“How in the world do you think we can get the parasol up to you?” asked Peggy. “Do you think we can fly up there with it?”

“Silly! Just get my rope—it’s in my trunk—and throw one end up to me and tie the parasol on the other; then I’ll pull it up.”

“That sounds easy enough,” Peggy admitted. “I’ll run and get it right away.”

She was starting away when Florence put in, “Wait a minute; I’ll go with you. Felipe might be at the door, and we mustn’t let him see the rope. It might rouse his curiosity.”

“Choke him—chloroform him!” called down Jo Ann crisply. “Anything, only get the parasol, qu-i-ck. I’ll be done to a turn if I stay up here much longer without it.”

The two girls hurried on to their room. As soon as Peggy had taken the coil of rope from the trunk, she slipped it inside the parasol, saying, “This is the way we brought the rope into the house without Felipe’s seeing it, so we can do it again.”

As they were entering the hall Felipe stopped them. “Have you found Miss Anita?” he asked, using the Spanish word for Jo Ann’s second name, Annette, rather than the longer name of Josephine.

“Yes, she’s here,” Florence answered quickly, hurrying off.

On reaching the balcony Peggy whistled softly several times, and Jo Ann’s head appeared over the ledge.

“Got it? Fine! Pitch it up to me,” she called in a loud whisper as Florence put her finger to her lips and motioned toward the office.

Straightening out the rope, Peggy tossed one end of it into the air. Up it sailed, then fell dangling over the balcony rail.

“It’s a good thing I had hold of the other end,” she laughed. “This grass rope is so stiff, it won’t go straight.”

“It would if you’d throw it straight,” scoffed Jo Ann. “Coil it up again. I believe it’ll be easier to throw that way and pitch it straight up.”

Obeying directions, Peggy tried again, only to fail once more. Seeing how far Jo Ann was leaning over the wall in her effort to catch the rope, she exclaimed, “Oh, Jo, don’t lean over so far! You make me nervous.”

“Well, it looks as if I’ll have to hang by my feet to catch anything you throw. If you just knew how hot it was up here!”

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