Linda Carlton's Island Adventure. Lavell Edith
certainly not. A month would be enough, for the first time. That would give you August with your family, Miss Carlton, before you accepted a regular aviation job in the fall."
This sounded much better to Linda, and she promised to write within the nest week, if her father agreed.
It was lots of fun riding back to Spring City in her autogiro the following day, although she flew alone, for Louise wanted to return with Ted. Without a mishap of any kind she brought the "Ladybug" down on the field behind her house.
When she entered her home, she found that her father had arrived during her absence. He was waiting for her in the library.
"Daddy!" she cried, joyfully, for Mr. Carlton's visits were always a pleasant surprise to his only child. "You came at just the right time! Come out and see my Bug!"
"Must you call it that, Linda?" asked her Aunt Emily, who, like all good housekeepers detested every sort of insect.
Linda laughed.
"Take a look at it, Aunt Emily, and see whether you could think of a better name."
Miss Carlton peered through the screen door.
"Where is it?" she asked.
"Come out on the porch, and you can see it," replied Linda.
Dragging her father and her aunt each by a hand, she gleefully skipped through the door.
"There!" she cried, as one who displays a marvel.
At the top of the hill, on the field behind the lovely Colonial house, they saw the new possession. Or rather, the top of the autogiro, for it was not wholly visible.
"It looks like a clothes-dryer to me," remarked Miss Carlton. "Or a wind-mill."
"But you agree that I couldn't call it my 'Clothes-dryer,' or my 'Wind-mill,' don't you, Aunt Emily? The words are too long. Besides, Lou thought of the cleverest name – the 'Ladybug.' But you needn't worry, Auntie, she won't ever creep into your spotless house!"
"I should hope not!"
"In a way, Emily," observed Linda's father, "it's a good name as far as you are concerned. You hate planes – and you hate bugs!"
"Only, Aunt Emily is going to love my autogiro," insisted Linda, putting her arm affectionately about the older woman, who had been the only mother she had ever known. "One of my biggest reasons for choosing an autogiro was because it is the safest flying machine known." Her tone grew soft, so low that her father could not hear, and she added, with her head turned aside, "I do want you to know that I care about your feelings, Aunt Emily."
Miss Carlton's eyes grew misty; Linda had always been so sweet, so thoughtful! Her niece couldn't help it, if she had a marvelous brain, and a mechanical mind. No wonder she wanted to use them!
"It's going to be the ambition of my life to convert Aunt Emily to flying," she announced, in a gay tone. "See if I don't, Daddy!"
"I hope so," he said. "How about taking me up for a little fly?"
"A fly?" repeated Linda, playfully. "You a fly – and my new plane a bug! Oh, think of poor Aunt Emily!"
"Now, Linda, I do believe you're getting silly!"
But already she was pulling her father down the steps, eager to show off her beloved possession.
Mr. Carlton proved almost as enthusiastic as his daughter about it. When they returned to the house, he laughingly told his sister that he was thinking of buying one for himself, to use to fly back and forth from New York, where his business was located.
Miss Carlton groaned.
"Then we'll have two flying maniacs in the house!" she exclaimed.
"No – Linda and I will usually be up in the air," he corrected, "not often in the house."
Linda had scarcely time to change from her flyer's suit into an afternoon dress, and no chance at all to talk with her father about Mr. Pitcairn's suggestion about a job, when Ralph Clavering drove over to see her. Linda was delighted, of course; here was another person to whom she could display her autogiro. Ralph was a licensed pilot, too, although with him flying was only a secondary interest, and he had never had his own plane.
"Come out and see my 'Ladybug'!" she insisted. "And wouldn't you like to try her out? I might let you!"
"No, thanks, Linda – I'd be sure to do something wrong. Besides, I'd rather talk to you – those things make such an infernal noise. No, just show it to me, and then let's go and have a game of tennis before supper, if you're not too tired."
"I've almost forgotten how to play," replied the girl. "But I'll try. If you will come out and see my 'Ladybug' first."
After they had examined the autogiro, and were driving to the Country Club in Ralph's roadster, the young man turned the conversation to the topic of vacation at Green Falls, the resort at which Linda's aunt, and most of her friends, had spent the preceding summer. Ralph told Linda about a new motor boat that he was getting, and spoke of the contests in all sorts of sports that would be repeated this year.
"How soon do you think you can get off, Linda?" he concluded eagerly.
"Not till August, I'm afraid," she replied, to his dismay.
"August!" he repeated, in horror. "You're not going to pull some new stunt on us, are you, Linda? Fly the Pacific – or the Arctic Ocean?"
The girl laughed, and shook her head.
"I'm through with stunts for a while, Ralph – you needn't worry about that. No; what I am planning now is steady work. I expect to take a job, as soon as Kit's wedding is over."
"A job? Where?"
"In Georgia, probably." She went into details about the proposition.
"You would!" he muttered, sulkily. "And pick out such a hot spot, that nobody would want to go with you… Linda, why can't you be sensible like other girls – like my sister Kit, for instance?"
"Kit?"
"Yes. And get married."
He leaned over hopefully, and put his hand on her arm. Now that Linda had accomplished her ambition in flying the Atlantic, perhaps she would be willing to settle down to marriage and a normal life.
But she drew away, smiling.
"Don't, Ralph!" she warned him. "Remember that you promised me you wouldn't ask me till you had finished college."
"All right, all right," he muttered, irritably, resolving that he wouldn't again. Let her wait awhile! She'd probably get tired of working after she'd had a taste of it for a month in that hot climate.
They met Dot Crowley and Jim Valier at the tennis courts, and doubled up with them for a couple of sets. But they were badly beaten, for these two were the best team at the Club.
After dinner that evening Linda had a chance to tell her father and her aunt of her proposed plan for the coming month, and won their consent, when she announced her intention of spending August at Green Falls. To Miss Carlton she put the all-important question of clothes; the older woman promised to get her half a dozen flyer's suits of linen for the trip.
During the next week Linda accepted enough invitations to satisfy even her Aunt Emily, and she wore one new dress after another, and flitted from tennis match or picnic to tea or dance, as the program happened to be. The grand finale was Kitty's wedding, at the girl's beautiful home just outside of Spring City.
It was a gorgeous affair, and Linda could not help thinking how Bess Hulbert, the Lieutenant's sister, would have enjoyed it, had she not given her life in the attempt to win the big prize which Linda herself had captured. Personally, she did not like the affair nearly so much as Louise's simple wedding at Easter.
Linda was quiet as she drove home beside her Aunt Emily in the limousine. She could not help wondering whether this event did not mark the end of her girlhood, the beginning of her career as a self-supporting woman – out in the world. No longer would she be free to come and go as she liked, to see her old friends at any and all hours of the day and evening. The thought was a little saddening, and she sighed.
Her