Dorothy Dale's engagement — Reading Companion

d lose his paper and the better element in the town lose their fight for prohibition; but Dorothy Dale, confident that she could do it, got out the _Bugle_ and did much, young girl though she was, to save the day. In this she was helped by Tavia Travers, a girl brought up entirely differently from Dorothy, and who possessed exactly the opposite characteristics to serve as a foil for Dorothy’s own good sense and practical nature.

Major Dale was unexpectedly blessed with a considerable legacy which enabled him to sell the _Bugle_ and take his children to The Cedars, at North Birchland, to live with his widowed sister and her two boys, Ned and Nat White, who were both older than their cousin Dorothy. In “Dorothy Dale at Glenwood School,” is related these changes for the better in the fortunes of the Dale family, and as well there is narrated the beginning of a series of adventures at school and during vacation times, in which Dorothy and Tavia are the central characters.

Subsequent books are entitled respectively: “Dorothy Dale’s Great Secret,” “Dorothy Dale and Her Chums,” “Dorothy Dale’s Queer Holidays,” “Dorothy Dale’s Camping Days,” “Dorothy Dale’s School Rivals,” “Dorothy Dale in the City,” and “Dorothy Dale’s Promise,” in which story the two friends graduate from Glenwood and return to their homes feeling—and looking, of course—like real, grown-up young ladies. Nevertheless, they are not then through with adventures, surprising happenings, and much fun.

About the time the girls graduated from school an old friend of Major Dale, Colonel Hardin, passed away, leaving his large estate in the West partly to the major and partly to be administered for the local public good. Cattle raising was not so generally followed as formerly in that section and dry farming was being tried.

Colonel Hardin had foreseen that nothing but a system of irrigation would save the poor farmers from ruin and on his land was the fountain of supply that should water the whole territory about Desert City and make it “blossom as the rose.” There were mining interests, however, selfishly determined to obtain the water rights on the Hardin Estate and that by hook or by crook.

Major Dale’s health was not at this time good enough for him to look into these matters actively or to administer his dead friend’s estate. Therefore, it is told in “Dorothy Dale in the West,” how Aunt Winnie White, Dorothy’s two cousins, Ned and Nat, and herself with Tavia, go far from North Birchland and mingle with the miners, and other Western characters to be found on and about the Hardin property, including a cowboy named Lance Petterby, who shows unmistakable signs of being devoted to Tavia. Indeed, after the party return to the East, Lance writes to Tavia and the latter’s apparent predilection for the cowboy somewhat troubles Dorothy.

However, after their return to the East the chums went for a long visit to the home of a school friend, Jennie Hapgood, in Pennsylvania; and there Tavia seemed to have secured other—and less dangerous—interests. In “Dorothy Dale’s Strange Discovery,” the narrative immediately preceding this present tale, Dorothy displays her characteristic kindliness and acute reasoning powers in solving a problem that brings to Jennie Hapgood’s father the very best of good fortune.

Naturally, the Hapgoods are devoted to Dorothy. Besides, Ned and Nat, her cousins, have visited Sunnyside and are vastly interested in Jennie. The girl chums now in New York City on this shopping tour, expect on returning to North Birchland to find Jennie Hapgood there for a promised visit.

At the moment, however, that we find Dorothy and Tavia at the beginning of this chapter, neither girl is thinking much about Jennie Hapgood and her expected visit, or of anything else of minor importance.

The flashily dressed woman who had run after Tavia down the aisle, again screamed her accusation at the amazed and troubled girl:

“That’s my bag! It’s cram full of money, too.”

There was no great crowd in the store, for New York ladies do not as a rule shop much before luncheon. Nevertheless, besides salespeople, there were plenty to hear the woman’s unkind accusation and enough curious shoppers to ring in immediately the two troubled girls and the angry woman.

“Give me it!” exclaimed the latter, and snatched the bag out of Tavia’s hand. As this was done the catch slipped in some way and the handbag burst open.