The Motor Girls on a Tour Part 36

Poor, afflicted little Wren!

Straight to the private sanitarium they went--these two motor girls.

Miss Brown helped carry the table up to Wren's bedside.

At the sight of it Wren uttered a scream--then the shock did what medical skill often fails to do. Wren Salvey sprang out of bed, touched a spring in the table and a drawer jerked open.

"There!" she shrieked, holding up a paper. "The will!" Then she fell back--exhausted.

"The shock has done it," said Miss Brown as Clip helped put the girl on the bed and Cora looked frightened. "It has broken the knot that tied her muscles. She will be cured."

Clip stepped over to a closet, and while Cora was almost fainting from excitement Clip quietly took off her motor coat. Presently she stepped back to Cora--in the full garb of a trained nurse.

"Clip!" exclaimed Cora.

"Yes," replied the girl, "I graduate to-night. Will you be able to come?"

What more should be told? With the failure of Rob Roland to get possession of the table he lost all courage and simply admitted defeat.

It was Sid Wilc.o.x who stole the book from little Wren--just to avenge Ida Giles, whose lunch basket had been demolished by a motor girl. An odd revenge, but he thought, in some way, it would annoy the motor girls. Of course Rob Roland paid him something for doing it. But all their strategy was not equal to the ready wit of Cora Kimball and her chums. Nor was this the only time that the motor girls proved their worth in times of danger and necessity. They were active partic.i.p.ants in other adventures, as will be related in the third volume of this series, to be called "The Motor Girls at Lookout Beach; Or, In Quest of the Runaways." How they went East in their cars, and how they unexpectedly got on, the trail of two girls who had left home under a cloud, will, I think, make a tale you will wish to peruse.

It was not long after the table and the promise book had been restored to Wren, and following her complete recovery, that the suit against Mr.

Robinson was dropped. Roland, Reed & Company admitted that they had arranged to have the papers taken from the mailbag, and the government imposed a heavy fine on them for their daring crime. They had done what they did with the idea of securing information, and not with a desire to keep the papers, but the Federal authorities would accept no excuses. Later Mr. Robinson secured heavy damages from the men, the disfigured thumb of one having served Clip to identify him.

As for Wren and Mrs. Salvey, with the will in their possession, they were enabled to get control of a comfortable income, and Wren could be taken to a health resort to fully recover her strength. Sid Wilc.o.x and Rob Roland were not prosecuted for their mean parts in the transactions, as it was desired to have as little publicity as possible.

"And to think, Clip, dear, that you were deceiving us all the while,"

remarked Cora several days later, when she and the Robinson twins; and a few other of the chums, were gathered in the Kimball home. "I never would have thought it of you."

"Nor I," added Belle.

"But wasn't it strange how it all came about?" suggested Bess. "It seemed like fate."

"It was fate," a.s.serted Clip. "Fate and--Cora."

"Mostly fate, I'm afraid," declared Cora. "Of course the table being disposed of at auction was a mere accident, likely to happen anywhere.

The real power, though, was little Wren. She, somehow, felt that the old will was in it, and by her talk, and through her promise book, the fact came to be known to the enemies of the family. Then Rob Roland, or some of the men who used him as a tool, conceived the idea of searching for the table. They probably had the old mahogany man act for them, and he made inquiries of auctioneers and persons who were in the habit of buying at auctions. Then we came into the game, and--"

"Yes, and then Ida and Sid Wilc.o.x, though I'm glad Ida didn't take any part in these proceedings," observed Belle.

"So am I," said Cora softly. "Well, we managed to get ahead of Rob Roland. A little later and he would have had the table, and would have found the will. Then little Wren and her mother would never have come into their inheritance. Oh, I don't see how people can be so mean!"

"And the way they treated Paul," added Clip. "They ought to be punished for that."

"Well, I guess Paul was more harmed mentally than he was physically,"

said Bess. "He told me the men used him very gently. It was the papers in the bag they were after."

"I think Clip gave us the greatest surprise of all," went on Cora. "The idea of a girl keeping it secret as long as she did, that she was all ready to graduate as a trained nurse! No wonder she knew how to treat Wren. I feel that she is far above us now."

"Shall I lose my honorary members.h.i.+p in the Motor Girls' Club?" asked Clip as she slipped her arm around Cora and pretended to feel her pulse.

"Well, I guess not! The motor girls are proud of you!" cried Bess.

"Of course," added Belle.

Cora said nothing, but the manner in which she put her arm around the waist of Clip was answer enough.