Betty Bonnet August 1915

Betty Bonnet is an ongoing serial story, released on the Sheep Among Wolves blog once a month. It follows the adventures of the Bonnet family, first created by Sheila Young as a paper doll series released in the Ladies’ Home Journal beginning 1915. To go to the first episode, click here.

I.

All this time, during which Betty and Bob had been making exciting—if disconcerting—discoveries about the corruptibility of human nature, I myself had been very busy.

There are people who look at you disapprovingly, when you mention that you have been very busy lying in a steamer chair at a seaside watering place contemplating the colour of the sand, and the shape of the clouds, and the boundless depths of a summer sky.

There is some sort of general prejudice against putting the sluggish tranquility of the dog days to the purpose for which they were so obviously intended—that of recruiting tired bodies (not to say tired brains) and laying in a stock of fresh, unsullied resources for the business of life.

Just because an August afternoon is too hot to do anything but lie still and doze, it has always been my principle to take it at face value, and accept graciously the permission to do just that.

All this I said—in one form or another—to Betty and Bob, when I came home from the seaside. I pointed out that the thermometer stood at a number which I didn’t like to mention, out of respect for its feelings. I drew their attention to the fact that the sun was glaring at an angle I didn’t like to mention, out of respect for mine.

It was all no good.

Betty and Bob were bent, with Livingstonian enterprise, on pressing through that wilderness of heat, to the Foster Street mission.

II.

“And Mamma said we mustn’t go by ourselves,” Betty explained to me, pleadingly.

“Ah!” I reflected, with an uneasy glance at the meagre shadows in the sundrenched garden. “One must always obey one’s mother. If she says you mustn’t go—”

“Mustn’t go by ourselves,” Betty corrected, with exasperating exactitude.

“You’re quite sure?” I inquired limply.

“Of course. And she can’t take us, because she’s gone to Aunt Julia’s garden party. And Birdie can’t take us, because she’s playing in a tennis match—”

“I thought Birdie wasn’t playing tennis this summer?”

“Oh, it’s a charity match. Of course, that isn’t the same thing at all. And then Belle won’t take us, because it’s too hot.”

“It is too hot,” I agreed, lying back on the sofa. “Your sister Belle is the sensible member of the family.”

“But we’ve got to go today,” persevered Betty. “And it isn’t much hotter in the street, than it is in the drawing room. And—and—you can always buy us an ice cream on the way home. And then it won’t feel hot at all.”

There was obviously no help for it.

I surrendered.

III.

“It isn’t just for nothing,” Betty explained, as we crossed the pavement onto Foster Street.

This was a reflection to bolster one’s courage.

“You see, Miss Burton,” Betty stood on tiptoe, to bring her lips into as close proximity with my ear as the relative limitations of the case would allow. “We’ve found out that the Foster Street mission—has a thief!!!”

Being already acquainted with the general object of the Foster Street mission, I was more surprised to hear the thief put in the singular, than to be informed of his existence.

“That’s the reason they need a mission, I suppose. To prevent bullying, and pickpocketing, and all sorts of petty crime.”

Betty raised reproachful eyes to mine. “They need a mission,” she informed me reprovingly, “because they don’t know about Jesus! And they would need one, even if they weren’t bullies or pickpocketers at all!”

There was a deep enough truth in this that I felt genuinely rebuked.

IV.

“It’s much worse than pocket picking, though,” Bob informed me gloomily. “At least, I suppose she picked it out of my pocket, because that’s where it was. But it’s much more serious than petty crime. It was a valuable scientific instrument!”

I began to feel slightly uncomfortable.

Convoying the children down to Foster Street was one thing.

Becoming suddenly embroiled in a fight over scientific instruments and accused thieves was another.

“I think the most sensible thing you could do, would be to lay the whole thing before Miss Proctor,” I said.

“We are going to,” Bob informed me grimly.

It ought to have been reassuring.

The words themselves were reassuring.

The tone in which Bob said them was not.

V.

I looked about me uneasily, in hopes of an unsuspected ice cream parlour materializing out of the dilapidated rows of dingy shops and slip-shod tenement buildings.

If we ate enough ice cream, it might be too late to disturb the mission secretary that afternoon. We could all go home again cheerfully, to our outrageously spoiled tea. And tomorrow morning, Mrs. Bonnet, or Birdie, or Belle, or somebody else who was genuinely responsible for this mess, could take the children down to say whatever they needed to say to Miss Proctor.

Sadly, the only thing that saw fit to materialize was the door of the Foster Street mission.

Bob opened it. And we went in.

Miss Proctor was in her office, at her desk.

Even Bob flushed a little nervously when he saw her.

“The awkward thing about being a thief,” he observed in an undertone to Betty, “is that it’s so awkward for everybody else, when they have to talk about it.”

Betty, however, was unmoved by the awkwardness. “Good afternoon, Miss Proctor,” she observed undauntedly.

Miss Proctor looked up and smiled. “Good afternoon, my dears. I didn’t expect to see you, today.”

Bob glowered reprovingly at this innuendo of a guilty conscience.

Miss Proctor, with either great boldness or great simplicity, did not seem to comprehend to what the glare alluded.

VI.

“We have come here today,” explained Betty impressively, “to know whether you have got any mail.”

“Plenty,” said Miss Proctor, still either feigning or achieving naïve innocence.

“She meant,” interposed Bob, forcefully, “did you get a tract about thieves?”

“A tract about thieves?” repeated Miss Proctor. “Oh, yes. You mean the booklets that came on Tuesday.”

“Booklets!” said Bob, surprised in his turn. “Did he find more than one of them, then?”

Miss Proctor glanced at him a little oddly. “It was a packet of fifty,” she replied. “What would be the good of a tract, if you didn’t have enough for distribution?”

Bob looked a little indignant. “I think that was rather wasteful,” he remarked. “When the clergyman knew we only wanted it for one.”

“Never mind that,” went on Betty, a little breathlessly. “You did read it, Miss Proctor, didn’t you?”

“Read it?” repeated Miss Proctor, putting up her silver-rimmed spectacles.

“The tract!” Betty gasped out impatiently. “You did read the tract, Miss Proctor, didn’t you?”

VII.

“My dear little girl,” said Miss Proctor kindly. “The packet only came on Tuesday, and our outreach isn’t until next Saturday. I mean to glance through the literature, before we distribute it, of course. Although the return address was that of a gentleman I know very well, and upon whose judgement I would unhesitatingly rely. But really, with the press of business we’ve undergone of late, I have had so little time or leisure for anything— Which reminds me,” Miss Proctor broke off suddenly, and turned towards her desk. “I haven’t had a moment to remember to give you this.”

She opened the very drawer upon which Bob’s gaze had been resting broodingly since he first entered the room.

She ruffled aside some papers. She drew out—

Yes, she actually drew out—

Sometime smooth, and round, and shining.

Something with a peculiar dent on one side.

Something which both Bob and Betty had known was in that drawer, but which neither of them—after the disappointing revelation of Miss Proctor’s lack of reading time—had expected to see.

“Why, Bob! It’s your compass!” Betty cried.

VIII.

Miss Proctor smiled affably. “I fancied it was. One of the street children picked it up, in the corridor, after you had been here—oh, more than a month ago, it must have been. I was peculiarly please,” Miss Proctor went on beamingly. “It was a little boy who was know, by many informants, to have been a notorious pickpocket, in days past. He had seemed genuinely touched by the spirit of the teaching here, and had made many protestations of reform. But until I observed him, unseen through my partially-open door, pick up the compass with one quick, dextrous, practiced movement; then stand perfectly still, as if the old instincts were warring with the new convictions; and at last turn resolutely to bring it straight to my office and candidly explain where and how he had found it—until I had this real proof of his change of character, I hardly knew whether to trust that his conversion was indeed as genuine as it professed to be. But I have seen. With the greatest possible satisfaction. And for that, young man,” her gaze turned approvingly upon Bob, “I am sincerely grateful for the accidental loan of your compass.”

Neither Bob nor Betty was equal to a reply.

“And now, what can I do for you today?” inquired Miss Proctor in a friendly tone.

Betty looked at Bob.

Bob looked at Betty.

“Perhaps,” said I, “you would care to come up town and have some ice cream, with the rest of us.”

(To be continued.)

Don’t miss Betty’s previous adventure:

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Springtime in Surrey, the first collection releasing with Wild Blue Wonder Press, is a Christian anthology featuring eight lovely stories. With a mix of historical and contemporary, romance and women’s fiction, a dash of mystery here and there, real-life themes presented in a loving way, and a vintage feel, this story is sure to charm lovers of Christian women’s fiction.

“Are you writing another book?” It’s a question I get asked all the time. But the answer ends up being so long that I rarely give it in full.

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