that," commented Mrs. Pursell. "But don't count on me for the theatre, daughter mine. Go and enjoy yourselves. Father will be home to dinner, so he telephoned."

"That's so nice of him. It's quite a concession on father's part to dine with us these days," Sylvia went on. "So you girls must sufficiently express yourselves as honoured. He'll probably lose I don't know how many thousand dollars by being away from the office for even a little while--at least he'll say so, anyhow," and she laughed.

The girls went to the play, and had supper at Sherry's afterward, Mr. Pursell allowing himself to be made a member of the merry little party, that attracted more than passing glances, for each of the four girls was distractingly pretty.

"And now to pack and pack and then pack some more," said Sylvia, gaily, the next day. "Oh, I forgot, you girls want to see about gowns. But you won't need such elaborate ones. A couple for dances at the hotels, and the rest--well, we're going to rough it, rather than otherwise. Now then----"

The butler knocked and entered.

"Excuse me, Miss Pursell," he said, "but you are wanted at the telephone. It's long-distance."

"Long-distance," faltered Sylvia. At once the same thought came to all the girls--Roy--up in the Adirondack woods.