"Such things have been
known to happen, you know."
"That's right!" admitted Walter. "Guess I had better look," and he
was proceeding to open a valise when Belle hastily took it from him.
"You mustn't!" she exclaimed. "It isn't ours, and poor little Inez
may not like it. Leave it up to her and she can tell if anything is
missing."
"Just tell that I saved it for her--I, Walter Pennington!" begged the
owner of that name. "Nothing like making a good impression, from the
start, on the pretty stranger," he added. "Eh?"
"Just my luck!" murmured Harry, with a tragic air.
"Oh, you silly boys!" laughed Belle. She hastened up the stairs to
the room where Inez as resting, the lace trailing from the
half-opened valise.
"Oh, you have it back--my satchel!" gasped a Spanish girl. "Oh, if
ze papairs are only safe!"
They were, evidently, for she gave utterance a sigh of relief when
she drew a bundle of crackling documents from a side pocket of the
valise, under a pile of filmy lace, at the sight of which Cora and
the girls uttered exclamations of delight. Inez heard them.
"Take it--take it all!" she begged of them, thrusting into Mrs.
Kimball's hands a mass of the beautiful cob-webby stuff. "It is all
yours, and too little for what you have done for me!"
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Cora's mother. "This lace is beautiful. I
shall be glad to purchase some of it, and pay you well for it--I
can't get that kind in the stores.
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