The chug-chug of the bus sounded on the main road. Dave was blowing his horn, too, as he always did, to warn any stragglers.

“Hurry!” urged Elizabeth Ann, taking hold of Doris’s hand to make her run. “Hurry, Catherine—you’ll be late.”

Elizabeth Ann and Doris ran as fast as they could, but Catherine simply walked as usual. Once Elizabeth Ann looked over her shoulder and called to her to run, but Catherine didn’t even answer.

“Almost missed it,” said Dave, when Elizabeth Ann reached the low, wide step, scarlet-faced and breathless and dragging a breathless Doris after her.

All the other children were inside and that showed Elizabeth Ann how nearly she had missed the bus. Usually she and Doris were on hand to stand in line and march in with the others.

“Hurry up,” Dave commanded. “Hop in.”

Doris obediently “hopped,” but Elizabeth Ann hung back.

“Catherine Gould is coming—I have to wait for her,” she said, looking pleadingly at Dave.

“Well, where is she?” he demanded impatiently.

Elizabeth Ann looked. Catherine wasn’t in sight yet. The road dipped behind a hill and you couldn’t see anyone coming up till he or she had almost reached the top. It was plain that Catherine didn’t intend to hurry.

“Get in,” said Dave curtly. “I can’t wait for Catherine—she never is willing to hurry.”

But he sounded his horn twice to let Catherine know he was there.

“Get in, Elizabeth Ann,” said Dave again. “I can’t wait any longer.”

Elizabeth Ann shook her head.

“I have to wait for Catherine,” she declared. “You go on without me.” “Oh, Elizabeth Ann, you’ll be late for school,” cried Doris from her seat in the bus. “You know Miss Owen hates to have a tardy mark against the class.”

Tears came into Elizabeth Ann’s eyes, but she looked steadily at Dave.

“I can’t go and leave her,” she said.

For answer Dave suddenly stood up. He slid out from behind the wheel and stooped down, seized the surprised Elizabeth Ann and lifted her into the bus. He put her down on the long seat and closed the door with a snap.

Then he started the bus.

“Wait!” screamed Catherine, just reaching the road. “Wait for me! Hey, Dave, you wait for me!”

Dave glanced at Elizabeth Ann. He stopped the bus. And that troublesome Catherine stopped running and began to walk as slowly as she could.

“Don’t wait for her, Dave,” said some of the boys. “She’s always acting like that. Serve her right to go on and leave her.”

To everyone’s surprise, Dave backed the bus. He let it run backward so fast that he reached the dawdling Catherine before she realized it. Neither was she prepared to have Dave jump out lift her up and tumble her into the bus with scant ceremony.

Then he closed the door again and began to drive with such a grim face that none of the children thought it best to speak to him. Elizabeth Ann didn’t feel very happy, but she was glad none of them would be late—at the rate Dave was driving they’d probably get to school a little earlier than usual.

Catherine sat and frowned out of the window all the way. She acted, thought Elizabeth Ann, as though someone had made her almost late instead of being the one who had nearly made the entire bus load late for school. Elizabeth Ann shuddered to think what Miss Owen would say if an entire bus load of children walked into school late. Of course they were not all in her room, but many of them were.

When they reached the school yard, Dave stopped the bus, but he did not open the door.

“I just want to tell you,” he said quietly, “that the next time anyone stages a performance like that this morning, I shall report him or her to the principal. And I’ll leave him behind, too—you’re all old enough to behave yourselves and if you’re not willing to make the bus and get to school on time, why that’s your affair, not mine.”

He swung the heavy iron lever that opened the door and the children began to file out quietly. Elizabeth Ann stayed in her seat until the last one was out and then she came up to Dave.

“I had to wait for Catherine,” she said earnestly. “She’s my friend.”

“Well—all right,” returned Dave. “I suppose you thought you had to wait for her; but the trouble with Catherine Gould is that too many people wait for her—give in to her, I mean. She’d be late for school every morning, and not care if the whole school would be late, too.”

Elizabeth Ann sincerely hoped that Catherine would try harder to get to school on time. Because she was so often later going home afternoons—on account of that homework that she just wouldn’t do—and if she had to walk to school mornings, dear me, she would be in a sad way.

Doris told Uncle Hiram about the bus incident, and Elizabeth Ann was sorry she had not asked her to keep still about it. Uncle Hiram declared that Elizabeth Ann and Doris should not wait past the usual time another morning for Catherine.

“She must get here in time to walk with you to the bus, or you must start without her,” said Uncle Hiram firmly. “Catherine is entirely too selfish and she gets more spoiled every week.”

And the very next morning Catherine missed the bus again—Elizabeth Ann and Doris didn’t even see her, but she wasn’t at the cross-roads with them and Roger Calendar and the others when Dave drove up. He honked his horn as usual, but no Catherine appeared, so he drove on to school.

It was ten o’clock when Catherine appeared, to the surprise of everyone, including Miss Owen who had marked her absent. At recess Catherine, whose eyes were red from crying, told Elizabeth Ann that she had missed the bus and had turned around and gone home.

“I’d rather be absent than tardy,” she sniffed, “but my father saw me coming back and he said I’d have to go to school. He wouldn’t drive me, either—I had to walk all the way. I wouldn’t have come, only he said if I didn’t I couldn’t have the party. After I’d told everybody about the party, I just couldn’t give it up.”

When Doris heard that, she said she was glad. If there was one thing Doris wanted to go to it was that Hallowe’en party. Elizabeth Ann looked forward to it, too, but she was more interested to learn what the others said when they saw Roger Calendar in his embroidered silk costume, than anything else.

Catherine kept telling them something new about the party every day, and the afternoon before it was actually to take place she confided that it was to be held in her daddy’s big barn.

“We’ve moved the piano out there and everything,” said Catherine proudly. “We’re going to have a lovely time. Do come early.”