diff options
| author | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-01-30 22:00:22 -0800 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-01-30 22:00:22 -0800 |
| commit | 058a6f8d510196cc529273c39e38334adc503138 (patch) | |
| tree | b00aabf33b4e14a919f80625c59b4642ed357b61 | |
| parent | 031fa9b99ab53bf6c89851693395506b77c926a0 (diff) | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 4 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-0.txt | 6891 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-0.zip | bin | 129047 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h.zip | bin | 1049679 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/62371-h.htm | 5636 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 189279 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/images/frontis.jpg | bin | 182689 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/images/i001.jpg | bin | 185059 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/images/i002.jpg | bin | 185881 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/62371-h/images/i003.jpg | bin | 183838 -> 0 bytes |
12 files changed, 17 insertions, 12527 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..652770e --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #62371 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/62371) diff --git a/old/62371-0.txt b/old/62371-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index fde8842..0000000 --- a/old/62371-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6891 +0,0 @@ -Project Gutenberg's Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur, by Isabel Hornibrook - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur - -Author: Isabel Hornibrook - -Illustrator: Nana Bickford Rollins - -Release Date: June 11, 2020 [EBook #62371] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR *** - - - - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR - - - - - By Isabel Hornibrook - - DRAKE OF TROOP ONE - SCOUT DRAKE IN WAR TIME - COXSWAIN DRAKE OF THE SEASCOUTS - DRAKE AND THE ADVENTURERS’ CUP - PEMROSE LORRY: CAMP FIRE GIRL - PEMROSE LORRY: RADIO AMATEUR - - - - -[Illustration: “We’ve got to ride on—your own horse is here—to where you -and I can be together.”] - - - - - PEMROSE LORRY - RADIO AMATEUR - - BY - ISABEL HORNIBROOK - - WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY - NANA BICKFORD ROLLINS - - BOSTON - LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY - 1923 - - - - - Copyright, 1923, - By LITTLE, Brown, AND COMPANY. - - All rights reserved - Published April, 1923 - - Printed in the United States of America - - - - -The author acknowledges her indebtedness to Nawadaha of the Camp Fire -(Ethel V. Smart) for the songs and rhymes, and for some helpful -collaboration. - - - - - CONTENTS - - I A Flower Clock - II A “Roaring Buckie” - III An Awful Note - IV Fathers - V The Magic Carpet - VI A Gentleman - VII Fit for Fit - VII The Wee Hour - IX Dandering Kate - X Hidden Valley - XI Her - XII The Shack Corner - XIII The Long Pasture - XIV Revel and Revelation - XV Wheeled through Life - XVI The Lip - XVII Wild Flowers - XVIII Mondamin - XIX A Girl Brigade - XX No Answer - XXI The Call of the Air - XXII On Little Sister - XXIII The Ring - XXIV The Race - XXV Spring - - - - - ILLUSTRATIONS - - “We’ve got to ride on—your own horse is here—to where you and - I can be together.” - - Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was. - - “Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t it?” - - Pemrose was standing with her aërial out to a gnarled pine-tree. - - - - - PEMROSE LORRY RADIO AMATEUR - - - - - CHAPTER I - - A Flower Clock - - -“Good morning, Daytime!” A girl stood upon the gray stone steps of a -Lenox mansion and, looking up, answered the first lovely smile that -young day flung down to her as, robed in pale pink and bluish bloom, it -slowly climbed the eastern sky. - -“Good morning, Day-sky!” she laughed again—smiling all over in response -to that pink of beauty above her. “Well! this is the first time that the -Sunrise and I have been chums,” she murmured to herself, “the first -spring, I mean; I—I who used to suffer from the sleepy fevers more -than—than the ‘nappiest’ little flower in my garden.” - -She laughed softly now, Una Grosvenor, known to her girl chums as Jack—a -gay bit of satire, by the way—and by the Council Fire as U-te-yan, -Flower, as she descended the gray steps into a dewy garden, where those -Rogues O’May, the late spring flowers, were still, many of them, -slumbering with eyes tight shut. - -“Yes, you gain an hour by the daylight saving—or you think you do, you -sluggards!” she flung at them, a slight nearsighted peculiarity in her -dark eye flashing with pretty mockery. “Six o’clock, now, by my -watch—really only five—and there you are: chicory, tulip, wild rose, -pond lily, fast asleep still; poppy, marigold, daisy—and wild dandelion, -only just awaking—and one little belated Crocus, just one, dozing, too!” - -It was with a smile, roguish and tender, tender as that of the dawn, -that Una stood still, cooling her toes in the dew, to look at her -garden—with its cheek, silver and pink as a baby’s, reflecting the flush -of the sky. - -A large, old-fashioned garden it was and full of surprises, inclosing -U-te-yan’s blooming beds where, as a Camp Fire Girl, she had sown or -planted, experimented and transplanted herself; and it was plain from -the look upon her face that she lived in it—dreamed in it, as a princess -might live in a fairy tale. - -“My flowers!” She dimpled imaginatively. “Oh-h! at this hour, I can -almost hear them singing to me. What is it—they—say? I made it up, for -them, before: - - “Good morning, dear Una! Good morning, dear Day! - The gloom of the night clouds has all flown away, - We kick off our blankets of mist, soft and white, - And dress ourselves up in the lovely gold light, - From rock, bed and border we’re smiling at you, - Good morning! Good morning! Now, you say it too!” - -“Good morning! Good morning!” threw back the caroling sprite, her dark -eyes dressing themselves up in light, too, as she impersonated her -flowers. “Now! what was it I wanted especially to do this morning,” thus -she silently questioned the dewy beds, “besides watching the sleepy -_flowers_ open in my flower clock, my sundial bed—that’s the clock which -really gets me up early,” with a merry nod, “to study _their_ waking -time, as the shadow of the dial hand, beginning to move with sunrise, -points to one after the other? Oh-h! I know; I wanted to do some -transplanting, ‘housemove’ my little Quaker Ladies, before—before old -Sods gets around. Now! did any of you ever hear of such a thing as a -crusty old gardener whose ‘really truly’ name is—Jacob Sods?” - -Whimsically she interrogated pansy and little blue johnny-jump-up, just -opening its sleepy eye, daffodil, narcissus and lamp-like geranium -which, open-eyed, had kept vigil all night long. - -“Humph! There he is now! I never can get ahead of him.” The girl -shrugged her shoulders. - -“Lorie me! Miss Una,” grunted an old mountaineer who at that moment came -shuffling down a garden path, spade in hand and munching a dew-piece, a -hunch of bread. “Lorie me! Now, what be you up for so ear-rly! It ben’t -but—five—o’clock.” He pulled a timeworn old silver watch out of a side -pocket. - -“Six—by—me!” Una glanced at her tiny jeweled wrist watch. - -“Humph! I go by the Lord’s time, I’ll have you to know!” snorted Jacob -Sods, gardener. “I—I ain’t no ‘nose o’ wax’ to be changin’ round.” He -shuffled on, grunting. - -Una’s tickled laughter rang out as she set to work to transplant her -little Quaker Ladies from what was known as the wildflower garden to a -sunny rock bed. - -“A plant—a plant is a regular tomboy when you’re making a new home for -it,” she was murmuring archly to herself, five minutes later, her dark -eyebrows lifting over the busy trowel. “You have to make a nice little -mound of earth, deep in your hole, for it to sit on and swing its legs, -its roots, just like a boy or girl. And—and it likes a snug fit, too! -There now, my bluets are in a nice, comfy hole.... And the little Quaker -Ladies will never know what happened to them!” - -She started. Something was happening to her. Breathlessly she kneeled -upright—earthy knuckles pressed against her lips, ear intent. - -“Goodness! this—this isn’t the first time when I’ve been up early, -before anybody else was around—Pemrose, anybody—that—I thought—I thought -I heard a strange sound from the wood. There it is again! Faint -hum—silvery hum—all round us in the air! Don’t you—don’t you hear it?” - -She turned half wildly to the Quaker Ladies, who seemed to be settling -into their new home to music—if music the faintest, vaguest murmur could -be called. - -“It—it comes from the wood, but it isn’t the trees—pines or beeches—it -isn’t, oh! it isn’t any sound in Nature, at all.” Una waved her trowel, -in utter bewilderment. “What can be doing it—making it? That distant -‘surgy’ hum, rising, falling, murmur, murmuration! Silvery murmuration!” -The little peculiar cast in her fascinated eye, too slight to be a -blemish, shone, a morning star of marvel, now as she gazed off towards a -low, stone wall about a hundred feet away, beyond which was a dark, -slowly lighting pine wood. - -“If I were to say anything about this to Pemrose, she’d laugh at -me—think it was all imagination. She’s—so different. Full of ‘pep’—a -radio amateur!” - -The girl, the dark-eyed girl whose nature was more woven of poetry than -“pep”, who put morning songs into the heads of her flowers, continued to -kneel “possessed”, upon a dew-silvered stone beside the rock garden, -continued to stare, bewitched, at the dusky green of the early wood. - -To her, the vague, sweet murmur which, like a silver cloud, enwrapped -her, was not unnatural; it was part of the fairy wonder of the sunrise; -of a May sun rising, dim and silvery, like a moon—like a young moon -calf—behind shrubbery trees. - -“Extra-ordinary!” Her earthy fingers sought each other, restlessly -intertwining. “It can’t be a bee? Big, droning bumble bee—Canny Nannie, -as the mountain children call it! A whole swarm of Canny Nannies! But -there isn’t a bee in sight at this hour; and, if there were, ’twould -have to be a glorified—glorified one for me to hear it—at this distance -from the wood.” - -She stumbled to her feet now, dropping the trowel almost upon the -long-suffering heads of the Quaker Ladies, and wandered down a dewy -pathway towards a point still nearer to the pine woods, where a gray old -sundial upon its four-foot pedestal, shimmered at sunrise, like a huge -primrose. - -Around this U-te-yan, Flower had created her masterpiece, a ring-like -bed in three-cornered sections, peopled only by horological flowers, as -her books called them, those that closed sleepily at night, to open at -various hours of the morning, energetically or lazily, as the case might -be. - -To the lovely flower clock, the blooming democracy, wild flowers, even -weeds, were admitted, side by side with garden aristocrats, in order to -find a flower, sometimes two or three, whose waking or sleeping habits -corresponded to the numbers upon the dial’s face—to the sunny hours -counted out by the pointing of the shadowy dial finger. - -The flower clock had suddenly developed a tongue. The vague hum pursued -her here. Pale, spring poppy, uncurling dandelion, caught it, held -it—and winked at her over its mystery. - -“If—if I were Pemrose now, I’d go right on into the wood, and find out -where it comes from—what’s making it,” she murmured to those waking -flowers. “The truth is, I’m too—t-too ‘funky’,” with a little -deprecatory shrug. “That—that’s why father won’t hear of my going -hiking, camping with the other girls this summer; he says I never would -stand the sleeping out at night—even for a few nights. And Treff, my -madcap cousin Treff, says I’d be such a ‘weer’ I’d turn them all -‘wuzzy’,”—a low laugh—“his barbarous college slang! - -“He—he’s coming over to take Pemrose for a little flight, this morning, -a little ‘air-hop’, as he calls it, before breakfast. I—I daren’t go up -with him in his aëroplane, to hear voices among the clouds—his new radio -outfit. That must be weird. But—this is weirder!” The girl’s lips curved -silently. “And yet—and yet that’s not the word, either; it’s too sweet. -Gracious! Now I hear it, now I d-don’t.” She stole forward a step, -bending her ear towards the intoning pines. - -“Now—now it’s like a wandering organ note. Oh! am I listening in on -anything by radio—a new sort of radio ‘bug’?” with the faintest whiff of -laughter. “Am I awake, at all? I’d give worlds—worlds—to go on into the -wood, find out what it is—what’s making it. But I’ve seldom been into -that pine wood, alone. Never—at this hour.” - -Yet, as if that dulcet, wavy murmur, now high-pitched, now low-pitched, -faint, yet audible—increasingly audible—in the still May morning, were a -luminous belt, an irresistible power-belt, drawing her, Una was moving -slowly—vaguely—towards the wood. - -She reached the low stone wall—the dark skirts of the passive pines were -only fifty feet away. - -Each gray stone in that rough wall was now a ruby, reflecting the -wonderful amethyst lights in the sky—wings of that mild young sun which -had risen so like a moon calf. - -Suddenly her hands clutched each other convulsively. Was she -masquerading, too? The morning had, all in a moment, become dim; and she -was the ghost of a girl standing down, in a mist, by a seashore—holding -a hollow sea shell to her ear. - -“I can’t—oh! I can’t be happy—unless I find out what’s doing it!” - -She sobbed it aloud, now, in light, breathless, seafoam sobs—all -irradiated, too—to the dewy flowers among which she stood; gay cottage -tulips straggling among sweetbriars along by the wall, each red and -yellow mite flashing as if, true to its legend, it had rocked a little -elf in its cradle the night before. - -There was not a flower in the garden whose legend was not in Una’s -flower-basket brain. - -This soft sea shell throbbing of the air about her, the faint, shrill -piping—now, again, it was high, clear, metallic—yet strangely -disembodied—fitted in with a dozen of them. - -“It’s not _earthly_; it’s not,” she cried passionately to the tulips; -“it’s t-too fairy-like—too unlike anything I ever heard ... but I can’t -be happy, unless—” - -A sweetbriar, herself, now, the unfinished protest a thorn in her brain, -she was over the low wall—and through the dim shadow gate of the wood. - - - - - CHAPTER II - - A “Roaring Buckie” - - -A pure, high note upon the air, a shrill, vibrating beat, as of a bird -or a woodsman faintly calling! Wordlessly calling! - -But it was not bird, nor woodsman. Una stood still, near a dark little -pond, fringed with blue iris—May iris. She heard the birds with it. - -“Goodness! can it be-e—am I dreaming that I’m Pemrose—Pemrose, -‘listening in’ on something, picking up sounds from the air with a -wonderful ring—radio ring—that her father has made for her?” - -The girl looked down at her forefinger; there was no deep ring, no -shining cat-whisker, no shimmering crystal there. - -“Or am I—am I going far beyond her, beyond any one, picking up waves, -sounds, without any of these things, aërial—or ‘radio soul’?” - -The dark eyes were translucent now in the dimness of the wood, with the -vision that she, least practical, least plodding of girls—except where -her flowers were concerned—should be the elect of heaven for a new -discovery. - -And as the elect of heaven cannot pause to consider, on she went, -through the heavy dew silvering the brown pine needles, sparkling upon -tall fiddle-head brake and cinnamon fern, occasionally upon the ebony -stem of a baby maidenhair upon a bank. - -The woods were unspeakable at this hour—the slowly lighting May woods. -There was a little, stealing smile in them, a laugh too young, too -subtle to belong to this old world, at all. Or else the world had -suddenly grown very young—so young that anything might happen! - -Una, herself, felt more like six than sixteen, within a near run of -sixteen, as she tiptoed over the trail of a sunbeam on the needles, -pausing now and again to lift one foot off the ground, lift it high and -listen—after the manner of the terrier who thinks that he cannot listen -satisfactorily without a paw in the air. - -The high-pitched note, the elfin call vibrated off into faintness. And -now, again, she seemed to be standing in mists by a seashore, holding a -hollow shell, with a curve in its pipe, to her ear. - -There was a throbbing of the air about her, a low reverberation, -swelling into a soft intoning, like the murmur of sad sea waves. - -“_Goodness!_ Now—now the wood is a ‘roaring buckie’, as Andrew, our -Scotch chauffeur, would call a big crooning shell that he’d pick up for -me on the seashore. I wish Andrew were here. If only Pemrose was here!” - -She had a momentary spasm of faint-heartedness—of being once more the -timid Una, timid to weakness in all but the strength of her imagination. -She turned to flee—to beat a retreat to the garden, to her fanciful -flower clock. - -But that hum was too alluring. A wood that, at daybreak, was a roaring -buckie was too persuasive—appealing to every fancy she had. - -She began to feel like the ghost of some poor little queer fish that had -crept back into the clammy shell it once inhabited. - -But she stole on. - -“It seems to come from somewhere behind that log-stack,” she told -herself, peering through thick brambles and umbrella-like scrub of the -tenderest fairy green, at a great pile of crossed logs, their ends -gleaming, golden—a shack for the haunting shadows. - -But when, taking her curiosity in both hands—if her courage was too -frail to be handled—she reached that shadowy stack, the mysterious -music—if music it could be called—had receded. - -She heard it from a recess farther on—and deeper in the wood. - -And now again she wanted to turn. But, at that moment, the soul of the -distant thicket, it soared, indescribably sweet, shrill, clear, like the -_vox angelica_, the angel stop upon an organ. - -“Oh-h! I m-must be dreaming!” Yet, with hands clasped—carried out of -herself—Una pursued that fleeing organ-note. - -It brought her in less than another minute to the pine-wood’s -battleground. Trailing, khaki-colored limbs of dead boughs, dead -soldiers, which had fought bravely with last winter’s record ice storm, -swept the earth, withering. - -But among them there were other warriors, green recruits, whose flexible -youth had so battled with wind and weight of ice that the branches, -twisted, deformed, bowed to earth, were still green. Sap flowed in them. -They were one with the living trunk. - -In some dim way the lesson of those young hemlocks went home to Una. Her -lower lip sagged as she looked at them. Some part of her—some part of -her—she began to feel it—was twisted by curiosity, over-wrought fancy, -away from her normal self. But it was not broken off. - -Suddenly—elastically—it sprang back into place: “I w-won’t go any -further—after it; I won’t!” she cried aloud—and turned her head to look -around. - -It was then that she got the crowning shock: yet as delicate, as -fairy-like—as full of glamour—as the others had been. - -Something fell at her feet. A little bunch of dewy wild flowers. - -Lace of the carroway, gemmed with dew, lavender wild geranium, its cheek -on her shoe, a lingering woodland violet with a tear in her eye, -buttercup, dandelion—ebony-stemmed maidenhair, fairy-like in its -pleading. - -It was beyond Una to resist flowers at her feet. - -She stooped to pick them up. Was there a nettle among them? Something -stung her. Stung sharply! - -She was about to rub the prickling fingers across her lips, but with -some thought of the poisonous weeds which, as a Camp Fire Girl she had -come to know, she chafed them against her skirt—her sweater -cuff—instead. - -But there seemed to be no poisoner in all the innocent little bunch that -rested its cheek so trustfully against her tan shoe. - -Was it the tear in the violet’s eye that warned her? Was it the averted -face of the drowsy dandelion, still, in the woods, half asleep? Was—oh! -was there the faintest whiff about them that was not natural? - -Suddenly all the daylight fled out through the tops of the trees, as it -were. - -And, spurning for the first time a flower, Una turned and fled with it, -sobbing, tripping, stumbling, out of the wood—the intoning wood. - -She reached the low, stone wall, breathless, wild-eyed. - -“Preserve us a’! lassie, what’s happened to ye, the morning? Ye look -‘beglammered.’ Ye look scared; ye look sparrow-blastit.” - -Never did a human voice fall more comfortingly upon a girl’s ears than -the rough Scotch accents which greeted hers from the other side of that -garden wall. - -“Oh! Andrew, I—heard—” began Una, as strong arms lifted her over the -wall. - -“I h-heard—” she raved again. - -But the words were blown from her lips by another hum; a hum that seemed -heavenly, so loud, so cocksure, so mechanically humdrum it was—the hum -of a skimming aëroplane. - -“I heard—” she began for the third time—and lifted her eyes to the sky. - -They were blinded by a sheet of flame. - - - - - CHAPTER III - - An Awful Note - - -“Preserve us a’! It’s coming down. Coming down—a fire-tail! Driftin’ -doomward—down’ard—an’ afire!” - -Andrew’s hoarse exclamations tore at the reddened air, even as sharp -horns of flame gored it, springing out from a biplane’s slipping side. - -“Willa-woo! It’s side-slippin’—side-slippin’ down—afire!” - -Old Andrew’s hand went to his head. The girl sank to her knees beside -her waking flower clock. For her the end of the world had come, heralded -by that mysterious pitch pipe in the woods. - -The chauffeur looked, too, as if he heard the Big Trump. - -Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was; a long, thin tail -feather of brightest flame streaming out from it to the little leaden -fish, two-pound fish, that held its radio antenna steady in the air, -kept it away from the controls—flipper and rudder controls! - -[Illustration: Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was.] - -Those controls were useless now. The burning plane was side-slipping -from five hundred feet aloft—in spite of the efforts of the one aviator -to right it before it landed. - -It was but for a moment—an eternal moment—that the man and the kneeling -girl watched it, before it roosted, bird of thunder, in a tree top, a -noble white ash, over fifty feet tall, growing upon this side of the -garden wall. - -The startled tree seemed rolling up the whites of its eyes in -terror—rustling the pale undersides of its crown of leaves—as the -burning plane landed and stuck upon a topmost branch; and, a second -earlier, the aviator, finding that he could not make a better landing -before the gasolene tank blew up, jumped. - -As the dark, helmeted streak shot downward, it just grazed the old -sundial, which now counted one flaming hour amid its many sunny ones—and -landed right in the middle of the blooming flower clock. - -“Dog out!” groaned Andrew and, with the hoarse exclamation on his lips, -sprang forward to catch it—break the fall. - -But his long arms, his strong breast missed it. - -With a soft, reverberating thud it landed in the dial-bed, right on the -head of pale Miss Poppy, garden beauty, who got the flattening shock of -her life at the moment. - -One leg of the figure, rebounding, hit its owner, the half-stunned -aviator, below the waist line, after which he, too, drooped over, lay, -huddled, amid the flattened flowers. - -“Treff! _Oh-h!_ my cousin Treff. Coming to take Pemrose—up!... Is -he—dead?” It seemed to Una to be the ghost of herself that put the -question. - -“Dead—no! My paley lamb!” Even at this moment the elderly chauffeur shot -a glance of fatherly concern and tenderness at the white-lipped girl—she -was to him a symbol of the daughter he had lost. - -“Dead—not by a hand’s-breadth!” Andrew was kneeling by the unconscious -figure, straightening it out. “But his right leg’s broke, I fear—poor -lad. Hit him in the stomach, too, that blamed leg, knocked his wind -out—knocked him into as-far-land! Water-r, lassie! Water! A stream -near-hand there, by the wood!” - -“The—w-wood!” Una stared at him feebly, making no motion to pick up the -little metal cup, blistered by heat, which he unhooked from the -aviator’s belt and flung towards her. - -“Yes, the wood! Air ‘ye jacky-witted’? Oh! shame fer a lassie to be -ginge’-bread at sech a time. Well, deil-mak’-matter! I’ll go meself.” - -But it was at that moment that the “deil”, called upon, seemed to make -the matter in question his own. - -It was at that moment that the world went quite to perdition with a roar -as, aloft in the tree top, the gasolene tank blew up. - -Flaming fragments, bits of wing that seemed wrenched from imps, red -imps, blazing splinters, scraps of wire and red-hot metal rained all -around the girl in the terrified grass—still blanched with dew. - -“Warry!” shrieked Andrew. “Down, lassie—down flat, ere the fiery -off-fall hit ye!” - -But that “fiery off-fall” dropped a curtain between Una and her visions -of the wood. In a delirium she picked up the cup—and fled, not back to -the wood, but to the nearest garden hydrant. - -A fragment of linen wing, aëroplane wing, treated with the preparation -that was so inflammable, swept her cheek—a scarlet butterfly. But she -managed to fetch the water, her brief dizziness shriveled, like that -doped wing, into a frenzy—red frenzy. - -As cool drops fell upon his face, moistened his blistered lips, the boy -aviator opened his eyes. - -“Gosh! but this is an aw-ful note.” He blinked mockingly at motes of his -wings swimming before him in the red glare, at his aëroplane fast being -reduced to a blackened motor and a few twisted wires in the tree top. -“Aw-ful note!” He grinned. - -“Aye, it is—my cock-o’-pluck!” gurgled Andrew. - -“‘Pulled a bone,’ up there—a blunder,” went on the freakish voice. “New -radio outfit, shoved the power plug into wrong groove, short -circuit—wires red-hot in a jiffy—spaghetti all blazing—” - -“Aye, the inflam’ble, insulating clothie around the bit wires,” put in -Andrew. - -“Reached over for my chemicals to right of seat—” an amber-brown speck -in one of the boy’s stone-gray eyes flashed—“unbalanced plane, she -side-slipped, and now ... it’s three thousand for a new ‘bus’ and I -can’t take a girl up this morning.” - -“Pemrose,” breathed Una. - -“Yes, Pemrose. Pretty—Pem!” - -“Easy there—easy there, with that right leg—my cock-o’-the-clouds!” -Andrew was muttering. “You’ve ‘pulled a bone’ in that, I’m thinking.” - -“Ouch! Have I? _You_ look as if I had broken every bone in your body by -falling a few hundred feet.” - -The aviator glared at Una—then winked his mischievous brown spot. - -She could not wink back. Behind the red note of misfortune was, still, -for her, the note of mystery: an echo that seemed borne from that -hum-haunted wood, the tear in the violet’s eye—a nettle where no nettle -was. - -She lifted her stung fingers, where the prickle had faded, and looked at -them. - -Still—still she was “sparrow-blasted” as Andrew’s queer figure put it, -blighted to the core by a trifle—kicked by a paltry sparrow, as it were. - -And she had not been able to come back with even one little kick of -spirit—not even so far as to venture to the safe skirts of the wood -again—to the spring not fifty yards away—in the face of another’s need. - -Her head drooped shamefacedly, her dark head. - -There was a sudden rush of figures running, wildly running across the -garden, where a patch of grass and a tree top were now ablaze: her -father’s, half clad, old Sods’, others—a girl with blue dilated eyes. - -“Pemrose!” She stretched out her arms, in a fair flutter as Andrew saw, -then drooped over and fainted, a lily-heart, beside her flower clock. - - - - - CHAPTER IV - - Fathers - - -“But I did hear it—father.” - -“You dreamed it, girlie—up so early.” - -Dwight Grosvenor, father of Una, drew his hand across his forehead; -curiously enough, the rim of that high forehead looked damp—clammy as -the woods at daybreak. - -“Pemrose—Pemrose will believe me that I heard it; that strange sound, -high piping—silvery hum. Pemrose will believe me.” - -Pemrose Lorry looked in bewilderment from one to another—in the tempered -glare of a bright sun-parlor. - -“It m-must have been the trees,” she ventured—her glance in the -direction of Una, the flower sprite, said that she was accustomed to the -whims of a girl as timid as she was finespun. - -“But there wasn’t any breeze, I tell you!” Una stamped deliriously. “The -pines—the beeches—weren’t even stirring.” - -Silent, for a moment, she gazed thoughtfully out at her May garden—at -the woods, the hills, beyond it. - -“’Twasn’t like anything I ever heard before,” she murmured pensively. -“Not like any sound in Nature, at all! ’Twas like the fine small music -Andrew speaks of that calls the—fairies—” - -“Andrew!” Her father suddenly set his foot down in relief—the vague -annoyance in his face melting, “I’ve a great mind to dismiss that -‘blellum.’ A fogy whose tongue drips folk lore as a rain streak drips -mist! Whose stories—” - -“Ending with; ‘An if a’ tales be true,’ that’s no lie,” put in Pemrose -slyly, with a preoccupied glance at an adjoining room where, in splints -and bandages, a young aviator, with a mocking brown speck in one gray -eye, lay dreaming of his fiery “note.” - -But, now, it was Una, petted child, who set her foot down, stamping it -again—stamping passionately: - -“Dismiss Andrew—father!” she cried. “Andrew who picked me up bodily and -hurled me into the back of the car when I was out with him alone, six -months ago, and another auto, recklessly driven, came right for us round -a corner! Andrew who never thought of himself, at all—only of saving me! -Who—who was so badly battered—got some of the glass of the wind shield -into him—that he had to have....” She almost snapped her fingers at her -father. - -“There! There, child! Of course I didn’t mean it.” The latter patted her -shoulder soothingly. “But I wish he’d shed his Scotch mists, anywhere -but in your ears.” - -“Well—well, Andrew had nothing to do with this,” insisted Una, after a -cooling minute. “I did hear it, that funny—piping—hum. The Quaker Ladies -heard it, too—” her eyebrows arching merrily—“and _they_ thought ’twas -like the ringing and singing in harebells—” - -“There now, Jack! There now!” Her father threw up his hands as he called -his only daughter by the name, occasionally, thrust upon her by her girl -chums, as a satire upon the “betty” element in her being so strong—on -her being as far as possible removed from what might, possibly, be known -as a “lassie-boy.” “There you are! You’re just steeped to the ears in -these flower legends, very finespun and poetic—but too airy an -atmosphere for a girl like you, with an imagination that ‘works -overtime.’ Oh! I’m glad of your new interest in your flowers; it -overcame your—” - -“‘Sleepy fivvers,’” put in Una archly. “You used to say I was as lazy as -the white Star of Bethlehem, Daddy dear, and she’s a perfect dormouse, -garden dormouse—the little ‘ten o’ clock.’” - -“But I—I’d like to see my little girl interested in something else, too, -to keep her earth-fast.” Mr. Grosvenor laid his arm tenderly around the -shoulders of his only child. “How—how about learning to run one of my -big cars? How about becoming interested in radio, like your friend -Pemrose? Oh-h! not in listening in on a concert. The laziest -lubber-sprite could do that!” with a laugh. “But in riding the whirlwind -and directing the storm,” gayly, “the jumble of noises coming through -the air taking you by storm. I declare if you could once gossip -familiarly of vacuum tube and variometer, current and condenser; if you -could pick up one sentence—one word even—from the dot and dash with -which the air is forever ticking, I might—” - -“What! code. Telegraphy that—that horrid teaser!” - -Una curled up like the finical Star of Bethlehem before the blinding -beat of a thunder shower. - -“I might,” Mr. Grosvenor went on, unheeding, swinging his eyeglasses -judicially, “I might, even, decide that you were stern enough stuff, hot -stuff enough, to go into camp with the other girls, this summer, and not -infect them all with ‘peerie-weerie’ fears—fancies.” - -“To camp!” It was a little diverted scream. “Oh! father, you know I’m -dying to go—go with Pemrose.” - -“Well! I’m beginning to think it might really be better for you than -staying here under the care of a governess, while I—while I make a -flying trip, business trip, to Europe—and your mother goes to bring me -back,” with a shrug. “When do you start? What are your hiking plans?” -The big man of affairs, banker, financier, turned to Pemrose. - -“Oh! we leave here—I leave here on the tenth of July, seven weeks from -now, to pick up my Camp Fire sisters just over the Massachusetts line, -where we follow the Greylock Trail until we strike the Long Trail -winding right through the Green Mountains, from end to end.” - -The girl paused, the lure of the Long Trail unwinding itself remotely in -her blue eyes. - -“But we don’t follow that, for long, either; we branch off along other -mountain trails and—and little snaky, brown roads that stand on their -hind legs and grope for the sky,” laughingly, “until—until—four days’ -hiking and sleeping out at night—” Pemrose waved a letter, just -received—“we come to Mount Pocohosette at the heart of the Green -Mountains—” - -“Pocohosette!” Una sprang erect and clapped her hands. “Why—why that’s -where your horse-farm is, Daddy, and I’ve never—never been up there.” - -“I only bought it and stocked it last year, down in the valley, the rich -bottom lands at the foot, and put a ‘canny’ farmer in charge of my -Morgan thoroughbreds.” Mr. Grosvenor laughed. “Well, go on with your -program,” he looked at Pemrose. - -“The mountain is very wild, so I understand—adventure by the yard!” -beamed the blue-eyed girl. “A—a rocky Balcony, half way up, where you -can stand on the lip of nothing and look down!” - -“Oh-h! lovely,” shivered Una; for her such a breakneck blank had a -fascination—fancy could always people it. - -“The Guardian—Guardian of our Camp Fire Group hopes to rent some old -farmhouse for a week or two.” Pemrose glanced at her letter. - -“How about a month or two—eh?” The fluttering eyeglasses in Mr. -Grosvenor’s hand reflected, now, the deepest twinkle in the eye above -them—is there any role more gratifying to a “high-powered” humanitarian -than to play fairy godfather to a group of girls? “If—if I might -suggest,” he said slowly, “there’s a jolly nice sort of camp—pine-log -cabin—there already, on the breezy sidehill, just a mile and a half -above the horse-farm, which I used for hunting quarters, before I was -seized with the passion for raising Morgan horses. If your Group will -accept the loan of it ... there, I’ll write to the Guardian to-day.” - -“Oh-h! Mr. Grosvenor....” The light fairly swooned in Pemrose’s blue -eyes. - -“And if this daughter of mine will only strike a bargain on the dot and -dash ‘teaser’ just to show that she isn’t entirely such stuff as dreams -are made of,” with a laugh, “I might have radio installed for you—so -that you can, now and again, tune in on a concert, while camping on the -edge of nothing.” - -“Boys—boys say that they have a respect for any ‘O. G.: Old Girl’, radio -slang, who can master code—the ‘crutch’, as they call it—because she has -to set her back to the wall to do it,” put in Pemrose roguishly. “And -then—” her hand went up, in excitement, to her dimpling chin—“we -wouldn’t have to depend altogether on my magic ring, radio ring, for -any—any little gleanings from the air.” - -“Magic ring—humph!” The fairy godfather’s eyebrows were lifted—just a -little superciliously. “What can you pick up with a gewgaw like that—toy -set like that? Firing pellets at the moon, eh?” he winked quizzically. - -“You forget—you forget that my father is an inventor, sir, and that he -has invented—discovered—a new crystal—‘radio soul’—which is an amplifier -as well as a detector!” Pemrose’s back was up and to the wall now, her -blue eyes flashing. “He—oh, he stumbled upon it while experimenting for -my ring. We all know that crystals up to this time have been crude -affairs,” vouchsafed the girlish radio fan, her chin in the air. - -“A one-stage amplifier, I suppose—as well as a detector, sorting out -sounds from the air!” Mr. Grosvenor gasped. - -“Oh, by George! child, I did forget that your father is the archwizard -who _has_ bombarded the moon with something more ponderable than -pellets. If any one can achieve the impossible—” - -“He could have made me a ring with just an ordinary galena crystal, or -silicon,” murmured Pemrose shyly, as the great man paused, “with which I -could have picked up waves—sounds—not very far off. But—with this—my two -hundred feet of aërial out to a tree, my spiked heel in the mud,” -laughingly, “early in the morning, especially, I can—can glean snatches -of everything within five or six miles; further—further, if it’s dot an’ -dash—a powerful station sending!” - -“Oh, by Jove! I can fancy you standing round, out-of-doors, after -daybreak, with your shining halo—headpiece—on.” The tall man threw back -his shoulders, with a chuckle. “Well! maybe, you’ll be the woman with -power on her head who can ride Revelation.” He winked. “Revelation, son -of Revel, Morgan bay, fifteen hands high, good-natured, -well-trained—bridle-wise—but needing a rider with ‘pep’ to handle him!” - -“I rode with father all last summer.” The “pep” leaked out of Pemrose’s -whisper into her red cheeks now—the sunburst of luck was too suffusing. - -“Oh! there will be eight or nine horses, I expect, out in the Long -Pasture, on the sidehill. You girls can take turns in riding. Revel, -gentle little mother-horse—a baby could ride her—I meant to have her -brought down here this summer, for Una.” - -“And—and I can ride her, up there, father!” Una flung her arms around -him—a clinging vine. Suddenly, however, she raised her head, as if -afraid that she might be riding Revel in a false habit. “But I did -hear-r it, father,” she persisted, “that silvery murmur—hum. And, oh! -that wasn’t all—only you’re so unbelieving. While I was listening, -wondering—wondering whether I could be strung on wires,” half -laughingly, half fearfully, “picking up sounds by radio, something fell -at my feet. A little bunch of wild flowers! I touched them. Something -stung me.” - -Again she held up her slim fingers and looked at them curiously. - -“Well, it left ‘nor mark nor burn’, child,” chaffed her father, catching -the hand and examining it, too. “Bah! Some boy playing a trick on -you—playing on a Jew’s harp! Don’t go into the wood again so—early—” - -“It wasn’t! It wasn’t!” Passionately the vine tore itself from its -pedestal and maintained its own independent conviction. - -But as Una caught the cloud, the vague cloud, descending again upon her -father’s face, her soft flower-heart capitulated. - -“Well! all right, Daddy, if you want me to think that, I will—I’ll try -to,” she pledged. “You’re the dearest prince of a father ever was—and I -wouldn’t exchange you even for Pemrose’s Wizard,” with a little _moue_, -a little grimace in the direction of the other girl, who had turned -aside and was looking out through the plateglass panels towards the -mountains. - -“There—I haven’t done your hair this morning, yet.” - -Una pressed her father into a low wicker chair, perched upon his knee -and began twisting the dark, graying locks around her finger. - -Pemrose, over her shoulder, watched them smilingly. She had no cause for -envy, she who wore a Wizard’s ring. - -“Revel and Revelation!” she murmured beatifically. “But why-y did he -look so upset if he, really, didn’t believe that Una heard anything -unusual in the wood ... now, that’s what I’d like to know!” - - - - - CHAPTER V - - The Magic Carpet - - -“Well—‘Jack!’ Hullo, Unie! Haven’t you said good-bye to your flower -clock yet? Good-bye for six weeks to your flower clock! Oh-h! I’m so -excited over the start I just don’t know what to do with myself.” - -Pemrose Lorry danced down the dew-blanched steps of the Grosvenor -mansion, at Lenox, just a little earlier, as clock and dial hand went, -than the “mornie” hour at which Una had descended them, seven weeks -before, with electrifying results. - -The sun was in the act of rising, no May moon-calf now, but a summer -Sultan, proclaiming that July was here: Moon of Thunder, but moon of -summer idylls, too, of wonderful shadows in the triple greens of brooks, -of cardinal flowers fairly “smashing” across the eye with their joy of -color in mountain passes—the ideal month for campers. - -The garden, the great, terraced garden, seemed to have paled a little in -July heat from its flush of June joy. - -White flowers predominated—or light ones. - -But, here and there, blue larkspur raised its dewy spires, one with the -dancing tint of the girl’s eyes. - -Gladioli and hollyhocks, tall pages of the rising sun, in their -salmon-pink and crimson, bent to awaken their neighbor, the yellow tiger -lily, one of the flowers admitted to the lovely democracy of the sundial -bed, the flower clock, because it closed sleepily at night, to open at a -rather late hour of the morning—as would the dreaming carnation. - -Una—Una was saying good-by to that dewy flower clock now, for which she -had won a Camp Fire honor for creation—original creation—or if the idea, -old as the hills as all ideas are, had been in the “flower-bab” brain of -some old botanist, a couple of hundred years before, it had been born -anew, impromptu, in hers: she had risen early and watched late, to work -it out. - -Old Sods, who spurned daylight saving, going by any but the Lord’s time, -established custom, had repaired the pretty floral clock after the rude -shock of an aviator’s crashing down upon the heads of the sleeping -flowers. - -Like Andrew, the contradictory old gardener, whose name fitted like a -glove, had an affection for the white flower of a girl whose hobby it -was! - -He had risen early, on the morning after the “fiery note”, had deported -sleeping flower families from other beds and wild flowers from their -rustic haunts, to build up the new democracy. - -But the ruined ash-tree he could not repair. Reduced almost, to a bare -trunk, it could no longer roll up the whites of its eyes, when -ruffled—show only the pale undersides of its crown of leaves—or it might -well have done so, this morning, over a miracle which presently took -place with its assistance. - -“Hullo—Unie! Unie-Wunie! Well! isn’t the last long farewell to your -flower clock said?” cried Pemrose again, dancing down the silvery garden -path—her whole warm being simply on the fire-edge of vacation joy. -“Oh-h! this is a wonderful day to start for camp. A little -‘chilly-cold’, as Sods would say! But that makes it all the better for -hiking. And to-night—to-night we may be sleeping out by the Long Trail! -Oh! aren’t you just wild over it, too?” - -There was an answering shout, rather faint, from the neighborhood of the -dim old sundial, within a stone’s throw of the wood. - -“I expect she’s watering the ‘clocksie’ with a final tear,” said Pemrose -to herself. “Well! if she is feeling rather blue over saying good-bye to -her flowers—goodbye for this year to most of them—on top of the good-bye -to her father and mother when they started for Europe yesterday, I—I’m -going to spring a diversion on her.... Hi there, Jack,” she called -exultingly, “don’t you want the big end of a sensation, a sunrise -sensation; don’t you want to listen in on my ring; so early in the -morning as this we ought to be able to pick up something, before the -sounds ‘dim off’ with bright daylight—there are some strong sending -stations near?” - -Una rose, a dewy sprite, from the neighborhood of her flower clock. - -“Why are the sound waves stronger at night—or in the early morning?” she -asked. - -“Search me!” The radio amateur shrugged her shoulders gayly. “Father did -venture some reason for it, something about ‘molecules’, but it didn’t -stick!” She tapped her forehead with a ringed forefinger. “Anyhow, he -said it was only an ‘out-shot’, merrily; that every day somebody was -making a new out-shot in the direction of radio, as _he_ did when he -discovered this new crystal, more wonderful than galena or silicon, or -any of the detectors which people have been using, as a ‘radio soul’, up -to the present.” - -That listening soul was in the girl’s eyes now, her larkspur eyes. She -swung the radio head-phone, artistically carved, or engraved, with Camp -Fire symbols, connected by an enameled wire with a minute joint in the -deep ring upon her forefinger—a ring whose light-hued bakelite setting -shimmered like amber in the primrose dawn. - -“Besides, at this hour, we’ll have the atmosphere to ourselves—or nearly -so—so that we may come in on something that’s broadcasted from some -powerful station in town,” she added hopefully, “or we may even steal in -on some fashionable amateur near by, in some one of the big camps or -houses along the lake! Some radio fiend, with a costly set, who is so -crazy over the new game that he has sat up all night over it and is -keeping on into daylight ... with my spiked heel in the soft ground of -the stream’s bank over there, by the—wood—” - -“The wood!” echoed Una fearfully. - -“Yes, you haven’t been ‘coming in’ on any funny murmur, uncanny murmur, -there, this morning; have you? I believe you’re a brand-new sort of -radio ‘bug’ yourself,” chaffingly. - -“No—I haven’t.” The dark-eyed girl shivered, white-cheeked, in the dew. -“If I did—if I ever should again—I’d have to try to find out what made -it—though—” - -“No, you wouldn’t. You’d run to earth—to Sods. I know you! Well! come -along then.” Pemrose impetuously seized her friend’s hand. “With my heel -in the magic carpet—the wet moss, over there—and my two hundred feet of -antenna, fine, insulated wire strung out to the poor old ash-tree, we -ought to be able to get results—some results, at this hour.” - -“Well! you’ll promise to let me listen in, too, you won’t hold on to -those magic ear-phones all the time yourself? I know _you_!” Una glanced -at the dangling “halo”, attached to the ring, yielding as she generally -did when Pemrose pulled the strings. - -“But we’ll have to hurry, we won’t have much time,” she said, “as we -leave here before seven, in the big car with Andrew, to pick up the -other campers at Greylock village. We haven’t had breakfast yet; and, -oh! are we quite sure that we have everything in our packs?” with the -tremor of a novice. - -“Everything—ducky! Including the last straw!” Pemrose was toying with -her ring. “The rolls of colored paper for our flower costumes, the Wild -Flower Pageant—your birthday, in August!” she murmured dreamily, really -thinking of those radio “fiends” who might, at the moment, be handling -their last few messages before broad daylight—on whom she might steal -in. “We ought to have sent them up with the camp stores and extra -clothing to the horse-farm—those rolls. When it comes to the last long -mile—” - -“Pshaw! they don’t weigh any more than two pinheads,” laughed Una, -swaying like “white weed”, herself, her dark eyes, like her flowers, -“dressing themselves up in gold light.” “And the farmers’ wives, their -little children, they have so little in their lives!” - -“Um-m. There may be very few ‘natives’ to admire us,” Pemrose was still -showing off the ring to the sunrise, “unless—unless you include -quack-natives,” merrily, “Treff and his father, who have a camp about -ten miles from the horse-farm.” - -“Poor Treff!” She dimpled. “Didn’t we have a time teasing him into -getting well after his awful note? I believe if the world came to an end -to-morrow that boy would call it a ‘note’.... But I like a boy who has a -brown speck in one gray eye, just one—his fun-mill!” - -“Wonder if he’s got a new ‘bus’ yet?” speculated Una. - -“And whether he’s ‘pulling any more bones’ with his radio outfit?” -laughed the amateur. “Well! I’ll tell you what, I’m going to loop my -aërial round the old ash-tree, this morning, just to make up for what it -suffered through him!” - -And now was the moment when that noble white ash, upon the garden side -of the wall, might have rolled up the whites of its eyes, ruffled the -pale lining of its leaves—if it had any left to ruffle—as a girl, -clambering up, looped her aërial, her shining wire, as loftily as she -could around the blackened trunk. - -“Eh! What’s the merricle now?” grunted old Sods to the waking flowers, -as he peeped, from a distance, over that garden wall. - -And they nodded that they did not know, that they might be still -dreaming, half open, as they saw that girl bounding lightly back over -the wall to the brook’s edge, to slip a steel creeper upon her heel, the -same that a girl might strap upon her daring heel, in icy weather—and -don a listening halo. - -“You—you’re not going any further into the _wood_?” Una probed the pines -with glances, half fearful, half fascinated. - -“No-o, ‘Peerie-Weerie?’ How are you going to stand sleeping out by the -Long Trail to-night, if you don’t ‘side-dish’ your fancies?” Pemrose -tilted the halo rakishly askew upon her little dark head. “Just look at -the ring!” she gasped. “Isn’t it a winner?” - -A winner it truly was; fraught every inch with glamour, the divine -glamour of ingenuity. - -“Four hundred turns of the finest hairwire wound round it, in this -bobbin-like groove! Isn’t that—that elfin, if you like it?” The blue -eyes danced. “And this ‘atomy’ lever which moves the cat-whisker to -touch the crystal—father’s new crystal that takes the shine out of the -others! And the miniature ‘bind-posts’, joints—three—one hooked on to my -ground connection,” the amateur displayed her heel, “another to my -aërial—the third to my hearing halo; father—oh! was there ever anybody -like him—” it was a transfigured sob—“worked over these magnetic -ear-phones, too, to make them extra sensitive.” - -“I wish—if only they could pick up a little speech—music—for us,” -murmured Una, half her faint-heart in the wood, “if—if ever so -dimly—faintly!” - -“Speech—music—before six o’clock in the morning! You don’t ask much!” -scoffed Pemrose. “I don’t suppose we’ll even get a twitter of -telephony—the twitter of an early bird.” She laughed excitedly. -“Listen—listen to that early bird, up there, in the tallest pine,” -pushing the ear-phones up, “do you know what he’s saying—that brown -thrasher? A brown thrasher it is! He’s chanting advice to the farmers: - - “‘Shuck it, shuck it, sow it, sow it, - Plow it, plow it, hoe it, hoe it.’ - -“And he doesn’t know that he’s away behind the times with his old song!” -Pemrose’s black brows were lifted archly. “That the air is just full of -advice ‘stuff’ about him to which he’s deaf: ships, far out at sea, -signaling reports about the weather, local Weather Bureaus sending in -radio reports to headquarters—perhaps, we may come in on some of that! -Oh! was there ever—ever, before, a time when it was so much better to be -a girl than a bird?” - -Fairly translated, now, in her excitement, that favored girl was -selecting a nice, wet, oozing spot in the moss of the magic carpet into -which to dig her heel—that fairy carpet more wonderful than ever was -genii’s for transporting the one who stepped on it, thus, afar—so far as -one sense was concerned, at least. - -“Good ground connection!” she murmured. “That ought to bring results. Of -course anything we do pick up will be awfully faint, just dot and dash, -easier to glean—and in which two-thirds of the messages are sent out. -Hus-sh!” - -Deeper she ground her heel into the sparkling moss—Pemrose Lorry, radio -amateur. She straightened her halo. She moved the bronze cat-whisker to -touch the crystal and stood a statue as, the magic ring “rubbed”, those -highly sensitive ear-phones became active—began to glean from the -morning air. - -“Do you ... are you—oh! are you—getting—anything?” Una watched her, -hands clasped. - -“Hush!” frowned the radio fan. “Your—your hor-rid racket!” - -“I didn’t make any. Needn’t be so peeved!... You have—have to make -allowance for radio ‘fiends’; they’re savage if you disturb them!” -murmured Una mischievously to the pines—her interest was beginning to be -concentrated on the experiment now. - -Five minutes passed. A finger was pointed at her, shooting her straight -through the heart with thrill. - -“Are you ... oh! are you ...” she ventured again. - -“I—am.” - -“Wha-at?” in a bewitched whisper. - -“Just a little dot an’ dash—faint ticking—weather station in town, -couple of miles off—three maybe—but I could—understand.” - -She gave her hand to the sunrise, the inventor’s daughter, the new -crystal flashing like a diamond. Never did queen of the middle ages, -never did Begum of the Indies dream of such a ring upon her forefinger. - -“L-let—me. I have been studying code a little, since father—” - -Una’s lips barely fluttered upon the whisper, like a flower. - -And now—now the halo was upon _her_ dark head. She was listening in -through the other girl’s ring, through the other girl’s heel, through -the other girl’s heart, as it were, to the faint, faint murmur in the -air. - -But a smattering of code could make nothing of that swooning tick. - -Again Pemrose transferred the headpiece. - -And now time as well as space was annihilated—even the approaching -departure forgotten. - -Una began to feel as if a Meg-of-the-many-feet, a centipede, was -stealing down her back, but its hundred little feet were -silver-pointed—tipped with light. - -“I—got—it!” Again a finger was pointed at her—not the ring finger, that -was held out level. “Not—not dot an’ dash, this time: whisper—speech, I -got it; one amateur asking another—‘play a few holes of golf—before -breakfast!’” Never had a girl’s eyebrows gone so high in the world of -wonder, of mischief, before, as those black ones lifted over the blue, -listening eyes—for every organ of the body was now “listening in.” - -“Word here, word there—repeated an’ repeated—I got it. B-but what’s -this? Never—never singing, before six o’clock in the morning. So-o -faint! Oh! it seems—seems to come from the far edge of nothing.” - -And to the “far edge of nothing” Pemrose Lorry listened, every pulse an -ear, until her hearing, so trained in this new aërial communication, -began to pick up syllables—words—faint as far moon-shine, indeed, yet -half-clear upon the air: - - “Night ... done, stars ... to rest, - Perhaps in soft, white clouds ... a nest, - Among your—dewy flowers....” - -“Oh! l-let me!” shivered Una, half-sobbing—transfigured sobs. - -Mechanically Pemrose transferred the headpiece. - - “Among ... dewy flowers ... see you stand, - You do not know ... in my hand!” - -“I hate it! Oh-h, I hate it—it.” Passionately the other girl tore the -phones from her ears. “It’s like the hum—” the little stand in her right -dark eye was fixed in fear—“makes me feel queer—creepy—I don’t know -why!” She began to cry. “I don’t want to listen in! I’ll—never—” - -“Nonsense!” said Pemrose sharply. “Only some amateur—crazy -amateur—singing into a horn at a near-by station, quite near-by, that’s -‘going strong’!” - -But, for a moment, her bright face had looked “sparrow-blasted”, too. - -Far away, in the silence, a fox barked. - - - - - CHAPTER VI - - A Gentleman - - -It was the “yamf” of a fox again. The sun was high now. The brown byroad -stretched away like a ribbon between the fringing woods that rose on -either side of it, screening the mountain’s grandeur, shadowing the path -of the gliding automobile. - -“Now where is he—the waif beastie?” said Andrew, peering ahead into the -sunlight from his chauffeur’s seat, as, once more, that “yamf” rose, -wild and desperate, between a cackle and bark of pain—heard above the -purr of the smooth machine. - -“It sounds—sounds as if he were near, quite near, oh! just around the -bend ahead,” gasped Pemrose, sitting up, a statue, in the tonneau, -where, side by side with Una—a rather pale and preoccupied “Jack”—she -was fairly cushioned with glee over being off at last; off for a six -weeks’ season of grace and growing among the Green Mountains, lying over -the line in Vermont. - -Andrew had vacation freedom in his veins, too. His employer had gone -abroad. For several weeks he would be at nobody’s beck but his wife’s. -Transformed into a boy again, by visions of fishing with a “canny” rod -in mountain brooks, he had been singing softly to himself, at intervals, -and much to the girls’ delight: - - “Said the trout to the fluke, - Where is your new crook?” - -For the last speeding quarter of a mile this had given way to a pleasing -dirge of: - - “The crow kilt the pussy, O! - The crow kilt the pussy, O! - The muckle cat sat down and grat - On the back of Johnny Hoosie, O!” - -The last “O” was long-drawn. Across it came the ill-dashed “yamf” of a -fox. - -“Something wrong with his crying pipes. That’s no barkin’ an’ fleeing -sound,” said Andrew, flashing a glance over his shoulder at the girls -behind. “Zooks! What a mad yammer he’s makin’ the morn!” - -A sad yammer it was, with a note in it of supplication that in turn -became a jabber, as of cackling laughter. - -“Dear sakes! he’s cacklin’ like a hen—a hen, at a hen-wile.” The -chauffeur leaned forward over his steering wheel. “Ah! there he is—the -puir beastie. Dog out!” proclaimed the voice which had said the same of -the falling aviator. “Ha! _Trapped_ he is! Trapped, by that worming -snake-fence! Trapped—an’ by the open roadside!” - -Trapped! The girls shrank together, shuddering—young shoulder to -shoulder. - -“Deil tak’ it now! if this isn’t a sight to comb ’em against the -hair—make the whole day seem ill-hued,” ground out Andrew. “Taken in a -skunk trap, the bit beastie! This is no season for trappin’ foxes. Taken -in a trap that some farmer has set for a skunk that’s been bothering his -chickens! Weary fa’ the loon that set it here by the roadside!” - -He shot another glance over his shoulder, the fatherly chauffeur, at the -two lassies in his charge. Una had covered her ears with her hands. -Pemrose was sitting tragically upright. Her face was pale. In her blue -eyes was the glint half-baffled, but not routed, which lit her father’s -when, driven to the last ditch of inventive ingenuity, he fought Nature -for some discovery. - -“Noo, what had I better do?” panted the chauffeur to himself. “Knock the -puir thing on the head here now, afore the lassies? To drive on and -leave him to die by slow inches in that ill-teethed trap—that’s na -possible.... Ods! but he looks hangit-like—shamed—shamed o’ being -caught—like—this.” - -There was moisture in Andrew’s eye now. Automatically, almost—and -looking round for a club—he had slowed down. - -And from the ditch at the roadside, the wild mountain byroad, the red -fox eyed him, groveling in his last ditch. - -“All his tricks an’ snecks no use to him now—an’ that’s what he seems to -feel, by fegs!” - -The mist in the chauffeur’s pitying eye grew more blinding, putting out -for him the flame in the fox’s, as the poor maddened waif-beastie -dragged the steel trap shamefacedly to and fro by the three-rail fence, -curving snake-fence, that bounded the byroad. - -Suddenly, thrown into a new panic, new frenzy, by the sight of the -halting car—such a juggernaut to his dimming eyes—he turned to that -fence for the hundredth time and tried to climb it, dragging the -skunk-trap, with him, but was pulled back by the six-foot chain ending -in the indomitable clog and bolt that anchored the trap to earth. - -“Oo-ooo! Ah-ah-ah-kak!” The last note of earth’s agony was in that -gibbering howl which told of a hind-leg almost torn from its socket, as -the wild thing fell into the ditch again and helplessly rolled there, -biting at his slim, white-stockinged, blood-wet leg—at the trap, at the -humbling dust all lashed to lather by his fine red brush and the foam of -his dripping mouth. - -“Oh! I c-can’t stand it. I can’t stand it. Do something! Do-o -something.” Una was standing upright in the car, pale and trembling in -the silky, rose-lined, fur coat which Andrew’s wife had tossed into the -automobile at the last moment, with a pleading: “Put it on, my lamb, the -morn’s chilly an’ ye look ‘blenchit’,” when she had come in, shivering, -from the garden—from experimenting with the radio ring. - -Simultaneously with her cry the red fox, in his new terra-cotta -coat—poor little skinny ten-pound victim—ceased beating the earth with -his bushy tail, that had a creamy powder puff at the tip, sat up on his -haunches, ruff bristling, mouth stretching in a tortured grin over the -bared, white fangs, chest heavily panting—and looked at them. - -“Gosh! he’s all in. He—he looks as if he was making sifflication to us.” - -The cry was wrenched from Andrew; his answer to that dumb supplication -was to throw the throttle open and shoot the big car forward. - -But, like a flash, Pemrose was upon him from behind. - -“Oh! he _is_ begging us. He is begging us,” she cried, clutching -throttle and wheel herself, so that the big car rocked in groaning -indecision. “We—we just can’t go on and leave him—leave him to -die—slowly.” - -“Who’s about doin’ it?” growled Andrew. “Sit down, lassie. Don’t tak’ -the fling-strings or ye’ll hae us in the ditch. I’m just for driving on -to the top o’ yon hill, there; then I’ll come back an’ free him—I’ll -come back an’ win’-free him.” - -The girl half loosed her hold, but a glance at the chauffeur’s leaking -eye-corners and she was upon him fiercely again. - -“You mean—you mean you’ll come back and kill him—knock him on the head -with an iron ‘jack’ or a club. Oh! I won’t have it. I won’t have it,” -she raved. “’Tisn’t the time for killing foxes, any way. We m-must, we -can, we _may_ free him now, somehow—somehow.” - -She was jabbering like the wild thing, herself, all the while that -something was struggling to the fore in her—hereditary -resourcefulness—the inventor’s ingenuity. - -Revelation came, as it always does, in a staggering flash. - -She whipped round upon her girl companion, so white-cheeked and -whimpering. - -“Your c-coat, Una!” She seized upon the fine beaver, which had, -presumably, been stripped from some trapped animal, too—but that did not -at the moment matter. “Your fur coat! We could throw it over him, hold -him down, while—while Andrew springs the trap.” - -“Do ye think I’m a madded fool?” came angrily from the chauffeur. - -“Oh! we don’t. We know you’re a brick. We know you’ll help us. Oh! don’t -you—don’t you see how this would spoil all the trip?” - -She shivered—and in the paling forgetmenot blue of the eyes near his own -Andrew saw the blight that would fall over the hiking start, at least, -and cursed his luck that they should meet up with the “black -cow”—misfortune—this early in the day. - -The fox still sat, making “sifflication.” - -“But—but you must help, too, Una.” Pem was plucking the smart little -costly coat from her friend’s shoulders, as she spoke. “You—you’ll have -to help hold him down.” - -“Oh! I daren’t. He might—bite.” Great, glassy tears rolled over Una’s -eyelids, down her cheeks. - -Did—did one of those passive tears, as it fell upon her bare hand, -suddenly become a detector, a crystal detector, through which she picked -up something from the air, by eye not by ear now, the memory, the ghost -of a faint claim, it seemed, wafted from somewhere, made upon -somebody—through a radio ring. - -“Yes, I-I’ll help! Oh-h! it must be awful to be trapped.” She stumbled -from the car. - -“Warry—warry now!” Andrew was springing, at the same time, from his -seat, drawing on thick gloves. “Hoot! I suppose a mon has got to make -the ill-best of a bad job—but he’ll be an ill one to tackle, all tooth -an’ claw.” - -Already Pemrose, with the glossy huddle of soft beaver in her arms, was -stealing towards the tortured thing that groveled and cackled again upon -three legs—the fourth stuck out straight. - -“Now, Unie, _now_ quick—jump in—hold it down over him, tight,” she -gasped “Over his head!” - -And while girlish pluck pinned the coat—and the stifled form under it—to -earth, Andrew’s quick hand found the spring of the steel trap, shaped -like a bear’s jaws, and pressed it. - -A convulsion under the smothering coat! A scraping—tearing and ripping! - -They jumped all three. - -All four! The fox jumped, too. - -He had a free try at the fence now. But he was weak. He fell back—licked -his leg passionately and tried again. - -He was over. Looking neither to the right hand nor to the left, he was -limping between waving grasses across the strip of rank meadow that -separated the snake-fence from the woods. - -“Fair gude day to ye!” grunted Andrew. “But ye might say: ‘Bethankit’!” - -The wild thing reached the wood-line, brush waving. - -Suddenly, before the trees swallowed him—and the undergrowth—he -half-halted, half-turned—shot a backward glance. - -“He’s a gentleman,” cried Pemrose. “That did mean, ‘Thank you’!” - -“He’s left me to mend a big tear in the lining of my coat,” said Una. -“But, oh! how awful to be trapped.” - - - - - CHAPTER VII - - Fit for Fit - - -“Well, grace and growing to ye!” - -Andrew, bareheaded, stood beside his car and waved his cap to the -hikers, the brave band of hiking girls. - -“Grace and growing! There, you’ve given us a ‘motto’,” said the -Guardian, smiling at him. - -“We’re ‘gracie’ without, as well as within.” Pemrose danced up to the -gray-haired chauffeur, with the humorous eye—her own blue as the wild -chicory, that wayside friend, by the mountain highroad. “How do you like -our hiking rig—Minute Girl costume?” Thus she challenged him, thrusting -out a bloomered knee. - -“No flick-ma-feathers about it, but it’s ‘snod.’” Andrew stroked his -shaven chin. “The mountains an’ ye will be fit-for-fit, I reckon.” - -“Oh! if that isn’t a lovely compliment,” the response came with -laughter—a perfect heart-shot, as the girl’s eyes danced off to timbered -hills, the Green Haystack, Moose Horn Mountain, summits of the lesser -Taconic Range, upon the threshold of the Green Mountains—to one dim -giant, Mount Anthony, in the hazy distance. - -“Fit-for-fit—chums, yes!” she caroled: - - “Serene, aloof and calm they stand, - The gateway of our summer land, - Does one, unheeding, pass them by, - With careless or indiff’rent eye, - They stare, forbidding, cool and grim, - For they are not at home to him. - But we who love their ev’ry look - Like some enchanting fairy book....” - -She threw out her arms towards them. - - “We are their friends—they open wide, - To welcome Camp Fire Girls inside! - -“That’s our marching song, part of it. _She_ made it up for us—wrote -it.” Pemrose glanced with fostering pride at Una, as she swung the dark -poncho-roll carried over her right shoulder, with a rope crossing the -left hip. - -“What ‘Missie’ did! Miss Una!” To the elderly chauffeur his employer’s -sixteen-year-old daughter was “Missie” still, as when she was six and he -built her “dillycastles” on the seashore. “Hasn’t she the gift, now?” he -murmured paternally. “But when it comes to the long tail o’ the day, -will she be a home-body still upon the rough trail? I guess ye’ll all be -drooping, ‘neb an’ feather.’ And she—she’ll be trailing that pack ahind -her—I’m thinking!” - -“Don’t—don’t be an ‘ill-dashed’ prophet, Andrew! If she does, we’ll help -her out,” pledged Pemrose. - -“An’—an’ when it comes to sleepin’ out, the night—in the dark o’ the wee -’oor, when—when restly ghosts walk that have to be shot through with a -silver sixpence?” The old chauffeur winked. “An’, if a’ tales be true, -that’s no lie!” - -“They aren’t loyal to Uncle Sam if they wouldn’t compromise on a dime,” -declared Pemrose. “Eh! Copper-nob?” - -Gayly she flung one arm around a fifteen-year-old girl, in Minute Girl -hiking costume, whose hair, bronze as the cat-whisker in the radio ring, -held warm lights, now, as if the flame from her heart nested there. - -“This is our Camp Fire sister, Lura Lovell, whose name by the Council -Fire is O-te-go, meaning ‘Fire There’!” Pem ruffled the wavy -“copper-nob.” “And here’s Tan-pa—‘White Bird’—Dorothy Bush. And our -‘Beam of Light’, La-tow—in everyday life Frances Goddard. Oh! yes, and -more than a dozen others of the Victory Group of Camp Fire Girls.” - -Pemrose pointed towards the red, white and blue Minute Girls, a score in -all, including Guardian and Assistant Guardian, now on their toes, for -departure. - -“Fegs! ‘sonsie’ it sounds an’ bonnie ye all are, red-cheekit an’ -red-lippit, ‘like the smith o’ Dunkelly’s wife’,” chuckled Andrew half -to himself—though his lingering glance made an exception of Una. -“And—_maybe_—ye won’t flinch before the fiery stick?” - -“Eh! What’s that—fiery stick? What does it mean, anyhow?” The fire in -Lura challenged the “stick.” “Hard luck! Hardship! Reality—eh?” She -twinkled. - -“Summat like it,” murmured the chauffeur. - -“Oh! you can’t scare us with that.” Pemrose flung her arms round two of -her “sisters”, rubbing a cheek, on either side, against theirs. “True -‘comerading’ can face any kind of camp luck; can’t it, my ‘hearties’?” - -“Aye! she’s ilka body’s body, with her bonny, blue-lit face,” thought -the chauffeur catching the beam from those blue eyes and throwing it -back. “But the other—_our_ lassie.” He caught his breath. “She’s -‘eye-sweet’! An’ she’s the black o’ her parents’ eye—meanin’ the apple. -If hurt—should—come to _her_.” - -One might say that Una was the apple of his grim eye, too—judging by the -anxiety with which it rested upon her—the parting anxiety. - -Una was looking, in somewhat homesick fashion at him, too, now, as if -she was burning all her bridges behind her, as she tossed him the smart -little fur coat, with its rose-satin lining torn by the red fox’s tooth -and claw. - -“Ask ‘Mither Jeanie’ to mend it for me,” she said, playfully alluding to -Andrew’s wife, “and send it along to me, to the horse-farm. If we don’t -get back until September and it’s cold among the mountains, I may need -it. Good-bye Andrew—my ‘fuffle-daddy’.... I call him that since he -tossed me, like a doll, into the back of the car and took all the -battering—all the glass of the windshield in himself,” she murmured in -Pemrose’s ear, turning away with a tear in her dark eye from the parting -hand-shake with the chauffeur. - -One and all of the band of twenty now shook hands with Andrew—all with -the momentary forlorness of burning bridges, as they looked at the great -purple-cushioned, radio-equipped touring car, symbol of civilization—at -his long-coated form towering beside it. - -Andrew’s eye was correspondingly misty: “Fegs! I’m sorry I threated ye -with the fiery stick—as I couldn’t stick by ye to meet it,” he muttered -dryly. “Well! fair good luck to ye, ma’am,” to the Guardian. “An’ may ye -find yerselves happy an’ home-at, among the old mountains!” - -The wild mountains were “home-at” with them—very much at home to Camp -Fire Girls—so the echoes presently testified, catching up the blithe -chorus written by Pemrose to Una’s marching song: - - “Brace up your packs and march along, - And set the echoes ringing, - Till woods and hills and Camp Fire Girls - Are all ‘Wo-he-lo!’ singing.” - -“All Wo-he-lo singing! Wo-he-lo for aye!” With the soft cheer on her -lips, the arm of the blue-eyed girl stole round her “play-marrow,” Una, -heart of her heart, chum of chums—play-marrow was Andrew’s word for that -girlish affection which, begun in youth, is a star that never sets until -the Camp Fire trail is done. “You’re not down-hearted: No-o!” she -insisted, catching the lingering little cloud on the “eye-sweet” face. -“You can’t be—honey. Look at the wild flowers.” - -“Ha: - - “Vervain and dill, - Hindereth witches of their will!” - -laughed Una, beguiled by the bait immediately, as she stooped to pick a -purplish blue spike of the wayside vervain—cousin to the garden -verbena—to which a bee had clung, asleep. - -“In one way she’ll be more at home in the wilderness than any of -us—being near kin to the wild flowers,” smiled the Guardian, following, -with her eyes on the tenderfoot among her Group—its exotic—Una—as the -latter darted off after boneset and yellow sow thistle now. - -“See the sow thistle is one of the flowers that close, go to sleep at -night—and open in the morning, quite early,” laughed its captor, holding -it up; “so I’ve admitted it to my flower clock—garden flower clock; -bindweed, chickweed and pimpernel are some of the others—pimpernel, lazy -little weather prophet!” - - “No eye can see, no tongue can tell, - The virtues of the pimpernel,” - -laughed Lura. “Come along, ducky, your brain is a regular flower -basket.” - -“With a ‘fancy’ legend wrapped round the stem of each flower in the -basket!” murmured Pemrose, her finger to her laughing lip. “No wonder -she thinks she hears sounds in the woods at daybreak—fairy singing.... -Oh! what’s—that? Kittens—are they? No-o!” - -“Coons! Three—three baby racoons trotting across the road!” The Guardian -clasped her hands. “Oh! girls, we are being admitted to the fellowship -of the wild.” - -“Oh! weren’t they the funniest little gray things—no, buff—bushy -tails—trotting from wood, oh! from wood to wood, to find their mother.” -Every lip was gasping now, every eye penetrating, trying to penetrate -the thicket of roadside scrub into which the wild things had vanished. - -“Gracious! The mountains are being at home to us, indeed—welcoming us, -as fit-for-fit,” cooed Pemrose exultantly. - -“Making us pay toll, too, aren’t they—as fit-for-fit?” The Guardian -eased the pack upon her back, the neat camper’s roll which carried much -more than the poncho, warm sleeping-bag and personal equipment—the limit -for her girls, most of them. “Just look at that mountain road before us, -there, standing upon its hind-legs—and feeling for the sky!” she added -merrily. - -“And when we have wrestled with that one, then there’ll be another at -the same rearing stunt,” laughed Dorothy. “Oh, dear! I have a hag-a-back -already—a pain between my shoulders.” - - “But ‘chivy’ aches and march along, - And set the echoes sing-ing, - Till woods and hills and laughing glens, - Are with ‘Wo-he-lo!’ ringing!” - -broke forth the marching chorus again, tiding them over that snaky, -brown hill and the next—landing them in the lap of luncheon—luncheon by -a mountain brook—with a deer crashing in the bushes near by—and a -black-throated warbler singing from a bush: “Oh! ’tis sweet here—’tis -sweet here,” as a naturalist has translated his song. - -“We’ll postpone lighting a fire and cooking a real meal until this -evening,” said the Guardian, “when our first day’s ten-mile hike -triumphantly accomplished, we hope to strike the Long Trail running from -end to end of the Green Mountains.” - -“But we only follow that for a short distance,” said Frances, “for five -miles or so.” - -“Just the listening radius of my ring!” Miser-like, Pemrose glanced at -her pack, shrined in whose heart lay the jewel more wonderful than any -boon fairy had ever bestowed, jealously sheathed, lest one homesick tear -or the tiniest raindrop falling upon the new crystal should mar its -magic. - -“Perhaps we may come in on a concert with it to-night,” said Terry Ross, -Assistant Guardian, baptized Theresa, ardently. “I’m just—dying—to -‘listen in’ on that ring!” - -“No radio concerts until we reach Mount Pocohosette—our camp on the -sidehill—at the end of our four days’ hike,” was Pemrose’s answer. “Una -and I did pick up a little faint, faint singing with it once, but ... -where is Una now?” - -“Off searching for an evening primrose near that fence corner,” said -Robin Drew, a bright-eyed girl. “She wants to find one all ‘tuggled’ up, -to sleep, as she says. She can tell you the exact hour at which every -wild flower opens and closes—those that do. Oh-h! I never knew a girl -whose brain was such a flower basket.” - -“I fancy her father hopes to find a little ‘sand’ among the flowers when -he gets back.” Pemrose dimpled slyly. “There, I didn’t mean to be -slangy,” with a sidelong, blue glance at the Guardian. - -“Her father! Oh! think of what he’s doing for us, that camp on the -sidehill, radio—horses—Revel and Revelation ... in more than horseflesh, -too!” It was a general ecstatic outburst that creamed the cake and -seasoned sandwiches—made the brook water effervescent. “Oh-h—to reach -Mount Pocohosette—that horse farm in the bottom-lands!” - -“Three more days’ hiking—and four nights, sleeping out, as a Rubicon,” -laughed Terry Ross, a tall, twenty-year-old maiden, long-legged, -slender-backed. - -“Oh! we’ll cross it—head up to the last step,” protested valiant voices. -“Don’t be too sure. Wait until the tail of the day—and the last long -mile,” suggested others. “It’s only one o’clock now.” - -Six o’clock—and a sun setting! Setting royally behind hills that rose, -detached, pell-mell, like huge, green bubbles, on either side of a -mountain trail! Hills clad upon their lower slopes by acres of feathery -podgum—hairy as Esau’s hands—with dark spruce woods above! - -Six o’clock—and packs weighing heavily! Una next door to trailing hers -by its cross ropes in the dust—almost like the can at the old dog’s -tail—but the hand of Pemrose or warm “Copper-nob” steadied it upon her -back! - -Six o’clock! And it was not their fit-for-fit song of the Mountains At -Home that steadied pluck now, kept girlish feet from slipping backward -on the trail but the song made sacred in mud and mettle by their -brothers over there: - - “Oh! it’s not the pack that you carry on your back, - Nor the rifle on your shoulder, - Nor the five-inch crust of khaki-colored dust, - That makes you feel your limbs are growing older, - It’s not the hike on the hard turnpike - That wipes away your smile, - Nor the socks of sister’s that raise the blooming blisters, - It’s the last—long—mile!” - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - - The Wee Hour - - - “Oh! it’s not the dusty highway, - That—Camp Fire Girls don’t mind! - And it’s not the thirsty hiking, - There are always springs—to find. - Oh! it’s not the mountain climbing, - Our jol-ly packs are light! - It’s not even snakes nor ’squitoes, - It’s the—sleeping out—at—night. - - “Sleeping out in the quiet night, - With the stars for bedroom candle-light, - Boo! Woo! Woo-oo!” - -Around the waning camp fire the wail of a parody rang, voicing or -burlesquing the sentiments of a dozen Camp Fire Girls. - -The other half dozen were loftily silent. They were seasoned campers—or -supposed they were. They had dwelt much upon the hike on the bliss of -the poncho-bed, with a mattress of pine or spruce boughs—the bliss that -never clung to wall or bedstead of a paper-hung room. - - “The stars for bedroom candle-lights,” - -rang the murmur, echoing, dreamy. - -“It’s not the stars for big candle tonight; it’s the moon, a full, -bright moon; there she’s rising now,” said a seventeen-year-old girl, -Madeline Fitch. “How about a ring concert?” - -“We’re too far from any strong sending station here, I think, to pick up -anything by radio—even a murmur, with such a tiny set,” said Pemrose -Lorry. “But I’ll try it if you like. Here, Unie,” to her girl chum, “you -put the ring on; I’ll play ‘ground’—sink my heel into the edge of the -spring—there. But, heavens! you mustn’t pickle the crystal,” she was -gasping deliriously, a moment later, interposing a quick palm to catch -the little tear of homesickness and novelty—swollen, perhaps by the -remembrance of strange sensations experienced when last she had -“listened in” on the ring—which came trickling down Una’s pretty nose. - -“Father says a drop of water, a horrid little teardrop, would spoil even -a galena crystal—and much more this new one. I have to be as careful of -it,” the inventor’s daughter caught her breath, “as he is with some of -his priceless laboratory treasures, his rare quartz tuning forks, for -instance, that give the purest pitch of any sound.... Oh! I wish we were -at camp now—so that I really, might talk with him, by radio—fancy -holding a wireless ‘hamfest’,—that’s the word, not a ‘gabfest’—with -him—a hundred miles off!” - -The longing tear was in Pemrose’s eye now, a flashing droplet, but there -was no fear of its pickling the sensitive “radio soul”, the new crystal; -instantly dashed away it was as she hurried to loop her aërial round a -distant tree—with a word to one and another of the girls to watch the -tip of Una’s nose. - -But nothing could be picked up from the air with the ring to-night, save -occasionally a “dying tick”, as its owner put it, the swooning ghost of -dot and dash, so faint, so very faint—remotely random—that it seemed to -come from the other side of the world—or from the moon, itself, -untranslatable signaling—and the experiment was abandoned in favor of -turning in early. - -“Oh! isn’t this—heavenly?” breezed “Copper-nob”, the torch in her heart, -blown by the night-gusts, inspiring her lips as, presently, she felt the -cool air, light as a kiss, upon her cheek, which nestled beside -Dorothy’s in the poncho-bed, formed of two ponchos, upper and lower, -upon the pine-bough mattress, on the ground. - -“Hea-ven-ly—oh-h!” The general, blissful sigh went round. - -“What a light blue the sky is—quite light blue! I nev-er thought a -night-sky could be so bright ... and the tree shadows so black, -ink-black, against it! If, only, I could paint it,” murmured an artistic -girl, Naomi Larned, who was seldom or never divorced mentally from -sketch book or palette. - -“But what—what’s that?” Una was sitting up with a scream, dragging -Pemrose, poncho-mate, with her—they had been lying down about fifteen -minutes. - -“Only a bat—barn bat flying round—or maybe—maybe he’s a cave-dweller,” -murmured the other sleepily. “Isn’t he funny—just like an aviator, doing -stunts? An aviator doing stunts!” she repeated it, nodding. - -“Listen—listen to the funny noise he—his wings—make: -‘Eb-eb-eb-eb-ob-ob!’ Oh! I think he’s—weird—horrible.” Una shuddered, -her face in the moonlight, white—shining—as the night-blooming cereus, -lifted over the dark poncho-edge to the peopled sky. - -“Now, ‘Jack’,” Pemrose used the rallying nickname, “you promised you -wouldn’t be a ‘weer’, as Treff would call it, a fanciful -‘peerie-weerie’,” with a low, “dropping-off” laugh, “frightened of -nothing—and getting every one worked up. Lie down-and go to sleep,” -mumblingly. “I’m so—” - -“_Two_ of them!” shivered Una—and shook her. “Oh-h, mercy! they’re -flying down close—close-near us. One almost touched me.” She stifled a -low scream by biting at the poncho-edge. - -The “weeriness”, like hay fever, spread. - -Girls were sitting up all along the line, now, upon the moonlight -bedding-ground, on the edge of a grove, where the taper-like stems of -slim white birches, their spreading crowns, were the black and silver -candlesticks that held the stars for bedroom candlelight. - -Across that strange light blue of the sky, so remote from the azure of -daytime, and embroidered with inky shadows, black patches were darting -and zigzagging in wavy lines, now side-slipping downward, on a wing-tip, -like a tilted aëroplane, turning a fantastic somersault, soaring -again—to take, with lightning rapidity, a nose-dive after prey. - -A nose-dive that brought them, each in turn, down very near to the row -of dark ponchos. - -“Goody—ginger! Just like aviators—stunt-flying! After insects, I -suppose—and any little bird, nestling, foolish enough to be out—late!” - -To Pemrose, rousing to watch them, that skinny-winged sky-cavalry, -darkly maneuvering, was part of the wonderful fascination of the -night—of the night-side of Nature just being turned outward. - -So it was to most of the girls—camping girls. - -To just one or two tenderfoots—Una in especial—the bats were vampires, -when they flew too close—with the low, eerie “eb-eb-eb-ob!” of swooping -wings. - -“They—they make the sky look ‘ghoulie’,” she whispered. - -And as night wore on and the ghouls sought their barns or caves, she did -not easily settle down again. - -“That black—black something s-stealing towards—us!” She was pinching -Pemrose’s arm, once more. “Oh! it looks like a bull—a bear.” - -“Elephant, perhaps! Can’t you see its tusks waving?” jeered her -poncho-mate. “I’ll tell you what it is; it’s great black, -stalking—worry-cow. Go to sleep.” - -“All—the funny little noises!” rippled on the nervous tenderfoot, who -now felt a Meg-many-foot, or half-a-dozen of them—clammy -centipedes—crawling down her back, not silver-footed, either. “And the -low boughs, swinging, they look like people! The birds—listen—they’re so -restless, aren’t they—sleep restlessly! Oh-h, de-ar! what’s—that? What, -ever, is that?” - -It was the sharp, slicing “Whit-whit-whir-r!” of a night hawk’s wings. -It was a frenzied, torn little “Cheep! Cheep!” with the momentary -flutter of a tiny body—two dark bodies—in mid-air; a fidgetty bird -scared out of the nest by the hawk’s proximity and caught in the night -hawk’s talons. - -Una bewailed the nocturnal tragedy, sobbing softly. - -But this was the fiery stick of reality waving luridly across the -cinematograph of worked-up sensations—she ceased creating worry-cows. - -Girls really steadied down now, settling to sleep, only arousing, once -in a while, to chase a stone from under an inquisitive elbow or hip, -where they had flattered themselves the bedding-ground was perfectly -clear. - -And so it drew on towards the plaintive stillness of the wee hour, one -o’clock, when, midnight past, the lusty Night seems to shake its dark -tresses and settle down for a breathing spell, too, before morn-blink. - -Pemrose was awake. She had been dreaming of the radio ring; that with -her heel in the fostering wet, it had added to its magic the gift of -transporting her—and she was back in the laboratory with her inventive -father. She had let one of his rare quartz tuning forks fall and had -broken it. - -She awoke to the wee ’oor ... and the rattle of a chain. - -“I—I m-mustn’t wake Una—at any cost. What is it—where is it?... It must -be after midnight—now.” - -Pemrose Lorry raised her cheek stealthily from the poncho-pillow. Talk -of “wuzziness” now! Her skin began to ooze at every pore, chilly as the -dew around. - -It was the mournful clank of a chain again. She saw that “Copper-nob”, -near her, was half sitting up, too, swaying like a feather backwards and -forwards. She could almost hear the other girl’s teeth chatter. - -Her own gave a frozen click, click—and set suddenly, as if in lockjaw. - -It was no figment of the imagination now, nor yet a mist-fawn of the -night—a pale, gliding mist-shape—there was a something white before her. - -It bobbed and bowed towards her, about fifty yards away. It accomplished -a weird levitation, ascending automatically into the moonlight—dropping -again. And there appeared another white form, poised above it—to the -faint, far rattle of a chain. - -Lightminded ghosts, they teetered up and down, blanching the moonbeams, -now checkered by a thin cloud. - -And at the sight “Copper-nob’s” nerves gave way; she “loosed” a shriek -that startled everybody. - -But it did not exorcise the apparitions. - -There they were, undeniable as ever, sketching their chalk-white -outlines against the night—so that the heart of the stoutest melted -within her bones—in the solemn stillness of the wee’oor—and her flesh -crept. - -“This is Ghost Craft ... and we’ve none of us—none of us taken honors in -that.” Pemrose’s faint mischief was curdled by an eerie note. - -“Ghosts that have to be shot through with a silver sixpence!” Andrew’s -nonsense came back to her. - -And the qualifying: “An’ if a’ tales be true, that’s no lie!” could not -resolve into thin air the spectres before her. - -Twenty pairs of eyes could testify to them, seesawing up and down in -silvery balances of moonbeams—now one, now another tipping the scale. - -And the small hour was very, very still. Not a sound troubled it, but -the hollow clanking of that distant chain—picked up by ears near the -ground, and ... rising sounds of hysteria among the girls. - -Even the Guardian felt as if some insulation were stripped from her -nerves. Each one sent a separate, tingling shock through her body. - -But she got to her knees and then to her feet—the dark poncho clinging -to her. - -“Girls! this can be explained. This must be explained. If we don’t -explain it.... Who’ll come—with—me?” - -There was a groveling and grubbing among the ponchos. - -“Let’s—go!” said a small voice then—the very small voice of Pemrose -Lorry, “I’d like to tell Daddy how a ghost tips the scale; I suppose -they weigh about as much as two pin-heads—or the dust off a feather,” -speculated the laboratory sprite. - -“No-o, you stay here, Theresa,” returned the Guardian to another -volunteer. “You stay with the younger girls. We three will investigate -this.” - -For now it was “Copper-nob” who, loosing the inner fire with a timid: -“Let’s go!” was tiptoeing in the Guardian’s wake along a plaided path of -moonbeams. - -And in the demeanor of the three, as the girls fell in on either side of -the older woman, there was something freakishly suggestive of the noble -Roman and his two companions: of “how well Horatius kept the bridge in -the brave days of old.” - -On across a strip of rank pasture they went, halting amid black, -confusing shadows to see whether the ghosts would falter before the -advance, or not. - -But the spectres never wavered, alternately poised, shimmering sentries, -against the sky, where the pasture ended in a grassy bank, which some -crowning had topped off into a tall sod-fence. - -Imponderable ghosts, weighing as much as two pin-heads, louder, more -blood-curdling, grew the hapless rattle of the chain they dragged! - -But somebody was feeling dizzily another freakish element in the -situation. - -Suddenly “Copper-nob”, whose training had been rather different to that -of her two companions—more rural—went mad as a March hare. - -She flung herself down in the heavy dew, arms limply outflung—feet -kicking wildly. - -“Goats!” she gasped. “Goats!” she shrieked. “Goats! Not Ghosts! Two -long-haired, milk-white goats, chained together! One—one has got to this -side of the fence, is trying to drag the other over. And the other won’t -stand for it! Oh-h!” - -“Nannie! Billy! Tug-of-war!” The failing knees of the two supporting -heroines gave way under them too; they sank down—down—into the moonlit -dew—and laughed until the wee ’oor shook. - - - - - CHAPTER IX - - Dandering Kate - - -“Well! _What_ a funny footprint! It’s a woman’s track, too, with spikes -on the heel. Now, gracious! it couldn’t be that somebody else—somebody -else has been trying my radio game, out here, listening in, in this wet -spot, with a little portable receiving set?... That’s what it looks -like! My-y!” - -A breathless image of astonishment, Pemrose Lorry knelt in the -underbrush near the trail, the scrubby tangled trail, broad enough to -pass muster for a grass-grown road, with ruts in either side and a cart -track in the center, which led from the girls’ camping-place of the -night before—through an arm of woods—to the farmhouse on whose land they -had slept. - -Right on the trail, submerging it in one spot, was stagnant pond-water. -Beside the pond was the curious footprint. Her face aflame, red as the -Turk’s cap—flame lily, near—the girl knelt, examining it. - -“I—I’ll wager that’s what it is,” she cried half-wildly. “Another radio -amateur, radio fan, has—judging by appearances—been here, this morning, -with her heel in the wet mud and her wire out to a tree—or smuggled away -in an umbrella, possibly, listening in with a toy set, like mine—or -probably with something larger—better—so far as results go. Oh, goody! -‘When Greek meets Greek!’ Don’t I wish we might run on to her.” She -craned her neck, also red with amazement, as the painted wood-lily, -searching the early sunlight, the woodland aisles. - -“I don’t see why that mightn’t very well be,” said Una. “If our -automobile is rigged up with radio, so that we can pick up messages -within twenty miles, as we speed along, why mightn’t somebody have a -little Kodak-like set, out here—and play with it out-of-doors, in the -early morning. You—you aren’t the only lion,” laughingly. “In one of the -out-of-the-way farmhouses there may be a red-hot amateur, like you; so -many of them.... Heavens! What’s—that?” She jumped three feet. - -Right in front of her was a bulky pincushion, a huddled pincushion, -bristling all over with black and brown spikes, menacingly white-tipped. - -And the pincushion inopportunely grunted. - -She screamed. So did bronze-haired Lura—and Naomi, a brown-haired girl, -who nursed a sketchbook. - -“Gracious! A porcupine! Dandering Kate—as woodsmen call it!” shrieked -Pemrose, startled from her contemplation of the mysterious footprint. - -“Oh! don’t go near him—her,” panted Una. “It’ll shoot its quills into -you.” - -“Not—unless it’s attacked!” - -“But—but it does into a dog.” - -“Because the dog shoots his face into the porcupine’s overcoat,” laughed -the inventor’s blue-eyed daughter, going nearer to the bristling ball, -which startled the pincushion into a grunting shuffle for the long grass -at the roadside, where it lay, curled up into a spiky hump-back, the -barbed quills erect on a three-inch tail. - -“I thought we’d see one somewhere in the woods this morning,” said Lura. -“They’re generally abroad early, before the dew goes.” - -“And in the evening,” added Pemrose. “They ‘hole up’ during the heat of -the day, so father—” - -She caught her breath, with a sudden stifled feeling of being “holed -up”, herself. - -Was it another Dandering Kate—the figure which, suddenly appeared by the -roadside—the porcupine was not the only round-shouldered thing. Looking -ahead under the shadow of maples and birches, overarching, Pemrose -caught sight of another. - -It flashed out of the woods almost simultaneously with a prolonged -shriek from Una—who had almost stumbled on to a second grunting -pincushion. - -It wore a woman’s riding habit, leather-faced breeches, leggings, gray -coat, with a red handkerchief knotted round the neck and felt hat jammed -down upon the head. - -But that—that which the coat covered; Pemrose—Lura—felt their eyes -water. - -It was Nature’s “grueling” pack, a lamb on the back, as mountaineers -pityingly call a lump between the shoulders, not obtrusive—but obvious -in the tight riding coat. - -But what did obtrude itself, what plowed deep into their young breasts, -was the flash of the eyes, very dark, very keen, against the green -radiance of the wood. - -It just crashed across Pemrose’s gaze, as it were, because for a moment, -the tiniest moment, she seemed to see something known, the ghost of -something familiar, in it, which, yet, was so wild, so _adrift_, so -unknown, as to seem a misfit for the morning—a misfit for the woods, -with their happy-hearted girlhood. - -It was almost as if the horsewoman felt that, herself, for she vanished -immediately, to reappear, a minute later, leading a bay horse forth from -a bridle path. - -With the bright, obtrusive flash of a heel now, a steel-shod heel, she -was in the saddle—which had a camper’s pack slung across it—and riding -off, with just one backward glance which lit like a brilliant moth on -Una. - -“Well—for goodness sake!” Pemrose stared vacantly—hands clasped. “Did -you see the shining creeper on her heel, the bulky umbrella in her -stirrup strap? So—so she’s the radio ‘bug’—amateur!” as if she could -hardly find breath for the discovery. “I’ll engage she has a nice little -receiving set tucked away in that umbrella, the antennæ running round -the steel ribs. Oh! it’s true—no longer am I the only lion,” with a -tragic chuckle. - -“Only witch—rather,” corrected Lura. “She! She just came and went, like -an apparition.” - -“Don’t talk of apparitions: - - “Give me the moonlight, give me the goat, - And—leave the rest to me!” - -caroled Pemrose, laughing all over, in quivering excitement, at the -memory of how illusory moonlight, long-haired goats, half-bred Angora, -with the novelty of the wee ’oor had—a few hours before—put phantoms -over upon the imagination. - -“Well—well! do you know that it isn’t goats we ought to think of now, -but cows, if we re going after milk for breakfast.” Naomi waved her -sketchbook—a rallying pennon. “They’ll say, the other girls, hungry -girls, that we—we’d be good ones to send out after trouble, because -we’re so slow in getting back,” with a fluttering dimple. - -“But—but I say,” began the budding artist again, as girlish feet pursued -the trail, “where’s the use of our all plodding on to the farmhouse? -Can’t ‘Jack’—Una—and I wait here—and you pick us up on the way back?” - -“Yes! Oh! this wood.” Una the ultra-feminine “Jack”, sniffed greedily. -“This wood! It smells just like glorified strawberry jam; the wild -strawberries are late here.” - -“And there’s the most delectable little brook that ever you saw over -there,” pleaded Naomi. “The shadows, reflections, in it: blue-greens of -pines, greeny-greens of rocks, gray-green of the water, itself. And—and -the light that never was on land or sea, this hour of the morning!” The -cooing whisper was the very voice of the green-gold radiance, itself. -“Una could hunt—wild—flowers—” - -Was it—was it the light that didn’t seem to belong on land or sea, the -light that seemed adrift as it flashed from under a riders hat, just a -minute or two before, that stiffened Pemrose’s tart answer then. - -“No-o, you don’t!” She decided quickly. “I’m leader of this -expedition—and we stick together. Forward march—and no straggling! -Good-bye, Dandering Kate!” - -As girlish hands waved farewell to the spiky pincushions, the wood-road -abruptly gave out in a field, which, in turn, yielded to a potato patch -that led up to the farmhouse door. - -Milk cans clashing together like cymbals, brought the farmer’s wife, -sunbonneted, from a meadow where she had been helping with the first -crop of hay. - -“Yes, my sakes! you can get all the milk you want,” she cried, “but my -son ain’t through milking yet, though it’s on for eight o’clock. He’s as -awk’ard as a one-armed paper hanger this morning,” in a lowered tone, -“you see his right arm has been pretty bad ever since the war. It was -broken by a machine-gun bullet; sometimes he can use it—sometimes it -worries him, ain’t no good, at all. You can go round to the barn -yerselves.” - -They did, with hearts beating slowly, like muffled drums, as they -pictured that one-armed milker. - -But suddenly feet moved to a quick step again, a merry quick step—though -stealthy—as they caught the whistle and then the chant—“swanky” -challenge—that came through the barn-door. - - “How’ll you keep’em down on the farm, - After they’ve seen Paree, - They’ll never want to see a rake or hoe, - Who the deuce can _parlez-vous_ a cow?” - -“It always was a good job; wasn’t it?” Suddenly a girl’s head was thrust -mischievously near to his—a head that burned like a lamp in the dim -stall. - -“_Always_ a good job!” White teeth flashed within a foot of his ear. -“Oh! I can parlez-vous a cow. I’ve taken full care of one for a month.” - -He started—the one-handed soldier. White jets flew, between his fingers, -giving each girl a milk-eye. - -“Here—just let me try. Let me ‘spell’ you for a while!” - -“Copper-nob” pushed him off the stool. “I’m a Camp Fire Girl—with honors -for milking. Watch me ‘parlez-vous’ her! Hove—lady?” This to the cow. - -“Well! by George, I’ve ‘no kick coming.’” The ex-service man rose, with -a glance at his Y. D. button. “I’m as awkward as a one-handed fiddler, -this morning,” he confessed ruefully. - -“And—and surely the others won’t mind, the other campers—if we keep -breakfast waiting.” Lura from the milking stool looked up at Pemrose, -“not when we tell them how—whom—we’ve been helping! ’Tisn’t as if we had -‘mooned’ round in the woods—” the milk was coursing richly -now—“watching—apparitions—in red handkerchiefs.” - -She broke off, cooing to the placid Jersey, for Pemrose seemed seeing -apparitions at the moment, staring bewitched, at a mountainside -opposite, where a figure on a small bay horse was slowly climbing a -rough bridle path. - -Her blue eyes, those of the inventor’s favored daughter, shone -half-petulantly with the feeling that she was not the only lion in the -desert, with fabulous hearing, if not roaring, powers, as she caught the -far, bright flash of metal—of more than the stirrup from the rider’s -right foot. - -“But who—is—she?” The girl’s black eyebrows drew together. “If Andrew -was here, he’d say she looked ‘fey’, unbalanced—rather unbalanced. Her -eyes, they were the strangest—wild and bright. But she looks like a sort -of ‘needle nose’, too,” with a sudden snap, “cunning in her face—and she -rivals me with radio—plays with it out-of-doors ... who ...” - - “Who the deuce can _parlez-vous_ a cow?” - -broke in “Copper-nob” triumphantly. “Look Pem, I’m down to ‘skimmings’ -now,” as the milk thinned to a frothy trickle, “but the pail is -three-parts full. Hove—lady! You’re a winner,” in grateful compliment to -the Jersey cow. - - - - - CHAPTER X - - Hidden Valley - - -“The night is heavy-hearted,” said the Guardian. - -“It’s ‘up to us’, then, to put a good face on its heavy heart by being -extra chipper,” laughed Dorothy Bush—a fair-haired girl. “We’ll be in -luck if it doesn’t rain more than it has done,” she shrugged herself -together, witch-like, “just little ‘neezly-noozly’ showers, that fit -into each other even-end-ways,” with a brooding pout, “at the moment -when you think each one is going to be over—bah! beastly.” - -“The clouds have been following us all day,” wailed Frances. “And I -don’t believe they’ve done with us yet. Who’s to light the fire?” - -“Pemrose. I believe she could light a fire with a piece of damp bark and -a snowball, as the saying is.” Madeline Fitch threw a chuckling glance -in the direction of the girl with the blue-lit face, who was “ilka -body’s body”, a general favorite. “Hereditary ingenuity, I suppose.” -Madeline pursed up her lips. “If I had a father like hers.... Well! -never mind, a fire will drive the dumps from Hidden Valley. There, I’ve -named it!” - -“I don’t like Hidden Valley. Gloomiest old place we’ve struck yet!” -murmured Una glancing up and down the heart-shaped glen, hoarding the -evening shadows between its narrowing head-walls. - -“You—you won’t know it when we get a blaze going.” Pemrose was chopping -away with a light axe—the handle symbolically carved—at a dead limb of a -larch tree, to strip off outside layers, damped by the ‘noozly’ showers -and get at the dry wood, inside. - -Already she had her roll of curly birch bark, stripped from a withering -bough, on the hike, before afternoon rain came on—and kept dry in her -pack. - -Soon the fire was lighting up the tall walls of the V-shaped valley, -between two ragged mountains which seemed, at some time or other, to -have thrust their heads up, promiscuously, out of the earth—just to have -a look around. A peculiarity of most of the hills through which the -girls had passed! - -Away to the north loomed the rounded outline of a taller mountain, the -Dome; and in the dim distance, before the evening shadows herded on the -trail—the day’s long trail—there had been mighty glimpses of giant Mount -Mansfield and Camel’s Hump. - -“The old farmer whom we met, back there, said that this valley was where -two brooks had ‘gouged out a hollow’, eaten the heart out of a hill,” -remarked Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, her brown eyes blinking at the -blaze; “that we had ‘civ’lization’, at a ‘far-come’, on either side of -us—nothing between.” - -“Yes! he cheerfully told us that, here, we were ‘two miles an’ a half -beyond God bless you’!”? came with a sidelong wink from Pemrose, who was -using her vigorous young lungs as bellows. “Humph! He’s beyond the pale -himself; his farm’s right here in Hidden Valley—not quarter of a mile -away. If it should come on a reckless downpour, we may have to storm his -old barn, before morning.” - -“We must wait till he’s asleep then—otherwise he’d turn us out; he was -the crankiest mountaineer we’ve run across yet; you—you could hear him -‘cur-murring’ a mile off.” Una knelt, stretching her hands to the fire -that valiantly defied the tail end of a shower. - -“Yes, he said this country was only ‘fit for b’ars’, that they ought to -chase all the folks out of it,” pouted Dorothy; “then, I suppose, he’d -be quite at home.” - -“He seemed awf’ly peeved over something, out of luck, somehow. But don’t -you remember he did drawl out—” Pemrose wrinkled up a moist little nose, -with a smut on the end of it, to imitate the high-pitched twang of the -old Green Mountaineer—“he did drawl out, looking us over: ‘Wal! I reckon -you birds can stand more’n _most_ city folks!’ Bah! this ‘bird’ can’t -stand another thing until she’s been fed—with crumbs. Has any one filled -the kettle?” - -“Yes.” Dorothy produced it. “We filled it at the clearest of the two -brooks, the one with the stony bed, which that peeved old farmer said -made the noise of the devil’s pans and kettles—the devil at his -dish-washing.” - -“But what a ‘solemncholy’ old demon he must be, judging by the night,” -laughed Terry Ross. - -For now, indeed, the night was growing heavy-hearted—even to bitterness. - -The moon, as she rose, was in mourning. Rain stole, sighing, through -Hidden Valley. Thunder hummed-and-hawed, afar. - -But the blaze kindled by a fire-witch, who wore brown honors for -building a fire in wind and rain, put a fair face on everything—that and -the toasted bacon, the steaming flapjacks, to say nothing of the evening -star of anticipation radiantly in the ascendant. - -“Well! this will be our last night of sleeping out,” said the Guardian, -“our fourth and last, so even if it isn’t very comfortable, we’ll make -the best of it. To-morrow, if we cover our ten miles—we made nine -to-day—’twill bring us to Mount Pocohosette, the horse-farm at the -foot—our snug camp on the side-hill!” - -“And Revel and Revelation!... Revel and Revelation—in more than -horseflesh, too!”? laughed blissful voices. “Oh! to-night we’ll just -dream of the Long Pasture; the horses to be caught with chaff—no, -oats—saddled, bridled.” - -“The radio concerts of an evening! A morning ‘hamfest’—gossip with -father—space obliterated,” supplemented Pemrose. “Let’s turn in -early—and bring it nearer—all nearer! Hush! Here comes the dream man.” - -They were not afraid of less flexible footsteps than his, to-night, as -they piled the fire up and lay down beside it. - -Two quiet nights in the open had lent a green seasoning even to -tenderfoot nerves. - -But some stronger “pep” was needed in Hidden Valley—as this side of -midnight proved. - -Eleven o’clock—and not the soothing Dream Man, but the black Rain Hand, -was upon them—groping for their faces with chilling fingers! - -“Goodness! It’s going to be a deluge—a bitter downpour.” The Guardian -sat up, gasping under the wet blanket. “I’m not sure but that we had -better break camp quickly, girls—fly for shelter—that barn isn’t far -off.” - -“Nor the old b’ar who said we were ‘beyond God bless you!’ either,” -piped Dorothy glumly. - -“Pshaw! he’d be ‘beyond praying for’, if he were to shoo us out,” came -from Madeline. “Ugh! How cold the rain is! I was just falling -asleep—dr-reaming of the horses.” - -“Um-m. Novel experience, any way, breaking camp by flash light! My -shoes! Oh! where _are_ my shoes? My ring! I have that safe! One teeny -drop of rain would spoil that new crystal—as a detector, a ‘radio -soul!’” Pemrose was excitedly tucking away the ring and -paraphernalia—tucking it away in her bosom. - -“The fancy paper-rolls! Oh! don’t let the colored paper-rolls get -wet—all wet an’ pulpy—then, there would be no flower party on my -birthday!” wailed Una. - -“Bah! You and your last straw! They’re done up in oilskin,” hooted -Pemrose. “What—what are you looking for Dorothy?” - -“My—toothbrush.” - -“Oh-h! come; we’ve no time for tomfoolery.” Whereat every one -laughed—the lightning, too! - -“My-y hair-brushes; where did I lay them?” Rain was pelting pitilessly -on Lura’s burnished “nob”, as she knelt, feeling round in the sodden -grass. - -“Before a storm everything goes wrong!” hooted the jeering thunder. - -“Cheep! Cheep! Tweak! Tweak! Very wrong, indeed!” echoed the poor little -birds in their rocking nests, complaining of the pecking rain-crow. - -“But it isn’t as bad as if we had a tent to take down, girls.” The -Guardian was searching for a silver lining, mislaid among other things. -“That’s—_weird_. Pulling tent pegs in a hurry, tent collapsing, just -shuddering down, canvas grating on the rough edge, something sure to be -left under.... _What!_” - -The tent had collapsed, indeed—the tabernacle of human spirits—and the -silver lining was left under. - -The flash light had gone out. - -The flash light had fainted, at the very most inopportune moment that a -craven battery could have chosen to give out. - -If confusion had reigned before—and hurry-scurry—now it was -extremity—the “neb-end” of extremity! The camp fire black as a “tinker’s -pot”, with a dismal brew of shrieks and groanings! The rain-hand -slapping right and left in the darkness! Faces running into trees, toes -stubbed against stone and stump—wet hair caught on dripping branches -that tweaked and plucked at it. - -“But—but there was a second battery! Who had charge of—that?” - -“Pemrose.” - -“I’ll find it in a ‘twink’,” said Pemrose manfully. “I hid it under this -bush—lest somebody should step on it.” - -But the bush protested that she didn’t, laughing in her face, as -lightning played through it—while she felt all round it in the wet -grass. - -“No-o—oh! dear, I remember—it was at the foot of this little tree.” - -“Out again!” said the sapling—and deluged her all over, for her pains. - -“Give it up,” said the Guardian desperately. “We can find our way to -shelter, without it.” - -“What! Go home and tell Father that I lost—mislaid—a battery, our only -other live battery.” The hapless wail of the traitor was in Pem’s voice -now—traitor to precise laboratory training, where vigilance meant -safety. “Not—oh! not if I stay here till I dr-rown,” miserably. - -She was groping round upon her knees now, others with her, in the black -wet, feeling amid vine and scrub. - -“I do believe they’re passing it from one to the other, the dark -bushes—playing hunt-the-slipper—” - -“The host of paradise are with us!” cried one suddenly. “She’s _found_ -it.” - -The hosts of paradise are always on the side of light—even a “spunky” -flash light. - -With heaven reinstated in sundry hearts, led by a triumphant -torch-bearer, the barnstorming party set out, a shadowy horde, wrapped -in ponchos for raincoats. - -“The light went out in the farmhouse quite a while ago,” said the -Guardian. “Perhaps we can get into the barn, find the stairs, the -ladder—find our way up into the barn, without disturbing anybody—” - -“Without rousing the old bear from his lair, who said we were beyond -‘God bless you!’” muttered Dorothy vindictively. “We’re not. The hosts -of heaven are with us still. The door’s open.” - -“And now for clover—dry clover—the hay above!” cried Pemrose, swinging -her flash light. “Oh! come on, girls. The menagerie—that’s nothing!” - -For at the heavy reek of animal bodies streaming out through a broad -doorway; at the snorting stamp of great farmhorses, rolling the whites -of their eyes in nocturnal curiosity, at the grunt of cows rattling -their chains against the stall-head, baaing of sheep—from somewhere the -squeal of a distressed little piggie—Una and others drew squeamishly -back. - -“Steady now! Keep the hush up! We don’t want to wake that old bear of a -farmer. The stairs—the ladder—is at the far end, I guess, leading up to -the hayloft.” - -Pemrose was tiptoeing along the straw-littered aisle, on the trail of -her own whisper, the flash light in her hand a cynosure for every -blinking, brute-eye in the barn; tap, tap, patter, patter, came the -staccato stamp of sheep’s feet, saluting it, from the pen behind the -horses’ stall. - -The Guardian brought up the rear. - -“Careful now! Don’t make a sound. Keep the hush—” - -But eighteen barn raiding girls, seeing the midnight adventure now in -the light of a huge joke, crowding up a dark and narrow ladder are not -likely to be too circumspect. - -A false step, a rung missed—and one was back upon the shoulders of the -others amid an hubbub of shrieks, poorly stifled. - -Simultaneously a near-by bedroom window was flung up. A hoarse old voice -was shouting: - -“Heaven an’ earth! What’s all this hally-baloo? What’s all this uproar, -I say? Now—now you stay right there till I come!” - -“Up! Up! Up—girls!” cried Pemrose. “If he tries to mount the ladder to -turn us out—we’ll push him down!” - -But as girls crouched in the hay at the ladder-head, arms down-stretched -to oust the besieger, that besieger, when he thrust a wild gray head up -into the light, showed signs of amazement—blank amazement—rather than -hostility. - -“My soul! So it’s you birds!” He wagged a crinkly beard. “You city birds -that I met ’way back there on the trail—dark-benighted, -wet-benighted!... An’ I thought ’twas Her. An’ s’elp me, if it had bin -Her, I’d ha’ come within a cow’s thumb o’ shootin’ Her.” - -He pulled his right hand, with something in it, up the ladder. - - - - - CHAPTER XI - - Her - - -“If it had ha’ been Her, I’d ha’ come within the breadth of a cow’s -thumb of shooting Her!” - -“But who’s—‘Her’?” The Guardian thrust a peering face forward, benighted -merriment in her eyes; so did other lively girls; this was worth a -wetting. - -“Um-m. If you ask me, I’ll say she’s as rank a witch as ever rode on -ragwort—I’ll say so! The wife she was talking about her jest now, when -the thunder woke us hoping she’d ridden safe home—with my slippers—posy -slippers.” - -Pemrose suddenly sat up stiffly—ear-hungry. - -“Your—slippers!” It was a hen-like cackle from the hay. - -“Um-m.” The farmer caressed his shotgun—growling like a bear with a sore -paw. - -“But who is She?” put forth the Guardian again; she felt that a lease of -the hayloft for the night—perhaps breakfast in the morning—would depend -upon the sympathy shown to a highly exasperated man, fresh from an -unpleasant “curtain” talk. - -“Wal! now, I reckon she’s a stray bird, like yerselves—a stranger, or -almost so. She ha’n’t been around these parts much more’n a year—blamed -heather cat, always on the roam! The wife she calls her the Little Lone -Lady—my wife’s awful stuck on her—an’ I reckon she does come o’ grammar -folks—edicate! Other o’ the mountain people call her Magic Margot, -jollying-like—or the spell-woman, ’cause she can tell things—put over -things—that other folks can’t.” He dropped his voice to a croon of -nocturnal mystery. - -“Does she—does she ride a bay horse—an umbrella in her stirrup strap, a -red handkerchief round her neck—something shiny upon her heel—at times?” -Pemrose’s breath came hotly—her hand was to her heart. - -“Umph!” The sore bear nodded. “Oh! ’tisn’t the fust time I’ve heard the -midnight shog, shog, of her bay cob’s hoofs stoppin’—heard her stealin’ -up into this loft, to roost. But—_never_ again, s’ ’elp me!” He brought -his unseen feet down upon the ladder, with a vehemence that started a -hayquake. - -“Why! what has she done now?” It was a general chorus from the guild of -glee, excited girls, done to death with weariness, yet tickled all over -with the sensation that, much as the vacation had promised them, they -had not expected melodrama. - -“Gosh! yes. She was at our house to-day, jest a while afore I met -you-uns on the valley trail.” The farmer thrust a red lantern up. “I was -out diggin’ ’mong the ‘crony hills’, pertater patch; an’ she jest came -it all over my wife with some palaver about a good offer we was going to -get for this plaguy farm, where rocks _grow_—an’ every one of ’em rooted -out means a back ache,” he mopped his face, “knowledge she didn’t have -from no nat’ral source, you understand—the Little Lone Lady. She had -some kind of a ‘fore-go’, too, ’bout a great cryin’ out there’d be ’mong -all the animals ’fore morning. An’ the wife she was so carried away with -her that I’m blessed if she didn’t give her a good fat chicken, to carry -home in her saddlebag—she allers has that saddlebag bulging, too—an’ the -pair o’ red slippers that she was workin’ with roses fer me—cut ’em down -to fit her ... she got the red felt f’om her brother who works in an -organ factory.” - -So this was the load which the trail-bear had carried upon his sore head -when he felt that the valley was beyond “God bless you”! There were -smothered shrieks from the hay. - -“Poor wronged man! You have all our sympathy—all our sympathy!” The -Guardian touched his hand. “Can’t you get them back? Won’t -she—disgorge?” - -“Not much! Not, when she’s ridden off with ’em to her den, her little -cabin on a lonely peak, ’bout nine miles from here. She lived there -alone all last winter—when she wasn’t on the go, riding round among the -mountains—living on crumbs, the neighbors gave her.... Oh! she’s a -sleek-gabbed one, but sometimes I think she’s as cracked as she’s -sly—and keen.” He sighed. - -“It’s easy to see how she comes by her ‘fore-goes’ about the weather and -so forth—a radio receiver in that bulky umbrella,” murmured Pemrose. - -“Wall, anyhow, I ain’t ‘cock-bird-high’ to be caught by her chaff.” The -farmer stamped again. “The women they go an’ see her an’ come back with -tales o’ what they hear and see—my wife with a muslin mouth upon her, -all stiff and starched, tellin’ about strange water-burn, little -cloudy-bright rings an’ shapes floating up from it—some new brand o’ -angels, I suppose, visiting with _her_, the Little Lone Lady.” - -“Um-m. Phosphine, I guess, Daddy would say!” whispered Pemrose to the -hay. - -“I didn’t see none of it when I went to ask her about Paddy’s cough—you -can hear him now underneath you.” - -There was a wild burst of laughter at this give-away, mingled with the -blowing noise of a windy cougher. - -“Wal! as you ain’t Her and want to spend the night here ... you ain’t -got no candles nor matches about you?” he asked suspiciously. - -“No, nothing that could start a fire,” the Guardian assured him, intent -now on seeing that the girls removed their wet shoes. - -“Well! good rest to ye on the hay. Mebbe there’ll be a bite o’ breakfast -comin’ to ye—for I vum ye can stand more ’n most city folks, though -there’s one among ye that looks a dainty piece—not meant for any -hard-sleddin’.” He raised the lantern, until its ray singled out Una, -yawning upon the hay. “So-o long!” He backed down the ladder—gun and -lantern. But, again, he thrust his head up and glared around. “Look -out—folks!” he began; “this ’ere hay-loft—.” But, once more, he saw red, -the red of his “rosie” slippers. “Gosh!” he gurgled, “lucky fer Her that -she warn’t you; I swear to goodness! I’d ha’ come within a grain o’ -shooting Her.” The lantern gave a final flash and disappeared. - -“Well! now—now that old ‘Bunch o’ Spinach’ has gone, I guess we can -settle to sleep,” gasped Lura. - -“Don’t call—names,” mumbled the Guardian, who was seeing that Una got -out of damp clothing. “Aren’t we lucky not to be Her!” - -It was a new flash light, mornie-blink, stealing up the ladder and -through the loft transom, some three hours later. - -It fell on tired face, trailing limbs, tossing promiscuously upon the -hay. - -“What’s—that?” Una sat up suddenly. - -“Only the rain. Another shower! Sounds—sounds like bricks upon a tin -roof!” Pemrose yawned. “Well! ducky, didn’t we have a good night—what -was left of it—in spite of that old ‘Hayseed’ and his slippers?” - -“Poor old bear! No wonder he called himself beyond God bless you!” -mumbled Dorothy. “Last night—didn’t it put the cream on -experiences—camping experiences?” - -“I’ll say—so.” Pemrose echoed the boy’s slang, cuddling close to her -loft-mate, her dearest joke-fellow, Una, careful, in her tickled -laughter, not to wake fifteen slumbering girls stretched like trailing -plants around their Guardian—their queen of the meadow, raised slightly -above them, upon a mouldy dais of hay. - -“Isn’t she a—dear? A dear!” Pemrose gazed at the white feather of hair -in the brown of the womanly locks, unbound. “Just the woman—I want to -be!” dreamily. “The birds, do you hear them? Pecking on the roof!” She -pinched Una. “Aren’t they loud—like scratching monkeys? Mercy! -what’s—that? A—rat?” - -“A rat! Oh! don’t—don’t let me see it,” wailed Una. “And we were so -‘comfy’!” - -“A rat! A hor-rid rat, with—oh! tail by the yard,” screamed Dorothy, -hopping round, in the dim light, from basement to bank of last year’s -hay. - -“A rat! Oh! the only thing—the only thing I’d ever want to kill is a -rat.” - -Did the sinister wish, a rebounding shell, hit Pemrose Lorry, -herself—she careering blindly, too? - -Had an earthquake struck the barn—or a bomb? - -Suddenly the world, the hay, went up; and she went down. - -Hay was in her eyes, her ears, her mouth, down her back—she would have -made a mule seem a sorry hay-consumer. - -She was clutching at it wildly with both hands—and finding it but thin -air in her grasp. - -In the feeble dawn glimmer she was sinking—being plunged into a shocking -world underneath. - -And where else she was to go, how far she was to travel in this awful -underworld, she did not know, for she had alighted on a horse’s -back—alighted in a huddle on a horse’s back! - -And there came the scream of Dorothy from the sheep pen, amid a torrent -of frightened baas. - -“It’s Paddy—the horse with the cough—and he’s trying to rub me off -against the stall!” - -Even as the knowledge crashed through Pemrose’s brain she was twisting -her groping hands fiercely in Paddy’s mane—in the musty gloom of the -horse-stall. - -Buried alive, she would carry on—as Dorothy was carrying on, judging by -the sheep. - -She managed to slip one foot from under her, get astride upon the dark, -lunging farmhorse—a mountain in the gloom. - -“Ha-a! Tha-at’s more like it!” She drew a hissing breath between her -teeth. - -But if Paddy was drawing comparisons, it was between making hay while -the sun shone, greedily pulling down more of it until he was half -smothered—and getting rid of the startling burden on his back. - -Snorting malignantly, he rocked up against his thrashing stall-mate, -Barney, trying to palm that grasshopper burden off on him. - -Barney was all reeking excitement, too, in the close, musty quarters. - -For a moment, one awful moment, the girl, jammed between their hot, -steaming sides, saw herself beneath their mangling hoofs—her life -trodden out in the stall. - -She was in the lions’ den—and no mistake. For Paddy, great, clodhopping -farmhorse, failing to dislodge her thus, swung his dark haunches, lunged -with his front shoulder at the dark partition—to crush her there. - -But, quick as thought—before his throbbing side could pin her, the -girl’s little bare foot, darting forward, was nestling in the hollow of -that brutish neck; five tickling, pink toes were stroking it -gently—combing it soothingly. - -“Treff told me, Treff—Treff,—if ever a horse tries to rub you off, dart -your foot forward into the hollow of his neck!” By waves far subtler -than radio, she was reaching out now, imploringly to that boy pal with -the amber speck of humor in one gray eye—rider of the clouds and rider -of the plains. - -Across miles of mountain and valley his mantle seemed flung to her, the -mantle of his daring, that cock-o’-pluck—so that, with her right leg -stretched out, level, across the cross brute’s shoulder and five little -toes seductively curry-combing, she was patting the other side of the -swollen neck, with a: - -“Steady—boy! Steady, there! Easy—now! Who the deuce can parlez-vous a -horse? That’s me! Oh-h! five little pigs went to market.” - -Was there ever the Paddy, yet, who could resist such treatment? - -Two minutes later a farmer, coming in mad haste and trembling to the -barn door, beheld, in the dim dawn a girl queening it in dun trappings -of hay upon a perfectly docile farmhorse—which rolled the whites of its -eyes at him sheepishly—the great jaws grinding upon a sheaf of hay. - -“Good—old—Paddy!” Patronizingly she patted the shoulder that would have -rubbed her out, rose to a standing position upon the broad back, her -up-flung hand gripping the top of the stall. - -Coolly she drew herself up, crept along the dark stall-edge, dropped -from the partition into the manger and thence, with a light spring, to -the barn floor. - -“Where are you—Dorothy? Oh-h! where are—_you_?” she anxiously cried. - - “Baa, baa, black sheep,” - -came a laughing voice. - - “I’m here—gathering wool!” - -“Wal! I swan to goodness there ain’t much ‘woolgathering’ about either -o’ you.” The farmer slapped his leg, with a roar. “Oh! I started at -midnight fer to tell you about that hayloft floor, jest bone-shanks, -bare poles across, widish spaces between ’em—and the hay thinned out in -places. But, land! what’s the odds?” He beamed upon Paddy’s rider. “I -vum even the Little Lone Lady will never get the better of you.” - -“She’ll never ride off in my shoes, eh?” laughed Pemrose. “But she was -right about the commotion among all the animals before morning; wasn’t -she?” as she flew to extricate Dorothy. - - - - - CHAPTER XII - - The Shack Corner - - -“Q. S. O. Increase your power, O. M.—Old Man!” - -In what had come to be known as the “shack corner” of the cabin on the -sidehill—the radio shack—Pemrose Lorry uttered the challenge into the -microphone, small mouthpiece, making merry with her father, a hundred -miles away. - -“Ha! That’s better. Your signals are coming in strong now. I have you -tuned O. K.” Yet, still, she fiddled with the knob upon the dial on the -face of the radio receiver; the knob which, beginning with zero upon the -dial-scale, she had gently turned, varying the capacity of her -condenser, the steel plates for storing up current, until she got her -wavelength—the wavelength of the distant station sending. - -In the hazy, morning sunlight stealing into the mountain camp, the camp -upon Mount Pocohosette, seventeen girls and a Guardian watched her, -bewitched by this new talking game, as she alternately threw the aërial -switch to the receiving side, thus connecting her receiving set to -aërial and ground wires, and then to the transmitter, forming a like -connection. - -“You’re coming in like a ton of bricks now,” she informed her distant -father. “I could hear you with the phones on the table,” with a merry -wink. - -“Radio Amateur, thy middle name is Exaggeration!” laughed the Guardian. - -“Always tell the other fellow what _he’s_ doing, not what you’re doing -yourself—then, if anything goes wrong, you can blame it on him—even if -he is your most blessed Dad ... first principle of radio transmission!” -She winked again—the amateur. - -“Oh! if I were only—only—mistress of it, as you are.” Lura clasped her -hands, her radiant “copper nob” shining like the bronze coils. - -“I’m going to give you all a lesson presently, a lesson in -radio—transmitting and receiving. But, first, I’m going to ‘parlez-vous’ -Dad in code, a little.” The first and second fingers of the girlish -amateur’s right hand now attacked the steely telegraph key upon the -operating table, as the radio shelf was called, ticking off endless -combinations of dots and dashes—a sealed book to most of the girls. - -“Goodness! That code is as bad as the Hindenburg line; ’twould be as -hard for me to work through it,” panted Lura, whose brother had been a -soldier. - -“Isn’t it the worst—teaser? I promised father I’d try to make something -of it—but it just won’t stick!” Una ruefully tapped her forehead. - -“There! Di-dit-di-dit! That’s a laugh—a radio laugh—if you only knew -it!” chuckled the girlish operator on her high stool before the -table—her black eyebrows meeting over the blue sky-beams in her eyes. -“Father got off to me ‘Y. L.—Young Lady’—I told him I hated that; and he -changed it to ‘O. W.—Old Woman.’ Well! there, we’re through our -‘hamfest’—gabfest—for this morning. Father’s rejoiced, tickled through, -that we’re having such a wonderful time in camp—Camp Chicolee, as I told -him we called it, from an Indian word meaning Horse; and he hopes I -won’t try taking four-foot fences on Revelation—just yet.” - -There was a general whoop of excited laughter at this, as girlish eyes -turned through sun-framed camp windows to amber forms of scattered -horses grazing upon the range, otherwise the Long Pasture down the -mountainside, about a quarter of a mile from camp. - -Pemrose was pulling all her switches as she spoke, the miraculous -conversation ended, so that the bright bulbs, the incandescent vacuum -tubes in transmitter and receiver gradually faded out from white-hot -filament and grid, and cherry-red plate about them, to cool blindness. - -“Oh! Revelation is—a prince of the Long Pasture!... But this!” She bowed -her head upon the operating table. “It sometimes seems too big a Wonder. -To think of hearing Father, his own dear, joking voice, a hundred and -five miles off! I’m going to try and tune in on him morning and evening -when he isn’t away, lecturing.” - -For a minute she was held speechless by the thought, that blue-eyed -girl, that never again, on land or sea, need she be hopelessly beyond -the hearing of that adored voice of Pater and pal—of him who, with -continents discussing his inventions, had bent his genius towards the -manufacturing of a “listening” ring for her. - -“Oh! it does make one’s heart slip around in one’s body, with the -wonder—the miracle—of it,” whispered artistic Naomi, slipping an arm -about her. “I, for one, don’t want to depend on somebody else to grind -my music for me, tune in on my evening concerts and speeches—Sunday -sermons—I want to do it for myself. Can’t you begin and explain it all -now, Pem—tell us how wheels go round? Do!” - -“If I try to understand how wheels go round, it sets my poor wits to -woolgathering—so that the wool stops my ears: I’m not a bit technical,” -protested Lura laughingly. “But I did—I did watch all _you_ did, without -moving an ‘eye-winker’,” merrily, “from the moment when you threw the -lightning-switch outside the cabin.” - -“Yes, that grounds the aërial, so that if lightning should strike—we’re -likely to have big storms up here—it wouldn’t go through the set, -through the camp.” - -Toying lovingly with a knob here and there upon the dialed face of her -receiver, the amateur’s blue eyes roamed off to the hills—still in curl -papers of mist—she still gloating over that morning “hamfest” with her -father. - -“This is a wonderful set which Mr. Grosvenor has had installed for -us—isn’t he a prince, Una’s father—but not quite powerful enough to talk -with _him_ overseas.... We ought all to learn to use it perfectly—just -to thank him!” - -Patiently she began to “handle” her recent message, or the method of it, -all over again, going from switch to switch, throwing the two-bladed -aërial switch to one side to send, to the other to listen. - -“It’s a ‘slow-thumbed’ business; one has to be careful of one’s bulbs, -so that they’ll live long.” She was turning the rheostat knob, to light -those bulbs—having re-started her generator, with its powerful -current—moving that rheostat knob very gently, as when she had called -“1—V. Z. M.” her father’s distant laboratory station, so that those -shining vacuum tubes glowed slowly from dim to bright—with an -incandescent eloquence that sent its poetry right into the enchained -girls’ souls. - -She was glancing at ammeters and radiation meter, the first to see if -she was forcing those shining tubes too much, the second to determine -whether she was putting enough power into the antennæ running around the -raftered ceiling of the log cabin, above her. - -“But explain it to us—more—Pemrose; how the message goes out! I’m -beginning to love the radio shack—this shack side of the cabin,” cried -various voices in tuneful keys and different pleading words. - -“‘How it goes out!’” The inventor’s daughter wrinkled her brows, trying -to meet the tax levied upon her—her matchless inheritance. “Well! father -explained it first to me with the hackneyed illustration of throwing a -stone into a pond, showing how the waves spread out, at first strong, -growing weaker—and how they may be intercepted in various ways; so it is -with the radio sound-waves. He illustrated it in the laboratory, too, -with a pair of tuning forks, how if one is struck, the other, if it is -in tune, will echo the sound at a little distance. If they are not in -tune, there must be a magnet between, for them to vibrate, answer each -other, with a funny, ‘surgy’ sound; we’ve tried it—” - -“Oh! but tuning forks are an old song; and that does not tell all the -story about radio. Go on—it’s fascinating.” Dorothy picked up the -microphone from the table against the log wall. - -“Well! when your voice goes into that it passes along the wire -connecting it with the transmitter at the rate of a few hundred -vibrations a second.” The girlish radio fan touched the two-foot cabinet -containing the sending set. “But that is not speed enough to send a -message out into the air, so my blessed Dad says—strength depends upon -the rapidity of the vibrations, so the voice passes into this -incandescent tube—bulb—where the vibrations are increased, but still not -enough to send them out. But they pass on into this other vacuum tube, -called the oscillator, where the vibrations are a thousand—and more—a -second.” - -“Whe-ew!” It was a prolonged whistle-whistle of awe. - -“But that, again, would be too high frequency—beyond audibility. But, -somehow, the shining bulbs strike an average between them—Dad says it’s -a sort of grab game—between them—very difficult for any but the Wizard -to understand,” Pem’s black eyebrows went merrily up. “But they do hit -it off and the voice goes out into the ether in audio-frequency waves; -waves that can be picked up—heard—on the back of an electric carrier -wave.” - -“Gracious! I’m on the back of a carrier wave now—carried away. I’m -riding a winged horse—and not old King.” Lura glanced down at the Long -Pasture. - -“But who wants to really ‘dig’?” laughed the girl amateur, pulling her -switches to disconnect the sets again. “If any one does, there’s a -buzzer on the table—code cards. About two-thirds of the stuff that’s -sent out is in dot and dash. You can hear twice as far with it.” - -“Yes, laugh in dots, cry in dashes, eh,” said Naomi. “Well—I’m ‘game’; -I’ll try to be, although I do want to be out on the mountain, -sketching—as it’s only our fourth morning here.” - -“How—how about you, ‘Jack’?” Pemrose glanced at Una. “Fair play—your -father!” - -“Revel—Revel is waiting for her morning lump of sugar,” said the latter, -pointing archly through the window at the amber shape and floss-silk -mane of a dainty little thoroughbred, down in the Long Pasture. - -Out there—out there, on the range, all was gayety, irresponsible -idleness, for the moment: horses madly racing automobiles that glided -by, on a mountain road below, snorting deliriously when brought up by a -fence. - -“Just look at that old Sickle Face, Cartoon!” laughed Una. “He thinks -he’s a racehorse, a fast ‘darb’, as the caretaker, the farmer in charge -of the horse-farm, says. But—but Revelation beats him to the fence—every -time.” - -“And the dear colts, all eyes,” murmured Lura. “The little, fluffy -babies that run under their mothers; and the older ones, Blue Boy, Big -Eyes, that kick so high; think they can kick—the—sky; don’t they?” - -“Well! if we haven’t kicked the sky this morning, we’ve come pretty near -it.” Dorothy’s chin was thrust out freakishly. “We will, when we really -inhabit the shack corner—send out messages for ourselves and receive -them. Oh! if we could only have a private code, like the Scout troops, -some of them.” - -“When you make your own of the ‘crutch’, then you can make it over.” -Pemrose was fingering a code card. “Dot an’ dash—the crutch! The -universal language! It requires ‘pep’ to handle it—the crutch.” Her blue -eyes flashed. “Father made my radio ring as a prize for being able to -tick off code calls and pick them up. He said that if I didn’t work hard -at a discovery, to understand—and use it to the full—I was just a -frothing-stick, whipping the cream that somebody else had made.” The -girl’s eyebrows went up in laughter. - -“And as none of us want to be that, I ordain a code lesson for this -morning, instead of first aid or handcraft,” said the Guardian. - -“We might have a private _sign_ of our own to begin a message with, -anyway.” Pemrose was ticking off that signal, five minutes later, -pressing the little lever that wagged the tongue of the “buzzer”, just -an ordinary electric doorbell, with a little dry-cell battery attached, -upon the camp table. - -“How would this do? Six dots, four dashes, for our Group sign. And—and -we might add to the ordinary radio abbreviations a few of our own: that -mountain off there—” the blue eyes gazed remotely through the -window—“Little Poco, Little Brother Mountain, as we call it, would be -‘L. B.’ if we were sending a message dot an’ dash. Little Speckle—Little -Sister would be ‘L. S.’ Oh! we may work out the whole private code in -time ... then where will boy amateurs be?” - -“We’ll have beaten them, to a frazzle,” purred Dorothy. “At least, they -won’t be ahead. With the help of Cannie Nanny we’ll do it—this droning -bumble-bee.” - -She laughed, putting out a finger to stroke the green buzzer, with its -tireless hum, doing duty, for instruction, as a telegraph key. - -“What—what a thing an electric battery is!” Pemrose was muttering -whimsically. “You can run everything with it—from a train to a burglar -alarm,” merrily, “and a little one-cell buzzer. What do you think—Una?” - -“Eh—what?” gasped the latter—her eyes had been turning listlessly to the -Long Pasture and Revel, as she counted the minutes until the morning -ride. - -“When—when we go away to school, to an Academy, this year, Unie, we -could have radio rigged up between our rooms,” put forth the blue-eyed -amateur, “and talk to each other with our own private signs—as Treff and -his chum do at college.” - -The bait worked—the challenge in the name of her aviator cousin, that -cock-o’-pluck. - -Una’s pencil, like the others, began to show no less grit than lead in -taking down hieroglyphics from the buzzer’s tongue. - -Cannie Nanny, in the midst, became a center of gravity. - -An hour later, when a riding party swung down the mountain, it was with -a gay switching of crops, a new _esprit de corps_, the sense of a leap -taken to keep abreast of bold boy amateurs—a leap in grace and growing. - - - - - CHAPTER XIII - - The Long Pasture - - -“Here, Rev. Here, Good Boy! Oats—_smell ’em_!” - -Pemrose, wild with the welcome of the mountains and the triumph of that -late long-distance talk with her father—to say nothing of a step, at any -rate, towards a secret code for Camp Fire Girls—was dancing all over the -Long Pasture. - -Temptingly in her hand was the flat tin, half full of oats, which she -had taken from a bin in the gray shed at a western corner of the -mile-long pasture. An outpost of the farm buildings, paddocks and -horse-boxes, more than a mile below, was that weather beaten shed; in it -tools were kept and farm implements used in the grain raising for -horses, the bean and corn growing, upon the lower sidehill, the -outskirts of the well-stocked horse-farm in the rich, green -bottom-lands! - -“Oats! Oats! Smell them—Boy! Maybe there’s a lump of sugar somewhere, -too! Two lumps—if you’re very good!” - -She patted the breast pocket of her linen riding habit, holding the pan -of grain aslant. - -Revelation approached warily, step by step, his beautiful bay neck -outstretched, his long face eager—dark eyelids blinking. - -Within a dozen feet of the temptress he halted, suspicious of the hand -behind her back, pushed his nose out, the neck quite level, his breath -coming in a white, investigating cloud. - -Suddenly he tossed his head with the bright, chestnut mane, those long, -silky eyelashes winking mischievously, wheeled and darted off, with a -teasing snort which plainly said: - -“Not this morning—thank you! I’d rather race automobiles along by the -fence.” - -“He senses that I have a halter with me,” murmured the radiant girl, -keeping the right hand still out of sight and renewing honeyed -negotiations with her left, displaying the oats, golden in the flash of -mountain sunlight, spilling a little of it into her shoes, while the -horse circled round her in wide rings, took a notion to walk slowly -towards her—then, at ten feet, again, darted away. - -“You’re a rogue, Revelation. But you’re not an outlaw—like Cartoon. But -I suppose he isn’t really a bad horse—or he wouldn’t be mingling with -human beings, up here in the Long Pasture—only Roman-nosed and -stubborn.” - -Pem’s glance roved now to a distant tall horse, a dark bay, with a long -neck sawing restlessly in the sunlight, a sharp sickle face, almost a -hatchet face, slanted sidelong, who hovered nervously upon the outskirts -of the parleying group of girls and horses. With gay satisfaction, her -eye came back to Revelation. - -A Morgan bay, fifteen hands high, with a foxy coat of satin, in every -lithe movement the thoroughbred, shy, sensitive, fast,—but kindly, -good-natured, too. - -She wheedled with the amber oats again, spattering it from the tilted -tin upon the laughing air, while her horse, in ever narrowing circles, -sampled the scent, nose away out, velvet nostrils quivering into -mischievous smiles—at the slightest movement to catch him, he was off -again, heels flinging. - -“You’re as naughty as can be, this morning, Boy. You’ve raced autos too -much—while we were handling the ‘crutch.’” The girl’s eyes danced, blue -as the sky-ways above her. “Can’t you take a lesson from your mother, -Revel? But I suppose you’re just a Revelation of what’s hidden in -her—only motherhood, mincing motherhood, keeps it down,” she laughed to -herself, turning to glance over the mountain pasture—a third of a mile -in width. - -Everywhere the same catch-as-can game was going on, with oats and -halter, everywhere challenge and parley, at the sunny end of the range -that is, at which the horses had congregated! - -Harmony, Fox, Galatea, old King, full of pasture play and human -curiosity, running along by the fence, in turn, to ogle a tempting girl, -with, somewhere, a halter concealed about her, then archly taking the -“fling-strings”, putting fifty or a hundred yards between them and a -morning ride, kicking blissfully, as they ran! - -And the colts, the enchanting colts, from the fluffy infant, with hair -inches long, running beside or under its mother, to the shaggy gawk, -with big, watery blue eyes, who thought he could kick the sky. - -“They’re all—all full of mischief this morning,” whispered Pemrose -between her teeth. “Una is the only one who has a ‘soft snap.’ Revel -stands still to be caught. And Unie—‘Jack’—scores in another way, too, -she owns her horse. Oh! what would I not give to call you mine, -Revelation—teasing imp though you are.” Pem’s knuckles pressed her lips, -to hold in the longing. “Ah, here comes the farmer—Menzies, who has -charge of the horse-farm—and his little son, Donnie, Menzies to give us -lessons in riding and jumping—Donnie, with a tan puppy under his arm! -What! Revel—Donnie! Curls—what!” - -Pemrose’s eyes were wide and round as the colts’ now—limpid, shining. -They were fixed upon a group, thirty yards away, where of all the -girls—with some experience in horseback riding before—who were to learn -this summer to catch and bridle their own mounts, Una was the only one -whose apple fell easily into her mouth. The only one who did not have to -run or pant—or spill oats into her shoes! - -Except on rare occasions Revel, beguiled by a lump of sugar, would stand -still, gentle image of motherhood, to have the halter thrown over her -short, fair head by her girl rider. - -A beautiful little horse she was, with her coat of cinnamon silk, her -form more chunky than that of her six-year-old son, Revelation—neck -thicker, shoulder heavier. - -And now—now, to the group, two figures were added: Menzies, the -horse-breeder, and his tiny son, not yet four, whose flaxen curls, in -this out-of-the way region, were, like the colts’ fluff, still unshorn. - -Una had exhausted her bribe of sugar—was waiting for the other girls to -catch their horses. But Revel knew where more was to be found, Donald -had some, generally, in the pocket of his little blouse for her. But -Donnie was, at present, taken up with displaying the pup under his arm. -And Revel found other amusement. - -Stealing up behind the child, until her soft mother breath was on his -cheek, gently she nibbled at his curls, taking them one by one into her -“nuzzling” mouth, letting them stray through it—heaven’s hay. - -Other horses, Harmony, Fox—Flying Fox—were curious about those flaxen -curls, too, had come near enough to smell of them; Revel alone fondled -them in her mouth. - -“What a—picture!” breathed Pemrose. “If Unie has one friend that she -loves more than me, it’s Revel—and on her back she is seldom afraid. -Oh-h! this is a won-der-ful morning. It puts even radio in the -background.” - -She was out of breath and she stood still, leaning against a side fence -watching that sunlit group, mother-horse, child, newborn dog—even the -wonder of riding the air with a whisper on the back of a carrier-wave -paling beside a rare moment in earth’s picture gallery. - -All the Long Pasture was a picture gallery that morning, dramatic -representations of girlish life and pluck, vivid horseplay. - -Presently, while Donnie, resenting the babying, snatched his head away -and fed Revel with a lump of sugar, instead, from his tiny breast -pocket, Pemrose resumed her game of catch. - -This time Revelation, being a good horse if gay, allowed himself to be -coaxed. He lessened the ten-foot barrier to five, sniffing at the -dribbing oats. In a trice the girl had him by the forelock. With her -left hand on his long head she was pressing that down until her foot was -on his neck—otherwise her elbow—while with her right hand feeding him -the oats. - -When that was gone she slipped the halter over his nose, on to his -obedient neck, buckled it—led him over to the fence, to saddle him. - -But just as she had thrown that saddle on, before she could tighten the -girths, her breath began to come thick and fast—very thick and fast. - -Donnie having fed Revel with a sweet lump and jerked his curls from her, -with a remonstrating: “You don’t t’ink hair’s hay; do you?” let her -gentle head find his pocket for herself—and extract a second lump of -sugar. - -Somebody was watching the trick—Cartoon! Cartoon not destined to be -ridden to-day; though not an outlaw, he was a churl, with his stubborn -Roman nose, flaring nostrils, fiery breath, his sharp triangular -face—almost a hatchet face. - -Cartoon was creeping slyly through the pasture grass, with a low snort, -his head not only high, as Revelation carried his, but the chin _in_ a -little, touching his chest—and the greedy meaning there. - -“Don’t give Revel any more sugar now, Donnie-boy! She’s had enough.” Una -was drawing her horse away. “Here! show me the puppy. Have you one for -me—I’d like a dog?” - -“Of course he has.” Donnie’s father turned his head from where, at a -little distance off, he was showing Dorothy how to post, rise gracefully -in her saddle, hold her whip well back. “Of course he has a a pup for -you, Miss Una. Which do you want, a male or female?” - -“’Tisn’t—’tisn’t either of those,” protested Donnie indignantly. “It’s -an Airedale!” - -There was a laugh. Una drew Revel off towards the fence. The farmer -moved away, starting Dorothy off on a preliminary canter round the -pasture. - -The eight who were to ride this morning had, by this time, captured -their mounts. - -It was then that Cartoon, stealing up, sniffed his opportunity. His -sharp nose, rooting in the air, said: “Sugar” and told him that the -sweets were in the breastpocket of a little child. - -It was then that Pemrose, watching afar, felt her “rooting” breath -suddenly become a snort, an excited “Weugh!” like his. - -Leaving Revelation with the white saddle-girths dangling, she started to -run across the pasture, crying out as she did so. - -But Cartoon was quick—greedy and quick. Taking short, mincing steps in -his excitement, his breath coming in very short puffs, he stole up -behind the child, lowered his high head and began feeling him -over—rooting softly with his nose near the tiny pocket. - -Donnie started and saw, not Revel’s fair “nuzzling” face near to his, -but the dark, ugly, Roman-nosed one. - -The child gave a scream and plunged away—tripped in his terror and fell. - -The horse plunged, too, with a baffled snort, wheeled crossly, lashing -his heels out. - -“Oh! God help—” breathed Pemrose, in the utter horror of -helplessness—for she was many, many yards away. - -And then the angel of God appeared—appeared so suddenly, in such an -unlooked-for shape that Pem, dazzled, saw two of her—and three of -Cartoon. - -It was a girl with wide dark eyes in whose blaze the angel of God had -bared his scabbard, his scabbard of deliverance, a girl with face -waxen-white as a snow-flower—a girl who “went through life as daintily -as if she were picking a flower”—who was snatching Donnie from the -proximity of those lashing heels—within an inch of being struck by them -herself. - -“U-na!” Pemrose’s hand went to her cold cheek—she was fairly stricken -still, out in the middle of the Long Pasture. - -“Goodness! I—I don’t know how I did it,” said Una, sinking down. - - - - - CHAPTER XIV - - Revel and Revelation - - -“Well we’re going to ride over to the Gap—Eden Gap,” suggested Pemrose. - -Revelation and she were, as usual, leading the way along the narrow -mountain road—and beside her was Una on Revel. - -“They go so well together, don’t they, mother and son?” said the latter, -stroking Revel’s silky mane, “Revelation, with his coat a brighter -chestnut, slighter, taller—faster—although I think Revel could hold her -own in a race, too, in spite of her being so gentle—and lady-toed,” with -a little laugh, “turning out her toes a little in that mincing, -lady-like way. Watch her! Oh! I’m never quite so happy as when I’m on -her back.” - -“And you seem to be braver there than anywhere else,” thought Pemrose. -“How did you ever get the courage to do it, catch Donnie by his little -arms and drag him, almost, from under Cartoon’s heels,” looking -silently, sidelong, at her friend, “you with all your little -‘whim-ma-garies’—foolish fears and fancies?” flicking at her horse’s -neck, with a smile. - -They broke into a canter, leaving the rest of the riding party behind. - -“Wha-at a summer we’re having!” gasped Una next, as they reined in, to -round a turn. “It—it’s the first time I’ve been with a lot of girls. -And—the mountains!” She waved her riding crop. - -“There—there are no words,” murmured Pemrose breathlessly. “All—all the -old ones have patches on them!” She winked at her own bankruptcy, gazing -up at a softly swelling mountainside, radiant in July green and silver, -the silver of innumerable flashing birch trees, with a few maples thrown -in—above them the dark emerald of spruce and pine. - -“Look at the hardhack,” Una panted. “Isn’t it lovely? The roadside just -pink—magenta! And, oh! there’s arrow head, white arrow head, wading into -the water, down there. - -“It’s as fond of the mud as you are—when you have the magic ring on.” It -was a dark eye which winked slyly now, as Una pointed down a tangled -slope that bordered, on one side, the narrow road, or bridle path, at a -shallow pond, just snow-flecked with the broad-leaved arrow head. “And, -oh-h! such violet asters! And, look there! purple deer grass—its heart -of gold. Love-ly!” - -There was a little break, a little catch in the voice of the girl whose -brain was a wildflower basket. - -“It—it makes everything so different, out-of-doors, when you can really -identify the flowers and trees; not be, as the Guardian, says, a Mrs. -Malaprop among them, going round all the time, miscalling them—or with a -‘]what-d’ye-call-’em’ on your lips.” Una laughed now—and there was a -new, a wild-bird frolic in the laughter of this girl who went through -life as daintily—as lovingly as if she were “picking a flower.” - -“Wake up, Revel!” she said. “You’d never be a Mrs. Malaprop anywhere, -would you? You’d always be a good Camp Fire Girl—you’re so knowing.” - -And Revel shook her fair head and, snorting—blowing a cloud of silky -breath over the compliment, as the girls, in their pretty linen riding -habits, cantered onward again. - -“Look! Look! Mount Mansfield off there—mighty Mount Mansfield! We’re on -higher ground now—and you can just get—a peep—at it,” panted Pemrose by -and by, her bare hand stroking Revelation’s neck, as they slackened pace -again. - -The trail was climbing, the curving mountain bridle path, broad enough, -in most places, for two to ride abreast—and far away in the distance -there were the cloudy outlines of the giants of the Green Mountains, -Mount Mansfield—Camel’s Hump. - -“And the hills to the right of us n-now!” It was an ecstatic little cry -from Una, her lip-corners curving up towards the dark, curly eyelashes. -“See! Two of them, just—just like big green bubbles—twin bubbles, as if -they had been blown there, tossed there!” - -“But the boulders!” said Pemrose, a minute or two later. “Just as if -some old giant had been playing pitch-and-toss with them on the -hillside! Goodness! the farmers must have a hard time.” - -“That’s why I’m giving my birthday party—for them,” whispered Una, -bending forward towards Revel’s silken ear. “Ha! We’re leaving the rest -of the party ‘in the dust,’—far behind,” she laughed, resting her hand -on the pommel, to look around. “Dorothy is riding more easily to-day, on -old King—you can’t see daylight between her and the saddle,” with a -quivering grin. - -“And Lura can keep her balance without holding on like grim death when -her horse wheels quickly round a turn,” said Pemrose, glancing back, -too. “Isn’t her ‘copper nob’ wonderful when she’s riding, bare-headed—a -lamp to the way?” - -“There! Oh! there’s another lamp to the way. Cardinal flowers! Cardinal -flowers—down by the brook, there!” Una’s quick eye caught the blaze of -vermilion through the scrub. “Oh! I must get off and pick some.” - -“Keep them for the Wild Flower Party—your farmers’ party—pageant—the day -after to-morrow; we can ride over, again, and get some,” Pemrose argued. -“It’s to-morrow that we plan to have a picnic—a supper up on the old -Balcony, on our mountain, where you stand on the lip of nothing.... -_Mercy!_ What! Oh—tumbleweed! Dry tumbleweed!” - -It was a big, brown pompon of the feathery weed, broken by the wind from -its stem and bowling gayly down the trail. - -It was Revelation shying nervously, side-stepping down the slope, his -neck curved restively—his eyes trained sidelong upon that trail tumbler, -as if it were a King of Terrors. - -It was a girl clinging desperately with both hands to the saddle. - -“Whoa! _Whoa_—Boy! There! There!” - -Breathlessly Pem—recovering—put him on to the trail again. - -“Goodness! If he didn’t take my breath away. Maybe I haven’t ridden -quite as much as I thought I had!” with a little, fluttering grin. -“There—there, you old Goose, look at it, so that you’ll know it again; -it isn’t any different off the stem from what it is on!” She pushed the -horse’s nose downward towards the great, fronded balls of the same weed -growing, meek and green, beside the trail. - -“Revel took no notice of it,” Una complacently patted her horse’s neck. -“Well, we’ll soon be at the Gap now.” - -They sighted it, a few minutes later, as they rode up the valley, a -narrow, rock-girt pass between two mountains, rising precipitately on -either side. - -The trail, broad enough in some places to be quite a respectable piece -of natural road, had shrunk now until there was scarcely room for two to -ride abreast. - -On the left was still the green slope, starred with wild flowers—ablaze -with hardhack and broad-leaved fireweed. - -To the right there was now a curving snake fence, four feet high, the -boundary of some estate or farm, with ten feet of grass between it and -the beaten trail. - -Beyond the fence was a broader grass strip, fringed by a narrow timber -belt, a screen for the rugged mountainside that rose behind it. - -Ahead was the Gap, flanked by its towering peaks, with their silvery -rock elbows, framing, as in a miniature, a glimpse of still loftier -peaks, beyond; of rich, green bottom lands between—and over all the -glory of a lamb’s wool sky, in mid-July. - -“Oh! now—now, all the words have got patches on them, indeed. One can’t -find any to fill the Gap with!” Una laughed. “But _there_! Oh! look -there.” She rose in her saddle so suddenly, so wildly, that even Revel -resented it, shook her fair head protestingly. - -“Above—above the Gap! Right over it! Against—the sky!” she cried. -“That—silver—speck, tumbling speck, what is it?” And now the thong of -her riding crop, frantically waving, seemed, from afar, to loop the -speck. - -“I believe—I believe it’s an aëroplane! Aëroplane doing stunts up there! -A—a thousand feet above the Gap!” Pemrose’s heart was stunt-flying too. -“Oh-h! now. See there! Turning somersaults! Flying upside down. Maybe -it’s Treff! He’s dare-devil—enough.” - -Just as the “zooming” bats had wheeled and turned somersaults against -the black and blue night-sky, on the girls’ first night out, so this -jolly air king was having his free frolic in the sun’s eye, cutting all -sorts of festive capers, or flitting, a radiant dragon fly, from peak to -peak, above the hills. - -It gave the crowning touch to the landscape—and skyscape. For it was -Life: Life joyous, dominant—devil-may-care. - -“Look! Look, girls! Oh, look!” Una pointed him out to those behind. -“Stunt-flying—an aviator! Isn’t that gr-reat?... I guess it is -Treff—that ‘nickum’ cousin of mine—and his new ‘bus.’ Oh, I hope he -isn’t going to have any more fiery ‘notes’ to-day!” - -“I’ll engage that’s who—it is.” The color was flooding Pemrose’s cheek. -“When I got his ‘radio’ a few nights ago—radio message—he said something -about ‘hopping’ over here for your birthday the day after to-morrow—and -the Flower Fuss, as he calls the party. Ha! There he goes now, dropping -down—dropping down, a few hundred feet!” - -“He’s flying in our direction—no, down towards the horse-farm,” said -Una. “Probably he means to stay there, for a few days. Hear—his purr! -Whew!” She turned suddenly a little pale. “If he comes nearer the horses -won’t like it.” - -The familiar buzz of the aëroplane was, now, only five hundred feet -above the trail. The solitary air king was flying southward, along the -route by which the girls had come—but down in the direction of the farm. - -Suddenly, however, he seemed seized with a fancy for reconnoitering the -wild hillside screened by the narrow birch belt, on the other side of -the bridle path from that on which he had been winging! - -Abruptly he wheeled. As abruptly—as mischievously—he “zoomed” down—until -he was only fifty or sixty feet above the trail. - -Well! if he was tired of playing mountebank to such lukewarm spectators -as the hills, he had lively enough witnesses now. - -Every horse was suddenly jumping sidelong—madly—down the slope; those -that weren’t backing, crab-fashion, with a frantic show of hind-legs. - -Even Revel shied—demoralized. - -But all this—all this was too tame for Revelation. - -He had saluted tumbleweed by taking to the slope. He greeted an aviator -by taking the fence. - -Together with the others he had swerved to the left of the trail—and a -few feet down that grassy slope—but there he turned and in mad bounds -made for the fence upon the right. - -The girl upon him felt as if her head and shoulders were being dragged -backward—the rest of her going with the horse. - -She had never taken a four-foot fence before—or come anywhere near it. - -But there was a mischievous boy, up there, who did stunt-flying a -thousand feet up. - -She set her teeth. Never once did she grip the saddle. Reuniting her -body by an inner jerk, as it were, she rose to the leap—and waved her -hand to the aviator as she went over. - -“Well! by gracious, that girl is an all-round winner,” chuckled the boy -in the sky, as he penitently pulled his “joy-stick” towards him and -soared again in a great hurry. - -Her head back upon her shoulders again, as it seemed, Revelation’s rider -galloped him a little way, wheeled him and with a lift of the reins, -saucily high, put him at the fence again, bounded back on to the -trail—into the scattered group of girls and horses. - -“Awfully—awfully sorry to have stampeded the outfit!” It was a -boy-aviator advancing, three minutes later, with a merry mixture of East -and West upon his tongue. - -“So—so you ought to be!” stormed Pemrose, her cheeks blazing. “Didn’t -you—you see the riding party—recognize us?” - -“Didn’t recognize you until after I had ‘zoomed’ down—and then it was -too late,” confessed the daredevil. “I wasn’t paying attention to the -riding party. I was stealing a march on somebody else.” - -“On who—whom?” - -“Merciful—green—hop-toads!” The boy threw up his hands, invoking every -hop-toad in the grass. “Oh! the funniest little figure it was, over -there on the hill, just back of the trees. I had been spying on her, -from aloft, through the glasses. She was standing, still as a stump, -upon the mountainside, an umbrella held behind, not over, her—and I -caught the flash of something bright, steely, upon her head.” - -“Head-phone,” murmured Pemrose. “No doubt she had something bright on -her heel, too, and that in a wet spot!” - -“Radio bug! I said to myself. So the wilderness has ’em, too!” The brown -speck winked. “By—by flying low, as I did, across the trail, up the -hill, I might have got a peep into the umbrella—just for fun!” - -“Just for fun—you played a nice trick on us,” sniffed Pemrose. - -“I didn’t see into the umbrella, but I saw her face to face, after I had -flown off to a distance and made a landing. She had mounted her horse -then. And by Jove”—the boy’s chest heaved under his khaki; he flicked -the helmet-strings dangling, about his ears—“by Jove! she was the -strangest... Ha! there she goes now—climbing the trail.” - -It was a pathetic little figure upon which all eyes were now turned; the -sunlight on it seemed almost heartless as it rode slowly up the -mountainside, with the umbrella in the stirrup strap—the something -bright upon the heel. - -Pemrose’s grip tightened convulsively upon her rein—as when she had -taken the leap. - -It was the same figure that she had seen before in a woodland aisle, -with the piercing eyes—keen and brilliant, but lonely, drifting. - -“The Little Lone Lady!” she breathed to herself. - -Treff’s gaze looked softened, too. He tapped his forehead under the -aviator’s helmet significantly. - -“You’re a radio bug, all right—what else you may be, I don’t know—but, -all the same, _there’s_ where you’re wanting, Sister!” he said. - -[Illustration: “Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t -it?”] - - - - - CHAPTER XV - - Wheeled Through Life - - -“Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t it?” - -Treffrey Graham, aviator, Polytechnic student, youth of nineteen in whom -East and West met on breezy ground, for most of his life had been spent -on the other side of the continent, lay upon the rocky Balcony half way -up Pocohosette Mountain and indolently kicked pebbles down a sloping -ledge, over a precipice’s brink. - -“So—so this is what Pemrose eloquently calls ‘the lip of nothing’,” he -remarked. “That rolling stone struck something,—bedrock—I guess, five -hundred feet below.” - -“The Balcony is the brow of nothing; the edge of the ledge is the -‘dod-lip’—pouting lip,” laughed Pemrose, with a little shudder, as her -glance shot down an inclined plane of seamy rock merging into the -precipice forty yards below the moss-draped Balcony on which she sat. - -On one side of this natural platform a fireplace had been built, with a -rough windbreak of piled stones, to prevent the flames from wildly -running amuck at the will of the evening breeze sweeping up the -mountain. - -This was a device of that inveterate camper, Treff Graham, whose camp -fire, with that of an erratic father, had blazed on far prairie and -mountain peak, in most of the picturesque spots of his native land. - -“This is a little bit of all right,” he murmured complacently; “you were -good to let me come in on it—and on the Flower Pageant to-morrow -night—after my ‘dumb stunt’ yesterday—stampeding the outfit.” His -lip-corners twitched. - -“We ought not to have done it.” Pemrose stabbed at his brown hand with a -pine needle—they were skulking among some bushes in the corner of the -rocky Balcony farthest from the fire, she sitting—he lying, breast -downward. “I like a boy who has a brown speck on the pupil of one eye, -just one—he has to have a sense of humor,” she murmured to herself. - -Treff was airing his humor upon Una—his cousin—just now. - -“Say! oughtn’t they to be tried first on the Society for the Prevention -of Cruelty to Animals?” he suggested, pointing to a rough sheet of tin, -dotted with little creamy mushrooms of batter, which Una, supported by -Naomi, was slipping on to a red-hot iron grating between the stone arms -of the fireplace. - -“The biscuits you mean? Seeing Una mixed them!” Pemrose blinked at the -two. - -Treff nodded. “The surprise to me is that she’s ‘sticking it’, at all, -as we fellows say,” he muttered, staring critically at his dark-eyed -cousin, a white rose when she started upon this camping trip, a red -carnation now. “The touch of hardship in the first days’ camping, before -you reached here, hiking, sleeping out at night!” he rambled on. “A -girl, like her, brought up in a flower-pot! If it had been a boy, he’d -have kicked the pot to pieces long ago.” - -“That’s what she’s doing now—trying to do,” broke in Pemrose. “She still -has her worry-cows,” laughingly, “foolish fears, but she’s ‘sticking it’ -at cooking and camp lessons—even at code, telegraphy, that horrid -teaser, to her,” with a little shrug, “just because her father asked it. -And—and she wouldn’t be Una without her little ‘crinkams’,” merrily. - -“Her ‘fancy’ curves with a trimming of blue funk!” The boy’s lips were -pursed. “She never could pull herself out of any mess.” - -“She pulled Donnie away from Cartoon’s heels.” - -“Bah! That was a mere flash, a fluke; it surprised herself more than -anybody else.” He blinked through the bushes at his cousin. “The trouble -with her”—the young aviator whistled shrewdly—“is that she has just been -wheeled through life in a cushioned chair—and she always will be. If -anything happened to the chair, she’d just—drop through,” with a -collapsing shrug. - -“But she’s the dearest girl, for all that!” fired up Pemrose. “Think of -this pageant—party—she’s giving for the mountain people to-morrow -night—her birthday, you know! She has been planning it for ages, a -lovely Wild Flower Pageant, to be given in our open-air theatre,” -grandly, “down the mountain, where a grassy bank forms a natural stage, -with trees for a background. And our dresses—if they aren’t fetching!” - -“I’ll say so—when I see them,” murmured the lad, with a fervent glance. - -“It’s to be a representation, as far as we can, of that blooming -democracy, Una’s flower clock.” The blue eyes winked—but there was dew -on the lashes. “And it’s all because—because, she has heard, her father, -others, talk, of the hard time the mountain farmers, have, clearing -land. And she wants to remind them that where rocks ‘grow’—and -back-aches—flowers grow, too,” quiveringly; “find the beauty around -them, for them—perhaps, in future, they’ll see some of it, when the day -begins, the hard day.” Pem brushed her hand across her eyes now. - -“Pretty idea—if any of it sticks,” muttered the boy. - -“And Una has coaxed out of the Guardian almost all the money that was -left for her, for her own entertainment, to spend it upon ice cream, oh! -and all sorts of ‘eats’ for them—their wives and little children—who -have so little in their lives—that’s—lovely.” - -“Well! with ice cream for a fertilizer—” began young Treff. - -“Come! You’d better not sneer. You’re to be scene shifter—general -electrician, properties’ man—” - -“Merciful hop-toads! what else?” - -“Anything you like—‘Hop’,” laughed the girl. - -“Well! there’s one comfort, I shan’t be the only ‘hop-toad’, not if that -old farmer comes who chased you up a ladder—and then let you fall from a -hayloft on to a horse’s back.” - -“And who came within a cow’s thumb of shooting us, because his wife gave -his slippers away to.... Oh! cock-a-luraloo!” The girl jumped up. -“There’s supper! And I’m hungry.” - -“So am I,” acknowledged Treff. “It’s low tide in me, I confess.” - -But it was a high tide while the feast lasted—a sweeping tide race of -fun and laughter, joke and story. - -“We might have had a concert up here,” remarked young Treff, when he was -disposing very appreciatively of his last biscuit, the biscuit sneered -at in its doughboy day, “we might have had the ghost of a concert up -here—if only you had brought that—that talisman ring up with you.” He -looked down at Pemrose’s right forefinger, without the insignia of her -father’s genius. “Humph! when it comes to radio, you’re the ‘Nello’.” - -“‘Wireless’ for winner, eh?” laughed the girl. “Somehow, I don’t think -you, really, believe that I can get any results with the witch-ring, at -all,” laughingly. “And I can! I can! Up here, we’d be too far from any -strong sending station I’m afraid. A five-mile radius is about my limit, -even for dot an’ dash—for any faint little gleamings of speech or song -it must be nearer—” the black eyebrows went up over the rapt blue -eyes—“and then—then it’s a whisper, seems to come from the other side of -the world, or—or from the farthest little blinking star,” dreamily. “But -Una—Una and I did—the morning we started—pick up something, just the -faintest little ‘queak’,”—half-laughingly—“singing ‘queak’—but we made -words out of it; didn’t we?” She glanced flutteringly at her friend. - -“Awfully funny what you do pick up, at times,” said Treff, “from all the -hotchpotch, all the stuff, broadcasted, shot out into the air, sometimes -by amateurs not licensed to broadcast—but who do it, just the same. I -cut in on some ‘queaky’ singing myself, a few nights ago.” He locked his -brown hands at the memory, looking down from the Balcony ledge. “Some -honey-head—radio bug—amateur, I guess, was shooting off something about -‘dewy flowers’—as well as I could get it—and ‘holding’ somebody ‘in a -hand—by the hand.’ Now, what little girl....” The brown speck winked. - -“Oh! go on—was there any more?” breathed Pemrose gasping—and she dared -not look at Una. - -“Oh! I kept getting snatches of the same ‘blarney’, whenever I could -blank out other sounds.... I’ve rigged up a pretty powerful set at our -camp, you know—wire enough to send a message to Mars.” He kicked a stone -down the ledge. - -“Go—on!” There was a queer little tickling in Pemrose’s throat. - -“Well! later—later it seemed as if the ‘bug’ was blowing about radio: I -caught the word ‘Air’ distinctly; and something about: - - ... ‘Waves you cannot see, - Bring you, at last—nearer to me.’ - -Funny—” - -He stopped. Two girls were sitting bolt upright upon the Balcony ledge, -one staring blankly with blue eyes—the other fearfully with black. - -“Where’s—Una?” said the Guardian, ten minutes later. “She ought not to -go off like that, alone.” - -Under cover of the general clearing up, one girl was missing. - -“She has never had the chance before,” said Pemrose. “In camp, we hunt -in couples,” gayly. “But she’s off after harebells, I suppose. Some of -the loveliest—loveliest bluebells you ever saw growing just on the edge -of the precipice—a wing of the precipice, over there near the wood! -Shall I go and look for her?” - -“I’ll go, too,” said young Treff, as the Guardian nodded. - -“Oh! do let us stop, for a minute, to look at the view.” He caught at -Pemrose’s hand, presently, to steady her upon the shelving rock. “Una’s -all right! There she is!” - -“The Guardian is going after her, too,” murmured the girl. “She wouldn’t -be the one to help ‘wheel Una through life’— but she feels her a handful -on her heart, just the same.” - -“No wonder, as Uncle Dwight, Una’s Dad, has fitted up that jolly camp -for you. Done it in such high-powered style, too—radio, horses, -everything! But the view!” The young aviator caught his breath. -“Fine—fine as from that Lenox Pinnacle, where I pulled you up out of the -Devil’s Chair!” - -“And cut me afterwards—Jack at a pinch!” dimpling mischievously. “But -the Pinnacle—the Pinnacle was nothing to this,” breathed Pemrose. -“Three—three tiers of mountains, rising one behind the other! Oh-h! they -look like three orders of angels; don’t they?” - -“In the sunset they are—‘ripping’!” - -The faces of both were transfigured as they gazed breathlessly off at -green, spangled foothills grading up into tinseled peaks, which, in -turn, did homage to the mighty, misty Archangel—Mount Mansfield, in the -distance, with wings of pearl. - -“He seems to be waving his Big Trump at us,” said Pemrose. - -“‘Say it with music’!” gasped the boy, his ear pricked towards the -woods. “What—what’s that. A murmur? Queer murmur! Didn’t you hear it?” - -It was, indeed, as if faint music—the vague ghost of murmuring music—was -being wafted to them from that golden trump. - -“Merciful hop-toads—green hop-toads!” It was Treff’s characteristic -explosion. “What does it mean? Where does it come from—on the wind—up -the mountain—from the woods?... But the wood doesn’t—own—it.” - -“No-o,” gasped the girl. “It isn’t the trees—nor any bird—nor insect.” - -“It’s as distinct from them—” the young aviator was breathing -heavily—“as—my soul! as the voice of a song sparrow down by the surf. -What.... The wind’s fetching it up to us—helping it. If—if this isn’t -eerie!” - -They stared blankly, boy and girl, each into the other’s face, trying to -tear thence the meaning of it: of that wild, wandering organ note—ghost -of disembodied music—a succession of piping notes stealing upon the -breeze up the mountain—hypnotizing, beguiling. - -Now the dim spruce wood below them became, as it seemed, a “roaring -buckie”, a hollow, reverberating sea shell, faintly throbbing with old -ocean’s murmur! Now, from it came a wee, high piping—undulating -piping—as of elfin singing, against which no evening sound in Nature -could hold its own for sweetness. - -“Well, I’m ding-wizzled!” Treff blew his bewilderment from eyes, ears -and nose together—blew it upon the roseate air. “At this hour—by George! -it makes one’s heart slip around in one’s body, like—like—” - -“Una’s—Una’s is slipping round in hers!” Pemrose caught her lip between -her teeth. “Look—will you? There—she’s off into the wood, to find -it—find out what it means! She so timid!... Una—come back!” she cried -sharply. - -At that moment there leaped into the blue eyes something that rather -dazzled young Treff. - -It had the flash of a bridge over a torrent—a flinty bridge. - -Not for nothing had this girl a father who had bridged even space itself -with his discoveries; it was her nature to build bridges—span the -incredible. - -“Una—come back,” she cried again—and sprang down the mountain towards -her friend, in her the same feeling that had possessed her yesterday, as -if her head and shoulders were being jerked backward, the rest of her -going with the horse—with something runaway. “Una—that’s that’s nothing! -I—I believe I know—” in half-mystified tones—“I believe I could—” - -As if a spell were broken, Una turned. On the very verge of losing -herself among the thick spruces, thick as hops near the precipice’s -edge, she paused uncertainly. - -The lovely harebells she had gathered, growing in such profusion in this -wild spot—a bunch almost as big as her head—stood out, like a fluttering -bluebird, against the green. - -Suddenly she tossed them from her. With a frightened cry—an awakening -cry—she began running blindly, climbing recklessly—not up towards -Pemrose—but in the direction of the mothering arms of the Guardian, wide -open to receive her. - -But, again, she was “sparrow-blasted”, mystified—quivering to the core -now. And the sunset drew a red muffler across her eyes. - -She caught her foot in a moss-seamed crack of the sloping rock that -skirted this right wing of the precipice. - -In the effort to dislodge it she set herself rolling. - -Before a hand could reach her, before an eye could take in just what had -happened, she was rolling downward—a scapegoat doll—from the brow to the -lip of nothing. - - - - - CHAPTER XVI - - The Lip - - -It was the Guardian who reached her first, almost stepping over the edge -of the abyss herself—in her recklessness about anything but saving the -girl. - -So quickly, had that girl rolled down the moss-seamed rock, a dummy—a -bundle of inanimate clothing—that such wild clutchings as her poor hands -made at moss and grass and helpless leaf seemed but mechanical -twitchings! - -Automatic twitchings to those who watched her, without a cry—lest a cry, -should cut the last chance! - -But in the human dummy, when consciousness is swooning, there is a -something which looks after that last chance. - -Over the first fold of the terrible lip, in the very teeth of the -precipice, earth-embedded, there grew a little tree—a stunted little -midget of a birch tree. - -That which took care of Una’s last chance, clutched it—and hung on. - -It bent—bent like everything—but it did not break. - -And in the same minute the Guardian reached her, realizing her own -rashness, her own danger, just in time to start back, kneel down upon -the edge of nothing and, leaning over, grasp the girl’s wrists. - -“Lord, don’t fail me. Don’t let me turn dizzy,” moaned the woman, -clinging in her agony to a tree, too—the Tree of Life. - -It was a branch of that Tree which answered—a very vital branch. - -Almost instantaneously a presence was beside her, a fearless presence. A -lad who could do flying stunts a few thousand feet in the air was -stretched out at her right hand, his shoulders over the brink. - -His voice, though edgy, was perfectly cool. - -“Keep quiet,” he said tensely. “Hang on. Great guns! hang on tight until -I can get a good grip of you. Now—now I have your wrist, just hang—as -easily as possible,” to the girl into whose up-staring dark eyes a -glazed reason was coming back. “There—I have you. Now we come! Let’s -lift her up!” - -A human chain of girls lying flat, had meanwhile formed, was holding on -to the Guardian’s feet; if she—or Una—had sounded the depth of the -waterfall, hundreds of feet below, it is probable that all would have -done so. - -Thanks to the little birch tree and that limb of daring, young Treff, -all were, presently, safe back upon the Balcony, Una wrapped in -Pemrose’s arms. - -“There now, darling! There now—don’t look down,” cooed the latter. -“You’re s-safe now. Quite safe now. And wasn’t the Guardian a -‘brick’?... Treff, too—oh! Treff, too, of course,” with an arch wink at -the latter, “but he’s seasoned—he’d stand on his head in a soaring -balloon—I—believe.” - -“Not ex-actly,” protested the hero a little breathlessly. “Stunt-flying -a thousand feet up would—would be a three-legged race on a Sunday School -picnic, compared to that ledge there—a girl hanging over—mean -proposition,” behind his teeth. - -“Ugh!” Pemrose shuddered. “Why—why did you go wandering off by yourself -like that?” She clasped her girl chum tighter. - -“Wander-ing—off!” But, with that, Una sat up; and now it seemed as if -the recent shock was but the unsealing of a greater terror behind it, in -her eyes. - -“Did you hear-r it?” she gasped, pushing herself away and staring at -Pem. “Now—now you heard it for yourself,” in feverish triumph. “That -strange hum; that pip-ing sound. ’Twas—’twas the same that I heard in -the wood, at home. And you wouldn’t believe me! I wanted to find out -where it—came—from. But it isn’t earthly,” in a low whimper. “I think -it’s trying—trying to get—hold—” - -“Not earthly!” hooted Pemrose. “I could make it.” - -“I c-can’t believe you,” hiccoughed the girl, who had been hypnotized -into following it. - -“Make it a dare—will you?” challenged the other—although, perhaps, with -a tiny “niggling” doubt in her blue eyes. “What will you bet me that -Treff and I together can’t ‘pull off that stunt’?” - - * * * * * - -That night a great scientist’s daughter talked long with her father by -radio, handling her message as cleverly as she did before, for the -edification and envy of her companions. - -It was a pact between them that on certain mornings and evenings—after -dark, in the latter case—they should try to tune in on a conversation -with each other. - -To-night, again, the experiment was an exciting success, for expense had -not been spared on the “outfit” installed in this mountain camp by Mr. -Grosvenor for the diversion and development of summering girls—his own -rather ineffectual daughter among them—and at the laboratory end, a -hundred miles away, was a powerful sending station. - -As the girl pulled her switches, after good-nights had been exchanged -through the air, with much badinage of “Y. L.” “O. M.” and jokes about -hearing with the phones on the table when they were over her straining -ears, Pemrose Lorry turned to her young knight and abettor, Treff -Graham, with the white light, just shut off from the bulbs, switched on -in her eyes. - -“Father—father says we can get the wherewithal at Roslyn College,” she -cried mysteriously. “He’ll telephone to one of his friends who’s -conducting a summer school there. And it’s only seventy miles away. -But—” anxiously—“could you go and come in the same day? The Flower -Pageant will be to-morrow evening.” - -“Yes, and that would be a ‘peach’ of a time to loose the pipes. Crowning -feature! Seventy miles! Why that’s only a little hop,” protested the -youth blithely. “I’ll be back with the pibroch, sleeping pibroch, in the -tail of the plane.” - - - - - CHAPTER XVII - - Wild Flowers - - - “Wake up, wake up, to greet the day! - Is what the morning glories say - And open at the sun’s first ray.” - -It was Una, a bell-shaped white flower, striped with pink, the light, -filmy costume divided into the three-lobed corolla and five-sepaled -calyx of the erratic little wild flower which, in traveling, always goes -in a contrary direction to its sun-god, although it rises with him—Una, -trailing triangular green leaves, who came floating on to the outdoor -stage. - -Spectators wildly cheered the girl Morning Glory as she flung her green -tendrils over a rock, symbol of beauty, indigenous beauty, to eyes tired -with fighting Nature for a farm-hold in a region where Mother Earth -seemed at times to set her foot down grimly and say: “Here, I don’t want -men, houses, corn fields; I want my uncut forests, boulders—untamed -mountains.” - -“Ain’t it a purty play-act, though—a dum fine show?” gasped the old -farmer who had “come, within the breadth of a cow’s thumb of shooting -her” when he believed her flower-like feet to be those which had walked -off in his floral slippers. - -“Gosh! when, at early mornin’ the sweat’s rolling off’n a man, grubbing -up rocks an’ stumps, and each one taken out means a fresh back ache, I -dunno as I’ll miss the little morning glory trailin’ over the rock—jest -opening its eye to the sun—seems as if, from now on, I’d see an’ not -trample on it,” he murmured pathetically to himself. - -“Well, it’s rising sunblink now, Si. Look!” said his wife beside him—his -impressionable wife, who had on what he called her prim, muslin mouth -that went with her Sunday dress—she pointed to the glaring mock-sun -rising, red, flamboyant, behind pine tree and beech that, formed the -background of the natural stage. - -While in a bosky dell Treff Graham played Sun Father, manipulating those -flamboyant effects, obtained by wiring the backs of the trees for -electricity, in a twilight that by a long stretch of the imagination -might be made to serve as dawn, not evening, another horological flower -of those that favor the sand-man, was murmuring her winsome Reveille. - - “I am the eye of summer days, - Once a great poet sang in praise - Of my gold heart and pink-tipt rays.” - -“Daisy! Day’s Eye!” applauded the farmers’ wives delightedly, as -fair-haired Dorothy flitted forth through the artificial sun-gates, a -lovely composite of white ray florets rimming a shining, yellow heart. - -While the Guardian, in lacy white as tall meadow-sweet, queen of the -meadow, was explaining to rustic ears—of which about fifty pairs, in -all, had assembled in the open-air theatre—that the yellow heart was a -whole flower family in miniature, another girl, in azure, glided from -behind a beech tree on to the stage with its borrowed plumes. - - “By every dusty roadside see - The bright blue flowers of chicory, - That wayside friend I choose to be.” - -“Wayside friend—mark ye! Wal! I wouldn’t say that she hasn’t got her -wish—would you?” The farmer—the farmer who would no more trample upon -the morning glory—winked slyly, nudged his wife, jerked his thumb in the -direction of broad tables among the trees, whose ware and glass -suggested junketing as well as pageantry. - -“That’s you, Si; always thinking o’ foddering!” expostulated his -wife—the wife who succumbed to spell-women and “fore-goes.” “Dear me -sass! what have we here—golden mouse-ear.” She expanded into delight. “I -was a-picking of it in the woods only yesterday an ’twill light ’em on -into September—devil’s paint brush the children call it.” - - “I light the mountain’s grassy knolls - With stars of gorgeous hue, - Burnt orange in a sky of green - Instead of gold in blue.” - -It was Lura who, as tawny hawkweed, that wild flower of many nicknames, -delivered this account of herself—her “copper nob” shining as burnt -orange, indeed. - -Dandelion, poppy, humble chickweed, lovely wild rose, field marigold, -pimpernel, others—all the sleepy flowers that favor the sand-man—were -represented. - -But, as they were for the most part early risers, it was the one thorn -in the wild bouquet to Una, whose fête this was, that she could not have -a perfect representation of her garden flower clock—to find a flower -whose awaking corresponded to each number upon the sundial she had to -turn to garden aristocrats. - -But when early pond lily, late evening primrose blended together in the -dance, the final dance of breeze-blown wild flowers, going through the -pretty pantomime of falling asleep—nodding—heads upon each other’s -shoulders, the thorn was sheathed. - -“Oh! hasn’t it been a success? As long as I live I shall love to think -of this—my sixteenth birthday.” Una clung adoringly to the Guardian, a -lovely Morning Glory, tender, dreamy, her eyes going down among the -spectators to single out faces of little children, mountain children to -whom even a moving picture display was a rare treat. “They’re all on -tiptoe for the ice cream now,” she said, feeling little pulses in her -throat at the pleasure she was giving. “But—what’s that?” - -Was there a bee in the bouquet—the wild flower bouquet? Had every -honeybee that visited the real flowers upon the mountain that day, in -return for sweets acquired, stored up in the blossoms its hum, to be -reproduced this evening? - -From behind the scenes stole a murmur, faint at first, swelling, -surging, until the air was full of it—that elfin hum. - -“Oh-h! where is it coming from—_now_?” Una stiffened distractedly, -shivering—blanching. - -“Patience—just for a moment, darling!” said the Guardian—and put an arm -round her. - -“The—the Murmuration, by heck!” the old farmer was exclaiming: “Is it a -bee-hive, a wild bees’ nest, anywheres near?” He started up, staring -everywhere in the gloaming. “No-o, ba gosh! ’tain’t any bee swarm—bee -tree—it’s too sweet. Sweet as honey from St. Peter’s garden!” - -In the gloaming he looked half-wild. - -“Sit down—you fool!” His wife caught him by the coat-tails; her prim -muslin mouth was all pleats and puckers, as if she could tell the source -of the honeyed hum, if she would—and that it did hail from St. Peter’s -garden—wasn’t earthly. - -Other of the farmers’ wives shared her air of awe—of mystery—as if the -air held something untellable—but, for them, not quite unfamiliar. - -The fascination grew upon their faces as the silvery murmuration became -a wild, sweet, wandering organ-note—a faint piping, as of elfin singing, -trembling off into inaudibility over spell-bound heads—while rough hands -clutched at the air, as if, could they but reach up high enough, they -could bring it back again. - -“Gosh! I’m bewiddied—I am,” gasped the farmer, beginning to think that, -possibly, his wife had more insight than he had. - -Upon his bewilderment broke a laugh—elfin in its mischief, but human. - -Forth from the background of trees danced a girl—a girl arrayed as a -bluebell—a mountain harebell. - -She carried a rather heavy box which she set down behind the -footlights—among the quivering Wild Flowers. She pressed a button. The -stage—all the open-air theatre for a couple of hundred feet -around—became a reverberating sea shell. Another! All the elves in -Christendom were piping! - -“Behold,” cried Pemrose Lorry, “the source of the elfin music; a simple -arrangement of tuning forks, magnets and a battery!... There, Unie, -isn’t that what you heard, last night?” - -“It sounds like it,” admitted Una doubtfully, her pulses galloping, -beginning to gallop, as she thought of the Lenox garden at home. - -“Weird enough in the gloaming—eh?” laughed a youth who knelt by Pemrose, -flourishing his hands as if he were pulling the joy-stick in his plane. -“Oh! we’re proud of our fairy music, pipes of Pan—anything you like to -call it—we had a great time rigging them up, after I got back with the -stuff. You see the forks—there are two pairs here, one low-pitched, the -other high and shrill—are not in tune, not quite of the same pitch, each -pair, so that when that pair is set vibrating, the magnet between them -carrying the sound, it—it makes a wave with a hump in it,” gleefully, -“that hollow sea shell crooning—elfin ringing.” - -“But how—how did you hit it off, clever children?” The Guardian was -flatly gasping. - -“Oh-h, such an old story to me,” dimpled Pemrose, “being brought up in a -laboratory! Father has every musical fork imaginable—experiments with -them—up to those brittle quartz ones which, set vibrating, give an -angel’s note, so pure and high. Some of them he loved to take out of -doors, at times, and match the pitch against Nature’s sounds. We’ve -tried it in the woods—and often down by the seashore, where we could -almost—almost hit it off with the tide—have a duet in the same key,” -laughingly. “But—up here—who could have been doing it?” - -“Some eccentric musician with the same hobby,” suggested the Guardian. -“There are camps here and there upon the mountain.” - -The girl nodded. “Dad hasn’t tried it for a long time now, our pipes o’ -Pan,” she said, with a tremble in her triumph—her face blue-lit, as -always when she spoke of her father. “He has been all taken up with his -inventions. But, sometimes—before—if I teased him, he’d take those rare, -wavy quartz tuning forks along, with their sound that nothing in Nature -could match, so pure, so crystal-clear it was! Heavenly!” The blue eyes -dimmed. “Perhaps, whoever was playing with it, last night—playing Pied -Piper....” She glanced at Una. “But who _was_ playing—with—it?” -Passionately the question forced itself again. - -From the low-pitched tuning forks was suddenly struck a murmur, vague, -unaccountable, carried by some magnet into her finger tips, her toes: “I -wish—I wish Una’s Father and Mother were back,” it said. - - - - - CHAPTER XVIII - - Mondamin - - -“Hurrah! Isn’t it fun to see our bonfire put the stars out?” - -It was Dorothy who gave vent to this extinguisher, piling on more dry -brush and resinous pine logs until not a spark in the firmament, planet -or fixed star, dared to vie with the blaze below—upon the wild mountain -top. - -“And when it dies down a little and the flames blow aside, you can see -old Orion, up there, stretched lazily, on watch,” said the Guardian. -“Well! whose ear is the most nearly roasted? I don’t mean an auricular -cavity,” laughingly. “I mean ‘Mondamin.’” - -Mondamin, great Corn Spirit, they were toasting him, in style, upon the -summit of Mount Pocohosette, while the two lesser peaks, Little Brother -and Little Sister Mountain, as the girls called them, retired into the -shadows of right and left. - -Carrying, each, half-a-dozen ears of the sweet, early corn, in its coat -of bishop’s purple, procured from the outskirts of the horse-farm, the -girls had climbed the mountain in the golden September afternoon, by a -trail which sidetracking Balcony and precipice, led almost to the very -top. - -Twenty-six hundred steep feet above sea level, fifteen hundred above -their cosy camp upon the sidehill, with its exciting proximity to the -Long Pasture, they had cut down wood with their Camp Fire axes, piled -high the brush—for it takes much fuel to toast Mondamin—and brought -water wherewith to wash him down, from a little lake of the clouds which -could almost compete with the famous one of that name upon Mount -Mansfield. - -Mount Mansfield, giant of the Green Mountains, they had waved him -goodnight before their bonfire put out the stars, so that lazy Orion’s -nose was, for the most part, out of joint. - -A teakettle sang its song upon a little red nest of its own, to the -right of the main blaze, around which eighteen girls, each with a -browning corn-ear upon the end of a stick, were preparing the jolly corn -roast. - -The first corn roast of the season—above the clouds! - -The wind, now sibilant, soft, now swelling to a summit roar, sang -through dark spruce and mountain ash of the heights—bringing out the red -cheeks of the latter, the ripening berry clusters. - -The mystery of night, young night, the girls had never before so felt -it—so reveled in it. - -Sparks played, firefly-like, among the trees. Potatoes hissed softly -among red embers. Flames flickered upon great piles of husks, rosetting -Mondamin’s bishop’s purple, his silken undercoats of pale green and -cream, stripped off before roasting him. - -Ever and anon, a toasting chorus to him rang out, led by Dorothy—the -mountain top guild of glee, laughing girls, airing their own -improvisations: - - “Snap and crackle, blazing bonfire, - Pile the brush and pine logs high, - Till the flames wax bolder—bolder, - Scaring stars out of the sky! - - _Strip_ Mondamin’s rustling coats, - _Strip_ his silky hair, - In the glowing embers - Roast him, sputtering, there!” - -Roasted he was royally and absorbed—devoured—too, with various -accompaniments, while the flames sank to a flicker—and Orion came into -his own again, with a belt of dark clouds around him. - -The wind muttered strangely now; muttered a “fore-go”, if girlish ears -had been attuned to its meaning. - -Faces, black and buttery—not beautiful, but very happy—gathered round a -core of red, soon to be extinguished, when the descent of the mountain -should begin. - -“It’s too bad that we didn’t bring ponchos and sleeping bags—spend the -night up here on the mountain top,” said Dorothy. “We’d have been comfy -enough in that open camp, over there—although it has no front wall, only -two gray wings, with a gap in the middle.” - -“How many of those camps you do run across among the Green Mountains,” -said Pemrose, “nearly all left generously open for the ‘next fellow,’” -laughingly; “some quite snug, with gray bunks and doors—others with no -face, like that!” - -“And haven’t we sampled the hard knocks,—hard bunks—too, by sleeping in -them?” murmured Madeline. “Well—hard or soft—it has been a great old -time. A wonderful summer! And now it’s—nearly—over.” - -“Some queer things have happened, too,” half-whispered Naomi. - -“Nothing very exciting since the night somebody played Pied Piper upon -the mountain—and coaxed Una almost over the precipice-edge! I wonder -who....” Lura leaned forward to stir the fire—her murmur breathlessly -low. - -“It was the same sound—the very same—I heard before in the -garden—at—home.” Una shivered a little, caught in a rose-lined pocket of -darkness—as the night became more overcast. - -“But now, pshaw! it’s so easily explained.” Pemrose shrugged her -shoulders impatiently, poking at the fire, too. “The Guardian was -right—just some crack-brained musician, off on a holiday, seized with a -fancy for sorting sounds out-of-doors,” laughingly, “testing old Nature -with a tuning fork—or a variety of them—to see what key she sang in—what -pitch she liked best. If father and I hadn’t done it before—” - -“But early—early morning.” Una’s whisper was still restless. - -“Trying to get the exact key of a bird’s song—waking song!” - -“Seems to me the bird didn’t get much of a chance!” The dark-eyed girl’s -whisper was whimsical now; that slight, near-sighted peculiarity in her -right eye, which the girls pronounced “fetching”, was fixed half -fearfully, as she stared into the fire, but she was trying—Una—to get -the better of what Pem called her little “crinkams”, her cousin Treff -her cowardly curves. - -“Well—well, we haven’t heard it again,” said Madeline. - -“I—I thought _I_ did—one night, near camp—one starry night—” - -Perhaps only the fire caught Una’s broken whisper, now, for the wind -suddenly shrieked into its ear, so that the flames leaped up again -noisily. - -“_Goodness!_ I hope we’re not going to have a storm,” said the Guardian. -“That would be too bad after all the fun.” - -“Huh! The thunder-plump comes on so quickly here,” hooted Madeline. -“Seems as if the mountains just heaved a long, sullen breath—and comes -the storm!” - -“Ouch! angry teeth, already!” quivered another, as the night wind took -her by the hair—and lightning grinned below her. - -“It is coming, sure enough—and we never would have time to get home -before it!” Girlish forms cowered towards the fire now, -trembling—trembling before the night’s angry teeth. - -“If I don’t mistake, ’twill make every storm we’ve witnessed before seem -mild as a Sunday School picnic—even the one the night the flash light -fainted,” said Pemrose, creeping round the fire on hands and knees, to -sit near Una. - -Presently, when the storm broke upon them—or below them, rather—they -were locked in each other’s arms, cheek to cheek. - -“They’re always ‘twosing’, those two,” Dorothy threw a little grimace -into the fire’s heart, as she shrank into her heavy sweater. “Pemrose -would stand up for Una against everything in the world—a good thing, -too, for Una could never stand up for herself!” - -But, as a matter of fact, every girl would have stood up for Una—would -have shielded her with a warm breast from mountain rain and storm—and -Dorothy knew it. - -“I suppose that’s what it means to be ‘born in the purple’,” she -murmured impishly to herself now; “it’s all gratitude to her -‘high-powered’ father,” with a low gasp, “for this wonderful, wonderful -summer: radio concerts, horseback riding—everything! Una isn’t spoiled, -though, I’ll admit; she loves us all, but she just swings like a -pendulum between Pemrose and the Guardian.” - -She had been privileged to go out alone with the Guardian—Dorothy -remembered that now—on sundry occasions when the other older girls had -undertaken climbing feats that were a little beyond her endurance—or her -energy—as when they had stormed Little Poco, Little Brother Mountain, a -precipitous peak, with a face rough as Esau’s hands—to interview the -spell-woman. - -They had not found her at home. And, contrary to custom, her camp on -Little Brother’s shoulder was not wide open for the “next fellow.” It -was securely locked. - -The girls, led by their Assistant Guardian, had come back almost -hysterical with fatigue, anathematizing the inhospitable “heather cat”, -whose roaming propensities were familiar to them, for occasionally they -saw her again—the Little Lone Lady—with Nature’s heavy cross, the lump -between her shoulders, climbing some lonely bridle path, always on -horseback—the camper’s pack across her saddle, the bloated umbrella in -her stirrup strap. - -But the interests, the growing pastimes, of their camp life were too -many and varied—chase and capture in the Long Pasture, riding the air -with a whisper by telephony and telegraphy, as most of them could now -do—for them to waste much thought upon that lonely—eccentric—little -figure. - -Yet, somehow, it rode before Pemrose to-night upon the lightning’s vivid -broomstick; she caught herself wondering what its background had -been—what sort of life had left it imposing upon the superstitions of -mountain people—living upon their crumbs, in return. - -At a certain point in her speculations the girl, staring into the fire -with eyes of blue patchwork, started—snorted. She always did snort and -shy, like Revelation at trail tumbleweed, when she thought long upon -that figure of a waif-woman who dabbled in radio like herself. - -“I’d like to see the inside of her umbrella,” thought Pemrose. - -And with that the world fell in beneath her. The clouds, for the most -part below them, were ripped by a terrible light. - -Like a thief in the night the mountain storm was on—and it was such a -thunderplump, sudden, banging electric storm, as these girls had never -beheld before. - -A blue-black darkness herded them together around their cowering -fire—feeling as if the Day of Judgment were upon them—and every minute -that bruised darkness spit flame; a flame so dazzling that the eyeballs -caught it and saw by it after it had passed. - -“We must seek shelter in that wooden camp,” said the Guardian, putting -her arm around Una. “The rain—I suppose it will ‘rain pitchforks’ -presently—may drift in upon us, but at least we shall have a roof.” - -And from there they watched the world pitchforked beneath them—torn, -racked, groaning, blazing. - -“_Goodness!_ It’s like fifty days of judgment rolled into one,” moaned -Dorothy—and hid her eyes against the Guardian. “Hide me! Hide me!” - -But the trees in the dark forest beneath them found no hiding place, no -rocks to fall on them and cover them from the wrath of the sky. - -A blazing fireball fell among them and one tree, sometimes two, jumped -into the air—clearly in the glare the girls saw them—then fell, riven. - -“Oh! those fireballs they seem to open my head ... every time one -strikes,” said Pemrose—a weak, bird-mouthed twitter. - -Una sat still as the planks beneath her, cheeks as white as the sudden -white light which, at the heart of the storm, weirdly cleft the -clouds—and reigned for minutes upon the mountainside, upon the torn, -staggering forest, and in the sky. - -“Oh-h! this is aw-ful. I wish I had been a better girl,” whined Dorothy. -“The black tops of those pines! There—there goes another fireball.... I -can’t bear to see them strike.” - -“‘When thou passest through the waters I will be with thee ... and -through the rivers they shall not overflow thee,’” said the Guardian -finding nothing more applicable to her steadfast faith. “We may be -thankful to be, so far, above the storm—only the lightning climbing—” - -The lightning, forked, blue, zigzagging up and down the shuddering -mountain, as the white light faded, counted every coral berry-bunch on -the mountain ash, every needle on the grinning spruces; but, although it -was so vivid—so lingering its dazzle—it was but the tail end of a flash -which climbed to this summit camp on old Pocohosette, two thousand feet -above the valley—almost three thousand above sea level. - -“Oh, my! The horses! The horses in the Long Pasture! I wonder how -they’re taking it? If one of them should be struck! Rev-el-a-tion!” -Pemrose felt as if the fireball, now striking, was in her heart. - -Far away, on a hilltop, a barn blazed. - -“_Revel!_” whimpered Una. “Revel!” It was the first sound she had made. -“If—anything—should happen to her-r!” - -“Oh! come,” said the Guardian; “don’t think of such things.” She, -forthwith, pinned a smile upon her lips, which the lightning, as -promptly, unpinned. - -“I—I can fancy them all crowding together against the fence,” droned -Pemrose again, “and nickering nervously—even Cartoon. And the little, -trembling foals hiding under their mothers! I wonder whether a -mother-horse would desert its baby?” - -“In danger, I hardly think so—although I don’t know that it has ever -been tested,” said the Guardian. “Ha! Now for the rain! The deluge! I -doubt whether our Ark will ride that, as it did the lightning.” - -The black rain clouds drifting through the lightning-ripped dusk, like -soot through smoke, floated higher than the thundershutters. - -Presently, girls were shrinking into themselves, trying to dwindle to -the sheltering capacity of their sweaters, cowering in corners, the -Guardian attempting to shield her brood, as fingers of rain came seeking -them out, curdling courage. - -They had escaped peril of fire bolt and fork-lightning which, to-night, -had killed many a noble tree. The thunder storm was now abating. - -But to spend the night here, unprovided—on the sodden floor of an open -camp! Or to attempt the descent of a washed-out trail through those -blindly dripping forests! - -Well! it was the first time that the Guardian wished herself back at her -teacher’s desk—in the stuffiest schoolroom imaginable—wished that she -had not undertaken the charge of eighteen girls through these summer -months. - -It was the first time that the girls, themselves, felt -flinching—breaking—before the “fiery stick” of reality with which Andrew -had threatened them—of deadly hardship. - -“And there may be a washout below us on the mountain, between here and -camp,” said the Guardian feebly, “an impassable washout. We’d better -wait for a while, anyway, before attempting the trail.” - -Slowly the sodden minutes dragged along, to the jeer of the rain -sweeping past the camp, occasionally into it, pecking, a merciless -rain-crow, in every corner. - -It took all the grit of the boldest hearts to say to themselves: “What -of it? The rain isn’t going to ‘come it all over me.’ I am a Camp Fire -Girl; I will not flinch nor falter!” - -The Guardian felt that she had one thought that cowed her, Una: Una whom -she had hoped to return proudly to her parents, a few days later, -rosier, healthier in body, if not hardier of soul—Una, possibly, laid up -ill, as a result of to-night’s exposure. - -By-and-by—an hour had passed—she was heavily, miserably, debating within -herself as to whether it were better to tackle the washout with draggled -girls on foot, or to try to light a fire again—stick it out on the -mountain top until morning. - -“We’ll have to wait a little longer, anyhow, before we could possibly -find anything ‘spunky’ enough to burn,” she murmured almost deciding -upon the latter course. - -Again the wet blanket of watching fell upon the camp. Suddenly—it was -well on into the second hour—a corner of it was lifted ... lifted by a -sound. - -Light—light so dazzling as to be unbelievable was stealing under that -blanket of misery. - -“Klopsh! Klopsh! Klopsh!... Klopsh!” There were distant heavy sounds -upon the mountainside. Something—something was struggling upward, in -heavy travail. - -“We saw bear signs upon the mountain, coming up,” moaned Una, -“stumps—torn—apart; bushes—” - -“Hush! Hush—listen!” The Guardian was sitting bolt upright—with a look -upon her face such as young Moses, of old, might have worn, when he saw -deliverance for his people. - -“Klopsh! Klopsh! Klopsh! _Klopsh!_” And now—now, with that nearing, -splashing crescendo mingled other sounds: whistling and complaining of -branches, upper branches, the sullen swish of lower boughs, through -which a passage was being forced; a rattling of little twigs against.... -What? - -And not one—not one of the wet and weary girls dared yet even to name it -to herself: “Wagon!”? - -Then, suddenly, one of them was on her feet and out of the cabin, flash -light in hand, in time to see a great, reeking farm horse, eyes rolling, -jaws foaming, lip rolled back from the dauntless teeth, plunge forth -from the mountain top spruces. - -Game leader, he was followed by a sweating, snorting wheel horse! - -“Tandem,” gasped Pemrose Lorry—and reeled against a tree, which splashed -her all Over. - -“Well! I reckon this storm would make the Day o’ Judgment seem a Sunday -School picnic, eh?” roared Donald Menzies, who managed the horse-farm -for Mr. Grosvenor. - -A giant figure, six-feet-four, in oilskins and sou’wester, he wavered -before the girls’ eyes—a beatific vision. - -“Pile in! _Pile in!_” he shouted. “Miss Una!... Where’s Miss Una?” - -“I guess the rest of us might have dr-rowned before he’d have come all -the way up the mountain—after—us,” pouted Dorothy. “Well! if we aren’t -the princess, we’re lucky to come in on her innings. Girls! A great hay -wagon—dry hay—a rubber covering to spread over us.... Talk of the -seventh heaven!” - -“I’d rather have this than—heaven.” Lura was creeping under that dark -rubber blanket in among the fresh, sweet hay, so dry and warm. - -“Gosh! I started in the thick of it,” Menzies was proclaiming. “An’ hard -work I had to make the top, with this mud-crunching outfit.” He pointed -to the dripping leader, whose whinnying snorts told the story of that -upward, raving struggle, amid peril of fireball and falling tree. - -“Did you walk beside them—climb beside them, all the way?” asked the -Guardian. - -“Yes’m. And I could hardly hold ’em to the trail, even then, lightning -searing their eyeballs—trees going up around ’em! But Mr. Grosvenor’s -daughter! To think o’ her being exposed up here!” The farmer’s voice -rocked to the swish of the “shoe-bree”, the water that filled his -waist-high boots. - -“Pshaw! ’twouldn’t hurt her—didn’t hurt her. We were above the storm—for -the most part,” declared Pemrose stoutly. “This is the cushioned chair -in which Treff said she was wheeled through life—always would be,” she -murmured to herself, with a cogitative wink, settling down beside Una in -what stood just now for the lap of the “chair”—luxury’s lap—this year’s -perfumed hay. “To-night, aren’t we in luck to occupy it with her?” - -“I can’t get ye back to yer camp ’fore morning. A washout on the old -mountain ’tween here and there!” The farmer was wheeling his sputtering -tandem, drawing the fifteen-foot hay wagon, now full, girls blissfully -cuddling close to each other, putting the rubber covering between them -and the last peckings of the angry rain-crow. “But, luck with us, we can -reach the valley—the horse-farm—by a roundabout trail ... though it may -be a ‘wild-bear’ game, going down,” with a grin. - -“Some tear-in-two jolts I expect,” prophesied Lura. “Ouch! -Beginning—already,” as she fell over on Naomi. “I always wanted to ride -behind a tandem—never thought ’twould be like this!” - -“That tall leader is a hero. I’m in love with him.” Dorothy lifted a -corner of the rubber coverlet, to peep out at the black form of the -plunging horse, tackling the miry, downward trail, lightning tickling -his ears, spent thunder hooting at him. “Oh-h! the wild-bear game is -beginning, indeed,” she screamed, a minute later, as the whole -mud-crunching outfit stuck fast in a quagmire. - -“Don’t mind if ye overhear some swearing in the teeth o’ judgment!” -growled Menzies whimsically, hauling upon his groaning tandem, in to its -knees. “Hi! there, you Yank,” to the game leader, “You’re all right; -you’ll come through.” - -“The Yanks are pulling through—pulling out!” gasped Pemrose. “But, -goodness! what an Adventure this is!” as the wagon resumed its way -through the torn, dark woods. - -“Lucky for ye all that this happened to-night—if ’twas bound to happen,” -murmured Menzies, ages later, as the mountain trail plunged downward -into a gutted road. “To-morrow, I’d ha’ been away.” - -“Oh! do you expect to be gone long?” asked the Guardian, leaning out, -with grateful interest. - -“No, ma’am. Not with two o’ my help missing,” came the grim answer; “one -off on a vacation, t’ other on his back with a ‘busted’ leg, broken by a -kick from a bad horse down in one of those concrete boxes—outdoor -boxes.” - -The girls, listening eagerly, knew well those great concrete-lined -“horse-boxes”, where outlaws moped and half-civilized horses, not good -enough to be trusted up on the range. - -“I guess, for one night, my son, Sanbie, and old ‘Burn-the-wind’, the -blacksmith, can hold the fort,” laughed Menzies. “I’m just making a -flying trip to Bennington, to buy grain,” came back the floating -accents; “double header—thinking of selling Revelation.” - -Double header! Kill two birds with one stone! But that stone hit -something in its way—the heart of Pemrose Lorry. - -Sell Revelation! The horse she had ridden all the summer. The horse who -had come to know her so well that, while he still coquetted with oats -and halter, once she had him caught, and saddled, he would look round at -her out of his almost human eyes, curiously saying: “Well! are we going -now? I’m—ready.” - -Now was when she got her tear-in-two jolt. Her heart jumped like a riven -tree—sank blighted. - -And here was where Una scored again; she owned her horse. Revel would be -sent up to the city, for her to ride. - -“But it wouldn’t be ‘sporty’ to show it—show anything,” murmured Pemrose -to her riven heart. “I’m too lucky to have ridden him—all—summer!” - -“Best—best horse in the Long Pasture,” went on Menzies’ musing croak. -“Expect to get five hundred for him. Only waiting till Mr. Grosvenor -gets back to clinch the bargain. And he’s expected home to-morrow; isn’t -he, Miss Una?” - -“Ye-es,” nodded Una sleepily, from the hay. “Ha! Farm lights, at last!” -She roused a little. “Horses stamping!” - -One horse stamped upon Pemrose’s heart all that night. She felt sorry -she had given it to him, to trample, thus. - -“But I believe he’ll miss me, too—Revelation,” she said to herself. -“Sometimes, when we were out riding, if we lay down under the pines, -he’d come and feel me over with his nose, to make sure that I was there; -I believe he’d have driven off anybody who attacked me.... Ah! lucky -Una.... But it wouldn’t be ‘sporty’ to show it.” - -It came almost as a relief, affording an excuse for pent-up feeling, -that when the campers got back to their own log cabin, at noon the next -day, a second loss confronted her, over which she might puzzle and rave -without breach of code. - -“Look! Look! Look!” she cried—and became, in a moment, the center of a -sensation, whirlwind sensation. “Somebody has been in here. In here -to-day! There’s a window open in our sleeping room—marks on the floor; -and my picture of Una, the one I had by my cot, is—gone.” - - - - - CHAPTER XIX - - A Girl Brigade - - -“Smoke! Smoke!” It was a cry from Frances Goddard and Naomi, the artist, -together. “Smoke! Smoke! Don’t you smell it? There’s a brush -fire—somewhere.” - -“It seems—near! The air’s thick—getting thicker,” the responsive scream -was from others, “oh! choking thickness.... Heavens! The—shed!” - -A banner of flame flung forth challengingly to the night air, at the -moment, left no doubt as to where the heavy reek was coming from. - -The gray shed at the corner of the Long Pasture! - -Twenty campers, twenty in all, had been preparing for bed—Devotions -over. Devotions and the singing of the Camp Fire hymn, so dear to -girlish hearts: - - “Lay me to rest in Shelt’ring Flame, - Oh—Master of the Hidden Fire!” - -And, lo! in a moment it was a consuming fire they were called upon to -fight. - -A fire—the realization swept these twenty chips of that grand old block -called Woman, like a wind which made their teeth chatter—a fire which -had unusual elements of horror in it. - -“The Pasture! The Sidehill! The Horses!... Revel!” The last blanched cry -came from Una. - -“If—the grass catches, they’d have hard work to save them. And the -farmer—the farmer is away—at Bennington. And his assistant was kicked by -a horse, has a broken leg. Only his son, Sanbie—seventeen!... Long -before help could come from the Fire Warden—anywhere.... Girls! Quick! -Dress! ‘Up to us’!” - -They were scrambling into their clothes again in a hurry, even as the -Guardian spoke. - -“Plen-ty of water! But the stream’s oh! a hundred feet from the shed,” -panted Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, helping Dorothy into her -sweater—then tugging on Una’s, fine and soft as the figurative cotton -wool in which this girl-heiress had been always wrapped. “Buckets, -girls! Every bucket you can find!” - -“Only—four!” Pemrose’s eyes in the emergency had the blue of the blind, -or bottled gentian, cowering in the smoke without,—the heavy reek -driving upon fickle gusts up the mountain or across it, now with the -awful carmine on its wings. - -Girls moaned softly at the sight. But there was no confusion. They were -accustomed to fire drill. - -“Our camp may go, if it spreads up the mountain. But—the horses!... -Brooms, too, to beat out the fire; dip them, wet them, in the stream, as -you run! Scrub—evergreen scrub—that’s good for beating out a brush fire; -break it off as you pass.... Could it, possibly, have been that awful -lightning?” - -“The storm last night! Nonsense!” Thus Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, -answered the excited chorus, which had in it no disorder. “The fire seed -couldn’t have smouldered so long. The barn we saw blazed right off. But -the wood of the shed—that may have been damp, still, from the -deluge—didn’t dry up like the scrub and grass ... caused the heavy -smoke. But—now!” - -Now the flames were rising red-mad—and gaining every moment. - -Pine, spruce, hemlock-scrub, the girls tore it off, broke it off as they -ran, those who, at the Guardian’s heels, were not armed with buckets or -brooms—in six minutes from the alarm the vanguard had reached the corner -of the Long Pasture, the eastern corner where the tool shed, a gray -twenty by twenty structure, had withstood gales for forty years. - -But they were not the earliest fire fighters. - -“There—there’s old ‘Burn-the-Wind’,” said Pemrose. “‘Burn-the-Wind’—and -Sanbie. They—they’re getting the stuff out—stuff out of the shed!” - -Mowing machine, tractor, harrow, plows, the two male figures were -hurling them out, the latter a long-legged high school boy—the former a -gray-haired, bare-armed blacksmith—the “wind” was now having its turn at -“burning” him. Both had galloped, barebacked, up from the farm. -“Burn-the-wind”—the nickname sounded cheering, in a fight frivolity has -its uses—who could, at seventy-odd, shoe a horse with his eyes shut, was -not in other respects very spry. - -It was Sanbie of the shankums, the long ungainly limbs, who had a -“leg-on” in the red fight. - -He had played the one can of chemical, with the little hose attached, -upon the flames—and still they gained—red-mad. - -The grass around the shed was catching—had caught. - -“Water!” They heard him shriek, Guardian and girls, as they reached the -scene. “Water! Buckets! Oh! fill ’em first and think about it -afterwards.” - -“He’s game,” gasped Pem. “If he was burning up himself, he’d joke. -Ugh-h!” She coughed and sputtered as the red smoke caught her. - -“Here—here’s another bucket,” screamed the Guardian. “That makes five. -Ten of you girls fall in, form a line, quick—bucket brigade,—ten feet -between you to the stream.” Already, at a hundred-foot dash, she had -filled two buckets herself, passed them to Sanbie who tossed them up to -the blazing roof. “Eight girls beat out—beat out the brush fire, the -grass ... take care you don’t get in among the frightened horses. Terry -and I will help the men.” - -The “wickering” horses were a menace. They added the last element of -wildness to the scene. Bunched together, in terror or curiosity, they -rushed up to the fence, along by the four-foot fence, at a corner of -which was the raging blaze. Necks arched, whinnying low and nervously, -or snorting madly, they would come to within fifteen feet of the Red -Horror, stamping even upon the lighting grass; the leaders, then, in a -panic, would wheel and dart off again, circling, cavorting round—the -mother horses stamping protest, with their fluffy foals beneath, or -their half-weaned colts beside them. - -Somewhere among them was Revel. Was that her plaintive “wicker”, her -whinny? It sounded as if she had been caught—protestingly caught—in the -darkness, the spark-swarming darkness, thought Una as, with a frenzy of -saving her more than anything else, the girl who had been wheeled -through life, softly shielded, took her place in the bucket line. - -Across the pasture to the little bush-fringed stream the night was -seized with a changeable blush, now a deep, furious black-burning that -faded out into moonless darkness, mystifying darkness, as the water -dashed upon the shed roof beat the flames down. - -There was not much hope of saving the gray old building, but, burning -furiously, it was a fire-brand to the whole mountainside. - -“Maybe, this isn’t some blaze! Bring on the ice water. Talk of your -broiled lobster, I’m a pretty good imitation!... Oh! shake it up down -there—in the brigade. Slide the buckets along—along—slide ’em faster ... -faster, if you can!” It was Sanbie’s prayer, with ever the note of -levity, to meet the flames’ hiss. - -And the brigade of ten rose to meet it, in ever-shifting line, the -momentary head of the procession of girls, stationed ten feet apart, -passing her full bucket to the Guardian, in the forefront of battle, who -handed it on to the scorched men—they throwing it as high as they could -on to the hissing roof—then the bucket was passed back to the breathless -girl who wheeling, made for the stream with it again. - -Thus making the most of their five buckets, Dorothy, Naomi, Beulah, -Robin, Frances—others—had all, in turn, headed the single line, for a -burning half-minute, seeing the brush fighters working in the red glare, -beating in towards the blaze. - -It was Una’s turn now. - -Her eyes very wide—fugitive and dark—her skin, naturally white and -transparent, glowing like a filmy lamp shade in the glare—panting—she -gave her brimming bucket into the Guardian’s hands. - -“Well done, dear! You girls are—doing—splendidly. Look out for the -horses, as you run back,” breathed the half-charred older woman, -grasping the handle. - -The fascinated horses were at that moment making another inquisitive -rush. They galloped up to within fourteen feet of the center of -excitement, threatening the brush fighters. - -Their “wickering” snorts circled round Una in the fiery seconds while -she stood waiting—waiting for her bucket to be returned. Awful seconds! - -A beam fell in and frightened them—frightened her, too—as flame and -sparks flew up; they wheeled and dashed off a hundred yards. - -“I wonder if Revel was among them,” breathed the trembling girl to -herself. “That sound she made a while ago—I’d know her soft ‘wicker’ -anywhere—it sounded just as if she had been caught—_caught_ against her -will.... Oh-h! I must save Revel. If the whole pasture were to -blaze....” - -Grasping the handle of her empty bucket again, she wheeled, too, and -made a dash for the distant stream edge. The brilliant patchwork with -which it glowed as the beam fell in darkened now into ebony gloom—the -red checkers fading out when the flames sank again. - -“If the fire spread through the whole pasture, Revel might not think of -jumping the fence,” she whispered to herself again, with the soft -earth-din of the horses’ hoofs in her ears—in her brain, it seemed, -maddening it. - -The ground was hummocky here—low mounds! And she was running very fast, -as she had never run before, to reach the stream-edge, leaving other -girls’ fleet footsteps behind. - -In a dark little bush-belt girdling a mound she suddenly tripped—there -had been nothing to trip on before. The bucket rolled away from her, -down into a hollow, black as a pit. - -The swift fall was stupefying. She lay for a minute—numb. A dark, soft -form brushed by her—she felt it was Dorothy, next in line to her, and -made no outcry; they were saving Revel. - -Picking herself up, presently, she groped for the bucket—found it. - -What! was the metal handle on fire, too? Red hot. It stung her—stung her -furiously. - -She rubbed her fingers across her lips. - - - - - CHAPTER XX - - No Answer - - -“Una Grosvenor!” A weary Guardian, who had done the work of ten women, -in saving the sidehill, in saving thousands of dollars worth of -thoroughbred horseflesh, in saving the whole mountain, was calling the -roll—a panting victory-roll. - -One after another her girls answered, some from the charred, wet ground -where they had wearily thrown themselves flat, without another breath in -their bodies. - -It came to the last name on the alphabetical roll; a name which to each -of them had a sort of lily-like aroma about it, savoring of a choice -lily who toiled not neither did she spin, nor look after young brothers -and sisters, nor earn her Camp Fire favors, yet who lacked nothing -lovely that Life could give—for whose sake a grim horse-breeder would -drive his tandem up the mountain in the thick of a raving -“thunder-plump”, to save her from exposure. - -“Una Grosvenor!... Gros-ven-or!” - -There was no answer, save the pounding earth-din of the horses’ hoofs, -still circling, restlessly—their blowing snorts, now quieting down. - -“Goodness! it’s as if she had dug a hole and buried herself,” said the -scorched Sanbie who, counting his burns upon the grass, forgot for a -moment the solicitude due to his employer’s daughter. - -“Hush!” said the Guardian sharply. “She must be somewhere near. Nothing -could have happened to her.... Oh! I should not have let her take part -in it at all. She was too precious.” - -“T-too precious!” sighed the hiss of the dying flames mockingly, curling -where a shed had been—it was the only answer. - -“Una! Un-a! Where are you? Oh! where are you, dear? Can’t you answer? -Don’t play with us!... Who saw her last?” - -But it was not like Una to play. Her nature was more woven of fancies -than frolic—even were frolic thinkable at such a time. And so the -Guardian felt, with a thousand pricks of burning in her body now, as she -put the desperate question as to who had seen her last. - -“Let me think; I guess I did—I may have done so,” said Dorothy. “I was -the next girl to her when she passed the bucket to you at the time that -beam fell in—and the horses kicked up such a shindy. I was behind her, -as she ran back to the stream, to fill it again—she was running very -fast. But when I got to the brook, in the dark, I couldn’t find her so I -helped Naomi fill her bucket—and we passed that back along the line. -Sanbie was yelling to us to ‘shake it up there!’ so I thought I -did—right,” wailed Dorothy. - -No one had any later news—not Pemrose, her play-marrow. _She_ had been -fighting brush fire. - -“Perhaps—perhaps she fell, slipped and hurt herself or fainted—fainted -with the fright and rush,” said Theresa. “We’d better scatter and look -for her. She couldn’t, she couldn’t have been kicked by one of the -horses—trampled?” - -The pasture burned anew at the thought, shriveled to a cinder, it -seemed, where the fire had been conquered, with the withering of girls’ -hearts within their breasts. - -Dividing into two search parties, one led by the old blacksmith, -breathing like his own forge, furnace-fed, the other by Sanbie—both of -whom knew the ways of excited horses better than the womanhood which had -helped them—they searched the Long Pasture, from end to end, hummock and -hollow and found no trace. - -Nothing but a wooden bucket in the dim brook—where it had been whirled a -little way downstream and caught among stones. The water had played over -it for an hour. It told no tales. - -“Ding-me-davel—knock me flat! The stream isn’t deep enough to drown -her!” puffed the exhausted blacksmith, drawing his bare arm, with the -whipcord muscles, across his forehead, dripping as it had never dripped -over an anvil in his life. - -“Some pretty deep holes further down,” moaned Sanbie, licking his burns, -like a dog. “Gosh! now you see her—and now you don’t,” peering into the -darkness. “There’s hardly any breath left in my wind-works.” He looked -piteously at the Guardian. “But we can’t do much without a strong -lantern—light—I didn’t bring one, galloping up; carried behind him, -’twould have startled the horse. Now....” - -Now, with hands scorched raw and lungs a desert, the young fire-fighter -was circling in the darkness until he cornered old King, most -good-natured of the bunch of horses on the sidehill—fast, too. - -Jumping on without even a halter, weaving his blistered fingers in the -cool mane, he started to gallop back to the farm. - -It was ages before he reappeared—while Guardian and girls searched -wearily in short circles—long ages before he reappeared with his dark -lantern carefully screened, so that no ray flung from behind ahead, -might startle even old King into shying into the ditch. - -And now his parched “wind-works” were swelled to bursting with a -discovery which, for a long minute, rocking deliriously upon his -bareback, he could not bring forth. - -“Hea-vens!” he gasped, at length. “Seems as if Something had visited us. -I counted the horses, coming back, Revel’s gone, too.” - - - - - CHAPTER XXI - - The Call of the Air - - -In the dawn-blink the gray dawn-blink, Pemrose Lorry sat before her -radio instruments. All night long, when she was not out searching upon -the mountain, she had been sending out the call-letters of every -station, near-by, within her New England district, seeking to get one -where she “came in strong enough” upon the air, to ask whether any one -had seen a girl upon a bay horse passing. - -At last came the answer from one mountain farm, “blanked out”, at first, -by a whining in the set. - -“Bah! like chickens squealing—that tube-howling!” she murmured restively -to herself—and dropped her head, with a dry sob, upon her receiver, for -she remembered how Una had once laughed at that simile. - -But the air had played true. Her call had gone home, home to hearts -among the Green Mountains. That young farmer had not even a telephone. -Radio was his one ear, listening afar to the world’s pulse. “Mr. -Grosvenor’s daughter—only daughter!” He flung himself upon a tired -farmhorse. A new Revere, he galloped to the next farm—to the lonely one -beyond that. He held up every belated pedestrian. - -Among these mountaineers whom the lost girl had entertained at her -flower party, were strugglers whom her father, out of his munificence, -had helped; now, it was a loan obtained on easy terms for one who wanted -to fight Nature for a farm and oust the “growing” rocks with backaches, -again it was a mortgage paid up on the eve of foreclosure. “We’ll find -his daughter, for him, if she’s above ground,” so stern men pledged -themselves. - -And, here and there, the mountains burned with lights, following upon -that call of the air. - -But, as yet, no signal had been sent up to say that she was found. - -During the earlier part of the night, following upon the arrival of -Sanbie and his lantern, Guardian and girls had sought up and down, but -without a clue. Una was not in camp. She was nowhere. Girl and horse had -vanished in the darkness as if the mountain swallowed them. - -“Perhaps she got distracted with the excitement—the terror—of the fire -and started to ride home—all that distance,” suggested one and another -of the girls blankly. - -Pemrose shook her head: “Never! She never would have done that. Una is -timid and fanciful, doesn’t depend on herself very much—has never -depended on herself—but to ride off, and leave me—us—in danger fighting -fire....” The girl shook her dew-wet head again, choking. - -And the Camp Fire sisters admitted that her play-marrow, heart of her -heart, knew her best. - -“But, still....” Here came the Guardian’s ordeal, from which she must -not flinch, but which, at the bitter moment, she would rather have died -than face. “But, still I had better go down myself to the horse-farm and -telephone her home. Her parents have just got back.” - -And now, in the dawn-blink Mr. Grosvenor was expected here, at any -minute. The Guardian and Sanbie, in whose young heart the laugh seemed -forever frozen black by the consciousness that he had better have let -all the choice “stock” on the mountainside perish than incur this loss, -were out searching slope and stream-edge hopelessly again. - -Weary girls, purple-lipped from exhaustion—heavy-lidded—white-cheeked, -had been condemned, as they felt it, to rest, or try to rest, a little. - -Pemrose flatly rebelled. “If anything, has happened to Una, I don’t want -to live,” she said in her passionate, tearless way. “I—I shouldn’t want -to live on,” with a quaver, “but I suppose—they’d make me.” - -Who was to enforce the boon of Life? Her father—her other -joke-fellow—play-fellow—Treff? - -There was a sudden sound of hoofs without the camp, hoofs slipping upon -rolling stones—striking flinty flashes out of the dawn, the pale, -primrose dawn? - -Pemrose was at the door, feeling suffocated. - -A haggard youth threw himself off a lame horse. It was not Sanbie. - -“Treff-ff!” - -The boy as he saw her face, held out his arms to her. She threw herself -into them. She caught him by the shoulders convulsively. And in the dawn -the tears came—washed her blue eyes in a silent flood, a silent, -helpless stream. - -“Treff!” - -“Una! Have you found—her?” His voice was hoarse. - -“No.” The girl shook him. “You-ou! How did _you_ know? Have you—heard—” - -“Anything about her—no! But I got your radio. Cut in when you were -talking with Station Y.V.Z. that farmer-fellow. Picked up enough, just -enough to know who was missing. Oh—heavens!” The young aviator threw up -his hands, rocking, groaning—looking as if the destruction of his plane -by fire had been a light “note”, compared to this. “Dad—you see he had -been telling me things—s-such things!” he finished lamely. - -“W-what had he been telling—you?” Through the girl’s lips, bruised by -suffering, the whisper could scarcely creep. - -“Merciful hop.... I mean don’t ask me; I don’t know where—how—to begin. -He only got back from his fishing trip last night—Dad.” - -“Yes?” - -“And he got me so worked up—talking, talking—that I couldn’t sleep, so I -was just making an owl’s night over the outfit—radio—for fun, you know—” -the young fellow threw out his hands again—“when I tuned in on your talk -with the other station. After midnight then,” he licked his dry lips, -“but I made a howling dash for the nearest farm, borrowed that ‘plug’,” -pointing to a lathered, drooping horse—“at night, wouldn’t trust the -plane.... Water! Is there any?” He caught at the collar of his khaki -shirt. - -“Oh! heavens—if I could only—begin to tell you, b-but—but I feel -up-choked.” He drained the last drop of water. - -“Don’t be a mope.” Pemrose grinned it at him, in fury. “Una!... Una!” - -“Well, you know that little figure we saw, queer little figure on -horseback, the day—the day I flew over the Gap, stampeded the -outfit—woman I said looked as if she wanted it ‘here’?” He touched his -forehead. - -“Yes! Oh! I don’t know why, but, somehow, I’ve been thinking of her, on -and off—all night. The—Little Lone Lady—all the names they give her!” -The girl’s teeth were just chattering now. - -“I mentioned her to Dad last evening, described her, you know—the slight -deformity, the big, queer eyes, made you feel as if she had a -‘nick-in-the-neck’ somehow—a peculiarity within, as without—oh-h! I’ve -met her once or twice on the trail—since—then.” He panted heavily. - -“And—and Dad he just leaped to his feet and caught at the camp table, so -that he pulled it over: ‘I’ll bet my life,’ he said, ‘I’ll bet my living -body! it’s that queer stepsister of Grosvenor’s—back—again ... not that -I would have called her queer long ago,’ he went on; ‘she had some -strange gifts—powers—that may be as natural as radio; she influenced all -our young set, in which she was, with them; she had a way of telling -what was going on inside us, boy, what we were thinking of—and sometimes -what was going to happen to us, too, that took our breath away.’ - -“Then—my gracious! he described her as if he had seen her only -yesterday—yesterday.” The boy caught at his collar again,—at his working -throat. “She was the daughter of Uncle Dwight Grosvenor’s mother, by a -first marriage, he said. Her name was Margaret Deane.” - -“They call her ‘Margot’ here—some of the mountain folk,” screamed -Pemrose. - -“And she always lived with Uncle Dwight, swayed him as she swayed the -rest, but he—he’s my uncle by marriage, you know—married father’s -sister, and that sister, Aunt Carolyn, simply couldn’t bear her. And -when Una was born—this was after Dad went out West, but he heard about -it since he came back—the feeling between the two women grew, for this -peculiar step-aunt just worshiped the baby, would sit staring at it as -if she saw something akin to herself in the little mite—Una—and wanted -to bring it out. - -“At last Aunt Carolyn couldn’t stand it any longer. She told Uncle -Dwight that his stepsister had got to go. She wouldn’t have her child -brought up under such influence. They were keeping it dark, until they -could find a nice home for her—but she cleared out of herself, without -saying good-by.” - -“And haven’t they seen her since—oh! since long ago?” Pemrose was -staring weirdly. - -“No—nor heard from her, either. She drew a little money that she had, -not enough Dad says, to support her, eked it out, he supposes by using -her strange powers in distant cities, as—as this woman has done among -the mountain people; and, in time, got to eking _them_ out by trickery; -she’d be a witch at that, he said, for she had a good education—knew -something of chemistry and physics.” - -“But Una—Una—you don’t think—” Pemrose was catching at her throat now. - -“Well—when I told my old Dad about that ‘elfin music’ we heard on the -old mountain—how we showed it up, played ‘choir invisible’ with tuning -forks—his lips worked for quite a while silently—you know he was a -terror at queer tricks himself—then he turned a sly cheek on me and -said: ‘That _may_ have been no crank of a musician, boy, out testing -bird-songs, or pine-songs—or pipes o’ Pan—or any of the rest of it. If -this queer little figure _is_ Margaret Deane and she’s lonely—longing to -see Una, the baby she so worshiped, and thinks the parents won’t let -her, she would be quite likely to work upon Una’s curiosity—or her -“hifalutin” imagination—in some fantastic way ... if only to pay your -Aunt Carolyn out. Or, perhaps, to get the girl off by herself into the -woods. She would have done it even when I knew her—and she isn’t likely -to have gathered balance, “a rolling stone.”’” - -“But—but you don’t think—he doesn’t think—that she would go the -length—the length of carrying Una off—doing anything to her?” Pem’s -voice rose to a shriek now. - -“I can’t help feeling that she has something—something to do with it.” -The boy choked. “Dad was frightened, too, when I woke him—told him. He -said for me to tear right over here— he’d follow when he got his car out -of hospital.” - -“But how could she—even in the confusion of the fire? The last Dorothy -saw of Una her bucket had rolled away.” - -“She managed to stupefy her in some way, slide something into -her—perhaps rubbed it on the bucket.” The boy was roughly pacing the -floor. “Got her, in a dazed state, on her horse.” - -“But why—why ... such a hor-ri-ble thing—” - -“Brooding resentment, perhaps,” said Treff moodily, “to get even with -her parents. Maybe a wild yearning to get Una to herself for a while. -Maybe because she has become quite unbalanced—Dad says people of her -temperament generally do.” - -“But Una—” Pem was fairly screaming now, her hands clutching at the pale -air, opening, closing—“Una—why! she’ll go mad herself, carried off like -that—by a strange, wild woman—away from us all. And she’ll be so -helpless,” it was a choking sob, “any other girl, Madeline, Naomi, -Frances—even Dorothy—might think of something to do—but Una—” - -“No-o, the bottom will be out of everything; she’ll just drop through.” -Treff stared gloomily out of the window. “But we’ll find her—together.” -He caught at Pemrose’s hands. “Oh-h! there isn’t cover enough on the old -mountain, nor kinks enough in the brain of that crazy creature, to -prevent.... Gosh! Automobile wheels on the road below—her father! I—I’d -rather crawl through an air hole, five thousand feet up, than have to -tell him this!” The young aviator’s neck writhed in its khaki collar. -“He idolizes Una—and his sister ... always a sore subject, Dad said!” - -“That’s why-y he looked so worried that day in the sun-parlor, when Una -had a story about hearing something strange, unearthly, in the wood; she -reminded him of his stepsister.” Pemrose’s lips were uncontrollably -twitching. - -“Well!” Treff was bracing himself for an ordeal, “I guess old Andrew -hasn’t let much grass grow under that car—has got here as fast as God -and gasolene would let him!” - -“Andrew!” It was a new cry from the girl’s lips. “Oh! Andrew would go -through fire and water for her; she makes him think of his own daughter -that he lost away back in Scotland. And he was brought up among -mountains—wild mountains! - -“He knows these hills, too—has fished among them—sent father and me the -trout, last year.” Pem’s hands were clasped against her lips, as she -watched the climbing figures. “Oh: Andrew! he can hear so far, see so -far ... it’s as if he saw into things, too.” - -“He’s a canny chauffeur, anyway,” said Treff. - -But it was no chauffeur who stood among them now, while Treff’s story -was repeated to Una’s stricken father; it was a Church Elder and a -passionate Highlander to boot—released from all ceremony and convention. - -“Gosh! I wouldn’t give much for Margot’s chances—wretched kidnapper—if -he tracks her among the mountains and finds that she has injured Una, -directly or indirectly; he’d wring her neck, as he’d wring a hen’s,” -said Treff, half-aloud, watching the ex-chauffeur’s grim face. - -But the latter was thinking of rescue, not revenge now; of the girl who -in her sweet democratic way had called him her “fuffle-daddy”, the girl -who was eye-sweet, the girl whom his wife and he had taken to their -hearts as a symbol of their own daughter. - -He clasped his hands. He flung his long arms to heaven—towering among -the reassembling search party. - -But the prayer which he prayed was the same which had sprung to his lips -when, a shepherd-boy among his native hills, he had missed a tender one -from his flock: - -“Noo, gin onything be lost or strayed—gin ony lamb be lost or strayed, -may the Almighty in his mercies fetch it back! - -“An’, noo, I’m awa’ to find her!” said Andrew, the Scot. - - - - - CHAPTER XXII - - On Little Sister - - -In a gray bunk of a mountain camp a girl lay, like death. - -The pink flush of dawn stealing through a small square that stood for a -window brushed her face, like a wing—and only made it more pallid. - -Near by a woman stood staring at her; a woman whose transient likeness -to herself, as the light caught her face, too—her too brilliant dark -eyes—made her a thousand times the more terrible. - -“Don’t shrink from me—honey,” said a voice whose scorching wildness had -a low hiss in it, like the hiss of flame around green wood in a fire. -“Don’t—oh! don’t turn away from me; I have been trying to draw you to me -for so long—influencing you, influencing you at a distance; some day I -knew I would get hold of you—have you to myself, to myself, for a -while—no matter how your parents might guard you.... And now—now—I -have!” - -The eager flame died down; and the poor green wood in the bunk, lay -charred by it, until the very sap in its veins seemed dried up—life -blood, as it were, ceased to flow. - -“I have hovered near you—near you for a year, precious—ever since I came -back to these mountains, my own hills where I was born.” The woman’s -figure, so pitiably “hulgy-backed”, round-shouldered, came to the edge -of the bunk. - -The kidnapped girl twitched, twitched spasmodically—a quiver only -noticeable in her toes and in the dark, curly eyelashes flickering -upward for a second to the red, spotted handkerchief around her captor’s -neck, but so full of horrified repugnance that the latter involuntarily -retreated a step. - -“I—I came to know your ways; I would watch for you early in the morning -on the edge of the wood near your home—which used to be my home until -your mother turned me out; but now—now I’m even with her!” It was a -bitter snap. “I watched you among your flowers, dew-wet flowers—and -wondered whether you had ever heard of me.... No-o, I suppose you -didn’t,” sorely, “but I’m your Aunt, Una, your father’s sister—half -sister, I suppose, the world would say—but I loved him as a brother and -could influence him—the powers I had!” The woman’s dark eyes flashed. - -Una shrank flatter—flatter—until in her abject terror she became one -with the wooden bunk. - -“But you, when you were a baby, a mite of a dark-eyed child, I loved -best of all—and your mother, she feared my influence over you. She -turned me out. I have had no home for fourteen years. I have been -lonely—hungry. But—always—I have dreamed of you; that, some day, I would -have you again, quite to myself—darling!” It was a hungry sob. - -“But I suppose people will say I was mad—mad—to carry you off, like -this, and because of means—means I have taken to try and draw you to -me—” - -“You—ar-re—mad,” whispered something in Una—and her flesh crept. - -“I knew your parents would not let me see you, but distance—distance is -no longer such a barrier, when a whisper can cross it.” In the wildness -of the woman’s look there was now a mixture of practical shrewdness, -normal enthusiasm, as her glance roved to what Una, in a lifeless way, -perceived was the “shack corner” of the cabin—radio instruments upon a -bench, or shelf, nailed to the log wall. - -“Oh! I’m not behind any amateur in that art,” said the Little Lone Lady, -with a flash of cunning, as if she had made use of it a good deal. -“Sometimes, as I rode near and far among the mountains, visiting -people—poor and rich—who wished to see me, I talked to _you_ by radio. -Occasionally—occasionally I sang to you, as I did when you were a little -baby, sometimes—sometimes from a station quite near your home.” - -The woman opened the door now to let in the daylight. Her eyes went -feverishly to the sky. Her wild croon floated back to Una: - - “Night is done, stars fly home to rest, - Perhaps in soft white clouds they build a nest, - Among your dewy flowers—dear....” - -“Uk-k!” It was an unintelligible cluck from Una; the little “stand” in -her right dark eye was weirdly set, in even blanker terror than -before—she lay in the bunk as in a coffin. - -Her captor looked at her; and the half-tender, whimsical smile which had -played about her lips, blew away like an erratic breeze. - -“But—but this isn’t my camp—” she tried to straighten her round -shoulders—“and—and when you’ve had some refreshment, honey, we’ve got to -ride on—on—your own horse is here—to where you and I can be -together—together—hidden for a while.... The Gypsies would hide us, -their encampment is over on Bald Mountain,” she muttered, speaking aloud -to herself, as she fidgeted round the cabin. “I’ve done favors for -them.... And search parties will look for her on the other little -mountain first, anyhow, if they suspect me, at all,” she added, with -that flash of needle-nosed cunning before which Una’s cold flesh crept. - -The woman was ferreting out a water bucket, as she spoke, moving, -indeed, as if the camp, a pine-log cabin, was not hers, although she had -made her own of it and kindled a fire there. - -It belonged as she knew, to two young city men, college professors, who -had locked their cabin before going off on a fishing trip, to prevent -amateurs from meddling with the transmitter and receiver of a very -powerful sending station with which they experimented overseas. - -Somehow, however, “Magic Margot,” with the cleverness of a burglar, had -found entrance through a connecting woodshed, the night before, because -she saw that the half-drugged girl whom she was holding on her horse -could go no further. - -“No! Even if the farmers should suspect me, at all—connect me with her -disappearance,” she flashed a sidelong glance at Una, “they would not be -likely to look for her _here_ first, on Speckle Mountain—Little Speckle -Mountain,” muttering more vehemently as she stirred up the fire on the -hearth and lifted the bucket. - -“Speckle Mountain ... Little Speckle Mountain!” Una was not distinctly -conscious of hearing anything; and yet the words sank into her -subconsciousness, as she lay perfectly passive, almost a dead girl, -while her captor opened the door, with a final: - -“The spring is some distance off, dear one. But I shan’t be very long. -Try to sleep a little—before we ride on.” - -She was closing the door as she spoke—tying it on the outside. - -Suddenly, as if remembering something, she slipped inside again, -fastened a steel creeper upon the heel of her shoe, took a bulky -umbrella from a corner—an umbrella that looked as if it had an unnatural -growth among its ribs, with bright ear-phones dangling from it, flashed -one half-doubtful glance at the stark girl in the bunk—another at the -complete wireless outfit upon that rough deal shelf—and was gone. - -In the same dim subconscious way that she had absorbed the remark that -she was on Little Speckle—Little Sister Mountain—as the girls called it, -Una felt the meaning of these maneuvers soak in through her clammy -pores: she had become too familiar with radio practices, during the -summer, to miss it. - -She was still beyond conscious thought. But, relieved of the flame of -that scorching presence beside her, lying a poor, staring dummy, upon -her back, against the rough logs above her, she began to see -pictures—and caught her breath convulsively at each. - -She saw the grass of the Long Pasture burning. She saw the gray shed -ablaze. She saw herself, running with others, to the stream, to fill -buckets. She saw black, shadowy forms of circling horses, stampeding, -galloping; even here, in the bunk upon Little Sister, she seemed to hear -the soft earth-din of excited hoofs—to wonder whether Revel was among -them. - -But, no—no, Revel was here—a captive, too! - -The last picture painted by daylight, growing daylight, possessed her; -she made her first hoarse sound, after night-long silence—a cluck! She -saw, did she see, herself tripping where the pasture was very dark, felt -the bucket roll away from her—now her cold hands clutched at the sides -of the bunk—roll away down a mound, while somebody shouted—shouted: -“Shake it up there, Brigade!” - -She saw a flurried girl picking up that runaway bucket, felt the handle -sting her, sting fiercely, saw her rub her fingers across her lips, -sucking them a little ... saw the fire become a red phantom, the meadow -a white mist. - -She knew that in the same bewildering mist, not unconscious, but numb, -powerless to resist, she had been led by a firm arm to her horse and -lifted upon it, while, as in a dream, the rush and noises of the fire -went on. - -And there had been a long ride up a mountain, while a hand held her on -Revel—guiding the horse by a lead strap. - -Only now was she remembering—thinking! Beginning to think! - -“And—she says we must ride further—further—where they won’t—where they -can’t find me. Gypsies—Encampment! Bald Mountain! And she’s mad—mad! -Maybe, ’twas she who made those strange sounds in the wood.... Oh! -I—I’ll go mad, too; I’m so-o frightened—” - -The poor green wood of girlhood rolled over in the bunk, fairly hissing -in the flame of that scorching presence still beside her—she felt it -beside her. - -She had a feeling that out of such a fire nothing could come alive. She -couldn’t, anyway—if it was really She who lay here, at daybreak, in a -lonely mountain-top cabin, with two gray bunks on either side—and a red -fire-cheek upon the hearth. - -But, no! The nightmare was too monstrous. The bunk held only a shell. - -The real Una, the guarded girl, was away, far away, with her Camp Fire -sisters. Why! she could hear them singing, singing their good-night -hymn, before the first foot of the nightmare caught her—before smoke -rushed up the sidehill and the glare burst forth in the Long Pasture: - - “Lay me to rest in Shelt’ring Flame, - Oh—Master of the Hidden Fire!” - -Ah! she had loved that hymn—dearest of Camp Fire songs. - -But suddenly—suddenly—her whole being became again a fiery stick, -shriveling, consuming, for, watching that changing fire-cheek, the red -glow upon the hearth, while daylight broadened, she realized that it was -Una—incredibly it was—who lay here, in a beyond-the-beyond of utter -terror—helplessness. - -Una who would be put upon her horse and forced to ride further, away -from father, mother—Pemrose—trapped—trapped.... - -“Master!... Master of the Hidden Fire!” She was feeling for the -life-tie, at last—wide awake, at last—gibbering, clutching with her cold -hands at the gray sides of the bunk, the outer bunk of two—with, -somewhere, a memory of a red fox trapped by the roadside. - -“Master! Master! Master!” Was there a Sheltering Flame? A Hidden Fire? -Anything that could save a girl now—burn up the trap? - -“Master! Master! Master!” She called it out loud, kneeling up in the -bunk, in the yellowing dawn, catching with both hands at her breast, her -blouse. “Master, help me! Save—me!” - -Where did the light come from; it seemed to flash all round her, beyond -daylight. - -“Help yourself,” it said. “Save—yourself! There must be something you -can do. Think—hard!” - -And the light fell full upon needle and dial on the face of the radio -transmitter, against a log wall, eight feet distant. - -She cowered in the bunk, cowered, as if she had been struck, looking up -in a ghastly way at the familiar antennæ running round the logs above -her head. - -“I never—could!” Yet, somehow, she was out of the gray bunk where she -had lain, coffined—the girl who would have to be wheeled through life in -a cushioned chair. - -“Master of the Hidden Fire! Now! Now!” She tottered, gripping its -side—but she reached that shining “shack corner”, the shelf with its -wireless litter. - -Amid a medley of plugs and jacks, used for connecting varied circuits, -amid shining brass and bakelite, was a little telegraph key. Study, -practice, at Camp Chicolee, had made it a pal—almost a pal. - -“If—I only ... could! But I never could—remember! But Master of the -Hidden Fire!” She tumbled on to a high stool against that shelf, the -table nailed to the log wall, dropping her head amid the litter. “We—we -had a private sign we always used, we girls. _She_ has a little receiver -in that umbrella, I know; if I speak, she’ll pick it up ... dot an’ -dash, maybe, she can’t! Oh-h! what first: light the bulbs, start the -generator.” - -Mechanically, with a glance at that dark generator under the table, -garner of power, she was throwing the switch, turning the rheostat knob -in the panel of the transmitting set, not slowly, carefully, as she had -been taught to do, to prolong the life of the bulbs to which she was -turning on the strong current. - -Much did a girl in her kidnapped plight care about bulbs—bulbs that talk -overseas! - -She slammed the rheostat on full, so that the fairy filaments in those -electric bulbs—the sending vacuum tubes of the powerful transmitter—just -leaped from dim to brightest—almost in a moment to white heat, the grids -and plates about them glowing cherry red. - -It was a cheerful cherry. It blinded her—her dull eyes. - -But it gave the girl with a face like a white cameo, who had been kept -all her life, as a gem, in cotton wool, a sense of power she had never -known before. - -“Master of the Hidden Fire!” - -She began to feel she was on top. - -Quite steadily she did the next half-familiar thing, closed the aërial -switch, connecting the whole set, cast a glance at the dial with the -needle on it in the face of the panel-like transmitter, to see if now -the miracle was working—the powerful set in action. - -“It is. The needle moves.... The message! If I can only send it out, -tell where I am, Pemrose—somebody—will g-get it! If only my head weren’t -so ‘whirley-hirly’!” piteously. “Our sign, the sign with which we always -begin a message: Di-dit-di-dit-di-dit! Dah-dah-dah-dah! That’s—it. Six -dots, four dashes.” The two first fingers of her right hand, pressing -the key, were ticking it off now, while her swollen lips murmured, -talking aloud, like her captor. “Now—if I can only give my name—or the -first letter of it! They’d know. ‘Dot-dot-dash’: di-dit-dah; yes, I -guess that stands for ‘U’. Where—am I? Oh! on Speckle Mountain—I never -can spell that all out ... and she’ll be coming back. What—what was the -abbreviation we had for it: ‘L. S’?” - -Straining memory to a white heat now, she ticked that off—both letters -clearly. - -“But—I must give it again. Pemrose—that’s what she said. Three times. A -distress signal! And that woman—” - -Again—again—she ticked it off, the bulbs glaring at her until she felt -their incandescence in her brain—light-headed, delirious—as if she were -sending herself out into the ether, while she tried to add to her -message and give the call-letters of the home-camp, beginning at the -wrong end, as she would be sure to do. - -“She—she’s coming!” - -Just enough presence of mind remained for her to pull the switches—turn -the rheostat knob again. - -“It will take a few seconds to cool off. But she can’t call it back—the -message.” - -Slowly those radiant bulbs, the shining vacuum tubes dimmed—became blind -eyes, the cherry-red plates fading out. - -But the current turned off from them was switched on—for ever—in the -eyes of the girl-prisoner, little white filaments glowing in their -lamp-like blackness as she shot back to the bunk. - -A knife, an old camp-knife, lay on a stool in the way. She whipped that -back with her. - - - - - CHAPTER XXIII - - The Ring - - -“I tell you I’m not going a step further—not going to ride any -further—until I stop and ‘listen in!’ This—this lit-tle ring-set,” -chokingly, “that’s why I brought it—brought it on the search.” - -“But, heavens, dear-oh! I know you’re in torture about her—but it seems -like—Jove! like shooting off peas at a battleship ... a time like this.” - -The nineteen-year-old boy looked distractedly at the white-faced girl, -who flung herself off her horse upon the mountainside—her eyes a “blue -day”, flinty—determined. - -“But it isn’t: it isn’t just fiddle-faddle—fooling! Your ‘soft-boiled -peas at a battleship’!” She stamped her foot. - -“I didn’t say anything about ‘soft-boiled’,” contradicted the youth. -“And I’m as anxious about her as you are.” - -“But, look here! it isn’t wasting time.” She caught at her throat. -“Father’s—father’s new crystal, you know—more sensitive than galena!” - -“Oh! I know your father is a Wizard.” - -“Then—be a dear boy and do this for me,” Pemrose looked up at him, -sidelong, coaxingly; “loop this aërial around that tree.” - -The boy was accustomed to find those blue eyes “too sweet for music”, as -he freakishly put it; before the agony in them and the wild suspense, he -found himself weakening. - -“But—but we ought to tear right up there.” He pointed along the rough -bridle path to a steep summit above. “It—it’s on this mountain, Little -Poco, as the farmers call it, that miserable thief-animal, -kidnapper—horrible aunt—who stole Una’s picture before she stole her—has -her shack—cabin—so-o they say.” - -“The farmers, three or four of them, are searching this m-mountain.” -Pemrose tried to speak calmly. “Her father has ridden—is riding—up the -other trail to the top. And we don’t know—we don’t know that she’s here, -at all, or near here. Word—word has gone out to every radio station in -this district, describing Una, asking whether any one has seen a girl on -a bay horse—so early in the morning we might be able to pick up -something, a hint of news; even—even this tiny—receiving—set—” - -She looked down at her outstretched forefinger—at the amber, bakelite -ring, coiled with the hundreds of turns of hairwire; at the “radio soul” -of the great inventor’s new crystal, shining softly—softly in the early -light. - -“Oh-h! I say—drop this foolishness and ride on.” The boy-aviator threw -up his hands. “See! The horses—they don’t know what to make of it. -Cartoon is looking round at me—like a nervous individual, with glasses -on.” He tried to laugh. - -Cartoon was bending his stubborn Roman nose to the edge of the dark -mountain swamp now, to nibble—failing to make sense of the halt. - -Revelation, long, lean, fast—shining in every hair, wet amber—rolled the -whites of his eyes, too, at his girl-rider, with a remonstrating: “Well! -aren’t we going on? Why stop here, on the edge of a black bog, where I’m -in to my hocks—the mountain before us?” - -But for once, Pemrose ignored that prudent horse-sense. - -“Will you stretch the wire, the antenna, out to the tree for me? Or must -I do it myself?” - -She pressed the fishing-reel, coiled with two hundred feet of outdoor -antenna—upon her companion, slipped the steel creeper upon her heel, -driving its spikes into the wet ground—the radio headpiece, carved with -Camp Fire symbols, upon her head. - -“Merciful—green—hop-toads!” The boy ground his teeth. “Folly—raving -folly, but I suppose I’ll do it.... Oh! so ear-rly in the morning, of -course you may pick up a murmur—dim murmur—but as for anything -important!” He shook his head—needing badly the support of the -hop-toads, as he uncoiled the bright, bronze wire upon the air. “Not six -o’clock—y-yet.” He glanced around. - -Six o’clock—six o’clock on a September morning, lacking that a little, -and a girl standing, presently, with her heel in the mountain bog, with -her aërial out to a gnarled pine tree—one of the scattered pines and -maples around her—with the red of the mountain fire-weed on her hectic -lips—a little faded, a little drooping, a little yellow at the corners. - -All around her the golden-rod dreamed—a shining dream. - -“She’s more stubborn than you are—old Sickle Face!” The boy bent to -Cartoon’s ear, flinging his arm over the horse’s neck, as he watched -her. “This is—mulish.... Oh-h! you may come in on a whisper, I -suppose—just the parings of a whisper from one of those boiled owls -who—who sit up all night over it and keep on into daylight—I’ve -done—it—myself,” he softly hissed. - -“Oh-h! hush.... Your—racket!” - -[Illustration: Pemrose was standing with her aërial out to a gnarled -pine-tree.] - -“Well! I like that. _My_ whisper couldn’t be heard a foot off.... Um-m! -I’ve kept the hush up long enough. Are you getting anything?” he -stormed, a minute later—a low, growling storm. - -The girl amateur’s lips grew a little more faded, a little more -drooping, at the corners. - -“Just a ghost—ghost of dot an’ dash,” she pleaded. “Very f-faint—far—” - -“Bah! Give it up then—come on!” He jerked Cartoon’s head up. “Let’s get -going! Give up this foolishness!” - -She half withdrew her heel from the black swamp—then drove it deeper, -the bog swishing around her. - -“I haven’t been five minutes yet—barely five.” She glanced down at her -little gold wrist watch—calm link with normal life—it was one which Una -had given her. - -“And I suppose you’ll waste another five—ten.” He resigned himself to -staring at the dim forest, pine and maple half way up the mountain side, -dark spruce above—in between the golden-rods dreaming—dreaming against -all the black spots on the horizon. - -Was he dreaming with them? His heart began to creep, to creep along the -waiting minutes—as it had not crept when he felt his plane side-slipping -under him, knew that he was doomed to a fiery fall to earth. - -The girl was pointing a finger at him—pointing it straight. Something -had come into her face which made his knees bend above their khaki -leggings. - -“Have.... Are you getting—anything?” Only his moving lips, his stretched -neck asked the question. - -A nod! A nod in which strange, bright crystals formed in the blue eyes, -to reinforce the listening one upon the finger. Above them the black -eyebrows were drawn together fiercely. The face, in its straining -effort, was pale as the meadow-sweet around. - -“Then—then stick with it,” he heard himself say hoarsely: oh! he _was_ -sharing the golden-rods’ dream. - -The horses seemed sharing it, too—they softly snorted. - -“Oh! can’t you—can’t you say a—blamed—thing?” - -“_Una!..._ Our private call—I got it.” The crystals, dissolving now into -tears, rolled down a face, set as ice. - -“I can’t—believe—you,” raved the boy, half silently—sullenly. - -“Faintly—clearly—distinctly—I got it: six dots, four dashes, the first -time. Second—that was indistinct; I picked up ‘U’; I know it was ‘U, -di-dit-dah’! Third time, ‘S’, I think; ‘L. S: di-dah-di-dit: -di-dit-dit’! Oh-h!” The fireweed lips were trembling awfully. - -“Location! Location—try to get it!” The aviator’s whisper was weird. - -Silence ensued, moments—ages. - -“Location—I did get it! It’s—Una. She seemed to be trying to spell out -‘Speckle’—I could only pick up a letter or two. But ‘L. S’, that was our -abbreviation for Little Speckle—Little Sister Mountain, over there; -sending a ‘radio’—a message—we always sent it, code or speech.... Oh! -she’s not here, at all—and, somehow, I knew she wasn’t all the time. -She’s on Little Speckle—at some camp on Little Sister—and she has -managed to send out a message ... Una!” - -A gulf yawned between the girl and boy into which all their previous -ideas dropped—out of which rose the most wonderful sunrise they had ever -seen; they stared at each other stupidly across it. - -“Oh-h! you may ride north, south, east or west, if you like—but I’m -going over there.” Suddenly Pemrose Lorry tore her spiked heel out of -the mud—out of the ground connection which had done its work. - -“Oh! unhitch the antenna—quick,” she screamed. - -“But—it beats me—” The boy hesitated a moment—blankly. - -“Nothing did ‘beat’ you! Even if I didn’t—didn’t get the ‘location’,” -she stamped her foot, “those two letters, the bungled rest of it, -there’s only one strong station really near enough for me to pick up -anything—distinctly—with the ring. That—that’s the new one over on -Speckle Mountain, just rigged up by college professors—can’t see their -camp from here—closed a few days ago, when we rode up there. -But—now....” - -She was restoring the ring to its case—that to her breast, as she spoke, -preparing to mount her horse. - -“Oh! you—you may ride to the top—go to the right and follow your left -ear, if you like!” The blue eyes snapped at him impudently—as did the -girl’s crop—in the incredible excitement of the moment. “But I—” - -He was going to the right, unlooping the aërial from the pine tree—in a -bewitched, protesting way. - -“But, for heaven’s sake! look out _how_ you go—where you’re going,” he -cried, five minutes later, following Pemrose on horseback down the steep -trail. “Don’t—don’t try to run him downhill! Better get there late than -not at all!” - -For the girl rider had started Revelation off at such a pace that he -stepped upon a rolling stone and almost slipped upon his haunches with -it, down the pebbly trail—sparks flying out, a galaxy, from his -hindfeet. - -“Hold his head up. Try-y to hold his head up. Bah! going down, -Revelation will leave Cartoon in the dust.” The boy rider ground his -teeth. - -“I’ll change with you, if you like!” - -“Do you think I’m such a cad—such a bounder?” - -But the passionate sincerity of the offer did more than anything else to -convince Treff Graham, aviator, that this whole thing was more than a -mere dream of the golden-rods. - -Sparks flew in front of hoofs now—whole constellations of them—hind feet -slid, Cartoon grunted stubbornly, the white star on his forehead moody. - -“Yes, going up, old Roman Nose, you could hold your own, because of -muscle; going down you’re not ‘in it’ with Revelation—not so nimble. -But, heavens! if that girl doesn’t ‘come a cropper’ before—the—bottom.” - -Treffrey, stroking his horse’s throbbing neck, grunted, too, appalled; -for his girl-leader, her hand on her saddle, was whirling round on him -again and the blue triumph of her eyes in the chalky whiteness of her -face made him feel queer. - -“Do you realize,” she cried—and rose in her stirrups, “do you realize -that if Una sent out that message—and I know she did—she isn’t dropping -through, as you said she would, she’s coming through?” - -“By the powers o’ pluck! It begins to look as if she was _crashing -through_.” The boy-aviator rose, too, high in his saddle—and in the -moisture of his eye, as its humorous brown speck flashed, there was all -the world of difference that yawned for him between helplessly dropping -through and crashing through an enemy, colors flying—the difference -between cripple and soldier, glory and defeat. - -“She—_she_ has to be gently wheeled through life—everybody looking out -for her!” hooted Pemrose—just as if she had not thought the same thing -herself. “Why! she’d make many a boy look foolish. She’s a—Girl. A Camp -Fire Girl!” - -She said it again. He said it, too, when, an hour—and more—later, a hard -climb accomplished, riders standing upright, at times, forcing the -stirrups back, to help struggling horses, the top of Little Sister was -gained ... and an empty camp. - -But what was this fluttering in the mountain wind, an indigo butterfly—a -bit of blue rag. - -“It looks—oh! it looks as if it might have belonged to Una’s riding -habit.” The back of Pemrose’s hand struck her lips. “She—she had riding -breeches on, that color; I helped her into them when the fire broke -out—first thing handy!” - -For a moment she felt as did Jacob of old when he, seeing his son’s rich -coat, thought a beast had devoured him—to what evil thing might this -fragment of blue cloth, finer than that of a girl’s sisters, testify? - -“Perhaps she bit it out, gnawed it—cut it out—left it as a clue, a clue -to searchers.” Treff was cornering the fragment. - -“Oh-h! do you think she could have done that?” - -“If she had presence of mind to send out the message—she could.” - -The boy-aviator’s face wore a look now as if the spot on which he stood, -might be holy ground. - -The next moment he knew it was. - -He was kneeling, bareheaded. Pemrose was sobbing wildly, kissing the -ground where among rank grasses, held down by a stone or two, were a few -drowsy wild flowers, of the sort that close sleepily at night—open in -the morning. - -Dandelion, daisy, a white clover blossom, its triple leaves unfolding, a -glow of orange, a little sprig of tawny hawkweed—devil’s -paint-brush—picked behind the camp. - -“Mercy! She must have looked round for them, arranged them so—so that -anybody who knew her, would know it could only be she who did it—at -least, we girls would—that she had been here—lately!” Pemrose could -hardly speak now. - -“And led that awful kidnapping aunt to believe she was only playing with -them!” The brown speck in Treff’s right eye, his seat of humor, blazed -as it had never blazed before—through a mist. - -He knelt, an unkempt figure, in khaki riding breeches—mud-splashed -shirt. - -“But—but her little flower clock! A ‘teeny’ bit of it!” The hand of -Pemrose caught at her throat. “Oh-h! I can’t stand this. Where is she -now?” - -“Wherever she is, she’s on top. And coming through!” The aviator drew -his sleeve across a wet face. “And we—we must get right after them. Just -a minute for the horses to draw breath—’twill pay! Do you—know—what this -reminds me of?” - -His voice dropped with his eyes to the flowers. - -“No-o.” - -“My old Dad, he was such a queer fish,” the young dare-devil’s voice had -the frankness of utter emotion now, “he could have given this hor-ri-ble -step-aunt pointers on queer tricks. Was a sort of a skeptic, too, didn’t -believe much in what he couldn’t feel or see. But—but, after that last -mad escapade, when he stole your father’s record, and lay in agony out -in the Man Killers trail, while you took care of him, he said to -himself—then—that there must be Something Very Fine back of it all—finer -than the girl herself—see? - -“He began to think and search—and find. My old Dad!” - -Across the fragment of a flower clock the girl’s hand stole into the -boy’s. - -He covered it with his other palm—held the finger tips for a moment -against his lips—then leaped to his feet, to search anew. - - - - - CHAPTER XXIV - - The Race - - -“If it weren’t for the trees, we ought to be able to see them now. -But—merciful hop toads! this trail is crooked enough to break a snake’s -back, isn’t it?” - -Treff Graham grasped it, ducking low to avoid the tall bushes and small -trees that almost swept him off his plunging horse as he followed -Pemrose down the shoulder of Little Sister mountain. - -The girl had started off recklessly at a fast trot—a chameleon-like trot -that was now a slip now a wild plunge—Revelation feeling with his fore -feet for a footing—and now a coasting gait in which he slid upon his -haunches; then the pace slackened, to become again the slip and slide -and plunge in which girl and horse, flashing amid the bright fall -foliage, turned all sorts of colors in the early light. - -“Are you—are you coming?” she shouted impatiently over her shoulder. - -“Sure—thing! As fast as I can come!” bellowed the boy; and then he swung -his whip and whooped, as the trail grew for a moment easier. - -“Camp Fire Girls on top,” he yelled. “Look—there!” - -Rising in his stirrups on the plunging horse he pointed to two white -arms stretched in benediction from the tallest tree upon the shoulder of -Little Sister. - -“If anybody found a trace of her, he was to signal the other search -parties,” young Treff had said, two minutes before. “The sign was to be -two smokes—or a white cloth waving. We haven’t time for the smokes—and a -handkerchief won’t show up very far.” - -“My sweater—my jersey!” Pemrose had gasped. “I can ride on in my -blouse.” - -“Camp Fire Girls on top, eh?” Treff let out another Western yell, as he -pointed to the cream-white arms burgeoning in the wind. “And, by heaven! -they are on top,” he cried. “They have crashed through. Una—what this -summer must have been doing for her! And nobody suspected it.... There’s -another bit of blue rag!” - -With a rearing swerve of his horse he plucked it from the bush on which -it had lit; the fine bit of cloth, true blue, cut or gnawed from a -girl’s riding habit—perhaps by the teeth of the girl whose brain had -been a fragile flower basket. - -“I suppose she felt that there was no use in putting up, trying to put -up, any open fight against that kidnapping relative,” he said. “The only -thing she could do—all that she could do was to leave such clues as she -could behind her. Well! we’re on their track, sure enough. Horses’ -prints in that swamp there, Revel’s among them, I’ll be sworn—toes -turning out! They’ve ridden down the mountain on the opposite side from -that on which we came up—and this—this is the blamed ‘cheekyside’, -too—of all the cross trails—” - -Already he was falling behind—gnashingly behind—upon the clumsy and -“winded” Cartoon, on the difficult trail that zigzagged over the -mountain’s shoulder among birches and red maples a few inches in -diameter, from twelve to fifteen feet in height. - -But the slender little trees, herding together, could screen from view -any riders making headway upon the lower stretches of that corkscrew -trail. - -“If only Una could know that we’re after her—hotfoot!” he raged to the -tormenting branches that swept his face. - -And one minute later the world rocked to the cry: - -“There they—are!” - -There they were, visible, plainly visible, at an almost perpendicular -angle, half-a-mile below, the little round-shouldered figure on the bay -cob dragging another dark object along, the hanging-back figure of Una -on Revel—Revel rolling wearily, as the trail widened, and tugging upon -the lead strap. - -“Ha-loo!” The yell which the young aviator discharged, then, just tore -at the mountain’s heart, calling on every echo in heaven and earth to -help it to reach the unwilling fugitive, the agonized girl, there below. - -Agony was in another girlish heart, too. The whole mountain blazed like -a brush fire, as she saw them. - -“Are—are you with me—still? Can you—see-ee....” she called back. - -“Yes! I’m—coming. As fast as I can! Careful—now! Better l-late than not -at all!” - -But that was the moment, the harebrained moment, when the boy rider, all -burning up within, too, disregarded his own maxim. - -The trail, the winding trail, was steep enough, but here and there upon -the mountainside were little precipitous cross-cuts by which a daredevil -could cut corners, gain an advantage, strike in on the trail again, with -a saving of a few hundred yards. - -One presented itself at the moment—a mere gash, lined with stones as big -as the rider’s fist. - -“Gee whiz! If ’twas a thermometer, the mercury would have hard work -climbing it, even in July,” was his freakish thought, thrown off by the -laboring excitement—the wild heartache, too—within. “Going down, I’ll -risk—it!” - -He put Cartoon at the stony “thermometer”—and in three seconds horse and -rider were seeing stars. - -Cartoon had slid and fallen. And a young aviator was testing the stones -with the back of his head—finding them more heartless than the flower -clock into which he had once tumbled. - -“Stars, moons and suns!” He sat up, gasping, rubbing his poll, while the -whole firmament whirled about him. “Merciful hop.... I hope you’re not -done for!” He blinked, half-stunned, at his horse. - -But Cartoon, trembling all over, grunting like a cyclone, had escaped -with bruises. - -“Well! we’re out of it now,” groaned the boy. “But Revelation won’t lose -them; he—he’ll come up after them ‘as tight as he can.’” - -Dizzily he was leading his horse down on to the trail again—while a -girlish cry rang back in piteous accents. - -The stony clatter had reached Pemrose. Even with those flying figures -ahead, now seen, now unseen, upon the mountain’s lower slopes, she -reined in among the baffling little trees. - -“It’s all-ll—right. I’m coming—along. Don’t—lose—them!” She heard her -companion’s fumbling cry. - -And now she knew, as she seemed to have known from the first, that when -it came to the last pinch, the last dash for Una’s safety, it would be a -race between Revel and Revelation. - -She was out on a road now. The trees were taller on either side of -her—but with great gaps between them. - -Heavenly in color they skirted the way: orange of a sugar-maple against -the quivering blue-green of a balsam, coral of a swamp maple, the tender -green of soft pines: and all reflected in the dark breast of a mountain -pool past which she galloped like a rocket. - -In her breast was the blackness of the water—the brilliant reflections -painted her hopes of saving Una. - -This wood road, an old lumber road, in which the zigzagging trail had -given out, wound, now, around the mountain’s side. - -And parallel with it—just below—ran a brawling mountain stream. - -Pem had a sort of feeling that, as long as she lived, she would never -lose the note of that stream—always it would flow parallel with her—it -and its cry as it umpired the race. - -It was going to be a tight race, that she saw. Revelation was lathered -all over—wet as if she had ridden him through the water. In the moment -that she had reined him in, his eyes had been wild and rolling; he had -pranced about among the bushes, neck deliriously arched—nostrils -smoking. - -The other two horsewomen were still an eighth of a mile ahead. - -Revel seemed to be going blindly, her neck stretched out, almost level; -now and again she slipped back a step and then—again—she rocked like a -boat; a quickly rolling motion that, if slower, would have been a -pathetic wabble—and Una upon her back! - -But the creature beside her was whipping her on, lashing her own tired -horse frantically, too. - -And the other pursuer, the youth on whom Pemrose had leaned, was now a -hundred and fifty yards behind. - -It was as the girl realized this and the blood seemed bursting through -the pores of her skin with the thought, the question, as to what she -should do when her gallop did bring her up with the riders, that the -stream suddenly burst into a jeer ... an awful jeer. - -“Don’t you remember that there’s a ‘washout’ ahead,” it said, “where I, -the water, swung in, some time ago, and ate back into the road: now, -there’s no road there, but a steep bank, a wild bank—clumps of sod ... -and Una can’t keep her seat?” - -The blood rushed back upon the girl rider’s heart now. Horrible sounds -were in her ears, as of a hurricane raging around her on a darkened -mountain as, standing in her stirrups, cowering forward, she whipped -Revelation on—coaxed him, by his love for her, on—_brave_ Revelation, -coming up after them as tight as he could. - -She saw that eaten-out bank descend at an angle of fifty degrees, its -snaring sod-clumps, wild bushes—girlish feet had once climbed it -breathlessly from below. - -“Una could never stick on ... and the woman is mad enough to force her -down it.... And can I hold them back?” - -But out of the hurricane came the still small Voice: “You are not -alone,” it said. “On this desperate ride you are not two—and one lagging -far behind—but Three. One is, surely, with you who was with Una when she -sent that message.” - -“But I can’t even r-reach them,” Pemrose was sobbing, a moment later, -setting her teeth, for though Revelation was gaining, “coming up tight”, -it was not tight enough; that breakdown in the road was very near—that -chewed-out pit-bank. - -“Father-r in—heaven!” The cry could not reach the girlish lips. The -figures ahead were but twenty feet from the washout—the deformity of one -plainly emphasized as she bent forward in the saddle, dragging Revel by -the lead strap—Revel with the martyred wabble, the neck so forlornly -straight. - -Una—Una realized what was before her now. She was rocking, too, rocking -fiercely, even striking out at her captor, putting up a -fight—ineffectual. But.... - -Was the rock near her suddenly cleft—the great rock above the brawling -stream? - -It seemed so—so sudden, so like a water jet, was the leap of a dripping -figure from behind it. - -Capless, coatless, soaking from a climb along the stream’s bed, it swung -before Pemrose’s eyes—and the whole world became a blinking washout. - -Its arm was round Una in the saddle. Its hurling grip was on her -captor’s bridle. It was between the two horsewomen. It bore down the -lead strap, like a thread. - -“An-drew!” gasped Pemrose—and dropped forward upon Revelation’s neck. - - - - - CHAPTER XXV - - Spring - - -“Aunt Margot is getting better—Margaret her real name is—and I don’t -know that I ought to call her ‘aunt’ after what she did to me ... but do -you know I can’t help feeling sorry for her. She was really unbalanced -when she put that through—had been becoming so for some time, so the -doctors say.” - -On the sidehill, near Camp Chicolee, on a spring day, two girls sat -talking. - -Below them, on the mountain, their horses grazed. - -“Wasn’t it lovely of father to arrange for us to spend our Easter -holidays, part of them, up here, at the farm—the stock farm?” remarked -Una, beginning again, on another tack. “And to have the horses sent up -here for us, too!” - -“And to think of Revelation being my horse! I never—never can get over -that.” The eyes of Pemrose rested upon the long, lithe shape—upon the -finely curry-combed coat glistening, amberlike, in the April sunlight. -“Menzies—Donald Menzies—didn’t like it one bit,” she dimpled -mischievously, “his being given to me. He wanted to sell him.” - -“Menzies needn’t complain,” said Una hotly, looking down at the tall -figure of the farmer out in the Long Pasture. “Father is going to send -Sanbie, his son, to college when he leaves high school, lend him the -money to go—a loan he never means to take back. They say that boy, burnt -and exhausted as he was, just searched all through the night I was lost, -saying: ‘Now you see her—and now you don’t!’” - -A little mischief crept into the rippling tones, too—fixing a stationary -star in Una’s dark eye. - -Pemrose sat very still upon her warm rock, crop in hand, gazing down at -the Long Pasture—its colts and horses. - -Seven months had passed since Andrew wheeled Revel on the verge of a -washout, where the road had been eaten away—months in which the two -girls had tasted the novel excitements of boarding school life, _minus_ -radio between their two rooms—and it was the first time that Una had -seemed inclined to talk freely and naturally of a wild ride up and down -Little Sister Mountain—Little Sister smiling under her April curl papers -of mist. - -“Yes, Mr. Grosvenor said the horse which carried me after you should -never go out of the family,” dimpled Pemrose, “and that, as I was an -honorary member thereof, he was going to give him to me,” arching black -eyebrows. “He’d have made Treff a present of Cartoon, too, only ‘Hop’—I -call him that when I want to tease him—said he wouldn’t have that old -Sickle Face, at any price.... But what put Her—I’m not going to call her -your aunt—into your head now?” - -“Father has been to see her lately.” Una’s lip corners twitched a -little. “You know she was taken to a hospital, very ill with brain -fever, after Andrew stopped the two horses on the verge of that -washed-out bank—Andrew has never stopped, calling himself a ‘fool-body’, -since, because he didn’t let her go over.” - -There was the faintest note of a chuckle in the voice now. - -“So you can talk about it easily; can you?” Pemrose glanced, sidelong, -at her friend, murmuring silently to herself. “It seems as if that night -in the cabin on Little Sister was a ‘canny moment’ as Andrew calls the -hour of birth,” with a mute little quiver of laughter. “And so—and so -She’s getting better,” she said aloud. - -“Yes, she was very weak after the fever and either couldn’t or wouldn’t -remember—things. But now she seems softened—sorry for what she did.” - -“So she jolly well may be—as Treff would say!” Pemrose kicked at the -grass with her riding-boot. “I suppose it was she who set fire to the -shed?” - -“She—she has never owned up to that.” Una’s lip corners drooped—there -was almost a squint in the soft dark eyes which gazed down at the spot -where that tool shed had stood. “How the blaze could have started -otherwise I—I don’t know,” quiveringly. “But she has confessed to father -that when she came back to these mountains, after living in one big city -after another, it was, really, because she was lonely and wanted to see -me—see how I had grown up. But she was so bitter against father and -mother that she wouldn’t even let them know that she was alive—so she -kept spying upon me invisibly—trying to influence me. As for her mad -idea of kidnapping me—carrying me off—I think it grew out of frantic -resentment against mother.” - -“But think how she went about it, the slyboots!” cried Pemrose. “Of -course she must have found it awfully hard to waylay you; you were so—so -‘peerie-weerie’,” laughingly; “so seldom beyond the garden, alone!” - -“Yes, and so she maneuvered with some of the tricks she played upon the -simple mountain folk!” said Una. “Her cabin was all wired for -electricity; at half-a-dozen different points, by touching an unseen -button with an elbow or foot—some part of her anatomy—she could set -invisible tuning forks vibrating—or some other—musical device. From that -it was an easy step to playing upon my curiosity—in the rôle of ‘Magic -Margot’ she carried some of her paraphernalia around with her, I -suppose,” with a catch of the breath, half sob, half laughter. - -“Yes, besides her radio equipment.” Pemrose’s black eyebrows drew -together. “Did she—did she confess how she managed to overcome you the -night of the fire?” - -“Father drew it out of her, bit by bit; she rubbed something on the -handle of the bucket, when it rolled away from me—you see she was -waylaying me then—some strong acid, so that when my fingers touched the -handle again it stung me—burned, prickled! Ugh!” Una lifted her fingers -as she had raised them, long ago, in the sun parlor and looked at them. -“There was a little drug mixed with the acid, so that when I rubbed my -fingers to my lips—as she guessed I would do—I got just enough of that -to stupefy me—at least, make me powerless to resist her. If that hadn’t -‘worked’ I suppose she’d have tried some other means, but she didn’t -want to hurt or frighten me.” - -“Well, of all the crazy cunning!” The other girl simply gasped. “I -suppose there was some of the same concoction on the little bunch of -wild flowers that fell at your feet in the wood.... And I—I wouldn’t -believe you that anything happened—anything unusual that morning! -Sometimes—” Pemrose slowly shook her head—“sometimes, Daddy says, I’m as -wilful as an acid,” laughingly, “an acid eating into salt—and it doesn’t -do to be that way, eh?” The blue eyes were mischievous, the lip corners -penitent. - -“But You! It was you who saved me. You won out against her—with radio,” -cried the victim of that unbalanced cunning. “It was you—you who picked -up my message—how I ever ticked it off, I don’t know—remembered enough -to tick it off! But you found out where I was.” Una’s lip was trembling -now—she dashed her hand across her eyes, one bright drop, dislodged, -fell upon the mountain grass. “It was when Andrew saw your signal, your -creamy sweater, waving from the tree on Little Sister that he knew I was -somewhere on that mountain. Immediately he thought of that awful bank, -that washout, in the road—then he caught sight of us and climbed—oh! it -was an awful climb, too, right through the stream’s bed, for a short -cut—was just in time to head us off!” - -“I know-ow.” Pemrose’s tone was very low. She caught an April cowslip in -the leather loop of her riding crop—there was silence for five minutes. -“But you—you yourself, were the real wonder,” she said, then in the same -low, thick voice. “Treff—Treff has never got over talking of the way you -came through—the clues you left behind you—bits of your habit!” - -“I carved them out with a knife I found—and she never saw me!” - -Was it a new Una: the mischief, shrewdness—young strength—leaking out of -the eye-corners? - -“And the bit—the little bit of your flower clock—oh-h! when I saw -that....” Pemrose’s hand pressed her lips. - -“In case the rags might blow away that was! She—she was watching me all -the time; she’d have noticed if I tried to pin _them_ down—the flowers, -she thought I was just playing with them!” More mischief, more young -strength, the lip corners curling up towards the curly eyelashes—dark -eyes twinkling. - -“But how on earth did you find your feet, at all?” cried Pemrose -desperately. “It’s what I’ve always wanted to ask you. How did you begin -to come through—‘crash through’?” - -“I think I found the Hidden Fire.” It was almost a whisper with which -Una bent to the Spring in the cowslip’s heart. - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur, by Isabel Hornibrook - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR *** - -***** This file should be named 62371-0.txt or 62371-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/3/7/62371/ - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/62371-0.zip b/old/62371-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ffae197..0000000 --- a/old/62371-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h.zip b/old/62371-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 471d940..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h/62371-h.htm b/old/62371-h/62371-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index bceb698..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/62371-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5636 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" -"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> -<head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> - <title>The Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur, by Isabel Hornibrook—A Project Gutenberg eBook</title> - <link rel='coverpage' href='images/cover.jpg' /> - <meta name='cover' content='images/cover.jpg' /> - <style type="text/css"> - body { margin-left:8%;margin-right:8%; } - p { text-indent:1.15em; margin-top:0.1em; margin-bottom:0.1em; text-align:justify; } - h1 { text-align:center; font-weight:normal; page-break-before: always; - font-size:1.4em; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; } - h2 { text-align:center; font-weight:normal; page-break-before: always; - font-size:1.4em; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; } - div.section { page-break-before:always; margin-top:4em; margin-bottom:4em; } - div.chapter { } - hr.tbk { border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; - margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:25%; width:50% } - table.toc {} - table { page-break-inside: avoid; } - table.tcenter { border-collapse:collapse; padding:3px; - margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; } - td { vertical-align:top; } - td.c1 { text-align:right; padding-right:0.7em; } - td.c2 { font-variant:small-caps; } - .poetry { display:inline-block; text-align: left; } - .poetry .stanza { margin: 1em auto; } - .poetry .verse { text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em; } - .poetry .indent2 { text-indent: -2em; } - .poetry .indent4 { text-indent: -1em; } - .poetry-container { text-align: center; } - div.cbline { margin-left:1.4em; text-indent:-1.4em; } - .caption { text-indent:0; padding:0.5em 0; text-align:center; font-size:smaller; } - .figcenter { margin:1em auto; } - .im010 { width:80% } - .im011 { width:80% } - .im012 { width:80% } - .im013 { width:80% } - @media handheld { - .figcenter { page-break-inside:avoid; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em } - .poetry { display: block; margin-left: 1.5em; } - .im010 { padding-left:10%; width:80% } - .im011 { padding-left:10%; width:80% } - .im012 { padding-left:10%; width:80% } - .im013 { padding-left:10%; width:80% } - } - .caption { font-size:0.9em; } - </style> -</head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -Project Gutenberg's Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur, by Isabel Hornibrook - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur - -Author: Isabel Hornibrook - -Illustrator: Nana Bickford Rollins - -Release Date: June 11, 2020 [EBook #62371] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR *** - - - - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - -<h1>PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR</h1> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; '> -<div>By Isabel Hornibrook</div> -</div> -<div style='font-size:smaller'> -<div style='text-align:center; margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto'> -<div style='display:inline-block; text-align:left;'> -<div class='cbline'>DRAKE OF TROOP ONE</div> -<div class='cbline'>SCOUT DRAKE IN WAR TIME</div> -<div class='cbline'>COXSWAIN DRAKE OF THE SEASCOUTS</div> -<div class='cbline'>DRAKE AND THE ADVENTURERS’ CUP</div> -<div class='cbline'>PEMROSE LORRY: CAMP FIRE GIRL</div> -<div class='cbline'>PEMROSE LORRY: RADIO AMATEUR</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<div class='section'></div> -<div id='frontis' class='figcenter im010' > - <img src='images/frontis.jpg' alt='' style='width:100%' /> -<p class='caption'>“We’ve got to ride on—your own horse is here—to where you and I can be together.”</p> -</div> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; '> -<div style='font-size:1.4em;'>PEMROSE LORRY</div> -<div style='font-size:1.2em;margin-bottom:1em;'>RADIO AMATEUR</div> -<div>BY</div> -<div style='margin-bottom:1em;'>ISABEL HORNIBROOK</div> -<div style='font-size:0.8em;'>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</div> -<div style='font-size:0.9em;margin-bottom:1em;'>NANA BICKFORD ROLLINS</div> -<div style='font-size:0.9em;'>BOSTON</div> -<div style='font-size:0.9em;'>LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY</div> -<div style='font-size:0.8em;'>1923</div> -</div> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='font-size:.9em;'> -<div style='text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; '> -<div style='font-style:italic;'>Copyright, 1923,</div> -<div style='margin-bottom:0.7em;font-variant:small-caps;'>By LITTLE, Brown, AND COMPANY.</div> -<div style='font-style:italic;'>All rights reserved</div> -<div style='margin-bottom:1em;'>Published April, 1923</div> -<div style='font-size:0.8em;font-variant:small-caps;'>Printed in the United States of America</div> -</div> -</div> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='width:80%; padding-left:10%; display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; font-size:.9em;'> -<p>The author acknowledges her indebtedness to Nawadaha of the Camp Fire -(Ethel V. Smart) for the songs and rhymes, and for some helpful -collaboration.</p> -</div> -<div class='section'></div> -<table class='toc tcenter' summary="" style='margin-bottom:3em'> -<thead> -<tr> -<th colspan='2' style='font-weight:normal;padding-bottom:1em;'>CONTENTS</th> -</tr> -</thead> -<tbody> -<tr><td class='c1'>I</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chI'>A Flower Clock</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>II</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chII'>A “Roaring Buckie”</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>III</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chIII'>An Awful Note</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>IV</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chIV'>Fathers</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>V</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chV'>The Magic Carpet</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>VI</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chVI'>A Gentleman</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>VII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chVII'>Fit for Fit</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>VII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chVII'>The Wee Hour</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>IX</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chIX'>Dandering Kate</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>X</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chX'>Hidden Valley</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XI</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXI'>Her</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXII'>The Shack Corner</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XIII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXIII'>The Long Pasture</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XIV</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXIV'>Revel and Revelation</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XV</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXV'>Wheeled through Life</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XVI</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXVI'>The Lip</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XVII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXVII'>Wild Flowers</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XVIII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXVIII'>Mondamin</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XIX</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXIX'>A Girl Brigade</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XX</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXX'>No Answer</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XXI</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXXI'>The Call of the Air</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XXII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXXII'>On Little Sister</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XXIII</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXXIII'>The Ring</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XXIV</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXXIV'>The Race</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class='c1'>XXV</td><td class='c2'><a href='#chXXV'>Spring</a></td></tr> -</tbody> -</table> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; '> -<div style='font-size:1.2em;margin-bottom:1em;'>ILLUSTRATIONS</div> -</div> -<ul style='list-style-type:none; display:table; margin: 0 auto;'> -<li style='margin-bottom:0.7em'><a href='#frontis'>“We’ve got to ride on—your own horse is here—to where you and I can be together.”</a></li> -<li style='margin-bottom:0.7em'><a href='#i001'>Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was.</a></li> -<li style='margin-bottom:0.7em'><a href='#i002'>“Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t it?”</a></li> -<li><a href='#i003'>Pemrose was standing with her aërial out to a gnarled pine-tree.</a></li> -</ul> -<div class='section'></div> -<div style='text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; '> -<div style='font-size:1.4em;margin-top:4em;'>PEMROSE LORRY RADIO AMATEUR</div> -</div> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chI' title='I: A Flower Clock'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER I</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>A Flower Clock</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Good morning, Daytime!” A girl stood upon the gray stone steps of a -Lenox mansion and, looking up, answered the first lovely smile that -young day flung down to her as, robed in pale pink and bluish bloom, it -slowly climbed the eastern sky.</p> -<p>“Good morning, Day-sky!” she laughed again—smiling all over in response -to that pink of beauty above her. “Well! this is the first time that the -Sunrise and I have been chums,” she murmured to herself, “the first -spring, I mean; I—I who used to suffer from the sleepy fevers more -than—than the ‘nappiest’ little flower in my garden.”</p> -<p>She laughed softly now, Una Grosvenor, known to her girl chums as Jack—a -gay bit of satire, by the way—and by the Council Fire as U-te-yan, -Flower, as she descended the gray steps into a dewy garden, where those -Rogues O’May, the late spring flowers, were still, many of them, -slumbering with eyes tight shut.</p> -<p>“Yes, you gain an hour by the daylight saving—or you think you do, you -sluggards!” she flung at them, a slight nearsighted peculiarity in her -dark eye flashing with pretty mockery. “Six o’clock, now, by my -watch—really only five—and there you are: chicory, tulip, wild rose, -pond lily, fast asleep still; poppy, marigold, daisy—and wild dandelion, -only just awaking—and one little belated Crocus, just one, dozing, too!”</p> -<p>It was with a smile, roguish and tender, tender as that of the dawn, -that Una stood still, cooling her toes in the dew, to look at her -garden—with its cheek, silver and pink as a baby’s, reflecting the flush -of the sky.</p> -<p>A large, old-fashioned garden it was and full of surprises, inclosing -U-te-yan’s blooming beds where, as a Camp Fire Girl, she had sown or -planted, experimented and transplanted herself; and it was plain from -the look upon her face that she lived in it—dreamed in it, as a princess -might live in a fairy tale.</p> -<p>“My flowers!” She dimpled imaginatively. “Oh-h! at this hour, I can -almost hear them singing to me. What is it—they—say? I made it up, for -them, before:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Good morning, dear Una! Good morning, dear Day!</div> -<div class='verse'>The gloom of the night clouds has all flown away,</div> -<div class='verse'>We kick off our blankets of mist, soft and white,</div> -<div class='verse'>And dress ourselves up in the lovely gold light,</div> -<div class='verse'>From rock, bed and border we’re smiling at you,</div> -<div class='verse'>Good morning! Good morning! Now, you say it too!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Good morning! Good morning!” threw back the caroling sprite, her dark -eyes dressing themselves up in light, too, as she impersonated her -flowers. “Now! what was it I wanted especially to do this morning,” thus -she silently questioned the dewy beds, “besides watching the sleepy -<i>flowers</i> open in my flower clock, my sundial bed—that’s the clock which -really gets me up early,” with a merry nod, “to study <i>their</i> waking -time, as the shadow of the dial hand, beginning to move with sunrise, -points to one after the other? Oh-h! I know; I wanted to do some -transplanting, ‘housemove’ my little Quaker Ladies, before—before old -Sods gets around. Now! did any of you ever hear of such a thing as a -crusty old gardener whose ‘really truly’ name is—Jacob Sods?”</p> -<p>Whimsically she interrogated pansy and little blue johnny-jump-up, just -opening its sleepy eye, daffodil, narcissus and lamp-like geranium -which, open-eyed, had kept vigil all night long.</p> -<p>“Humph! There he is now! I never can get ahead of him.” The girl -shrugged her shoulders.</p> -<p>“Lorie me! Miss Una,” grunted an old mountaineer who at that moment came -shuffling down a garden path, spade in hand and munching a dew-piece, a -hunch of bread. “Lorie me! Now, what be you up for so ear-rly! It ben’t -but—five—o’clock.” He pulled a timeworn old silver watch out of a side -pocket.</p> -<p>“Six—by—me!” Una glanced at her tiny jeweled wrist watch.</p> -<p>“Humph! I go by the Lord’s time, I’ll have you to know!” snorted Jacob -Sods, gardener. “I—I ain’t no ‘nose o’ wax’ to be changin’ round.” He -shuffled on, grunting.</p> -<p>Una’s tickled laughter rang out as she set to work to transplant her -little Quaker Ladies from what was known as the wildflower garden to a -sunny rock bed.</p> -<p>“A plant—a plant is a regular tomboy when you’re making a new home for -it,” she was murmuring archly to herself, five minutes later, her dark -eyebrows lifting over the busy trowel. “You have to make a nice little -mound of earth, deep in your hole, for it to sit on and swing its legs, -its roots, just like a boy or girl. And—and it likes a snug fit, too! -There now, my bluets are in a nice, comfy hole.... And the little Quaker -Ladies will never know what happened to them!”</p> -<p>She started. Something was happening to her. Breathlessly she kneeled -upright—earthy knuckles pressed against her lips, ear intent.</p> -<p>“Goodness! this—this isn’t the first time when I’ve been up early, -before anybody else was around—Pemrose, anybody—that—I thought—I thought -I heard a strange sound from the wood. There it is again! Faint -hum—silvery hum—all round us in the air! Don’t you—don’t you hear it?”</p> -<p>She turned half wildly to the Quaker Ladies, who seemed to be settling -into their new home to music—if music the faintest, vaguest murmur could -be called.</p> -<p>“It—it comes from the wood, but it isn’t the trees—pines or beeches—it -isn’t, oh! it isn’t any sound in Nature, at all.” Una waved her trowel, -in utter bewilderment. “What can be doing it—making it? That distant -‘surgy’ hum, rising, falling, murmur, murmuration! Silvery murmuration!” -The little peculiar cast in her fascinated eye, too slight to be a -blemish, shone, a morning star of marvel, now as she gazed off towards a -low, stone wall about a hundred feet away, beyond which was a dark, -slowly lighting pine wood.</p> -<p>“If I were to say anything about this to Pemrose, she’d laugh at -me—think it was all imagination. She’s—so different. Full of ‘pep’—a -radio amateur!”</p> -<p>The girl, the dark-eyed girl whose nature was more woven of poetry than -“pep”, who put morning songs into the heads of her flowers, continued to -kneel “possessed”, upon a dew-silvered stone beside the rock garden, -continued to stare, bewitched, at the dusky green of the early wood.</p> -<p>To her, the vague, sweet murmur which, like a silver cloud, enwrapped -her, was not unnatural; it was part of the fairy wonder of the sunrise; -of a May sun rising, dim and silvery, like a moon—like a young moon -calf—behind shrubbery trees.</p> -<p>“Extra-ordinary!” Her earthy fingers sought each other, restlessly -intertwining. “It can’t be a bee? Big, droning bumble bee—Canny Nannie, -as the mountain children call it! A whole swarm of Canny Nannies! But -there isn’t a bee in sight at this hour; and, if there were, ’twould -have to be a glorified—glorified one for me to hear it—at this distance -from the wood.”</p> -<p>She stumbled to her feet now, dropping the trowel almost upon the -long-suffering heads of the Quaker Ladies, and wandered down a dewy -pathway towards a point still nearer to the pine woods, where a gray old -sundial upon its four-foot pedestal, shimmered at sunrise, like a huge -primrose.</p> -<p>Around this U-te-yan, Flower had created her masterpiece, a ring-like -bed in three-cornered sections, peopled only by horological flowers, as -her books called them, those that closed sleepily at night, to open at -various hours of the morning, energetically or lazily, as the case might -be.</p> -<p>To the lovely flower clock, the blooming democracy, wild flowers, even -weeds, were admitted, side by side with garden aristocrats, in order to -find a flower, sometimes two or three, whose waking or sleeping habits -corresponded to the numbers upon the dial’s face—to the sunny hours -counted out by the pointing of the shadowy dial finger.</p> -<p>The flower clock had suddenly developed a tongue. The vague hum pursued -her here. Pale, spring poppy, uncurling dandelion, caught it, held -it—and winked at her over its mystery.</p> -<p>“If—if I were Pemrose now, I’d go right on into the wood, and find out -where it comes from—what’s making it,” she murmured to those waking -flowers. “The truth is, I’m too—t-too ‘funky’,” with a little -deprecatory shrug. “That—that’s why father won’t hear of my going -hiking, camping with the other girls this summer; he says I never would -stand the sleeping out at night—even for a few nights. And Treff, my -madcap cousin Treff, says I’d be such a ‘weer’ I’d turn them all -‘wuzzy’,”—a low laugh—“his barbarous college slang!</p> -<p>“He—he’s coming over to take Pemrose for a little flight, this morning, -a little ‘air-hop’, as he calls it, before breakfast. I—I daren’t go up -with him in his aëroplane, to hear voices among the clouds—his new radio -outfit. That must be weird. But—this is weirder!” The girl’s lips curved -silently. “And yet—and yet that’s not the word, either; it’s too sweet. -Gracious! Now I hear it, now I d-don’t.” She stole forward a step, -bending her ear towards the intoning pines.</p> -<p>“Now—now it’s like a wandering organ note. Oh! am I listening in on -anything by radio—a new sort of radio ‘bug’?” with the faintest whiff of -laughter. “Am I awake, at all? I’d give worlds—worlds—to go on into the -wood, find out what it is—what’s making it. But I’ve seldom been into -that pine wood, alone. Never—at this hour.”</p> -<p>Yet, as if that dulcet, wavy murmur, now high-pitched, now low-pitched, -faint, yet audible—increasingly audible—in the still May morning, were a -luminous belt, an irresistible power-belt, drawing her, Una was moving -slowly—vaguely—towards the wood.</p> -<p>She reached the low stone wall—the dark skirts of the passive pines were -only fifty feet away.</p> -<p>Each gray stone in that rough wall was now a ruby, reflecting the -wonderful amethyst lights in the sky—wings of that mild young sun which -had risen so like a moon calf.</p> -<p>Suddenly her hands clutched each other convulsively. Was she -masquerading, too? The morning had, all in a moment, become dim; and she -was the ghost of a girl standing down, in a mist, by a seashore—holding -a hollow sea shell to her ear.</p> -<p>“I can’t—oh! I can’t be happy—unless I find out what’s doing it!”</p> -<p>She sobbed it aloud, now, in light, breathless, seafoam sobs—all -irradiated, too—to the dewy flowers among which she stood; gay cottage -tulips straggling among sweetbriars along by the wall, each red and -yellow mite flashing as if, true to its legend, it had rocked a little -elf in its cradle the night before.</p> -<p>There was not a flower in the garden whose legend was not in Una’s -flower-basket brain.</p> -<p>This soft sea shell throbbing of the air about her, the faint, shrill -piping—now, again, it was high, clear, metallic—yet strangely -disembodied—fitted in with a dozen of them.</p> -<p>“It’s not <i>earthly</i>; it’s not,” she cried passionately to the tulips; -“it’s t-too fairy-like—too unlike anything I ever heard ... but I can’t -be happy, unless—”</p> -<p>A sweetbriar, herself, now, the unfinished protest a thorn in her brain, -she was over the low wall—and through the dim shadow gate of the wood.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chII' title='II: A “Roaring Buckie”'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER II</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>A “Roaring Buckie”</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>A pure, high note upon the air, a shrill, vibrating beat, as of a bird -or a woodsman faintly calling! Wordlessly calling!</p> -<p>But it was not bird, nor woodsman. Una stood still, near a dark little -pond, fringed with blue iris—May iris. She heard the birds with it.</p> -<p>“Goodness! can it be-e—am I dreaming that I’m Pemrose—Pemrose, -‘listening in’ on something, picking up sounds from the air with a -wonderful ring—radio ring—that her father has made for her?”</p> -<p>The girl looked down at her forefinger; there was no deep ring, no -shining cat-whisker, no shimmering crystal there.</p> -<p>“Or am I—am I going far beyond her, beyond any one, picking up waves, -sounds, without any of these things, aërial—or ‘radio soul’?”</p> -<p>The dark eyes were translucent now in the dimness of the wood, with the -vision that she, least practical, least plodding of girls—except where -her flowers were concerned—should be the elect of heaven for a new -discovery.</p> -<p>And as the elect of heaven cannot pause to consider, on she went, -through the heavy dew silvering the brown pine needles, sparkling upon -tall fiddle-head brake and cinnamon fern, occasionally upon the ebony -stem of a baby maidenhair upon a bank.</p> -<p>The woods were unspeakable at this hour—the slowly lighting May woods. -There was a little, stealing smile in them, a laugh too young, too -subtle to belong to this old world, at all. Or else the world had -suddenly grown very young—so young that anything might happen!</p> -<p>Una, herself, felt more like six than sixteen, within a near run of -sixteen, as she tiptoed over the trail of a sunbeam on the needles, -pausing now and again to lift one foot off the ground, lift it high and -listen—after the manner of the terrier who thinks that he cannot listen -satisfactorily without a paw in the air.</p> -<p>The high-pitched note, the elfin call vibrated off into faintness. And -now, again, she seemed to be standing in mists by a seashore, holding a -hollow shell, with a curve in its pipe, to her ear.</p> -<p>There was a throbbing of the air about her, a low reverberation, -swelling into a soft intoning, like the murmur of sad sea waves.</p> -<p>“<i>Goodness!</i> Now—now the wood is a ‘roaring buckie’, as Andrew, our -Scotch chauffeur, would call a big crooning shell that he’d pick up for -me on the seashore. I wish Andrew were here. If only Pemrose was here!”</p> -<p>She had a momentary spasm of faint-heartedness—of being once more the -timid Una, timid to weakness in all but the strength of her imagination. -She turned to flee—to beat a retreat to the garden, to her fanciful -flower clock.</p> -<p>But that hum was too alluring. A wood that, at daybreak, was a roaring -buckie was too persuasive—appealing to every fancy she had.</p> -<p>She began to feel like the ghost of some poor little queer fish that had -crept back into the clammy shell it once inhabited.</p> -<p>But she stole on.</p> -<p>“It seems to come from somewhere behind that log-stack,” she told -herself, peering through thick brambles and umbrella-like scrub of the -tenderest fairy green, at a great pile of crossed logs, their ends -gleaming, golden—a shack for the haunting shadows.</p> -<p>But when, taking her curiosity in both hands—if her courage was too -frail to be handled—she reached that shadowy stack, the mysterious -music—if music it could be called—had receded.</p> -<p>She heard it from a recess farther on—and deeper in the wood.</p> -<p>And now again she wanted to turn. But, at that moment, the soul of the -distant thicket, it soared, indescribably sweet, shrill, clear, like the -<i>vox angelica</i>, the angel stop upon an organ.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! I m-must be dreaming!” Yet, with hands clasped—carried out of -herself—Una pursued that fleeing organ-note.</p> -<p>It brought her in less than another minute to the pine-wood’s -battleground. Trailing, khaki-colored limbs of dead boughs, dead -soldiers, which had fought bravely with last winter’s record ice storm, -swept the earth, withering.</p> -<p>But among them there were other warriors, green recruits, whose flexible -youth had so battled with wind and weight of ice that the branches, -twisted, deformed, bowed to earth, were still green. Sap flowed in them. -They were one with the living trunk.</p> -<p>In some dim way the lesson of those young hemlocks went home to Una. Her -lower lip sagged as she looked at them. Some part of her—some part of -her—she began to feel it—was twisted by curiosity, over-wrought fancy, -away from her normal self. But it was not broken off.</p> -<p>Suddenly—elastically—it sprang back into place: “I w-won’t go any -further—after it; I won’t!” she cried aloud—and turned her head to look -around.</p> -<p>It was then that she got the crowning shock: yet as delicate, as -fairy-like—as full of glamour—as the others had been.</p> -<p>Something fell at her feet. A little bunch of dewy wild flowers.</p> -<p>Lace of the carroway, gemmed with dew, lavender wild geranium, its cheek -on her shoe, a lingering woodland violet with a tear in her eye, -buttercup, dandelion—ebony-stemmed maidenhair, fairy-like in its -pleading.</p> -<p>It was beyond Una to resist flowers at her feet.</p> -<p>She stooped to pick them up. Was there a nettle among them? Something -stung her. Stung sharply!</p> -<p>She was about to rub the prickling fingers across her lips, but with -some thought of the poisonous weeds which, as a Camp Fire Girl she had -come to know, she chafed them against her skirt—her sweater -cuff—instead.</p> -<p>But there seemed to be no poisoner in all the innocent little bunch that -rested its cheek so trustfully against her tan shoe.</p> -<p>Was it the tear in the violet’s eye that warned her? Was it the averted -face of the drowsy dandelion, still, in the woods, half asleep? Was—oh! -was there the faintest whiff about them that was not natural?</p> -<p>Suddenly all the daylight fled out through the tops of the trees, as it -were.</p> -<p>And, spurning for the first time a flower, Una turned and fled with it, -sobbing, tripping, stumbling, out of the wood—the intoning wood.</p> -<p>She reached the low, stone wall, breathless, wild-eyed.</p> -<p>“Preserve us a’! lassie, what’s happened to ye, the morning? Ye look -‘beglammered.’ Ye look scared; ye look sparrow-blastit.”</p> -<p>Never did a human voice fall more comfortingly upon a girl’s ears than -the rough Scotch accents which greeted hers from the other side of that -garden wall.</p> -<p>“Oh! Andrew, I—heard—” began Una, as strong arms lifted her over the -wall.</p> -<p>“I h-heard—” she raved again.</p> -<p>But the words were blown from her lips by another hum; a hum that seemed -heavenly, so loud, so cocksure, so mechanically humdrum it was—the hum -of a skimming aëroplane.</p> -<p>“I heard—” she began for the third time—and lifted her eyes to the sky.</p> -<p>They were blinded by a sheet of flame.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chIII' title='III: An Awful Note'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER III</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>An Awful Note</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Preserve us a’! It’s coming down. Coming down—a fire-tail! Driftin’ -doomward—down’ard—an’ afire!”</p> -<p>Andrew’s hoarse exclamations tore at the reddened air, even as sharp -horns of flame gored it, springing out from a biplane’s slipping side.</p> -<p>“Willa-woo! It’s side-slippin’—side-slippin’ down—afire!”</p> -<p>Old Andrew’s hand went to his head. The girl sank to her knees beside -her waking flower clock. For her the end of the world had come, heralded -by that mysterious pitch pipe in the woods.</p> -<p>The chauffeur looked, too, as if he heard the Big Trump.</p> -<p>Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was; a long, thin tail -feather of brightest flame streaming out from it to the little leaden -fish, two-pound fish, that held its radio antenna steady in the air, -kept it away from the controls—flipper and rudder controls!</p> -<div id='i001' class='figcenter im011' > - <img src='images/i001.jpg' alt='' style='width:100%' /> -<p class='caption'>Drifting down, a fire-tail, the aëroplane truly was.</p> -</div> -<p>Those controls were useless now. The burning plane was side-slipping -from five hundred feet aloft—in spite of the efforts of the one aviator -to right it before it landed.</p> -<p>It was but for a moment—an eternal moment—that the man and the kneeling -girl watched it, before it roosted, bird of thunder, in a tree top, a -noble white ash, over fifty feet tall, growing upon this side of the -garden wall.</p> -<p>The startled tree seemed rolling up the whites of its eyes in -terror—rustling the pale undersides of its crown of leaves—as the -burning plane landed and stuck upon a topmost branch; and, a second -earlier, the aviator, finding that he could not make a better landing -before the gasolene tank blew up, jumped.</p> -<p>As the dark, helmeted streak shot downward, it just grazed the old -sundial, which now counted one flaming hour amid its many sunny ones—and -landed right in the middle of the blooming flower clock.</p> -<p>“Dog out!” groaned Andrew and, with the hoarse exclamation on his lips, -sprang forward to catch it—break the fall.</p> -<p>But his long arms, his strong breast missed it.</p> -<p>With a soft, reverberating thud it landed in the dial-bed, right on the -head of pale Miss Poppy, garden beauty, who got the flattening shock of -her life at the moment.</p> -<p>One leg of the figure, rebounding, hit its owner, the half-stunned -aviator, below the waist line, after which he, too, drooped over, lay, -huddled, amid the flattened flowers.</p> -<p>“Treff! <i>Oh-h!</i> my cousin Treff. Coming to take Pemrose—up!... Is -he—dead?” It seemed to Una to be the ghost of herself that put the -question.</p> -<p>“Dead—no! My paley lamb!” Even at this moment the elderly chauffeur shot -a glance of fatherly concern and tenderness at the white-lipped girl—she -was to him a symbol of the daughter he had lost.</p> -<p>“Dead—not by a hand’s-breadth!” Andrew was kneeling by the unconscious -figure, straightening it out. “But his right leg’s broke, I fear—poor -lad. Hit him in the stomach, too, that blamed leg, knocked his wind -out—knocked him into as-far-land! Water-r, lassie! Water! A stream -near-hand there, by the wood!”</p> -<p>“The—w-wood!” Una stared at him feebly, making no motion to pick up the -little metal cup, blistered by heat, which he unhooked from the -aviator’s belt and flung towards her.</p> -<p>“Yes, the wood! Air ‘ye jacky-witted’? Oh! shame fer a lassie to be -ginge’-bread at sech a time. Well, deil-mak’-matter! I’ll go meself.”</p> -<p>But it was at that moment that the “deil”, called upon, seemed to make -the matter in question his own.</p> -<p>It was at that moment that the world went quite to perdition with a roar -as, aloft in the tree top, the gasolene tank blew up.</p> -<p>Flaming fragments, bits of wing that seemed wrenched from imps, red -imps, blazing splinters, scraps of wire and red-hot metal rained all -around the girl in the terrified grass—still blanched with dew.</p> -<p>“Warry!” shrieked Andrew. “Down, lassie—down flat, ere the fiery -off-fall hit ye!”</p> -<p>But that “fiery off-fall” dropped a curtain between Una and her visions -of the wood. In a delirium she picked up the cup—and fled, not back to -the wood, but to the nearest garden hydrant.</p> -<p>A fragment of linen wing, aëroplane wing, treated with the preparation -that was so inflammable, swept her cheek—a scarlet butterfly. But she -managed to fetch the water, her brief dizziness shriveled, like that -doped wing, into a frenzy—red frenzy.</p> -<p>As cool drops fell upon his face, moistened his blistered lips, the boy -aviator opened his eyes.</p> -<p>“Gosh! but this is an aw-ful note.” He blinked mockingly at motes of his -wings swimming before him in the red glare, at his aëroplane fast being -reduced to a blackened motor and a few twisted wires in the tree top. -“Aw-ful note!” He grinned.</p> -<p>“Aye, it is—my cock-o’-pluck!” gurgled Andrew.</p> -<p>“‘Pulled a bone,’ up there—a blunder,” went on the freakish voice. “New -radio outfit, shoved the power plug into wrong groove, short -circuit—wires red-hot in a jiffy—spaghetti all blazing—”</p> -<p>“Aye, the inflam’ble, insulating clothie around the bit wires,” put in -Andrew.</p> -<p>“Reached over for my chemicals to right of seat—” an amber-brown speck -in one of the boy’s stone-gray eyes flashed—“unbalanced plane, she -side-slipped, and now ... it’s three thousand for a new ‘bus’ and I -can’t take a girl up this morning.”</p> -<p>“Pemrose,” breathed Una.</p> -<p>“Yes, Pemrose. Pretty—Pem!”</p> -<p>“Easy there—easy there, with that right leg—my cock-o’-the-clouds!” -Andrew was muttering. “You’ve ‘pulled a bone’ in that, I’m thinking.”</p> -<p>“Ouch! Have I? <i>You</i> look as if I had broken every bone in your body by -falling a few hundred feet.”</p> -<p>The aviator glared at Una—then winked his mischievous brown spot.</p> -<p>She could not wink back. Behind the red note of misfortune was, still, -for her, the note of mystery: an echo that seemed borne from that -hum-haunted wood, the tear in the violet’s eye—a nettle where no nettle -was.</p> -<p>She lifted her stung fingers, where the prickle had faded, and looked at -them.</p> -<p>Still—still she was “sparrow-blasted” as Andrew’s queer figure put it, -blighted to the core by a trifle—kicked by a paltry sparrow, as it were.</p> -<p>And she had not been able to come back with even one little kick of -spirit—not even so far as to venture to the safe skirts of the wood -again—to the spring not fifty yards away—in the face of another’s need.</p> -<p>Her head drooped shamefacedly, her dark head.</p> -<p>There was a sudden rush of figures running, wildly running across the -garden, where a patch of grass and a tree top were now ablaze: her -father’s, half clad, old Sods’, others—a girl with blue dilated eyes.</p> -<p>“Pemrose!” She stretched out her arms, in a fair flutter as Andrew saw, -then drooped over and fainted, a lily-heart, beside her flower clock.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chIV' title='IV: Fathers'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER IV</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Fathers</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“But I did hear it—father.”</p> -<p>“You dreamed it, girlie—up so early.”</p> -<p>Dwight Grosvenor, father of Una, drew his hand across his forehead; -curiously enough, the rim of that high forehead looked damp—clammy as -the woods at daybreak.</p> -<p>“Pemrose—Pemrose will believe me that I heard it; that strange sound, -high piping—silvery hum. Pemrose will believe me.”</p> -<p>Pemrose Lorry looked in bewilderment from one to another—in the tempered -glare of a bright sun-parlor.</p> -<p>“It m-must have been the trees,” she ventured—her glance in the -direction of Una, the flower sprite, said that she was accustomed to the -whims of a girl as timid as she was finespun.</p> -<p>“But there wasn’t any breeze, I tell you!” Una stamped deliriously. “The -pines—the beeches—weren’t even stirring.”</p> -<p>Silent, for a moment, she gazed thoughtfully out at her May garden—at -the woods, the hills, beyond it.</p> -<p>“’Twasn’t like anything I ever heard before,” she murmured pensively. -“Not like any sound in Nature, at all! ’Twas like the fine small music -Andrew speaks of that calls the—fairies—”</p> -<p>“Andrew!” Her father suddenly set his foot down in relief—the vague -annoyance in his face melting, “I’ve a great mind to dismiss that -‘blellum.’ A fogy whose tongue drips folk lore as a rain streak drips -mist! Whose stories—”</p> -<p>“Ending with; ‘An if a’ tales be true,’ that’s no lie,” put in Pemrose -slyly, with a preoccupied glance at an adjoining room where, in splints -and bandages, a young aviator, with a mocking brown speck in one gray -eye, lay dreaming of his fiery “note.”</p> -<p>But, now, it was Una, petted child, who set her foot down, stamping it -again—stamping passionately:</p> -<p>“Dismiss Andrew—father!” she cried. “Andrew who picked me up bodily and -hurled me into the back of the car when I was out with him alone, six -months ago, and another auto, recklessly driven, came right for us round -a corner! Andrew who never thought of himself, at all—only of saving me! -Who—who was so badly battered—got some of the glass of the wind shield -into him—that he had to have....” She almost snapped her fingers at her -father.</p> -<p>“There! There, child! Of course I didn’t mean it.” The latter patted her -shoulder soothingly. “But I wish he’d shed his Scotch mists, anywhere -but in your ears.”</p> -<p>“Well—well, Andrew had nothing to do with this,” insisted Una, after a -cooling minute. “I did hear it, that funny—piping—hum. The Quaker Ladies -heard it, too—” her eyebrows arching merrily—“and <i>they</i> thought ’twas -like the ringing and singing in harebells—”</p> -<p>“There now, Jack! There now!” Her father threw up his hands as he called -his only daughter by the name, occasionally, thrust upon her by her girl -chums, as a satire upon the “betty” element in her being so strong—on -her being as far as possible removed from what might, possibly, be known -as a “lassie-boy.” “There you are! You’re just steeped to the ears in -these flower legends, very finespun and poetic—but too airy an -atmosphere for a girl like you, with an imagination that ‘works -overtime.’ Oh! I’m glad of your new interest in your flowers; it -overcame your—”</p> -<p>“‘Sleepy fivvers,’” put in Una archly. “You used to say I was as lazy as -the white Star of Bethlehem, Daddy dear, and she’s a perfect dormouse, -garden dormouse—the little ‘ten o’ clock.’”</p> -<p>“But I—I’d like to see my little girl interested in something else, too, -to keep her earth-fast.” Mr. Grosvenor laid his arm tenderly around the -shoulders of his only child. “How—how about learning to run one of my -big cars? How about becoming interested in radio, like your friend -Pemrose? Oh-h! not in listening in on a concert. The laziest -lubber-sprite could do that!” with a laugh. “But in riding the whirlwind -and directing the storm,” gayly, “the jumble of noises coming through -the air taking you by storm. I declare if you could once gossip -familiarly of vacuum tube and variometer, current and condenser; if you -could pick up one sentence—one word even—from the dot and dash with -which the air is forever ticking, I might—”</p> -<p>“What! code. Telegraphy that—that horrid teaser!”</p> -<p>Una curled up like the finical Star of Bethlehem before the blinding -beat of a thunder shower.</p> -<p>“I might,” Mr. Grosvenor went on, unheeding, swinging his eyeglasses -judicially, “I might, even, decide that you were stern enough stuff, hot -stuff enough, to go into camp with the other girls, this summer, and not -infect them all with ‘peerie-weerie’ fears—fancies.”</p> -<p>“To camp!” It was a little diverted scream. “Oh! father, you know I’m -dying to go—go with Pemrose.”</p> -<p>“Well! I’m beginning to think it might really be better for you than -staying here under the care of a governess, while I—while I make a -flying trip, business trip, to Europe—and your mother goes to bring me -back,” with a shrug. “When do you start? What are your hiking plans?” -The big man of affairs, banker, financier, turned to Pemrose.</p> -<p>“Oh! we leave here—I leave here on the tenth of July, seven weeks from -now, to pick up my Camp Fire sisters just over the Massachusetts line, -where we follow the Greylock Trail until we strike the Long Trail -winding right through the Green Mountains, from end to end.”</p> -<p>The girl paused, the lure of the Long Trail unwinding itself remotely in -her blue eyes.</p> -<p>“But we don’t follow that, for long, either; we branch off along other -mountain trails and—and little snaky, brown roads that stand on their -hind legs and grope for the sky,” laughingly, “until—until—four days’ -hiking and sleeping out at night—” Pemrose waved a letter, just -received—“we come to Mount Pocohosette at the heart of the Green -Mountains—”</p> -<p>“Pocohosette!” Una sprang erect and clapped her hands. “Why—why that’s -where your horse-farm is, Daddy, and I’ve never—never been up there.”</p> -<p>“I only bought it and stocked it last year, down in the valley, the rich -bottom lands at the foot, and put a ‘canny’ farmer in charge of my -Morgan thoroughbreds.” Mr. Grosvenor laughed. “Well, go on with your -program,” he looked at Pemrose.</p> -<p>“The mountain is very wild, so I understand—adventure by the yard!” -beamed the blue-eyed girl. “A—a rocky Balcony, half way up, where you -can stand on the lip of nothing and look down!”</p> -<p>“Oh-h! lovely,” shivered Una; for her such a breakneck blank had a -fascination—fancy could always people it.</p> -<p>“The Guardian—Guardian of our Camp Fire Group hopes to rent some old -farmhouse for a week or two.” Pemrose glanced at her letter.</p> -<p>“How about a month or two—eh?” The fluttering eyeglasses in Mr. -Grosvenor’s hand reflected, now, the deepest twinkle in the eye above -them—is there any role more gratifying to a “high-powered” humanitarian -than to play fairy godfather to a group of girls? “If—if I might -suggest,” he said slowly, “there’s a jolly nice sort of camp—pine-log -cabin—there already, on the breezy sidehill, just a mile and a half -above the horse-farm, which I used for hunting quarters, before I was -seized with the passion for raising Morgan horses. If your Group will -accept the loan of it ... there, I’ll write to the Guardian to-day.”</p> -<p>“Oh-h! Mr. Grosvenor....” The light fairly swooned in Pemrose’s blue -eyes.</p> -<p>“And if this daughter of mine will only strike a bargain on the dot and -dash ‘teaser’ just to show that she isn’t entirely such stuff as dreams -are made of,” with a laugh, “I might have radio installed for you—so -that you can, now and again, tune in on a concert, while camping on the -edge of nothing.”</p> -<p>“Boys—boys say that they have a respect for any ‘O. G.: Old Girl’, radio -slang, who can master code—the ‘crutch’, as they call it—because she has -to set her back to the wall to do it,” put in Pemrose roguishly. “And -then—” her hand went up, in excitement, to her dimpling chin—“we -wouldn’t have to depend altogether on my magic ring, radio ring, for -any—any little gleanings from the air.”</p> -<p>“Magic ring—humph!” The fairy godfather’s eyebrows were lifted—just a -little superciliously. “What can you pick up with a gewgaw like that—toy -set like that? Firing pellets at the moon, eh?” he winked quizzically.</p> -<p>“You forget—you forget that my father is an inventor, sir, and that he -has invented—discovered—a new crystal—‘radio soul’—which is an amplifier -as well as a detector!” Pemrose’s back was up and to the wall now, her -blue eyes flashing. “He—oh, he stumbled upon it while experimenting for -my ring. We all know that crystals up to this time have been crude -affairs,” vouchsafed the girlish radio fan, her chin in the air.</p> -<p>“A one-stage amplifier, I suppose—as well as a detector, sorting out -sounds from the air!” Mr. Grosvenor gasped.</p> -<p>“Oh, by George! child, I did forget that your father is the archwizard -who <i>has</i> bombarded the moon with something more ponderable than -pellets. If any one can achieve the impossible—”</p> -<p>“He could have made me a ring with just an ordinary galena crystal, or -silicon,” murmured Pemrose shyly, as the great man paused, “with which I -could have picked up waves—sounds—not very far off. But—with this—my two -hundred feet of aërial out to a tree, my spiked heel in the mud,” -laughingly, “early in the morning, especially, I can—can glean snatches -of everything within five or six miles; further—further, if it’s dot an’ -dash—a powerful station sending!”</p> -<p>“Oh, by Jove! I can fancy you standing round, out-of-doors, after -daybreak, with your shining halo—headpiece—on.” The tall man threw back -his shoulders, with a chuckle. “Well! maybe, you’ll be the woman with -power on her head who can ride Revelation.” He winked. “Revelation, son -of Revel, Morgan bay, fifteen hands high, good-natured, -well-trained—bridle-wise—but needing a rider with ‘pep’ to handle him!”</p> -<p>“I rode with father all last summer.” The “pep” leaked out of Pemrose’s -whisper into her red cheeks now—the sunburst of luck was too suffusing.</p> -<p>“Oh! there will be eight or nine horses, I expect, out in the Long -Pasture, on the sidehill. You girls can take turns in riding. Revel, -gentle little mother-horse—a baby could ride her—I meant to have her -brought down here this summer, for Una.”</p> -<p>“And—and I can ride her, up there, father!” Una flung her arms around -him—a clinging vine. Suddenly, however, she raised her head, as if -afraid that she might be riding Revel in a false habit. “But I did -hear-r it, father,” she persisted, “that silvery murmur—hum. And, oh! -that wasn’t all—only you’re so unbelieving. While I was listening, -wondering—wondering whether I could be strung on wires,” half -laughingly, half fearfully, “picking up sounds by radio, something fell -at my feet. A little bunch of wild flowers! I touched them. Something -stung me.”</p> -<p>Again she held up her slim fingers and looked at them curiously.</p> -<p>“Well, it left ‘nor mark nor burn’, child,” chaffed her father, catching -the hand and examining it, too. “Bah! Some boy playing a trick on -you—playing on a Jew’s harp! Don’t go into the wood again so—early—”</p> -<p>“It wasn’t! It wasn’t!” Passionately the vine tore itself from its -pedestal and maintained its own independent conviction.</p> -<p>But as Una caught the cloud, the vague cloud, descending again upon her -father’s face, her soft flower-heart capitulated.</p> -<p>“Well! all right, Daddy, if you want me to think that, I will—I’ll try -to,” she pledged. “You’re the dearest prince of a father ever was—and I -wouldn’t exchange you even for Pemrose’s Wizard,” with a little <i>moue</i>, -a little grimace in the direction of the other girl, who had turned -aside and was looking out through the plateglass panels towards the -mountains.</p> -<p>“There—I haven’t done your hair this morning, yet.”</p> -<p>Una pressed her father into a low wicker chair, perched upon his knee -and began twisting the dark, graying locks around her finger.</p> -<p>Pemrose, over her shoulder, watched them smilingly. She had no cause for -envy, she who wore a Wizard’s ring.</p> -<p>“Revel and Revelation!” she murmured beatifically. “But why-y did he -look so upset if he, really, didn’t believe that Una heard anything -unusual in the wood ... now, that’s what I’d like to know!”</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chV' title='V: The Magic Carpet'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER V</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Magic Carpet</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Well—‘Jack!’ Hullo, Unie! Haven’t you said good-bye to your flower -clock yet? Good-bye for six weeks to your flower clock! Oh-h! I’m so -excited over the start I just don’t know what to do with myself.”</p> -<p>Pemrose Lorry danced down the dew-blanched steps of the Grosvenor -mansion, at Lenox, just a little earlier, as clock and dial hand went, -than the “mornie” hour at which Una had descended them, seven weeks -before, with electrifying results.</p> -<p>The sun was in the act of rising, no May moon-calf now, but a summer -Sultan, proclaiming that July was here: Moon of Thunder, but moon of -summer idylls, too, of wonderful shadows in the triple greens of brooks, -of cardinal flowers fairly “smashing” across the eye with their joy of -color in mountain passes—the ideal month for campers.</p> -<p>The garden, the great, terraced garden, seemed to have paled a little in -July heat from its flush of June joy.</p> -<p>White flowers predominated—or light ones.</p> -<p>But, here and there, blue larkspur raised its dewy spires, one with the -dancing tint of the girl’s eyes.</p> -<p>Gladioli and hollyhocks, tall pages of the rising sun, in their -salmon-pink and crimson, bent to awaken their neighbor, the yellow tiger -lily, one of the flowers admitted to the lovely democracy of the sundial -bed, the flower clock, because it closed sleepily at night, to open at a -rather late hour of the morning—as would the dreaming carnation.</p> -<p>Una—Una was saying good-by to that dewy flower clock now, for which she -had won a Camp Fire honor for creation—original creation—or if the idea, -old as the hills as all ideas are, had been in the “flower-bab” brain of -some old botanist, a couple of hundred years before, it had been born -anew, impromptu, in hers: she had risen early and watched late, to work -it out.</p> -<p>Old Sods, who spurned daylight saving, going by any but the Lord’s time, -established custom, had repaired the pretty floral clock after the rude -shock of an aviator’s crashing down upon the heads of the sleeping -flowers.</p> -<p>Like Andrew, the contradictory old gardener, whose name fitted like a -glove, had an affection for the white flower of a girl whose hobby it -was!</p> -<p>He had risen early, on the morning after the “fiery note”, had deported -sleeping flower families from other beds and wild flowers from their -rustic haunts, to build up the new democracy.</p> -<p>But the ruined ash-tree he could not repair. Reduced almost, to a bare -trunk, it could no longer roll up the whites of its eyes, when -ruffled—show only the pale undersides of its crown of leaves—or it might -well have done so, this morning, over a miracle which presently took -place with its assistance.</p> -<p>“Hullo—Unie! Unie-Wunie! Well! isn’t the last long farewell to your -flower clock said?” cried Pemrose again, dancing down the silvery garden -path—her whole warm being simply on the fire-edge of vacation joy. -“Oh-h! this is a wonderful day to start for camp. A little -‘chilly-cold’, as Sods would say! But that makes it all the better for -hiking. And to-night—to-night we may be sleeping out by the Long Trail! -Oh! aren’t you just wild over it, too?”</p> -<p>There was an answering shout, rather faint, from the neighborhood of the -dim old sundial, within a stone’s throw of the wood.</p> -<p>“I expect she’s watering the ‘clocksie’ with a final tear,” said Pemrose -to herself. “Well! if she is feeling rather blue over saying good-bye to -her flowers—goodbye for this year to most of them—on top of the good-bye -to her father and mother when they started for Europe yesterday, I—I’m -going to spring a diversion on her.... Hi there, Jack,” she called -exultingly, “don’t you want the big end of a sensation, a sunrise -sensation; don’t you want to listen in on my ring; so early in the -morning as this we ought to be able to pick up something, before the -sounds ‘dim off’ with bright daylight—there are some strong sending -stations near?”</p> -<p>Una rose, a dewy sprite, from the neighborhood of her flower clock.</p> -<p>“Why are the sound waves stronger at night—or in the early morning?” she -asked.</p> -<p>“Search me!” The radio amateur shrugged her shoulders gayly. “Father did -venture some reason for it, something about ‘molecules’, but it didn’t -stick!” She tapped her forehead with a ringed forefinger. “Anyhow, he -said it was only an ‘out-shot’, merrily; that every day somebody was -making a new out-shot in the direction of radio, as <i>he</i> did when he -discovered this new crystal, more wonderful than galena or silicon, or -any of the detectors which people have been using, as a ‘radio soul’, up -to the present.”</p> -<p>That listening soul was in the girl’s eyes now, her larkspur eyes. She -swung the radio head-phone, artistically carved, or engraved, with Camp -Fire symbols, connected by an enameled wire with a minute joint in the -deep ring upon her forefinger—a ring whose light-hued bakelite setting -shimmered like amber in the primrose dawn.</p> -<p>“Besides, at this hour, we’ll have the atmosphere to ourselves—or nearly -so—so that we may come in on something that’s broadcasted from some -powerful station in town,” she added hopefully, “or we may even steal in -on some fashionable amateur near by, in some one of the big camps or -houses along the lake! Some radio fiend, with a costly set, who is so -crazy over the new game that he has sat up all night over it and is -keeping on into daylight ... with my spiked heel in the soft ground of -the stream’s bank over there, by the—wood—”</p> -<p>“The wood!” echoed Una fearfully.</p> -<p>“Yes, you haven’t been ‘coming in’ on any funny murmur, uncanny murmur, -there, this morning; have you? I believe you’re a brand-new sort of -radio ‘bug’ yourself,” chaffingly.</p> -<p>“No—I haven’t.” The dark-eyed girl shivered, white-cheeked, in the dew. -“If I did—if I ever should again—I’d have to try to find out what made -it—though—”</p> -<p>“No, you wouldn’t. You’d run to earth—to Sods. I know you! Well! come -along then.” Pemrose impetuously seized her friend’s hand. “With my heel -in the magic carpet—the wet moss, over there—and my two hundred feet of -antenna, fine, insulated wire strung out to the poor old ash-tree, we -ought to be able to get results—some results, at this hour.”</p> -<p>“Well! you’ll promise to let me listen in, too, you won’t hold on to -those magic ear-phones all the time yourself? I know <i>you</i>!” Una glanced -at the dangling “halo”, attached to the ring, yielding as she generally -did when Pemrose pulled the strings.</p> -<p>“But we’ll have to hurry, we won’t have much time,” she said, “as we -leave here before seven, in the big car with Andrew, to pick up the -other campers at Greylock village. We haven’t had breakfast yet; and, -oh! are we quite sure that we have everything in our packs?” with the -tremor of a novice.</p> -<p>“Everything—ducky! Including the last straw!” Pemrose was toying with -her ring. “The rolls of colored paper for our flower costumes, the Wild -Flower Pageant—your birthday, in August!” she murmured dreamily, really -thinking of those radio “fiends” who might, at the moment, be handling -their last few messages before broad daylight—on whom she might steal -in. “We ought to have sent them up with the camp stores and extra -clothing to the horse-farm—those rolls. When it comes to the last long -mile—”</p> -<p>“Pshaw! they don’t weigh any more than two pinheads,” laughed Una, -swaying like “white weed”, herself, her dark eyes, like her flowers, -“dressing themselves up in gold light.” “And the farmers’ wives, their -little children, they have so little in their lives!”</p> -<p>“Um-m. There may be very few ‘natives’ to admire us,” Pemrose was still -showing off the ring to the sunrise, “unless—unless you include -quack-natives,” merrily, “Treff and his father, who have a camp about -ten miles from the horse-farm.”</p> -<p>“Poor Treff!” She dimpled. “Didn’t we have a time teasing him into -getting well after his awful note? I believe if the world came to an end -to-morrow that boy would call it a ‘note’.... But I like a boy who has a -brown speck in one gray eye, just one—his fun-mill!”</p> -<p>“Wonder if he’s got a new ‘bus’ yet?” speculated Una.</p> -<p>“And whether he’s ‘pulling any more bones’ with his radio outfit?” -laughed the amateur. “Well! I’ll tell you what, I’m going to loop my -aërial round the old ash-tree, this morning, just to make up for what it -suffered through him!”</p> -<p>And now was the moment when that noble white ash, upon the garden side -of the wall, might have rolled up the whites of its eyes, ruffled the -pale lining of its leaves—if it had any left to ruffle—as a girl, -clambering up, looped her aërial, her shining wire, as loftily as she -could around the blackened trunk.</p> -<p>“Eh! What’s the merricle now?” grunted old Sods to the waking flowers, -as he peeped, from a distance, over that garden wall.</p> -<p>And they nodded that they did not know, that they might be still -dreaming, half open, as they saw that girl bounding lightly back over -the wall to the brook’s edge, to slip a steel creeper upon her heel, the -same that a girl might strap upon her daring heel, in icy weather—and -don a listening halo.</p> -<p>“You—you’re not going any further into the <i>wood</i>?” Una probed the pines -with glances, half fearful, half fascinated.</p> -<p>“No-o, ‘Peerie-Weerie?’ How are you going to stand sleeping out by the -Long Trail to-night, if you don’t ‘side-dish’ your fancies?” Pemrose -tilted the halo rakishly askew upon her little dark head. “Just look at -the ring!” she gasped. “Isn’t it a winner?”</p> -<p>A winner it truly was; fraught every inch with glamour, the divine -glamour of ingenuity.</p> -<p>“Four hundred turns of the finest hairwire wound round it, in this -bobbin-like groove! Isn’t that—that elfin, if you like it?” The blue -eyes danced. “And this ‘atomy’ lever which moves the cat-whisker to -touch the crystal—father’s new crystal that takes the shine out of the -others! And the miniature ‘bind-posts’, joints—three—one hooked on to my -ground connection,” the amateur displayed her heel, “another to my -aërial—the third to my hearing halo; father—oh! was there ever anybody -like him—” it was a transfigured sob—“worked over these magnetic -ear-phones, too, to make them extra sensitive.”</p> -<p>“I wish—if only they could pick up a little speech—music—for us,” -murmured Una, half her faint-heart in the wood, “if—if ever so -dimly—faintly!”</p> -<p>“Speech—music—before six o’clock in the morning! You don’t ask much!” -scoffed Pemrose. “I don’t suppose we’ll even get a twitter of -telephony—the twitter of an early bird.” She laughed excitedly. -“Listen—listen to that early bird, up there, in the tallest pine,” -pushing the ear-phones up, “do you know what he’s saying—that brown -thrasher? A brown thrasher it is! He’s chanting advice to the farmers:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“‘Shuck it, shuck it, sow it, sow it,</div> -<div class='verse'>Plow it, plow it, hoe it, hoe it.’</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“And he doesn’t know that he’s away behind the times with his old song!” -Pemrose’s black brows were lifted archly. “That the air is just full of -advice ‘stuff’ about him to which he’s deaf: ships, far out at sea, -signaling reports about the weather, local Weather Bureaus sending in -radio reports to headquarters—perhaps, we may come in on some of that! -Oh! was there ever—ever, before, a time when it was so much better to be -a girl than a bird?”</p> -<p>Fairly translated, now, in her excitement, that favored girl was -selecting a nice, wet, oozing spot in the moss of the magic carpet into -which to dig her heel—that fairy carpet more wonderful than ever was -genii’s for transporting the one who stepped on it, thus, afar—so far as -one sense was concerned, at least.</p> -<p>“Good ground connection!” she murmured. “That ought to bring results. Of -course anything we do pick up will be awfully faint, just dot and dash, -easier to glean—and in which two-thirds of the messages are sent out. -Hus-sh!”</p> -<p>Deeper she ground her heel into the sparkling moss—Pemrose Lorry, radio -amateur. She straightened her halo. She moved the bronze cat-whisker to -touch the crystal and stood a statue as, the magic ring “rubbed”, those -highly sensitive ear-phones became active—began to glean from the -morning air.</p> -<p>“Do you ... are you—oh! are you—getting—anything?” Una watched her, -hands clasped.</p> -<p>“Hush!” frowned the radio fan. “Your—your hor-rid racket!”</p> -<p>“I didn’t make any. Needn’t be so peeved!... You have—have to make -allowance for radio ‘fiends’; they’re savage if you disturb them!” -murmured Una mischievously to the pines—her interest was beginning to be -concentrated on the experiment now.</p> -<p>Five minutes passed. A finger was pointed at her, shooting her straight -through the heart with thrill.</p> -<p>“Are you ... oh! are you ...” she ventured again.</p> -<p>“I—am.”</p> -<p>“Wha-at?” in a bewitched whisper.</p> -<p>“Just a little dot an’ dash—faint ticking—weather station in town, -couple of miles off—three maybe—but I could—understand.”</p> -<p>She gave her hand to the sunrise, the inventor’s daughter, the new -crystal flashing like a diamond. Never did queen of the middle ages, -never did Begum of the Indies dream of such a ring upon her forefinger.</p> -<p>“L-let—me. I have been studying code a little, since father—”</p> -<p>Una’s lips barely fluttered upon the whisper, like a flower.</p> -<p>And now—now the halo was upon <i>her</i> dark head. She was listening in -through the other girl’s ring, through the other girl’s heel, through -the other girl’s heart, as it were, to the faint, faint murmur in the -air.</p> -<p>But a smattering of code could make nothing of that swooning tick.</p> -<p>Again Pemrose transferred the headpiece.</p> -<p>And now time as well as space was annihilated—even the approaching -departure forgotten.</p> -<p>Una began to feel as if a Meg-of-the-many-feet, a centipede, was -stealing down her back, but its hundred little feet were -silver-pointed—tipped with light.</p> -<p>“I—got—it!” Again a finger was pointed at her—not the ring finger, that -was held out level. “Not—not dot an’ dash, this time: whisper—speech, I -got it; one amateur asking another—‘play a few holes of golf—before -breakfast!’” Never had a girl’s eyebrows gone so high in the world of -wonder, of mischief, before, as those black ones lifted over the blue, -listening eyes—for every organ of the body was now “listening in.”</p> -<p>“Word here, word there—repeated an’ repeated—I got it. B-but what’s -this? Never—never singing, before six o’clock in the morning. So-o -faint! Oh! it seems—seems to come from the far edge of nothing.”</p> -<p>And to the “far edge of nothing” Pemrose Lorry listened, every pulse an -ear, until her hearing, so trained in this new aërial communication, -began to pick up syllables—words—faint as far moon-shine, indeed, yet -half-clear upon the air:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Night ... done, stars ... to rest,</div> -<div class='verse'>Perhaps in soft, white clouds ... a nest,</div> -<div class='verse'>Among your—dewy flowers....”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Oh! l-let me!” shivered Una, half-sobbing—transfigured sobs.</p> -<p>Mechanically Pemrose transferred the headpiece.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Among ... dewy flowers ... see you stand,</div> -<div class='verse'>You do not know ... in my hand!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“I hate it! Oh-h, I hate it—it.” Passionately the other girl tore the -phones from her ears. “It’s like the hum—” the little stand in her right -dark eye was fixed in fear—“makes me feel queer—creepy—I don’t know -why!” She began to cry. “I don’t want to listen in! I’ll—never—”</p> -<p>“Nonsense!” said Pemrose sharply. “Only some amateur—crazy -amateur—singing into a horn at a near-by station, quite near-by, that’s -‘going strong’!”</p> -<p>But, for a moment, her bright face had looked “sparrow-blasted”, too.</p> -<p>Far away, in the silence, a fox barked.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chVI' title='VI: A Gentleman'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER VI</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>A Gentleman</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>It was the “yamf” of a fox again. The sun was high now. The brown byroad -stretched away like a ribbon between the fringing woods that rose on -either side of it, screening the mountain’s grandeur, shadowing the path -of the gliding automobile.</p> -<p>“Now where is he—the waif beastie?” said Andrew, peering ahead into the -sunlight from his chauffeur’s seat, as, once more, that “yamf” rose, -wild and desperate, between a cackle and bark of pain—heard above the -purr of the smooth machine.</p> -<p>“It sounds—sounds as if he were near, quite near, oh! just around the -bend ahead,” gasped Pemrose, sitting up, a statue, in the tonneau, -where, side by side with Una—a rather pale and preoccupied “Jack”—she -was fairly cushioned with glee over being off at last; off for a six -weeks’ season of grace and growing among the Green Mountains, lying over -the line in Vermont.</p> -<p>Andrew had vacation freedom in his veins, too. His employer had gone -abroad. For several weeks he would be at nobody’s beck but his wife’s. -Transformed into a boy again, by visions of fishing with a “canny” rod -in mountain brooks, he had been singing softly to himself, at intervals, -and much to the girls’ delight:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Said the trout to the fluke,</div> -<div class='verse'>Where is your new crook?”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>For the last speeding quarter of a mile this had given way to a pleasing -dirge of:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“The crow kilt the pussy, O!</div> -<div class='verse'>The crow kilt the pussy, O!</div> -<div class='verse'>The muckle cat sat down and grat</div> -<div class='verse'>On the back of Johnny Hoosie, O!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>The last “O” was long-drawn. Across it came the ill-dashed “yamf” of a -fox.</p> -<p>“Something wrong with his crying pipes. That’s no barkin’ an’ fleeing -sound,” said Andrew, flashing a glance over his shoulder at the girls -behind. “Zooks! What a mad yammer he’s makin’ the morn!”</p> -<p>A sad yammer it was, with a note in it of supplication that in turn -became a jabber, as of cackling laughter.</p> -<p>“Dear sakes! he’s cacklin’ like a hen—a hen, at a hen-wile.” The -chauffeur leaned forward over his steering wheel. “Ah! there he is—the -puir beastie. Dog out!” proclaimed the voice which had said the same of -the falling aviator. “Ha! <i>Trapped</i> he is! Trapped, by that worming -snake-fence! Trapped—an’ by the open roadside!”</p> -<p>Trapped! The girls shrank together, shuddering—young shoulder to -shoulder.</p> -<p>“Deil tak’ it now! if this isn’t a sight to comb ’em against the -hair—make the whole day seem ill-hued,” ground out Andrew. “Taken in a -skunk trap, the bit beastie! This is no season for trappin’ foxes. Taken -in a trap that some farmer has set for a skunk that’s been bothering his -chickens! Weary fa’ the loon that set it here by the roadside!”</p> -<p>He shot another glance over his shoulder, the fatherly chauffeur, at the -two lassies in his charge. Una had covered her ears with her hands. -Pemrose was sitting tragically upright. Her face was pale. In her blue -eyes was the glint half-baffled, but not routed, which lit her father’s -when, driven to the last ditch of inventive ingenuity, he fought Nature -for some discovery.</p> -<p>“Noo, what had I better do?” panted the chauffeur to himself. “Knock the -puir thing on the head here now, afore the lassies? To drive on and -leave him to die by slow inches in that ill-teethed trap—that’s na -possible.... Ods! but he looks hangit-like—shamed—shamed o’ being -caught—like—this.”</p> -<p>There was moisture in Andrew’s eye now. Automatically, almost—and -looking round for a club—he had slowed down.</p> -<p>And from the ditch at the roadside, the wild mountain byroad, the red -fox eyed him, groveling in his last ditch.</p> -<p>“All his tricks an’ snecks no use to him now—an’ that’s what he seems to -feel, by fegs!”</p> -<p>The mist in the chauffeur’s pitying eye grew more blinding, putting out -for him the flame in the fox’s, as the poor maddened waif-beastie -dragged the steel trap shamefacedly to and fro by the three-rail fence, -curving snake-fence, that bounded the byroad.</p> -<p>Suddenly, thrown into a new panic, new frenzy, by the sight of the -halting car—such a juggernaut to his dimming eyes—he turned to that -fence for the hundredth time and tried to climb it, dragging the -skunk-trap, with him, but was pulled back by the six-foot chain ending -in the indomitable clog and bolt that anchored the trap to earth.</p> -<p>“Oo-ooo! Ah-ah-ah-kak!” The last note of earth’s agony was in that -gibbering howl which told of a hind-leg almost torn from its socket, as -the wild thing fell into the ditch again and helplessly rolled there, -biting at his slim, white-stockinged, blood-wet leg—at the trap, at the -humbling dust all lashed to lather by his fine red brush and the foam of -his dripping mouth.</p> -<p>“Oh! I c-can’t stand it. I can’t stand it. Do something! Do-o -something.” Una was standing upright in the car, pale and trembling in -the silky, rose-lined, fur coat which Andrew’s wife had tossed into the -automobile at the last moment, with a pleading: “Put it on, my lamb, the -morn’s chilly an’ ye look ‘blenchit’,” when she had come in, shivering, -from the garden—from experimenting with the radio ring.</p> -<p>Simultaneously with her cry the red fox, in his new terra-cotta -coat—poor little skinny ten-pound victim—ceased beating the earth with -his bushy tail, that had a creamy powder puff at the tip, sat up on his -haunches, ruff bristling, mouth stretching in a tortured grin over the -bared, white fangs, chest heavily panting—and looked at them.</p> -<p>“Gosh! he’s all in. He—he looks as if he was making sifflication to us.”</p> -<p>The cry was wrenched from Andrew; his answer to that dumb supplication -was to throw the throttle open and shoot the big car forward.</p> -<p>But, like a flash, Pemrose was upon him from behind.</p> -<p>“Oh! he <i>is</i> begging us. He is begging us,” she cried, clutching -throttle and wheel herself, so that the big car rocked in groaning -indecision. “We—we just can’t go on and leave him—leave him to -die—slowly.”</p> -<p>“Who’s about doin’ it?” growled Andrew. “Sit down, lassie. Don’t tak’ -the fling-strings or ye’ll hae us in the ditch. I’m just for driving on -to the top o’ yon hill, there; then I’ll come back an’ free him—I’ll -come back an’ win’-free him.”</p> -<p>The girl half loosed her hold, but a glance at the chauffeur’s leaking -eye-corners and she was upon him fiercely again.</p> -<p>“You mean—you mean you’ll come back and kill him—knock him on the head -with an iron ‘jack’ or a club. Oh! I won’t have it. I won’t have it,” -she raved. “’Tisn’t the time for killing foxes, any way. We m-must, we -can, we <i>may</i> free him now, somehow—somehow.”</p> -<p>She was jabbering like the wild thing, herself, all the while that -something was struggling to the fore in her—hereditary -resourcefulness—the inventor’s ingenuity.</p> -<p>Revelation came, as it always does, in a staggering flash.</p> -<p>She whipped round upon her girl companion, so white-cheeked and -whimpering.</p> -<p>“Your c-coat, Una!” She seized upon the fine beaver, which had, -presumably, been stripped from some trapped animal, too—but that did not -at the moment matter. “Your fur coat! We could throw it over him, hold -him down, while—while Andrew springs the trap.”</p> -<p>“Do ye think I’m a madded fool?” came angrily from the chauffeur.</p> -<p>“Oh! we don’t. We know you’re a brick. We know you’ll help us. Oh! don’t -you—don’t you see how this would spoil all the trip?”</p> -<p>She shivered—and in the paling forgetmenot blue of the eyes near his own -Andrew saw the blight that would fall over the hiking start, at least, -and cursed his luck that they should meet up with the “black -cow”—misfortune—this early in the day.</p> -<p>The fox still sat, making “sifflication.”</p> -<p>“But—but you must help, too, Una.” Pem was plucking the smart little -costly coat from her friend’s shoulders, as she spoke. “You—you’ll have -to help hold him down.”</p> -<p>“Oh! I daren’t. He might—bite.” Great, glassy tears rolled over Una’s -eyelids, down her cheeks.</p> -<p>Did—did one of those passive tears, as it fell upon her bare hand, -suddenly become a detector, a crystal detector, through which she picked -up something from the air, by eye not by ear now, the memory, the ghost -of a faint claim, it seemed, wafted from somewhere, made upon -somebody—through a radio ring.</p> -<p>“Yes, I-I’ll help! Oh-h! it must be awful to be trapped.” She stumbled -from the car.</p> -<p>“Warry—warry now!” Andrew was springing, at the same time, from his -seat, drawing on thick gloves. “Hoot! I suppose a mon has got to make -the ill-best of a bad job—but he’ll be an ill one to tackle, all tooth -an’ claw.”</p> -<p>Already Pemrose, with the glossy huddle of soft beaver in her arms, was -stealing towards the tortured thing that groveled and cackled again upon -three legs—the fourth stuck out straight.</p> -<p>“Now, Unie, <i>now</i> quick—jump in—hold it down over him, tight,” she -gasped “Over his head!”</p> -<p>And while girlish pluck pinned the coat—and the stifled form under it—to -earth, Andrew’s quick hand found the spring of the steel trap, shaped -like a bear’s jaws, and pressed it.</p> -<p>A convulsion under the smothering coat! A scraping—tearing and ripping!</p> -<p>They jumped all three.</p> -<p>All four! The fox jumped, too.</p> -<p>He had a free try at the fence now. But he was weak. He fell back—licked -his leg passionately and tried again.</p> -<p>He was over. Looking neither to the right hand nor to the left, he was -limping between waving grasses across the strip of rank meadow that -separated the snake-fence from the woods.</p> -<p>“Fair gude day to ye!” grunted Andrew. “But ye might say: ‘Bethankit’!”</p> -<p>The wild thing reached the wood-line, brush waving.</p> -<p>Suddenly, before the trees swallowed him—and the undergrowth—he -half-halted, half-turned—shot a backward glance.</p> -<p>“He’s a gentleman,” cried Pemrose. “That did mean, ‘Thank you’!”</p> -<p>“He’s left me to mend a big tear in the lining of my coat,” said Una. -“But, oh! how awful to be trapped.”</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chVII' title='VII: Fit for Fit'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER VII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Fit for Fit</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Well, grace and growing to ye!”</p> -<p>Andrew, bareheaded, stood beside his car and waved his cap to the -hikers, the brave band of hiking girls.</p> -<p>“Grace and growing! There, you’ve given us a ‘motto’,” said the -Guardian, smiling at him.</p> -<p>“We’re ‘gracie’ without, as well as within.” Pemrose danced up to the -gray-haired chauffeur, with the humorous eye—her own blue as the wild -chicory, that wayside friend, by the mountain highroad. “How do you like -our hiking rig—Minute Girl costume?” Thus she challenged him, thrusting -out a bloomered knee.</p> -<p>“No flick-ma-feathers about it, but it’s ‘snod.’” Andrew stroked his -shaven chin. “The mountains an’ ye will be fit-for-fit, I reckon.”</p> -<p>“Oh! if that isn’t a lovely compliment,” the response came with -laughter—a perfect heart-shot, as the girl’s eyes danced off to timbered -hills, the Green Haystack, Moose Horn Mountain, summits of the lesser -Taconic Range, upon the threshold of the Green Mountains—to one dim -giant, Mount Anthony, in the hazy distance.</p> -<p>“Fit-for-fit—chums, yes!” she caroled:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Serene, aloof and calm they stand,</div> -<div class='verse'>The gateway of our summer land,</div> -<div class='verse'>Does one, unheeding, pass them by,</div> -<div class='verse'>With careless or indiff’rent eye,</div> -<div class='verse'>They stare, forbidding, cool and grim,</div> -<div class='verse'>For they are not at home to him.</div> -<div class='verse'>But we who love their ev’ry look</div> -<div class='verse'>Like some enchanting fairy book....”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>She threw out her arms towards them.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“We are their friends—they open wide,</div> -<div class='verse'>To welcome Camp Fire Girls inside!</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“That’s our marching song, part of it. <i>She</i> made it up for us—wrote -it.” Pemrose glanced with fostering pride at Una, as she swung the dark -poncho-roll carried over her right shoulder, with a rope crossing the -left hip.</p> -<p>“What ‘Missie’ did! Miss Una!” To the elderly chauffeur his employer’s -sixteen-year-old daughter was “Missie” still, as when she was six and he -built her “dillycastles” on the seashore. “Hasn’t she the gift, now?” he -murmured paternally. “But when it comes to the long tail o’ the day, -will she be a home-body still upon the rough trail? I guess ye’ll all be -drooping, ‘neb an’ feather.’ And she—she’ll be trailing that pack ahind -her—I’m thinking!”</p> -<p>“Don’t—don’t be an ‘ill-dashed’ prophet, Andrew! If she does, we’ll help -her out,” pledged Pemrose.</p> -<p>“An’—an’ when it comes to sleepin’ out, the night—in the dark o’ the wee -’oor, when—when restly ghosts walk that have to be shot through with a -silver sixpence?” The old chauffeur winked. “An’, if a’ tales be true, -that’s no lie!”</p> -<p>“They aren’t loyal to Uncle Sam if they wouldn’t compromise on a dime,” -declared Pemrose. “Eh! Copper-nob?”</p> -<p>Gayly she flung one arm around a fifteen-year-old girl, in Minute Girl -hiking costume, whose hair, bronze as the cat-whisker in the radio ring, -held warm lights, now, as if the flame from her heart nested there.</p> -<p>“This is our Camp Fire sister, Lura Lovell, whose name by the Council -Fire is O-te-go, meaning ‘Fire There’!” Pem ruffled the wavy -“copper-nob.” “And here’s Tan-pa—‘White Bird’—Dorothy Bush. And our -‘Beam of Light’, La-tow—in everyday life Frances Goddard. Oh! yes, and -more than a dozen others of the Victory Group of Camp Fire Girls.”</p> -<p>Pemrose pointed towards the red, white and blue Minute Girls, a score in -all, including Guardian and Assistant Guardian, now on their toes, for -departure.</p> -<p>“Fegs! ‘sonsie’ it sounds an’ bonnie ye all are, red-cheekit an’ -red-lippit, ‘like the smith o’ Dunkelly’s wife’,” chuckled Andrew half -to himself—though his lingering glance made an exception of Una. -“And—<i>maybe</i>—ye won’t flinch before the fiery stick?”</p> -<p>“Eh! What’s that—fiery stick? What does it mean, anyhow?” The fire in -Lura challenged the “stick.” “Hard luck! Hardship! Reality—eh?” She -twinkled.</p> -<p>“Summat like it,” murmured the chauffeur.</p> -<p>“Oh! you can’t scare us with that.” Pemrose flung her arms round two of -her “sisters”, rubbing a cheek, on either side, against theirs. “True -‘comerading’ can face any kind of camp luck; can’t it, my ‘hearties’?”</p> -<p>“Aye! she’s ilka body’s body, with her bonny, blue-lit face,” thought -the chauffeur catching the beam from those blue eyes and throwing it -back. “But the other—<i>our</i> lassie.” He caught his breath. “She’s -‘eye-sweet’! An’ she’s the black o’ her parents’ eye—meanin’ the apple. -If hurt—should—come to <i>her</i>.”</p> -<p>One might say that Una was the apple of his grim eye, too—judging by the -anxiety with which it rested upon her—the parting anxiety.</p> -<p>Una was looking, in somewhat homesick fashion at him, too, now, as if -she was burning all her bridges behind her, as she tossed him the smart -little fur coat, with its rose-satin lining torn by the red fox’s tooth -and claw.</p> -<p>“Ask ‘Mither Jeanie’ to mend it for me,” she said, playfully alluding to -Andrew’s wife, “and send it along to me, to the horse-farm. If we don’t -get back until September and it’s cold among the mountains, I may need -it. Good-bye Andrew—my ‘fuffle-daddy’.... I call him that since he -tossed me, like a doll, into the back of the car and took all the -battering—all the glass of the windshield in himself,” she murmured in -Pemrose’s ear, turning away with a tear in her dark eye from the parting -hand-shake with the chauffeur.</p> -<p>One and all of the band of twenty now shook hands with Andrew—all with -the momentary forlorness of burning bridges, as they looked at the great -purple-cushioned, radio-equipped touring car, symbol of civilization—at -his long-coated form towering beside it.</p> -<p>Andrew’s eye was correspondingly misty: “Fegs! I’m sorry I threated ye -with the fiery stick—as I couldn’t stick by ye to meet it,” he muttered -dryly. “Well! fair good luck to ye, ma’am,” to the Guardian. “An’ may ye -find yerselves happy an’ home-at, among the old mountains!”</p> -<p>The wild mountains were “home-at” with them—very much at home to Camp -Fire Girls—so the echoes presently testified, catching up the blithe -chorus written by Pemrose to Una’s marching song:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Brace up your packs and march along,</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>And set the echoes ringing,</div> -<div class='verse'>Till woods and hills and Camp Fire Girls</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>Are all ‘Wo-he-lo!’ singing.”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“All Wo-he-lo singing! Wo-he-lo for aye!” With the soft cheer on her -lips, the arm of the blue-eyed girl stole round her “play-marrow,” Una, -heart of her heart, chum of chums—play-marrow was Andrew’s word for that -girlish affection which, begun in youth, is a star that never sets until -the Camp Fire trail is done. “You’re not down-hearted: No-o!” she -insisted, catching the lingering little cloud on the “eye-sweet” face. -“You can’t be—honey. Look at the wild flowers.”</p> -<p>“Ha:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse indent4'>“Vervain and dill,</div> -<div class='verse'>Hindereth witches of their will!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>laughed Una, beguiled by the bait immediately, as she stooped to pick a -purplish blue spike of the wayside vervain—cousin to the garden -verbena—to which a bee had clung, asleep.</p> -<p>“In one way she’ll be more at home in the wilderness than any of -us—being near kin to the wild flowers,” smiled the Guardian, following, -with her eyes on the tenderfoot among her Group—its exotic—Una—as the -latter darted off after boneset and yellow sow thistle now.</p> -<p>“See the sow thistle is one of the flowers that close, go to sleep at -night—and open in the morning, quite early,” laughed its captor, holding -it up; “so I’ve admitted it to my flower clock—garden flower clock; -bindweed, chickweed and pimpernel are some of the others—pimpernel, lazy -little weather prophet!”</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“No eye can see, no tongue can tell,</div> -<div class='verse'>The virtues of the pimpernel,”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>laughed Lura. “Come along, ducky, your brain is a regular flower -basket.”</p> -<p>“With a ‘fancy’ legend wrapped round the stem of each flower in the -basket!” murmured Pemrose, her finger to her laughing lip. “No wonder -she thinks she hears sounds in the woods at daybreak—fairy singing.... -Oh! what’s—that? Kittens—are they? No-o!”</p> -<p>“Coons! Three—three baby racoons trotting across the road!” The Guardian -clasped her hands. “Oh! girls, we are being admitted to the fellowship -of the wild.”</p> -<p>“Oh! weren’t they the funniest little gray things—no, buff—bushy -tails—trotting from wood, oh! from wood to wood, to find their mother.” -Every lip was gasping now, every eye penetrating, trying to penetrate -the thicket of roadside scrub into which the wild things had vanished.</p> -<p>“Gracious! The mountains are being at home to us, indeed—welcoming us, -as fit-for-fit,” cooed Pemrose exultantly.</p> -<p>“Making us pay toll, too, aren’t they—as fit-for-fit?” The Guardian -eased the pack upon her back, the neat camper’s roll which carried much -more than the poncho, warm sleeping-bag and personal equipment—the limit -for her girls, most of them. “Just look at that mountain road before us, -there, standing upon its hind-legs—and feeling for the sky!” she added -merrily.</p> -<p>“And when we have wrestled with that one, then there’ll be another at -the same rearing stunt,” laughed Dorothy. “Oh, dear! I have a hag-a-back -already—a pain between my shoulders.”</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“But ‘chivy’ aches and march along,</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>And set the echoes sing-ing,</div> -<div class='verse'>Till woods and hills and laughing glens,</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>Are with ‘Wo-he-lo!’ ringing!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>broke forth the marching chorus again, tiding them over that snaky, -brown hill and the next—landing them in the lap of luncheon—luncheon by -a mountain brook—with a deer crashing in the bushes near by—and a -black-throated warbler singing from a bush: “Oh! ’tis sweet here—’tis -sweet here,” as a naturalist has translated his song.</p> -<p>“We’ll postpone lighting a fire and cooking a real meal until this -evening,” said the Guardian, “when our first day’s ten-mile hike -triumphantly accomplished, we hope to strike the Long Trail running from -end to end of the Green Mountains.”</p> -<p>“But we only follow that for a short distance,” said Frances, “for five -miles or so.”</p> -<p>“Just the listening radius of my ring!” Miser-like, Pemrose glanced at -her pack, shrined in whose heart lay the jewel more wonderful than any -boon fairy had ever bestowed, jealously sheathed, lest one homesick tear -or the tiniest raindrop falling upon the new crystal should mar its -magic.</p> -<p>“Perhaps we may come in on a concert with it to-night,” said Terry Ross, -Assistant Guardian, baptized Theresa, ardently. “I’m just—dying—to -‘listen in’ on that ring!”</p> -<p>“No radio concerts until we reach Mount Pocohosette—our camp on the -sidehill—at the end of our four days’ hike,” was Pemrose’s answer. “Una -and I did pick up a little faint, faint singing with it once, but ... -where is Una now?”</p> -<p>“Off searching for an evening primrose near that fence corner,” said -Robin Drew, a bright-eyed girl. “She wants to find one all ‘tuggled’ up, -to sleep, as she says. She can tell you the exact hour at which every -wild flower opens and closes—those that do. Oh-h! I never knew a girl -whose brain was such a flower basket.”</p> -<p>“I fancy her father hopes to find a little ‘sand’ among the flowers when -he gets back.” Pemrose dimpled slyly. “There, I didn’t mean to be -slangy,” with a sidelong, blue glance at the Guardian.</p> -<p>“Her father! Oh! think of what he’s doing for us, that camp on the -sidehill, radio—horses—Revel and Revelation ... in more than horseflesh, -too!” It was a general ecstatic outburst that creamed the cake and -seasoned sandwiches—made the brook water effervescent. “Oh-h—to reach -Mount Pocohosette—that horse farm in the bottom-lands!”</p> -<p>“Three more days’ hiking—and four nights, sleeping out, as a Rubicon,” -laughed Terry Ross, a tall, twenty-year-old maiden, long-legged, -slender-backed.</p> -<p>“Oh! we’ll cross it—head up to the last step,” protested valiant voices. -“Don’t be too sure. Wait until the tail of the day—and the last long -mile,” suggested others. “It’s only one o’clock now.”</p> -<p>Six o’clock—and a sun setting! Setting royally behind hills that rose, -detached, pell-mell, like huge, green bubbles, on either side of a -mountain trail! Hills clad upon their lower slopes by acres of feathery -podgum—hairy as Esau’s hands—with dark spruce woods above!</p> -<p>Six o’clock—and packs weighing heavily! Una next door to trailing hers -by its cross ropes in the dust—almost like the can at the old dog’s -tail—but the hand of Pemrose or warm “Copper-nob” steadied it upon her -back!</p> -<p>Six o’clock! And it was not their fit-for-fit song of the Mountains At -Home that steadied pluck now, kept girlish feet from slipping backward -on the trail but the song made sacred in mud and mettle by their -brothers over there:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Oh! it’s not the pack that you carry on your back,</div> -<div class='verse'>Nor the rifle on your shoulder,</div> -<div class='verse'>Nor the five-inch crust of khaki-colored dust,</div> -<div class='verse'>That makes you feel your limbs are growing older,</div> -<div class='verse'>It’s not the hike on the hard turnpike</div> -<div class='verse'>That wipes away your smile,</div> -<div class='verse'>Nor the socks of sister’s that raise the blooming blisters,</div> -<div class='verse'>It’s the last—long—mile!”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chVIII' title='VIII: The Wee Hour'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER VIII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Wee Hour</span> -</h2> -</div> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Oh! it’s not the dusty highway,</div> -<div class='verse'>That—Camp Fire Girls don’t mind!</div> -<div class='verse'>And it’s not the thirsty hiking,</div> -<div class='verse'>There are always springs—to find.</div> -<div class='verse'>Oh! it’s not the mountain climbing,</div> -<div class='verse'>Our jol-ly packs are light!</div> -<div class='verse'>It’s not even snakes nor ’squitoes,</div> -<div class='verse'>It’s the—sleeping out—at—night.</div> -<div class='verse'></div> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>Around the waning camp fire the wail of a parody rang, voicing or -burlesquing the sentiments of a dozen Camp Fire Girls.</p> -<p>The other half dozen were loftily silent. They were seasoned campers—or -supposed they were. They had dwelt much upon the hike on the bliss of -the poncho-bed, with a mattress of pine or spruce boughs—the bliss that -never clung to wall or bedstead of a paper-hung room.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>rang the murmur, echoing, dreamy.</p> -<p>“It’s not the stars for big candle tonight; it’s the moon, a full, -bright moon; there she’s rising now,” said a seventeen-year-old girl, -Madeline Fitch. “How about a ring concert?”</p> -<p>“We’re too far from any strong sending station here, I think, to pick up -anything by radio—even a murmur, with such a tiny set,” said Pemrose -Lorry. “But I’ll try it if you like. Here, Unie,” to her girl chum, “you -put the ring on; I’ll play ‘ground’—sink my heel into the edge of the -spring—there. But, heavens! you mustn’t pickle the crystal,” she was -gasping deliriously, a moment later, interposing a quick palm to catch -the little tear of homesickness and novelty—swollen, perhaps by the -remembrance of strange sensations experienced when last she had -“listened in” on the ring—which came trickling down Una’s pretty nose.</p> -<p>“Father says a drop of water, a horrid little teardrop, would spoil even -a galena crystal—and much more this new one. I have to be as careful of -it,” the inventor’s daughter caught her breath, “as he is with some of -his priceless laboratory treasures, his rare quartz tuning forks, for -instance, that give the purest pitch of any sound.... Oh! I wish we were -at camp now—so that I really, might talk with him, by radio—fancy -holding a wireless ‘hamfest’,—that’s the word, not a ‘gabfest’—with -him—a hundred miles off!”</p> -<p>The longing tear was in Pemrose’s eye now, a flashing droplet, but there -was no fear of its pickling the sensitive “radio soul”, the new crystal; -instantly dashed away it was as she hurried to loop her aërial round a -distant tree—with a word to one and another of the girls to watch the -tip of Una’s nose.</p> -<p>But nothing could be picked up from the air with the ring to-night, save -occasionally a “dying tick”, as its owner put it, the swooning ghost of -dot and dash, so faint, so very faint—remotely random—that it seemed to -come from the other side of the world—or from the moon, itself, -untranslatable signaling—and the experiment was abandoned in favor of -turning in early.</p> -<p>“Oh! isn’t this—heavenly?” breezed “Copper-nob”, the torch in her heart, -blown by the night-gusts, inspiring her lips as, presently, she felt the -cool air, light as a kiss, upon her cheek, which nestled beside -Dorothy’s in the poncho-bed, formed of two ponchos, upper and lower, -upon the pine-bough mattress, on the ground.</p> -<p>“Hea-ven-ly—oh-h!” The general, blissful sigh went round.</p> -<p>“What a light blue the sky is—quite light blue! I nev-er thought a -night-sky could be so bright ... and the tree shadows so black, -ink-black, against it! If, only, I could paint it,” murmured an artistic -girl, Naomi Larned, who was seldom or never divorced mentally from -sketch book or palette.</p> -<p>“But what—what’s that?” Una was sitting up with a scream, dragging -Pemrose, poncho-mate, with her—they had been lying down about fifteen -minutes.</p> -<p>“Only a bat—barn bat flying round—or maybe—maybe he’s a cave-dweller,” -murmured the other sleepily. “Isn’t he funny—just like an aviator, doing -stunts? An aviator doing stunts!” she repeated it, nodding.</p> -<p>“Listen—listen to the funny noise he—his wings—make: -‘Eb-eb-eb-eb-ob-ob!’ Oh! I think he’s—weird—horrible.” Una shuddered, -her face in the moonlight, white—shining—as the night-blooming cereus, -lifted over the dark poncho-edge to the peopled sky.</p> -<p>“Now, ‘Jack’,” Pemrose used the rallying nickname, “you promised you -wouldn’t be a ‘weer’, as Treff would call it, a fanciful -‘peerie-weerie’,” with a low, “dropping-off” laugh, “frightened of -nothing—and getting every one worked up. Lie down-and go to sleep,” -mumblingly. “I’m so—”</p> -<p>“<i>Two</i> of them!” shivered Una—and shook her. “Oh-h, mercy! they’re -flying down close—close-near us. One almost touched me.” She stifled a -low scream by biting at the poncho-edge.</p> -<p>The “weeriness”, like hay fever, spread.</p> -<p>Girls were sitting up all along the line, now, upon the moonlight -bedding-ground, on the edge of a grove, where the taper-like stems of -slim white birches, their spreading crowns, were the black and silver -candlesticks that held the stars for bedroom candlelight.</p> -<p>Across that strange light blue of the sky, so remote from the azure of -daytime, and embroidered with inky shadows, black patches were darting -and zigzagging in wavy lines, now side-slipping downward, on a wing-tip, -like a tilted aëroplane, turning a fantastic somersault, soaring -again—to take, with lightning rapidity, a nose-dive after prey.</p> -<p>A nose-dive that brought them, each in turn, down very near to the row -of dark ponchos.</p> -<p>“Goody—ginger! Just like aviators—stunt-flying! After insects, I -suppose—and any little bird, nestling, foolish enough to be out—late!”</p> -<p>To Pemrose, rousing to watch them, that skinny-winged sky-cavalry, -darkly maneuvering, was part of the wonderful fascination of the -night—of the night-side of Nature just being turned outward.</p> -<p>So it was to most of the girls—camping girls.</p> -<p>To just one or two tenderfoots—Una in especial—the bats were vampires, -when they flew too close—with the low, eerie “eb-eb-eb-ob!” of swooping -wings.</p> -<p>“They—they make the sky look ‘ghoulie’,” she whispered.</p> -<p>And as night wore on and the ghouls sought their barns or caves, she did -not easily settle down again.</p> -<p>“That black—black something s-stealing towards—us!” She was pinching -Pemrose’s arm, once more. “Oh! it looks like a bull—a bear.”</p> -<p>“Elephant, perhaps! Can’t you see its tusks waving?” jeered her -poncho-mate. “I’ll tell you what it is; it’s great black, -stalking—worry-cow. Go to sleep.”</p> -<p>“All—the funny little noises!” rippled on the nervous tenderfoot, who -now felt a Meg-many-foot, or half-a-dozen of them—clammy -centipedes—crawling down her back, not silver-footed, either. “And the -low boughs, swinging, they look like people! The birds—listen—they’re so -restless, aren’t they—sleep restlessly! Oh-h, de-ar! what’s—that? What, -ever, is that?”</p> -<p>It was the sharp, slicing “Whit-whit-whir-r!” of a night hawk’s wings. -It was a frenzied, torn little “Cheep! Cheep!” with the momentary -flutter of a tiny body—two dark bodies—in mid-air; a fidgetty bird -scared out of the nest by the hawk’s proximity and caught in the night -hawk’s talons.</p> -<p>Una bewailed the nocturnal tragedy, sobbing softly.</p> -<p>But this was the fiery stick of reality waving luridly across the -cinematograph of worked-up sensations—she ceased creating worry-cows.</p> -<p>Girls really steadied down now, settling to sleep, only arousing, once -in a while, to chase a stone from under an inquisitive elbow or hip, -where they had flattered themselves the bedding-ground was perfectly -clear.</p> -<p>And so it drew on towards the plaintive stillness of the wee hour, one -o’clock, when, midnight past, the lusty Night seems to shake its dark -tresses and settle down for a breathing spell, too, before morn-blink.</p> -<p>Pemrose was awake. She had been dreaming of the radio ring; that with -her heel in the fostering wet, it had added to its magic the gift of -transporting her—and she was back in the laboratory with her inventive -father. She had let one of his rare quartz tuning forks fall and had -broken it.</p> -<p>She awoke to the wee ’oor ... and the rattle of a chain.</p> -<p>“I—I m-mustn’t wake Una—at any cost. What is it—where is it?... It must -be after midnight—now.”</p> -<p>Pemrose Lorry raised her cheek stealthily from the poncho-pillow. Talk -of “wuzziness” now! Her skin began to ooze at every pore, chilly as the -dew around.</p> -<p>It was the mournful clank of a chain again. She saw that “Copper-nob”, -near her, was half sitting up, too, swaying like a feather backwards and -forwards. She could almost hear the other girl’s teeth chatter.</p> -<p>Her own gave a frozen click, click—and set suddenly, as if in lockjaw.</p> -<p>It was no figment of the imagination now, nor yet a mist-fawn of the -night—a pale, gliding mist-shape—there was a something white before her.</p> -<p>It bobbed and bowed towards her, about fifty yards away. It accomplished -a weird levitation, ascending automatically into the moonlight—dropping -again. And there appeared another white form, poised above it—to the -faint, far rattle of a chain.</p> -<p>Lightminded ghosts, they teetered up and down, blanching the moonbeams, -now checkered by a thin cloud.</p> -<p>And at the sight “Copper-nob’s” nerves gave way; she “loosed” a shriek -that startled everybody.</p> -<p>But it did not exorcise the apparitions.</p> -<p>There they were, undeniable as ever, sketching their chalk-white -outlines against the night—so that the heart of the stoutest melted -within her bones—in the solemn stillness of the wee’oor—and her flesh -crept.</p> -<p>“This is Ghost Craft ... and we’ve none of us—none of us taken honors in -that.” Pemrose’s faint mischief was curdled by an eerie note.</p> -<p>“Ghosts that have to be shot through with a silver sixpence!” Andrew’s -nonsense came back to her.</p> -<p>And the qualifying: “An’ if a’ tales be true, that’s no lie!” could not -resolve into thin air the spectres before her.</p> -<p>Twenty pairs of eyes could testify to them, seesawing up and down in -silvery balances of moonbeams—now one, now another tipping the scale.</p> -<p>And the small hour was very, very still. Not a sound troubled it, but -the hollow clanking of that distant chain—picked up by ears near the -ground, and ... rising sounds of hysteria among the girls.</p> -<p>Even the Guardian felt as if some insulation were stripped from her -nerves. Each one sent a separate, tingling shock through her body.</p> -<p>But she got to her knees and then to her feet—the dark poncho clinging -to her.</p> -<p>“Girls! this can be explained. This must be explained. If we don’t -explain it.... Who’ll come—with—me?”</p> -<p>There was a groveling and grubbing among the ponchos.</p> -<p>“Let’s—go!” said a small voice then—the very small voice of Pemrose -Lorry, “I’d like to tell Daddy how a ghost tips the scale; I suppose -they weigh about as much as two pin-heads—or the dust off a feather,” -speculated the laboratory sprite.</p> -<p>“No-o, you stay here, Theresa,” returned the Guardian to another -volunteer. “You stay with the younger girls. We three will investigate -this.”</p> -<p>For now it was “Copper-nob” who, loosing the inner fire with a timid: -“Let’s go!” was tiptoeing in the Guardian’s wake along a plaided path of -moonbeams.</p> -<p>And in the demeanor of the three, as the girls fell in on either side of -the older woman, there was something freakishly suggestive of the noble -Roman and his two companions: of “how well Horatius kept the bridge in -the brave days of old.”</p> -<p>On across a strip of rank pasture they went, halting amid black, -confusing shadows to see whether the ghosts would falter before the -advance, or not.</p> -<p>But the spectres never wavered, alternately poised, shimmering sentries, -against the sky, where the pasture ended in a grassy bank, which some -crowning had topped off into a tall sod-fence.</p> -<p>Imponderable ghosts, weighing as much as two pin-heads, louder, more -blood-curdling, grew the hapless rattle of the chain they dragged!</p> -<p>But somebody was feeling dizzily another freakish element in the -situation.</p> -<p>Suddenly “Copper-nob”, whose training had been rather different to that -of her two companions—more rural—went mad as a March hare.</p> -<p>She flung herself down in the heavy dew, arms limply outflung—feet -kicking wildly.</p> -<p>“Goats!” she gasped. “Goats!” she shrieked. “Goats! Not Ghosts! Two -long-haired, milk-white goats, chained together! One—one has got to this -side of the fence, is trying to drag the other over. And the other won’t -stand for it! Oh-h!”</p> -<p>“Nannie! Billy! Tug-of-war!” The failing knees of the two supporting -heroines gave way under them too; they sank down—down—into the moonlit -dew—and laughed until the wee ’oor shook.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chIX' title='IX: Dandering Kate'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER IX</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Dandering Kate</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Well! <i>What</i> a funny footprint! It’s a woman’s track, too, with spikes -on the heel. Now, gracious! it couldn’t be that somebody else—somebody -else has been trying my radio game, out here, listening in, in this wet -spot, with a little portable receiving set?... That’s what it looks -like! My-y!”</p> -<p>A breathless image of astonishment, Pemrose Lorry knelt in the -underbrush near the trail, the scrubby tangled trail, broad enough to -pass muster for a grass-grown road, with ruts in either side and a cart -track in the center, which led from the girls’ camping-place of the -night before—through an arm of woods—to the farmhouse on whose land they -had slept.</p> -<p>Right on the trail, submerging it in one spot, was stagnant pond-water. -Beside the pond was the curious footprint. Her face aflame, red as the -Turk’s cap—flame lily, near—the girl knelt, examining it.</p> -<p>“I—I’ll wager that’s what it is,” she cried half-wildly. “Another radio -amateur, radio fan, has—judging by appearances—been here, this morning, -with her heel in the wet mud and her wire out to a tree—or smuggled away -in an umbrella, possibly, listening in with a toy set, like mine—or -probably with something larger—better—so far as results go. Oh, goody! -‘When Greek meets Greek!’ Don’t I wish we might run on to her.” She -craned her neck, also red with amazement, as the painted wood-lily, -searching the early sunlight, the woodland aisles.</p> -<p>“I don’t see why that mightn’t very well be,” said Una. “If our -automobile is rigged up with radio, so that we can pick up messages -within twenty miles, as we speed along, why mightn’t somebody have a -little Kodak-like set, out here—and play with it out-of-doors, in the -early morning. You—you aren’t the only lion,” laughingly. “In one of the -out-of-the-way farmhouses there may be a red-hot amateur, like you; so -many of them.... Heavens! What’s—that?” She jumped three feet.</p> -<p>Right in front of her was a bulky pincushion, a huddled pincushion, -bristling all over with black and brown spikes, menacingly white-tipped.</p> -<p>And the pincushion inopportunely grunted.</p> -<p>She screamed. So did bronze-haired Lura—and Naomi, a brown-haired girl, -who nursed a sketchbook.</p> -<p>“Gracious! A porcupine! Dandering Kate—as woodsmen call it!” shrieked -Pemrose, startled from her contemplation of the mysterious footprint.</p> -<p>“Oh! don’t go near him—her,” panted Una. “It’ll shoot its quills into -you.”</p> -<p>“Not—unless it’s attacked!”</p> -<p>“But—but it does into a dog.”</p> -<p>“Because the dog shoots his face into the porcupine’s overcoat,” laughed -the inventor’s blue-eyed daughter, going nearer to the bristling ball, -which startled the pincushion into a grunting shuffle for the long grass -at the roadside, where it lay, curled up into a spiky hump-back, the -barbed quills erect on a three-inch tail.</p> -<p>“I thought we’d see one somewhere in the woods this morning,” said Lura. -“They’re generally abroad early, before the dew goes.”</p> -<p>“And in the evening,” added Pemrose. “They ‘hole up’ during the heat of -the day, so father—”</p> -<p>She caught her breath, with a sudden stifled feeling of being “holed -up”, herself.</p> -<p>Was it another Dandering Kate—the figure which, suddenly appeared by the -roadside—the porcupine was not the only round-shouldered thing. Looking -ahead under the shadow of maples and birches, overarching, Pemrose -caught sight of another.</p> -<p>It flashed out of the woods almost simultaneously with a prolonged -shriek from Una—who had almost stumbled on to a second grunting -pincushion.</p> -<p>It wore a woman’s riding habit, leather-faced breeches, leggings, gray -coat, with a red handkerchief knotted round the neck and felt hat jammed -down upon the head.</p> -<p>But that—that which the coat covered; Pemrose—Lura—felt their eyes -water.</p> -<p>It was Nature’s “grueling” pack, a lamb on the back, as mountaineers -pityingly call a lump between the shoulders, not obtrusive—but obvious -in the tight riding coat.</p> -<p>But what did obtrude itself, what plowed deep into their young breasts, -was the flash of the eyes, very dark, very keen, against the green -radiance of the wood.</p> -<p>It just crashed across Pemrose’s gaze, as it were, because for a moment, -the tiniest moment, she seemed to see something known, the ghost of -something familiar, in it, which, yet, was so wild, so <i>adrift</i>, so -unknown, as to seem a misfit for the morning—a misfit for the woods, -with their happy-hearted girlhood.</p> -<p>It was almost as if the horsewoman felt that, herself, for she vanished -immediately, to reappear, a minute later, leading a bay horse forth from -a bridle path.</p> -<p>With the bright, obtrusive flash of a heel now, a steel-shod heel, she -was in the saddle—which had a camper’s pack slung across it—and riding -off, with just one backward glance which lit like a brilliant moth on -Una.</p> -<p>“Well—for goodness sake!” Pemrose stared vacantly—hands clasped. “Did -you see the shining creeper on her heel, the bulky umbrella in her -stirrup strap? So—so she’s the radio ‘bug’—amateur!” as if she could -hardly find breath for the discovery. “I’ll engage she has a nice little -receiving set tucked away in that umbrella, the antennæ running round -the steel ribs. Oh! it’s true—no longer am I the only lion,” with a -tragic chuckle.</p> -<p>“Only witch—rather,” corrected Lura. “She! She just came and went, like -an apparition.”</p> -<p>“Don’t talk of apparitions:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>caroled Pemrose, laughing all over, in quivering excitement, at the -memory of how illusory moonlight, long-haired goats, half-bred Angora, -with the novelty of the wee ’oor had—a few hours before—put phantoms -over upon the imagination.</p> -<p>“Well—well! do you know that it isn’t goats we ought to think of now, -but cows, if we re going after milk for breakfast.” Naomi waved her -sketchbook—a rallying pennon. “They’ll say, the other girls, hungry -girls, that we—we’d be good ones to send out after trouble, because -we’re so slow in getting back,” with a fluttering dimple.</p> -<p>“But—but I say,” began the budding artist again, as girlish feet pursued -the trail, “where’s the use of our all plodding on to the farmhouse? -Can’t ‘Jack’—Una—and I wait here—and you pick us up on the way back?”</p> -<p>“Yes! Oh! this wood.” Una the ultra-feminine “Jack”, sniffed greedily. -“This wood! It smells just like glorified strawberry jam; the wild -strawberries are late here.”</p> -<p>“And there’s the most delectable little brook that ever you saw over -there,” pleaded Naomi. “The shadows, reflections, in it: blue-greens of -pines, greeny-greens of rocks, gray-green of the water, itself. And—and -the light that never was on land or sea, this hour of the morning!” The -cooing whisper was the very voice of the green-gold radiance, itself. -“Una could hunt—wild—flowers—”</p> -<p>Was it—was it the light that didn’t seem to belong on land or sea, the -light that seemed adrift as it flashed from under a riders hat, just a -minute or two before, that stiffened Pemrose’s tart answer then.</p> -<p>“No-o, you don’t!” She decided quickly. “I’m leader of this -expedition—and we stick together. Forward march—and no straggling! -Good-bye, Dandering Kate!”</p> -<p>As girlish hands waved farewell to the spiky pincushions, the wood-road -abruptly gave out in a field, which, in turn, yielded to a potato patch -that led up to the farmhouse door.</p> -<p>Milk cans clashing together like cymbals, brought the farmer’s wife, -sunbonneted, from a meadow where she had been helping with the first -crop of hay.</p> -<p>“Yes, my sakes! you can get all the milk you want,” she cried, “but my -son ain’t through milking yet, though it’s on for eight o’clock. He’s as -awk’ard as a one-armed paper hanger this morning,” in a lowered tone, -“you see his right arm has been pretty bad ever since the war. It was -broken by a machine-gun bullet; sometimes he can use it—sometimes it -worries him, ain’t no good, at all. You can go round to the barn -yerselves.”</p> -<p>They did, with hearts beating slowly, like muffled drums, as they -pictured that one-armed milker.</p> -<p>But suddenly feet moved to a quick step again, a merry quick step—though -stealthy—as they caught the whistle and then the chant—“swanky” -challenge—that came through the barn-door.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“It always was a good job; wasn’t it?” Suddenly a girl’s head was thrust -mischievously near to his—a head that burned like a lamp in the dim -stall.</p> -<p>“<i>Always</i> a good job!” White teeth flashed within a foot of his ear. -“Oh! I can parlez-vous a cow. I’ve taken full care of one for a month.”</p> -<p>He started—the one-handed soldier. White jets flew, between his fingers, -giving each girl a milk-eye.</p> -<p>“Here—just let me try. Let me ‘spell’ you for a while!”</p> -<p>“Copper-nob” pushed him off the stool. “I’m a Camp Fire Girl—with honors -for milking. Watch me ‘parlez-vous’ her! Hove—lady?” This to the cow.</p> -<p>“Well! by George, I’ve ‘no kick coming.’” The ex-service man rose, with -a glance at his Y. D. button. “I’m as awkward as a one-handed fiddler, -this morning,” he confessed ruefully.</p> -<p>“And—and surely the others won’t mind, the other campers—if we keep -breakfast waiting.” Lura from the milking stool looked up at Pemrose, -“not when we tell them how—whom—we’ve been helping! ’Tisn’t as if we had -‘mooned’ round in the woods—” the milk was coursing richly -now—“watching—apparitions—in red handkerchiefs.”</p> -<p>She broke off, cooing to the placid Jersey, for Pemrose seemed seeing -apparitions at the moment, staring bewitched, at a mountainside -opposite, where a figure on a small bay horse was slowly climbing a -rough bridle path.</p> -<p>Her blue eyes, those of the inventor’s favored daughter, shone -half-petulantly with the feeling that she was not the only lion in the -desert, with fabulous hearing, if not roaring, powers, as she caught the -far, bright flash of metal—of more than the stirrup from the rider’s -right foot.</p> -<p>“But who—is—she?” The girl’s black eyebrows drew together. “If Andrew -was here, he’d say she looked ‘fey’, unbalanced—rather unbalanced. Her -eyes, they were the strangest—wild and bright. But she looks like a sort -of ‘needle nose’, too,” with a sudden snap, “cunning in her face—and she -rivals me with radio—plays with it out-of-doors ... who ...”</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>broke in “Copper-nob” triumphantly. “Look Pem, I’m down to ‘skimmings’ -now,” as the milk thinned to a frothy trickle, “but the pail is -three-parts full. Hove—lady! You’re a winner,” in grateful compliment to -the Jersey cow.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chX' title='X: Hidden Valley'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER X</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Hidden Valley</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“The night is heavy-hearted,” said the Guardian.</p> -<p>“It’s ‘up to us’, then, to put a good face on its heavy heart by being -extra chipper,” laughed Dorothy Bush—a fair-haired girl. “We’ll be in -luck if it doesn’t rain more than it has done,” she shrugged herself -together, witch-like, “just little ‘neezly-noozly’ showers, that fit -into each other even-end-ways,” with a brooding pout, “at the moment -when you think each one is going to be over—bah! beastly.”</p> -<p>“The clouds have been following us all day,” wailed Frances. “And I -don’t believe they’ve done with us yet. Who’s to light the fire?”</p> -<p>“Pemrose. I believe she could light a fire with a piece of damp bark and -a snowball, as the saying is.” Madeline Fitch threw a chuckling glance -in the direction of the girl with the blue-lit face, who was “ilka -body’s body”, a general favorite. “Hereditary ingenuity, I suppose.” -Madeline pursed up her lips. “If I had a father like hers.... Well! -never mind, a fire will drive the dumps from Hidden Valley. There, I’ve -named it!”</p> -<p>“I don’t like Hidden Valley. Gloomiest old place we’ve struck yet!” -murmured Una glancing up and down the heart-shaped glen, hoarding the -evening shadows between its narrowing head-walls.</p> -<p>“You—you won’t know it when we get a blaze going.” Pemrose was chopping -away with a light axe—the handle symbolically carved—at a dead limb of a -larch tree, to strip off outside layers, damped by the ‘noozly’ showers -and get at the dry wood, inside.</p> -<p>Already she had her roll of curly birch bark, stripped from a withering -bough, on the hike, before afternoon rain came on—and kept dry in her -pack.</p> -<p>Soon the fire was lighting up the tall walls of the V-shaped valley, -between two ragged mountains which seemed, at some time or other, to -have thrust their heads up, promiscuously, out of the earth—just to have -a look around. A peculiarity of most of the hills through which the -girls had passed!</p> -<p>Away to the north loomed the rounded outline of a taller mountain, the -Dome; and in the dim distance, before the evening shadows herded on the -trail—the day’s long trail—there had been mighty glimpses of giant Mount -Mansfield and Camel’s Hump.</p> -<p>“The old farmer whom we met, back there, said that this valley was where -two brooks had ‘gouged out a hollow’, eaten the heart out of a hill,” -remarked Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, her brown eyes blinking at the -blaze; “that we had ‘civ’lization’, at a ‘far-come’, on either side of -us—nothing between.”</p> -<p>“Yes! he cheerfully told us that, here, we were ‘two miles an’ a half -beyond God bless you’!”? came with a sidelong wink from Pemrose, who was -using her vigorous young lungs as bellows. “Humph! He’s beyond the pale -himself; his farm’s right here in Hidden Valley—not quarter of a mile -away. If it should come on a reckless downpour, we may have to storm his -old barn, before morning.”</p> -<p>“We must wait till he’s asleep then—otherwise he’d turn us out; he was -the crankiest mountaineer we’ve run across yet; you—you could hear him -‘cur-murring’ a mile off.” Una knelt, stretching her hands to the fire -that valiantly defied the tail end of a shower.</p> -<p>“Yes, he said this country was only ‘fit for b’ars’, that they ought to -chase all the folks out of it,” pouted Dorothy; “then, I suppose, he’d -be quite at home.”</p> -<p>“He seemed awf’ly peeved over something, out of luck, somehow. But don’t -you remember he did drawl out—” Pemrose wrinkled up a moist little nose, -with a smut on the end of it, to imitate the high-pitched twang of the -old Green Mountaineer—“he did drawl out, looking us over: ‘Wal! I reckon -you birds can stand more’n <i>most</i> city folks!’ Bah! this ‘bird’ can’t -stand another thing until she’s been fed—with crumbs. Has any one filled -the kettle?”</p> -<p>“Yes.” Dorothy produced it. “We filled it at the clearest of the two -brooks, the one with the stony bed, which that peeved old farmer said -made the noise of the devil’s pans and kettles—the devil at his -dish-washing.”</p> -<p>“But what a ‘solemncholy’ old demon he must be, judging by the night,” -laughed Terry Ross.</p> -<p>For now, indeed, the night was growing heavy-hearted—even to bitterness.</p> -<p>The moon, as she rose, was in mourning. Rain stole, sighing, through -Hidden Valley. Thunder hummed-and-hawed, afar.</p> -<p>But the blaze kindled by a fire-witch, who wore brown honors for -building a fire in wind and rain, put a fair face on everything—that and -the toasted bacon, the steaming flapjacks, to say nothing of the evening -star of anticipation radiantly in the ascendant.</p> -<p>“Well! this will be our last night of sleeping out,” said the Guardian, -“our fourth and last, so even if it isn’t very comfortable, we’ll make -the best of it. To-morrow, if we cover our ten miles—we made nine -to-day—’twill bring us to Mount Pocohosette, the horse-farm at the -foot—our snug camp on the side-hill!”</p> -<p>“And Revel and Revelation!... Revel and Revelation—in more than -horseflesh, too!”? laughed blissful voices. “Oh! to-night we’ll just -dream of the Long Pasture; the horses to be caught with chaff—no, -oats—saddled, bridled.”</p> -<p>“The radio concerts of an evening! A morning ‘hamfest’—gossip with -father—space obliterated,” supplemented Pemrose. “Let’s turn in -early—and bring it nearer—all nearer! Hush! Here comes the dream man.”</p> -<p>They were not afraid of less flexible footsteps than his, to-night, as -they piled the fire up and lay down beside it.</p> -<p>Two quiet nights in the open had lent a green seasoning even to -tenderfoot nerves.</p> -<p>But some stronger “pep” was needed in Hidden Valley—as this side of -midnight proved.</p> -<p>Eleven o’clock—and not the soothing Dream Man, but the black Rain Hand, -was upon them—groping for their faces with chilling fingers!</p> -<p>“Goodness! It’s going to be a deluge—a bitter downpour.” The Guardian -sat up, gasping under the wet blanket. “I’m not sure but that we had -better break camp quickly, girls—fly for shelter—that barn isn’t far -off.”</p> -<p>“Nor the old b’ar who said we were ‘beyond God bless you!’ either,” -piped Dorothy glumly.</p> -<p>“Pshaw! he’d be ‘beyond praying for’, if he were to shoo us out,” came -from Madeline. “Ugh! How cold the rain is! I was just falling -asleep—dr-reaming of the horses.”</p> -<p>“Um-m. Novel experience, any way, breaking camp by flash light! My -shoes! Oh! where <i>are</i> my shoes? My ring! I have that safe! One teeny -drop of rain would spoil that new crystal—as a detector, a ‘radio -soul!’” Pemrose was excitedly tucking away the ring and -paraphernalia—tucking it away in her bosom.</p> -<p>“The fancy paper-rolls! Oh! don’t let the colored paper-rolls get -wet—all wet an’ pulpy—then, there would be no flower party on my -birthday!” wailed Una.</p> -<p>“Bah! You and your last straw! They’re done up in oilskin,” hooted -Pemrose. “What—what are you looking for Dorothy?”</p> -<p>“My—toothbrush.”</p> -<p>“Oh-h! come; we’ve no time for tomfoolery.” Whereat every one -laughed—the lightning, too!</p> -<p>“My-y hair-brushes; where did I lay them?” Rain was pelting pitilessly -on Lura’s burnished “nob”, as she knelt, feeling round in the sodden -grass.</p> -<p>“Before a storm everything goes wrong!” hooted the jeering thunder.</p> -<p>“Cheep! Cheep! Tweak! Tweak! Very wrong, indeed!” echoed the poor little -birds in their rocking nests, complaining of the pecking rain-crow.</p> -<p>“But it isn’t as bad as if we had a tent to take down, girls.” The -Guardian was searching for a silver lining, mislaid among other things. -“That’s—<i>weird</i>. Pulling tent pegs in a hurry, tent collapsing, just -shuddering down, canvas grating on the rough edge, something sure to be -left under.... <i>What!</i>”</p> -<p>The tent had collapsed, indeed—the tabernacle of human spirits—and the -silver lining was left under.</p> -<p>The flash light had gone out.</p> -<p>The flash light had fainted, at the very most inopportune moment that a -craven battery could have chosen to give out.</p> -<p>If confusion had reigned before—and hurry-scurry—now it was -extremity—the “neb-end” of extremity! The camp fire black as a “tinker’s -pot”, with a dismal brew of shrieks and groanings! The rain-hand -slapping right and left in the darkness! Faces running into trees, toes -stubbed against stone and stump—wet hair caught on dripping branches -that tweaked and plucked at it.</p> -<p>“But—but there was a second battery! Who had charge of—that?”</p> -<p>“Pemrose.”</p> -<p>“I’ll find it in a ‘twink’,” said Pemrose manfully. “I hid it under this -bush—lest somebody should step on it.”</p> -<p>But the bush protested that she didn’t, laughing in her face, as -lightning played through it—while she felt all round it in the wet -grass.</p> -<p>“No-o—oh! dear, I remember—it was at the foot of this little tree.”</p> -<p>“Out again!” said the sapling—and deluged her all over, for her pains.</p> -<p>“Give it up,” said the Guardian desperately. “We can find our way to -shelter, without it.”</p> -<p>“What! Go home and tell Father that I lost—mislaid—a battery, our only -other live battery.” The hapless wail of the traitor was in Pem’s voice -now—traitor to precise laboratory training, where vigilance meant -safety. “Not—oh! not if I stay here till I dr-rown,” miserably.</p> -<p>She was groping round upon her knees now, others with her, in the black -wet, feeling amid vine and scrub.</p> -<p>“I do believe they’re passing it from one to the other, the dark -bushes—playing hunt-the-slipper—”</p> -<p>“The host of paradise are with us!” cried one suddenly. “She’s <i>found</i> -it.”</p> -<p>The hosts of paradise are always on the side of light—even a “spunky” -flash light.</p> -<p>With heaven reinstated in sundry hearts, led by a triumphant -torch-bearer, the barnstorming party set out, a shadowy horde, wrapped -in ponchos for raincoats.</p> -<p>“The light went out in the farmhouse quite a while ago,” said the -Guardian. “Perhaps we can get into the barn, find the stairs, the -ladder—find our way up into the barn, without disturbing anybody—”</p> -<p>“Without rousing the old bear from his lair, who said we were beyond -‘God bless you!’” muttered Dorothy vindictively. “We’re not. The hosts -of heaven are with us still. The door’s open.”</p> -<p>“And now for clover—dry clover—the hay above!” cried Pemrose, swinging -her flash light. “Oh! come on, girls. The menagerie—that’s nothing!”</p> -<p>For at the heavy reek of animal bodies streaming out through a broad -doorway; at the snorting stamp of great farmhorses, rolling the whites -of their eyes in nocturnal curiosity, at the grunt of cows rattling -their chains against the stall-head, baaing of sheep—from somewhere the -squeal of a distressed little piggie—Una and others drew squeamishly -back.</p> -<p>“Steady now! Keep the hush up! We don’t want to wake that old bear of a -farmer. The stairs—the ladder—is at the far end, I guess, leading up to -the hayloft.”</p> -<p>Pemrose was tiptoeing along the straw-littered aisle, on the trail of -her own whisper, the flash light in her hand a cynosure for every -blinking, brute-eye in the barn; tap, tap, patter, patter, came the -staccato stamp of sheep’s feet, saluting it, from the pen behind the -horses’ stall.</p> -<p>The Guardian brought up the rear.</p> -<p>“Careful now! Don’t make a sound. Keep the hush—”</p> -<p>But eighteen barn raiding girls, seeing the midnight adventure now in -the light of a huge joke, crowding up a dark and narrow ladder are not -likely to be too circumspect.</p> -<p>A false step, a rung missed—and one was back upon the shoulders of the -others amid an hubbub of shrieks, poorly stifled.</p> -<p>Simultaneously a near-by bedroom window was flung up. A hoarse old voice -was shouting:</p> -<p>“Heaven an’ earth! What’s all this hally-baloo? What’s all this uproar, -I say? Now—now you stay right there till I come!”</p> -<p>“Up! Up! Up—girls!” cried Pemrose. “If he tries to mount the ladder to -turn us out—we’ll push him down!”</p> -<p>But as girls crouched in the hay at the ladder-head, arms down-stretched -to oust the besieger, that besieger, when he thrust a wild gray head up -into the light, showed signs of amazement—blank amazement—rather than -hostility.</p> -<p>“My soul! So it’s you birds!” He wagged a crinkly beard. “You city birds -that I met ’way back there on the trail—dark-benighted, -wet-benighted!... An’ I thought ’twas Her. An’ s’elp me, if it had bin -Her, I’d ha’ come within a cow’s thumb o’ shootin’ Her.”</p> -<p>He pulled his right hand, with something in it, up the ladder.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXI' title='XI: Her'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XI</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Her</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“If it had ha’ been Her, I’d ha’ come within the breadth of a cow’s -thumb of shooting Her!”</p> -<p>“But who’s—‘Her’?” The Guardian thrust a peering face forward, benighted -merriment in her eyes; so did other lively girls; this was worth a -wetting.</p> -<p>“Um-m. If you ask me, I’ll say she’s as rank a witch as ever rode on -ragwort—I’ll say so! The wife she was talking about her jest now, when -the thunder woke us hoping she’d ridden safe home—with my slippers—posy -slippers.”</p> -<p>Pemrose suddenly sat up stiffly—ear-hungry.</p> -<p>“Your—slippers!” It was a hen-like cackle from the hay.</p> -<p>“Um-m.” The farmer caressed his shotgun—growling like a bear with a sore -paw.</p> -<p>“But who is She?” put forth the Guardian again; she felt that a lease of -the hayloft for the night—perhaps breakfast in the morning—would depend -upon the sympathy shown to a highly exasperated man, fresh from an -unpleasant “curtain” talk.</p> -<p>“Wal! now, I reckon she’s a stray bird, like yerselves—a stranger, or -almost so. She ha’n’t been around these parts much more’n a year—blamed -heather cat, always on the roam! The wife she calls her the Little Lone -Lady—my wife’s awful stuck on her—an’ I reckon she does come o’ grammar -folks—edicate! Other o’ the mountain people call her Magic Margot, -jollying-like—or the spell-woman, ’cause she can tell things—put over -things—that other folks can’t.” He dropped his voice to a croon of -nocturnal mystery.</p> -<p>“Does she—does she ride a bay horse—an umbrella in her stirrup strap, a -red handkerchief round her neck—something shiny upon her heel—at times?” -Pemrose’s breath came hotly—her hand was to her heart.</p> -<p>“Umph!” The sore bear nodded. “Oh! ’tisn’t the fust time I’ve heard the -midnight shog, shog, of her bay cob’s hoofs stoppin’—heard her stealin’ -up into this loft, to roost. But—<i>never</i> again, s’ ’elp me!” He brought -his unseen feet down upon the ladder, with a vehemence that started a -hayquake.</p> -<p>“Why! what has she done now?” It was a general chorus from the guild of -glee, excited girls, done to death with weariness, yet tickled all over -with the sensation that, much as the vacation had promised them, they -had not expected melodrama.</p> -<p>“Gosh! yes. She was at our house to-day, jest a while afore I met -you-uns on the valley trail.” The farmer thrust a red lantern up. “I was -out diggin’ ’mong the ‘crony hills’, pertater patch; an’ she jest came -it all over my wife with some palaver about a good offer we was going to -get for this plaguy farm, where rocks <i>grow</i>—an’ every one of ’em rooted -out means a back ache,” he mopped his face, “knowledge she didn’t have -from no nat’ral source, you understand—the Little Lone Lady. She had -some kind of a ‘fore-go’, too, ’bout a great cryin’ out there’d be ’mong -all the animals ’fore morning. An’ the wife she was so carried away with -her that I’m blessed if she didn’t give her a good fat chicken, to carry -home in her saddlebag—she allers has that saddlebag bulging, too—an’ the -pair o’ red slippers that she was workin’ with roses fer me—cut ’em down -to fit her ... she got the red felt f’om her brother who works in an -organ factory.”</p> -<p>So this was the load which the trail-bear had carried upon his sore head -when he felt that the valley was beyond “God bless you”! There were -smothered shrieks from the hay.</p> -<p>“Poor wronged man! You have all our sympathy—all our sympathy!” The -Guardian touched his hand. “Can’t you get them back? Won’t -she—disgorge?”</p> -<p>“Not much! Not, when she’s ridden off with ’em to her den, her little -cabin on a lonely peak, ’bout nine miles from here. She lived there -alone all last winter—when she wasn’t on the go, riding round among the -mountains—living on crumbs, the neighbors gave her.... Oh! she’s a -sleek-gabbed one, but sometimes I think she’s as cracked as she’s -sly—and keen.” He sighed.</p> -<p>“It’s easy to see how she comes by her ‘fore-goes’ about the weather and -so forth—a radio receiver in that bulky umbrella,” murmured Pemrose.</p> -<p>“Wall, anyhow, I ain’t ‘cock-bird-high’ to be caught by her chaff.” The -farmer stamped again. “The women they go an’ see her an’ come back with -tales o’ what they hear and see—my wife with a muslin mouth upon her, -all stiff and starched, tellin’ about strange water-burn, little -cloudy-bright rings an’ shapes floating up from it—some new brand o’ -angels, I suppose, visiting with <i>her</i>, the Little Lone Lady.”</p> -<p>“Um-m. Phosphine, I guess, Daddy would say!” whispered Pemrose to the -hay.</p> -<p>“I didn’t see none of it when I went to ask her about Paddy’s cough—you -can hear him now underneath you.”</p> -<p>There was a wild burst of laughter at this give-away, mingled with the -blowing noise of a windy cougher.</p> -<p>“Wal! as you ain’t Her and want to spend the night here ... you ain’t -got no candles nor matches about you?” he asked suspiciously.</p> -<p>“No, nothing that could start a fire,” the Guardian assured him, intent -now on seeing that the girls removed their wet shoes.</p> -<p>“Well! good rest to ye on the hay. Mebbe there’ll be a bite o’ breakfast -comin’ to ye—for I vum ye can stand more ’n most city folks, though -there’s one among ye that looks a dainty piece—not meant for any -hard-sleddin’.” He raised the lantern, until its ray singled out Una, -yawning upon the hay. “So-o long!” He backed down the ladder—gun and -lantern. But, again, he thrust his head up and glared around. “Look -out—folks!” he began; “this ’ere hay-loft—.” But, once more, he saw red, -the red of his “rosie” slippers. “Gosh!” he gurgled, “lucky fer Her that -she warn’t you; I swear to goodness! I’d ha’ come within a grain o’ -shooting Her.” The lantern gave a final flash and disappeared.</p> -<p>“Well! now—now that old ‘Bunch o’ Spinach’ has gone, I guess we can -settle to sleep,” gasped Lura.</p> -<p>“Don’t call—names,” mumbled the Guardian, who was seeing that Una got -out of damp clothing. “Aren’t we lucky not to be Her!”</p> -<p>It was a new flash light, mornie-blink, stealing up the ladder and -through the loft transom, some three hours later.</p> -<p>It fell on tired face, trailing limbs, tossing promiscuously upon the -hay.</p> -<p>“What’s—that?” Una sat up suddenly.</p> -<p>“Only the rain. Another shower! Sounds—sounds like bricks upon a tin -roof!” Pemrose yawned. “Well! ducky, didn’t we have a good night—what -was left of it—in spite of that old ‘Hayseed’ and his slippers?”</p> -<p>“Poor old bear! No wonder he called himself beyond God bless you!” -mumbled Dorothy. “Last night—didn’t it put the cream on -experiences—camping experiences?”</p> -<p>“I’ll say—so.” Pemrose echoed the boy’s slang, cuddling close to her -loft-mate, her dearest joke-fellow, Una, careful, in her tickled -laughter, not to wake fifteen slumbering girls stretched like trailing -plants around their Guardian—their queen of the meadow, raised slightly -above them, upon a mouldy dais of hay.</p> -<p>“Isn’t she a—dear? A dear!” Pemrose gazed at the white feather of hair -in the brown of the womanly locks, unbound. “Just the woman—I want to -be!” dreamily. “The birds, do you hear them? Pecking on the roof!” She -pinched Una. “Aren’t they loud—like scratching monkeys? Mercy! -what’s—that? A—rat?”</p> -<p>“A rat! Oh! don’t—don’t let me see it,” wailed Una. “And we were so -‘comfy’!”</p> -<p>“A rat! A hor-rid rat, with—oh! tail by the yard,” screamed Dorothy, -hopping round, in the dim light, from basement to bank of last year’s -hay.</p> -<p>“A rat! Oh! the only thing—the only thing I’d ever want to kill is a -rat.”</p> -<p>Did the sinister wish, a rebounding shell, hit Pemrose Lorry, -herself—she careering blindly, too?</p> -<p>Had an earthquake struck the barn—or a bomb?</p> -<p>Suddenly the world, the hay, went up; and she went down.</p> -<p>Hay was in her eyes, her ears, her mouth, down her back—she would have -made a mule seem a sorry hay-consumer.</p> -<p>She was clutching at it wildly with both hands—and finding it but thin -air in her grasp.</p> -<p>In the feeble dawn glimmer she was sinking—being plunged into a shocking -world underneath.</p> -<p>And where else she was to go, how far she was to travel in this awful -underworld, she did not know, for she had alighted on a horse’s -back—alighted in a huddle on a horse’s back!</p> -<p>And there came the scream of Dorothy from the sheep pen, amid a torrent -of frightened baas.</p> -<p>“It’s Paddy—the horse with the cough—and he’s trying to rub me off -against the stall!”</p> -<p>Even as the knowledge crashed through Pemrose’s brain she was twisting -her groping hands fiercely in Paddy’s mane—in the musty gloom of the -horse-stall.</p> -<p>Buried alive, she would carry on—as Dorothy was carrying on, judging by -the sheep.</p> -<p>She managed to slip one foot from under her, get astride upon the dark, -lunging farmhorse—a mountain in the gloom.</p> -<p>“Ha-a! Tha-at’s more like it!” She drew a hissing breath between her -teeth.</p> -<p>But if Paddy was drawing comparisons, it was between making hay while -the sun shone, greedily pulling down more of it until he was half -smothered—and getting rid of the startling burden on his back.</p> -<p>Snorting malignantly, he rocked up against his thrashing stall-mate, -Barney, trying to palm that grasshopper burden off on him.</p> -<p>Barney was all reeking excitement, too, in the close, musty quarters.</p> -<p>For a moment, one awful moment, the girl, jammed between their hot, -steaming sides, saw herself beneath their mangling hoofs—her life -trodden out in the stall.</p> -<p>She was in the lions’ den—and no mistake. For Paddy, great, clodhopping -farmhorse, failing to dislodge her thus, swung his dark haunches, lunged -with his front shoulder at the dark partition—to crush her there.</p> -<p>But, quick as thought—before his throbbing side could pin her, the -girl’s little bare foot, darting forward, was nestling in the hollow of -that brutish neck; five tickling, pink toes were stroking it -gently—combing it soothingly.</p> -<p>“Treff told me, Treff—Treff,—if ever a horse tries to rub you off, dart -your foot forward into the hollow of his neck!” By waves far subtler -than radio, she was reaching out now, imploringly to that boy pal with -the amber speck of humor in one gray eye—rider of the clouds and rider -of the plains.</p> -<p>Across miles of mountain and valley his mantle seemed flung to her, the -mantle of his daring, that cock-o’-pluck—so that, with her right leg -stretched out, level, across the cross brute’s shoulder and five little -toes seductively curry-combing, she was patting the other side of the -swollen neck, with a:</p> -<p>“Steady—boy! Steady, there! Easy—now! Who the deuce can parlez-vous a -horse? That’s me! Oh-h! five little pigs went to market.”</p> -<p>Was there ever the Paddy, yet, who could resist such treatment?</p> -<p>Two minutes later a farmer, coming in mad haste and trembling to the -barn door, beheld, in the dim dawn a girl queening it in dun trappings -of hay upon a perfectly docile farmhorse—which rolled the whites of its -eyes at him sheepishly—the great jaws grinding upon a sheaf of hay.</p> -<p>“Good—old—Paddy!” Patronizingly she patted the shoulder that would have -rubbed her out, rose to a standing position upon the broad back, her -up-flung hand gripping the top of the stall.</p> -<p>Coolly she drew herself up, crept along the dark stall-edge, dropped -from the partition into the manger and thence, with a light spring, to -the barn floor.</p> -<p>“Where are you—Dorothy? Oh-h! where are—<i>you</i>?” she anxiously cried.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>came a laughing voice.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Wal! I swan to goodness there ain’t much ‘woolgathering’ about either -o’ you.” The farmer slapped his leg, with a roar. “Oh! I started at -midnight fer to tell you about that hayloft floor, jest bone-shanks, -bare poles across, widish spaces between ’em—and the hay thinned out in -places. But, land! what’s the odds?” He beamed upon Paddy’s rider. “I -vum even the Little Lone Lady will never get the better of you.”</p> -<p>“She’ll never ride off in my shoes, eh?” laughed Pemrose. “But she was -right about the commotion among all the animals before morning; wasn’t -she?” as she flew to extricate Dorothy.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXII' title='XII: The Shack Corner'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Shack Corner</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Q. S. O. Increase your power, O. M.—Old Man!”</p> -<p>In what had come to be known as the “shack corner” of the cabin on the -sidehill—the radio shack—Pemrose Lorry uttered the challenge into the -microphone, small mouthpiece, making merry with her father, a hundred -miles away.</p> -<p>“Ha! That’s better. Your signals are coming in strong now. I have you -tuned O. K.” Yet, still, she fiddled with the knob upon the dial on the -face of the radio receiver; the knob which, beginning with zero upon the -dial-scale, she had gently turned, varying the capacity of her -condenser, the steel plates for storing up current, until she got her -wavelength—the wavelength of the distant station sending.</p> -<p>In the hazy, morning sunlight stealing into the mountain camp, the camp -upon Mount Pocohosette, seventeen girls and a Guardian watched her, -bewitched by this new talking game, as she alternately threw the aërial -switch to the receiving side, thus connecting her receiving set to -aërial and ground wires, and then to the transmitter, forming a like -connection.</p> -<p>“You’re coming in like a ton of bricks now,” she informed her distant -father. “I could hear you with the phones on the table,” with a merry -wink.</p> -<p>“Radio Amateur, thy middle name is Exaggeration!” laughed the Guardian.</p> -<p>“Always tell the other fellow what <i>he’s</i> doing, not what you’re doing -yourself—then, if anything goes wrong, you can blame it on him—even if -he is your most blessed Dad ... first principle of radio transmission!” -She winked again—the amateur.</p> -<p>“Oh! if I were only—only—mistress of it, as you are.” Lura clasped her -hands, her radiant “copper nob” shining like the bronze coils.</p> -<p>“I’m going to give you all a lesson presently, a lesson in -radio—transmitting and receiving. But, first, I’m going to ‘parlez-vous’ -Dad in code, a little.” The first and second fingers of the girlish -amateur’s right hand now attacked the steely telegraph key upon the -operating table, as the radio shelf was called, ticking off endless -combinations of dots and dashes—a sealed book to most of the girls.</p> -<p>“Goodness! That code is as bad as the Hindenburg line; ’twould be as -hard for me to work through it,” panted Lura, whose brother had been a -soldier.</p> -<p>“Isn’t it the worst—teaser? I promised father I’d try to make something -of it—but it just won’t stick!” Una ruefully tapped her forehead.</p> -<p>“There! Di-dit-di-dit! That’s a laugh—a radio laugh—if you only knew -it!” chuckled the girlish operator on her high stool before the -table—her black eyebrows meeting over the blue sky-beams in her eyes. -“Father got off to me ‘Y. L.—Young Lady’—I told him I hated that; and he -changed it to ‘O. W.—Old Woman.’ Well! there, we’re through our -‘hamfest’—gabfest—for this morning. Father’s rejoiced, tickled through, -that we’re having such a wonderful time in camp—Camp Chicolee, as I told -him we called it, from an Indian word meaning Horse; and he hopes I -won’t try taking four-foot fences on Revelation—just yet.”</p> -<p>There was a general whoop of excited laughter at this, as girlish eyes -turned through sun-framed camp windows to amber forms of scattered -horses grazing upon the range, otherwise the Long Pasture down the -mountainside, about a quarter of a mile from camp.</p> -<p>Pemrose was pulling all her switches as she spoke, the miraculous -conversation ended, so that the bright bulbs, the incandescent vacuum -tubes in transmitter and receiver gradually faded out from white-hot -filament and grid, and cherry-red plate about them, to cool blindness.</p> -<p>“Oh! Revelation is—a prince of the Long Pasture!... But this!” She bowed -her head upon the operating table. “It sometimes seems too big a Wonder. -To think of hearing Father, his own dear, joking voice, a hundred and -five miles off! I’m going to try and tune in on him morning and evening -when he isn’t away, lecturing.”</p> -<p>For a minute she was held speechless by the thought, that blue-eyed -girl, that never again, on land or sea, need she be hopelessly beyond -the hearing of that adored voice of Pater and pal—of him who, with -continents discussing his inventions, had bent his genius towards the -manufacturing of a “listening” ring for her.</p> -<p>“Oh! it does make one’s heart slip around in one’s body, with the -wonder—the miracle—of it,” whispered artistic Naomi, slipping an arm -about her. “I, for one, don’t want to depend on somebody else to grind -my music for me, tune in on my evening concerts and speeches—Sunday -sermons—I want to do it for myself. Can’t you begin and explain it all -now, Pem—tell us how wheels go round? Do!”</p> -<p>“If I try to understand how wheels go round, it sets my poor wits to -woolgathering—so that the wool stops my ears: I’m not a bit technical,” -protested Lura laughingly. “But I did—I did watch all <i>you</i> did, without -moving an ‘eye-winker’,” merrily, “from the moment when you threw the -lightning-switch outside the cabin.”</p> -<p>“Yes, that grounds the aërial, so that if lightning should strike—we’re -likely to have big storms up here—it wouldn’t go through the set, -through the camp.”</p> -<p>Toying lovingly with a knob here and there upon the dialed face of her -receiver, the amateur’s blue eyes roamed off to the hills—still in curl -papers of mist—she still gloating over that morning “hamfest” with her -father.</p> -<p>“This is a wonderful set which Mr. Grosvenor has had installed for -us—isn’t he a prince, Una’s father—but not quite powerful enough to talk -with <i>him</i> overseas.... We ought all to learn to use it perfectly—just -to thank him!”</p> -<p>Patiently she began to “handle” her recent message, or the method of it, -all over again, going from switch to switch, throwing the two-bladed -aërial switch to one side to send, to the other to listen.</p> -<p>“It’s a ‘slow-thumbed’ business; one has to be careful of one’s bulbs, -so that they’ll live long.” She was turning the rheostat knob, to light -those bulbs—having re-started her generator, with its powerful -current—moving that rheostat knob very gently, as when she had called -“1—V. Z. M.” her father’s distant laboratory station, so that those -shining vacuum tubes glowed slowly from dim to bright—with an -incandescent eloquence that sent its poetry right into the enchained -girls’ souls.</p> -<p>She was glancing at ammeters and radiation meter, the first to see if -she was forcing those shining tubes too much, the second to determine -whether she was putting enough power into the antennæ running around the -raftered ceiling of the log cabin, above her.</p> -<p>“But explain it to us—more—Pemrose; how the message goes out! I’m -beginning to love the radio shack—this shack side of the cabin,” cried -various voices in tuneful keys and different pleading words.</p> -<p>“‘How it goes out!’” The inventor’s daughter wrinkled her brows, trying -to meet the tax levied upon her—her matchless inheritance. “Well! father -explained it first to me with the hackneyed illustration of throwing a -stone into a pond, showing how the waves spread out, at first strong, -growing weaker—and how they may be intercepted in various ways; so it is -with the radio sound-waves. He illustrated it in the laboratory, too, -with a pair of tuning forks, how if one is struck, the other, if it is -in tune, will echo the sound at a little distance. If they are not in -tune, there must be a magnet between, for them to vibrate, answer each -other, with a funny, ‘surgy’ sound; we’ve tried it—”</p> -<p>“Oh! but tuning forks are an old song; and that does not tell all the -story about radio. Go on—it’s fascinating.” Dorothy picked up the -microphone from the table against the log wall.</p> -<p>“Well! when your voice goes into that it passes along the wire -connecting it with the transmitter at the rate of a few hundred -vibrations a second.” The girlish radio fan touched the two-foot cabinet -containing the sending set. “But that is not speed enough to send a -message out into the air, so my blessed Dad says—strength depends upon -the rapidity of the vibrations, so the voice passes into this -incandescent tube—bulb—where the vibrations are increased, but still not -enough to send them out. But they pass on into this other vacuum tube, -called the oscillator, where the vibrations are a thousand—and more—a -second.”</p> -<p>“Whe-ew!” It was a prolonged whistle-whistle of awe.</p> -<p>“But that, again, would be too high frequency—beyond audibility. But, -somehow, the shining bulbs strike an average between them—Dad says it’s -a sort of grab game—between them—very difficult for any but the Wizard -to understand,” Pem’s black eyebrows went merrily up. “But they do hit -it off and the voice goes out into the ether in audio-frequency waves; -waves that can be picked up—heard—on the back of an electric carrier -wave.”</p> -<p>“Gracious! I’m on the back of a carrier wave now—carried away. I’m -riding a winged horse—and not old King.” Lura glanced down at the Long -Pasture.</p> -<p>“But who wants to really ‘dig’?” laughed the girl amateur, pulling her -switches to disconnect the sets again. “If any one does, there’s a -buzzer on the table—code cards. About two-thirds of the stuff that’s -sent out is in dot and dash. You can hear twice as far with it.”</p> -<p>“Yes, laugh in dots, cry in dashes, eh,” said Naomi. “Well—I’m ‘game’; -I’ll try to be, although I do want to be out on the mountain, -sketching—as it’s only our fourth morning here.”</p> -<p>“How—how about you, ‘Jack’?” Pemrose glanced at Una. “Fair play—your -father!”</p> -<p>“Revel—Revel is waiting for her morning lump of sugar,” said the latter, -pointing archly through the window at the amber shape and floss-silk -mane of a dainty little thoroughbred, down in the Long Pasture.</p> -<p>Out there—out there, on the range, all was gayety, irresponsible -idleness, for the moment: horses madly racing automobiles that glided -by, on a mountain road below, snorting deliriously when brought up by a -fence.</p> -<p>“Just look at that old Sickle Face, Cartoon!” laughed Una. “He thinks -he’s a racehorse, a fast ‘darb’, as the caretaker, the farmer in charge -of the horse-farm, says. But—but Revelation beats him to the fence—every -time.”</p> -<p>“And the dear colts, all eyes,” murmured Lura. “The little, fluffy -babies that run under their mothers; and the older ones, Blue Boy, Big -Eyes, that kick so high; think they can kick—the—sky; don’t they?”</p> -<p>“Well! if we haven’t kicked the sky this morning, we’ve come pretty near -it.” Dorothy’s chin was thrust out freakishly. “We will, when we really -inhabit the shack corner—send out messages for ourselves and receive -them. Oh! if we could only have a private code, like the Scout troops, -some of them.”</p> -<p>“When you make your own of the ‘crutch’, then you can make it over.” -Pemrose was fingering a code card. “Dot an’ dash—the crutch! The -universal language! It requires ‘pep’ to handle it—the crutch.” Her blue -eyes flashed. “Father made my radio ring as a prize for being able to -tick off code calls and pick them up. He said that if I didn’t work hard -at a discovery, to understand—and use it to the full—I was just a -frothing-stick, whipping the cream that somebody else had made.” The -girl’s eyebrows went up in laughter.</p> -<p>“And as none of us want to be that, I ordain a code lesson for this -morning, instead of first aid or handcraft,” said the Guardian.</p> -<p>“We might have a private <i>sign</i> of our own to begin a message with, -anyway.” Pemrose was ticking off that signal, five minutes later, -pressing the little lever that wagged the tongue of the “buzzer”, just -an ordinary electric doorbell, with a little dry-cell battery attached, -upon the camp table.</p> -<p>“How would this do? Six dots, four dashes, for our Group sign. And—and -we might add to the ordinary radio abbreviations a few of our own: that -mountain off there—” the blue eyes gazed remotely through the -window—“Little Poco, Little Brother Mountain, as we call it, would be -‘L. B.’ if we were sending a message dot an’ dash. Little Speckle—Little -Sister would be ‘L. S.’ Oh! we may work out the whole private code in -time ... then where will boy amateurs be?”</p> -<p>“We’ll have beaten them, to a frazzle,” purred Dorothy. “At least, they -won’t be ahead. With the help of Cannie Nanny we’ll do it—this droning -bumble-bee.”</p> -<p>She laughed, putting out a finger to stroke the green buzzer, with its -tireless hum, doing duty, for instruction, as a telegraph key.</p> -<p>“What—what a thing an electric battery is!” Pemrose was muttering -whimsically. “You can run everything with it—from a train to a burglar -alarm,” merrily, “and a little one-cell buzzer. What do you think—Una?”</p> -<p>“Eh—what?” gasped the latter—her eyes had been turning listlessly to the -Long Pasture and Revel, as she counted the minutes until the morning -ride.</p> -<p>“When—when we go away to school, to an Academy, this year, Unie, we -could have radio rigged up between our rooms,” put forth the blue-eyed -amateur, “and talk to each other with our own private signs—as Treff and -his chum do at college.”</p> -<p>The bait worked—the challenge in the name of her aviator cousin, that -cock-o’-pluck.</p> -<p>Una’s pencil, like the others, began to show no less grit than lead in -taking down hieroglyphics from the buzzer’s tongue.</p> -<p>Cannie Nanny, in the midst, became a center of gravity.</p> -<p>An hour later, when a riding party swung down the mountain, it was with -a gay switching of crops, a new <i>esprit de corps</i>, the sense of a leap -taken to keep abreast of bold boy amateurs—a leap in grace and growing.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXIII' title='XIII: The Long Pasture'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XIII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Long Pasture</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Here, Rev. Here, Good Boy! Oats—<i>smell ’em</i>!”</p> -<p>Pemrose, wild with the welcome of the mountains and the triumph of that -late long-distance talk with her father—to say nothing of a step, at any -rate, towards a secret code for Camp Fire Girls—was dancing all over the -Long Pasture.</p> -<p>Temptingly in her hand was the flat tin, half full of oats, which she -had taken from a bin in the gray shed at a western corner of the -mile-long pasture. An outpost of the farm buildings, paddocks and -horse-boxes, more than a mile below, was that weather beaten shed; in it -tools were kept and farm implements used in the grain raising for -horses, the bean and corn growing, upon the lower sidehill, the -outskirts of the well-stocked horse-farm in the rich, green -bottom-lands!</p> -<p>“Oats! Oats! Smell them—Boy! Maybe there’s a lump of sugar somewhere, -too! Two lumps—if you’re very good!”</p> -<p>She patted the breast pocket of her linen riding habit, holding the pan -of grain aslant.</p> -<p>Revelation approached warily, step by step, his beautiful bay neck -outstretched, his long face eager—dark eyelids blinking.</p> -<p>Within a dozen feet of the temptress he halted, suspicious of the hand -behind her back, pushed his nose out, the neck quite level, his breath -coming in a white, investigating cloud.</p> -<p>Suddenly he tossed his head with the bright, chestnut mane, those long, -silky eyelashes winking mischievously, wheeled and darted off, with a -teasing snort which plainly said:</p> -<p>“Not this morning—thank you! I’d rather race automobiles along by the -fence.”</p> -<p>“He senses that I have a halter with me,” murmured the radiant girl, -keeping the right hand still out of sight and renewing honeyed -negotiations with her left, displaying the oats, golden in the flash of -mountain sunlight, spilling a little of it into her shoes, while the -horse circled round her in wide rings, took a notion to walk slowly -towards her—then, at ten feet, again, darted away.</p> -<p>“You’re a rogue, Revelation. But you’re not an outlaw—like Cartoon. But -I suppose he isn’t really a bad horse—or he wouldn’t be mingling with -human beings, up here in the Long Pasture—only Roman-nosed and -stubborn.”</p> -<p>Pem’s glance roved now to a distant tall horse, a dark bay, with a long -neck sawing restlessly in the sunlight, a sharp sickle face, almost a -hatchet face, slanted sidelong, who hovered nervously upon the outskirts -of the parleying group of girls and horses. With gay satisfaction, her -eye came back to Revelation.</p> -<p>A Morgan bay, fifteen hands high, with a foxy coat of satin, in every -lithe movement the thoroughbred, shy, sensitive, fast,—but kindly, -good-natured, too.</p> -<p>She wheedled with the amber oats again, spattering it from the tilted -tin upon the laughing air, while her horse, in ever narrowing circles, -sampled the scent, nose away out, velvet nostrils quivering into -mischievous smiles—at the slightest movement to catch him, he was off -again, heels flinging.</p> -<p>“You’re as naughty as can be, this morning, Boy. You’ve raced autos too -much—while we were handling the ‘crutch.’” The girl’s eyes danced, blue -as the sky-ways above her. “Can’t you take a lesson from your mother, -Revel? But I suppose you’re just a Revelation of what’s hidden in -her—only motherhood, mincing motherhood, keeps it down,” she laughed to -herself, turning to glance over the mountain pasture—a third of a mile -in width.</p> -<p>Everywhere the same catch-as-can game was going on, with oats and -halter, everywhere challenge and parley, at the sunny end of the range -that is, at which the horses had congregated!</p> -<p>Harmony, Fox, Galatea, old King, full of pasture play and human -curiosity, running along by the fence, in turn, to ogle a tempting girl, -with, somewhere, a halter concealed about her, then archly taking the -“fling-strings”, putting fifty or a hundred yards between them and a -morning ride, kicking blissfully, as they ran!</p> -<p>And the colts, the enchanting colts, from the fluffy infant, with hair -inches long, running beside or under its mother, to the shaggy gawk, -with big, watery blue eyes, who thought he could kick the sky.</p> -<p>“They’re all—all full of mischief this morning,” whispered Pemrose -between her teeth. “Una is the only one who has a ‘soft snap.’ Revel -stands still to be caught. And Unie—‘Jack’—scores in another way, too, -she owns her horse. Oh! what would I not give to call you mine, -Revelation—teasing imp though you are.” Pem’s knuckles pressed her lips, -to hold in the longing. “Ah, here comes the farmer—Menzies, who has -charge of the horse-farm—and his little son, Donnie, Menzies to give us -lessons in riding and jumping—Donnie, with a tan puppy under his arm! -What! Revel—Donnie! Curls—what!”</p> -<p>Pemrose’s eyes were wide and round as the colts’ now—limpid, shining. -They were fixed upon a group, thirty yards away, where of all the -girls—with some experience in horseback riding before—who were to learn -this summer to catch and bridle their own mounts, Una was the only one -whose apple fell easily into her mouth. The only one who did not have to -run or pant—or spill oats into her shoes!</p> -<p>Except on rare occasions Revel, beguiled by a lump of sugar, would stand -still, gentle image of motherhood, to have the halter thrown over her -short, fair head by her girl rider.</p> -<p>A beautiful little horse she was, with her coat of cinnamon silk, her -form more chunky than that of her six-year-old son, Revelation—neck -thicker, shoulder heavier.</p> -<p>And now—now, to the group, two figures were added: Menzies, the -horse-breeder, and his tiny son, not yet four, whose flaxen curls, in -this out-of-the way region, were, like the colts’ fluff, still unshorn.</p> -<p>Una had exhausted her bribe of sugar—was waiting for the other girls to -catch their horses. But Revel knew where more was to be found, Donald -had some, generally, in the pocket of his little blouse for her. But -Donnie was, at present, taken up with displaying the pup under his arm. -And Revel found other amusement.</p> -<p>Stealing up behind the child, until her soft mother breath was on his -cheek, gently she nibbled at his curls, taking them one by one into her -“nuzzling” mouth, letting them stray through it—heaven’s hay.</p> -<p>Other horses, Harmony, Fox—Flying Fox—were curious about those flaxen -curls, too, had come near enough to smell of them; Revel alone fondled -them in her mouth.</p> -<p>“What a—picture!” breathed Pemrose. “If Unie has one friend that she -loves more than me, it’s Revel—and on her back she is seldom afraid. -Oh-h! this is a won-der-ful morning. It puts even radio in the -background.”</p> -<p>She was out of breath and she stood still, leaning against a side fence -watching that sunlit group, mother-horse, child, newborn dog—even the -wonder of riding the air with a whisper on the back of a carrier-wave -paling beside a rare moment in earth’s picture gallery.</p> -<p>All the Long Pasture was a picture gallery that morning, dramatic -representations of girlish life and pluck, vivid horseplay.</p> -<p>Presently, while Donnie, resenting the babying, snatched his head away -and fed Revel with a lump of sugar, instead, from his tiny breast -pocket, Pemrose resumed her game of catch.</p> -<p>This time Revelation, being a good horse if gay, allowed himself to be -coaxed. He lessened the ten-foot barrier to five, sniffing at the -dribbing oats. In a trice the girl had him by the forelock. With her -left hand on his long head she was pressing that down until her foot was -on his neck—otherwise her elbow—while with her right hand feeding him -the oats.</p> -<p>When that was gone she slipped the halter over his nose, on to his -obedient neck, buckled it—led him over to the fence, to saddle him.</p> -<p>But just as she had thrown that saddle on, before she could tighten the -girths, her breath began to come thick and fast—very thick and fast.</p> -<p>Donnie having fed Revel with a sweet lump and jerked his curls from her, -with a remonstrating: “You don’t t’ink hair’s hay; do you?” let her -gentle head find his pocket for herself—and extract a second lump of -sugar.</p> -<p>Somebody was watching the trick—Cartoon! Cartoon not destined to be -ridden to-day; though not an outlaw, he was a churl, with his stubborn -Roman nose, flaring nostrils, fiery breath, his sharp triangular -face—almost a hatchet face.</p> -<p>Cartoon was creeping slyly through the pasture grass, with a low snort, -his head not only high, as Revelation carried his, but the chin <i>in</i> a -little, touching his chest—and the greedy meaning there.</p> -<p>“Don’t give Revel any more sugar now, Donnie-boy! She’s had enough.” Una -was drawing her horse away. “Here! show me the puppy. Have you one for -me—I’d like a dog?”</p> -<p>“Of course he has.” Donnie’s father turned his head from where, at a -little distance off, he was showing Dorothy how to post, rise gracefully -in her saddle, hold her whip well back. “Of course he has a a pup for -you, Miss Una. Which do you want, a male or female?”</p> -<p>“’Tisn’t—’tisn’t either of those,” protested Donnie indignantly. “It’s -an Airedale!”</p> -<p>There was a laugh. Una drew Revel off towards the fence. The farmer -moved away, starting Dorothy off on a preliminary canter round the -pasture.</p> -<p>The eight who were to ride this morning had, by this time, captured -their mounts.</p> -<p>It was then that Cartoon, stealing up, sniffed his opportunity. His -sharp nose, rooting in the air, said: “Sugar” and told him that the -sweets were in the breastpocket of a little child.</p> -<p>It was then that Pemrose, watching afar, felt her “rooting” breath -suddenly become a snort, an excited “Weugh!” like his.</p> -<p>Leaving Revelation with the white saddle-girths dangling, she started to -run across the pasture, crying out as she did so.</p> -<p>But Cartoon was quick—greedy and quick. Taking short, mincing steps in -his excitement, his breath coming in very short puffs, he stole up -behind the child, lowered his high head and began feeling him -over—rooting softly with his nose near the tiny pocket.</p> -<p>Donnie started and saw, not Revel’s fair “nuzzling” face near to his, -but the dark, ugly, Roman-nosed one.</p> -<p>The child gave a scream and plunged away—tripped in his terror and fell.</p> -<p>The horse plunged, too, with a baffled snort, wheeled crossly, lashing -his heels out.</p> -<p>“Oh! God help—” breathed Pemrose, in the utter horror of -helplessness—for she was many, many yards away.</p> -<p>And then the angel of God appeared—appeared so suddenly, in such an -unlooked-for shape that Pem, dazzled, saw two of her—and three of -Cartoon.</p> -<p>It was a girl with wide dark eyes in whose blaze the angel of God had -bared his scabbard, his scabbard of deliverance, a girl with face -waxen-white as a snow-flower—a girl who “went through life as daintily -as if she were picking a flower”—who was snatching Donnie from the -proximity of those lashing heels—within an inch of being struck by them -herself.</p> -<p>“U-na!” Pemrose’s hand went to her cold cheek—she was fairly stricken -still, out in the middle of the Long Pasture.</p> -<p>“Goodness! I—I don’t know how I did it,” said Una, sinking down.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXIV' title='XIV: Revel and Revelation'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XIV</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Revel and Revelation</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Well we’re going to ride over to the Gap—Eden Gap,” suggested Pemrose.</p> -<p>Revelation and she were, as usual, leading the way along the narrow -mountain road—and beside her was Una on Revel.</p> -<p>“They go so well together, don’t they, mother and son?” said the latter, -stroking Revel’s silky mane, “Revelation, with his coat a brighter -chestnut, slighter, taller—faster—although I think Revel could hold her -own in a race, too, in spite of her being so gentle—and lady-toed,” with -a little laugh, “turning out her toes a little in that mincing, -lady-like way. Watch her! Oh! I’m never quite so happy as when I’m on -her back.”</p> -<p>“And you seem to be braver there than anywhere else,” thought Pemrose. -“How did you ever get the courage to do it, catch Donnie by his little -arms and drag him, almost, from under Cartoon’s heels,” looking -silently, sidelong, at her friend, “you with all your little -‘whim-ma-garies’—foolish fears and fancies?” flicking at her horse’s -neck, with a smile.</p> -<p>They broke into a canter, leaving the rest of the riding party behind.</p> -<p>“Wha-at a summer we’re having!” gasped Una next, as they reined in, to -round a turn. “It—it’s the first time I’ve been with a lot of girls. -And—the mountains!” She waved her riding crop.</p> -<p>“There—there are no words,” murmured Pemrose breathlessly. “All—all the -old ones have patches on them!” She winked at her own bankruptcy, gazing -up at a softly swelling mountainside, radiant in July green and silver, -the silver of innumerable flashing birch trees, with a few maples thrown -in—above them the dark emerald of spruce and pine.</p> -<p>“Look at the hardhack,” Una panted. “Isn’t it lovely? The roadside just -pink—magenta! And, oh! there’s arrow head, white arrow head, wading into -the water, down there.</p> -<p>“It’s as fond of the mud as you are—when you have the magic ring on.” It -was a dark eye which winked slyly now, as Una pointed down a tangled -slope that bordered, on one side, the narrow road, or bridle path, at a -shallow pond, just snow-flecked with the broad-leaved arrow head. “And, -oh-h! such violet asters! And, look there! purple deer grass—its heart -of gold. Love-ly!”</p> -<p>There was a little break, a little catch in the voice of the girl whose -brain was a wildflower basket.</p> -<p>“It—it makes everything so different, out-of-doors, when you can really -identify the flowers and trees; not be, as the Guardian, says, a Mrs. -Malaprop among them, going round all the time, miscalling them—or with a -‘]what-d’ye-call-’em’ on your lips.” Una laughed now—and there was a -new, a wild-bird frolic in the laughter of this girl who went through -life as daintily—as lovingly as if she were “picking a flower.”</p> -<p>“Wake up, Revel!” she said. “You’d never be a Mrs. Malaprop anywhere, -would you? You’d always be a good Camp Fire Girl—you’re so knowing.”</p> -<p>And Revel shook her fair head and, snorting—blowing a cloud of silky -breath over the compliment, as the girls, in their pretty linen riding -habits, cantered onward again.</p> -<p>“Look! Look! Mount Mansfield off there—mighty Mount Mansfield! We’re on -higher ground now—and you can just get—a peep—at it,” panted Pemrose by -and by, her bare hand stroking Revelation’s neck, as they slackened pace -again.</p> -<p>The trail was climbing, the curving mountain bridle path, broad enough, -in most places, for two to ride abreast—and far away in the distance -there were the cloudy outlines of the giants of the Green Mountains, -Mount Mansfield—Camel’s Hump.</p> -<p>“And the hills to the right of us n-now!” It was an ecstatic little cry -from Una, her lip-corners curving up towards the dark, curly eyelashes. -“See! Two of them, just—just like big green bubbles—twin bubbles, as if -they had been blown there, tossed there!”</p> -<p>“But the boulders!” said Pemrose, a minute or two later. “Just as if -some old giant had been playing pitch-and-toss with them on the -hillside! Goodness! the farmers must have a hard time.”</p> -<p>“That’s why I’m giving my birthday party—for them,” whispered Una, -bending forward towards Revel’s silken ear. “Ha! We’re leaving the rest -of the party ‘in the dust,’—far behind,” she laughed, resting her hand -on the pommel, to look around. “Dorothy is riding more easily to-day, on -old King—you can’t see daylight between her and the saddle,” with a -quivering grin.</p> -<p>“And Lura can keep her balance without holding on like grim death when -her horse wheels quickly round a turn,” said Pemrose, glancing back, -too. “Isn’t her ‘copper nob’ wonderful when she’s riding, bare-headed—a -lamp to the way?”</p> -<p>“There! Oh! there’s another lamp to the way. Cardinal flowers! Cardinal -flowers—down by the brook, there!” Una’s quick eye caught the blaze of -vermilion through the scrub. “Oh! I must get off and pick some.”</p> -<p>“Keep them for the Wild Flower Party—your farmers’ party—pageant—the day -after to-morrow; we can ride over, again, and get some,” Pemrose argued. -“It’s to-morrow that we plan to have a picnic—a supper up on the old -Balcony, on our mountain, where you stand on the lip of nothing.... -<i>Mercy!</i> What! Oh—tumbleweed! Dry tumbleweed!”</p> -<p>It was a big, brown pompon of the feathery weed, broken by the wind from -its stem and bowling gayly down the trail.</p> -<p>It was Revelation shying nervously, side-stepping down the slope, his -neck curved restively—his eyes trained sidelong upon that trail tumbler, -as if it were a King of Terrors.</p> -<p>It was a girl clinging desperately with both hands to the saddle.</p> -<p>“Whoa! <i>Whoa</i>—Boy! There! There!”</p> -<p>Breathlessly Pem—recovering—put him on to the trail again.</p> -<p>“Goodness! If he didn’t take my breath away. Maybe I haven’t ridden -quite as much as I thought I had!” with a little, fluttering grin. -“There—there, you old Goose, look at it, so that you’ll know it again; -it isn’t any different off the stem from what it is on!” She pushed the -horse’s nose downward towards the great, fronded balls of the same weed -growing, meek and green, beside the trail.</p> -<p>“Revel took no notice of it,” Una complacently patted her horse’s neck. -“Well, we’ll soon be at the Gap now.”</p> -<p>They sighted it, a few minutes later, as they rode up the valley, a -narrow, rock-girt pass between two mountains, rising precipitately on -either side.</p> -<p>The trail, broad enough in some places to be quite a respectable piece -of natural road, had shrunk now until there was scarcely room for two to -ride abreast.</p> -<p>On the left was still the green slope, starred with wild flowers—ablaze -with hardhack and broad-leaved fireweed.</p> -<p>To the right there was now a curving snake fence, four feet high, the -boundary of some estate or farm, with ten feet of grass between it and -the beaten trail.</p> -<p>Beyond the fence was a broader grass strip, fringed by a narrow timber -belt, a screen for the rugged mountainside that rose behind it.</p> -<p>Ahead was the Gap, flanked by its towering peaks, with their silvery -rock elbows, framing, as in a miniature, a glimpse of still loftier -peaks, beyond; of rich, green bottom lands between—and over all the -glory of a lamb’s wool sky, in mid-July.</p> -<p>“Oh! now—now, all the words have got patches on them, indeed. One can’t -find any to fill the Gap with!” Una laughed. “But <i>there</i>! Oh! look -there.” She rose in her saddle so suddenly, so wildly, that even Revel -resented it, shook her fair head protestingly.</p> -<p>“Above—above the Gap! Right over it! Against—the sky!” she cried. -“That—silver—speck, tumbling speck, what is it?” And now the thong of -her riding crop, frantically waving, seemed, from afar, to loop the -speck.</p> -<p>“I believe—I believe it’s an aëroplane! Aëroplane doing stunts up there! -A—a thousand feet above the Gap!” Pemrose’s heart was stunt-flying too. -“Oh-h! now. See there! Turning somersaults! Flying upside down. Maybe -it’s Treff! He’s dare-devil—enough.”</p> -<p>Just as the “zooming” bats had wheeled and turned somersaults against -the black and blue night-sky, on the girls’ first night out, so this -jolly air king was having his free frolic in the sun’s eye, cutting all -sorts of festive capers, or flitting, a radiant dragon fly, from peak to -peak, above the hills.</p> -<p>It gave the crowning touch to the landscape—and skyscape. For it was -Life: Life joyous, dominant—devil-may-care.</p> -<p>“Look! Look, girls! Oh, look!” Una pointed him out to those behind. -“Stunt-flying—an aviator! Isn’t that gr-reat?... I guess it is -Treff—that ‘nickum’ cousin of mine—and his new ‘bus.’ Oh, I hope he -isn’t going to have any more fiery ‘notes’ to-day!”</p> -<p>“I’ll engage that’s who—it is.” The color was flooding Pemrose’s cheek. -“When I got his ‘radio’ a few nights ago—radio message—he said something -about ‘hopping’ over here for your birthday the day after to-morrow—and -the Flower Fuss, as he calls the party. Ha! There he goes now, dropping -down—dropping down, a few hundred feet!”</p> -<p>“He’s flying in our direction—no, down towards the horse-farm,” said -Una. “Probably he means to stay there, for a few days. Hear—his purr! -Whew!” She turned suddenly a little pale. “If he comes nearer the horses -won’t like it.”</p> -<p>The familiar buzz of the aëroplane was, now, only five hundred feet -above the trail. The solitary air king was flying southward, along the -route by which the girls had come—but down in the direction of the farm.</p> -<p>Suddenly, however, he seemed seized with a fancy for reconnoitering the -wild hillside screened by the narrow birch belt, on the other side of -the bridle path from that on which he had been winging!</p> -<p>Abruptly he wheeled. As abruptly—as mischievously—he “zoomed” down—until -he was only fifty or sixty feet above the trail.</p> -<p>Well! if he was tired of playing mountebank to such lukewarm spectators -as the hills, he had lively enough witnesses now.</p> -<p>Every horse was suddenly jumping sidelong—madly—down the slope; those -that weren’t backing, crab-fashion, with a frantic show of hind-legs.</p> -<p>Even Revel shied—demoralized.</p> -<p>But all this—all this was too tame for Revelation.</p> -<p>He had saluted tumbleweed by taking to the slope. He greeted an aviator -by taking the fence.</p> -<p>Together with the others he had swerved to the left of the trail—and a -few feet down that grassy slope—but there he turned and in mad bounds -made for the fence upon the right.</p> -<p>The girl upon him felt as if her head and shoulders were being dragged -backward—the rest of her going with the horse.</p> -<p>She had never taken a four-foot fence before—or come anywhere near it.</p> -<p>But there was a mischievous boy, up there, who did stunt-flying a -thousand feet up.</p> -<p>She set her teeth. Never once did she grip the saddle. Reuniting her -body by an inner jerk, as it were, she rose to the leap—and waved her -hand to the aviator as she went over.</p> -<p>“Well! by gracious, that girl is an all-round winner,” chuckled the boy -in the sky, as he penitently pulled his “joy-stick” towards him and -soared again in a great hurry.</p> -<p>Her head back upon her shoulders again, as it seemed, Revelation’s rider -galloped him a little way, wheeled him and with a lift of the reins, -saucily high, put him at the fence again, bounded back on to the -trail—into the scattered group of girls and horses.</p> -<p>“Awfully—awfully sorry to have stampeded the outfit!” It was a -boy-aviator advancing, three minutes later, with a merry mixture of East -and West upon his tongue.</p> -<p>“So—so you ought to be!” stormed Pemrose, her cheeks blazing. “Didn’t -you—you see the riding party—recognize us?”</p> -<p>“Didn’t recognize you until after I had ‘zoomed’ down—and then it was -too late,” confessed the daredevil. “I wasn’t paying attention to the -riding party. I was stealing a march on somebody else.”</p> -<p>“On who—whom?”</p> -<p>“Merciful—green—hop-toads!” The boy threw up his hands, invoking every -hop-toad in the grass. “Oh! the funniest little figure it was, over -there on the hill, just back of the trees. I had been spying on her, -from aloft, through the glasses. She was standing, still as a stump, -upon the mountainside, an umbrella held behind, not over, her—and I -caught the flash of something bright, steely, upon her head.”</p> -<p>“Head-phone,” murmured Pemrose. “No doubt she had something bright on -her heel, too, and that in a wet spot!”</p> -<p>“Radio bug! I said to myself. So the wilderness has ’em, too!” The brown -speck winked. “By—by flying low, as I did, across the trail, up the -hill, I might have got a peep into the umbrella—just for fun!”</p> -<p>“Just for fun—you played a nice trick on us,” sniffed Pemrose.</p> -<p>“I didn’t see into the umbrella, but I saw her face to face, after I had -flown off to a distance and made a landing. She had mounted her horse -then. And by Jove”—the boy’s chest heaved under his khaki; he flicked -the helmet-strings dangling, about his ears—“by Jove! she was the -strangest... Ha! there she goes now—climbing the trail.”</p> -<p>It was a pathetic little figure upon which all eyes were now turned; the -sunlight on it seemed almost heartless as it rode slowly up the -mountainside, with the umbrella in the stirrup strap—the something -bright upon the heel.</p> -<p>Pemrose’s grip tightened convulsively upon her rein—as when she had -taken the leap.</p> -<p>It was the same figure that she had seen before in a woodland aisle, -with the piercing eyes—keen and brilliant, but lonely, drifting.</p> -<p>“The Little Lone Lady!” she breathed to herself.</p> -<p>Treff’s gaze looked softened, too. He tapped his forehead under the -aviator’s helmet significantly.</p> -<p>“You’re a radio bug, all right—what else you may be, I don’t know—but, -all the same, <i>there’s</i> where you’re wanting, Sister!” he said.</p> -<div id='i002' class='figcenter im012' > - <img src='images/i002.jpg' alt='' style='width:100%' /> -<p class='caption'>“Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t it?”</p> -</div> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXV' title='XV: Wheeled Through Life'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XV</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Wheeled Through Life</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Well! I say, this is a little bit of all right—isn’t it?”</p> -<p>Treffrey Graham, aviator, Polytechnic student, youth of nineteen in whom -East and West met on breezy ground, for most of his life had been spent -on the other side of the continent, lay upon the rocky Balcony half way -up Pocohosette Mountain and indolently kicked pebbles down a sloping -ledge, over a precipice’s brink.</p> -<p>“So—so this is what Pemrose eloquently calls ‘the lip of nothing’,” he -remarked. “That rolling stone struck something,—bedrock—I guess, five -hundred feet below.”</p> -<p>“The Balcony is the brow of nothing; the edge of the ledge is the -‘dod-lip’—pouting lip,” laughed Pemrose, with a little shudder, as her -glance shot down an inclined plane of seamy rock merging into the -precipice forty yards below the moss-draped Balcony on which she sat.</p> -<p>On one side of this natural platform a fireplace had been built, with a -rough windbreak of piled stones, to prevent the flames from wildly -running amuck at the will of the evening breeze sweeping up the -mountain.</p> -<p>This was a device of that inveterate camper, Treff Graham, whose camp -fire, with that of an erratic father, had blazed on far prairie and -mountain peak, in most of the picturesque spots of his native land.</p> -<p>“This is a little bit of all right,” he murmured complacently; “you were -good to let me come in on it—and on the Flower Pageant to-morrow -night—after my ‘dumb stunt’ yesterday—stampeding the outfit.” His -lip-corners twitched.</p> -<p>“We ought not to have done it.” Pemrose stabbed at his brown hand with a -pine needle—they were skulking among some bushes in the corner of the -rocky Balcony farthest from the fire, she sitting—he lying, breast -downward. “I like a boy who has a brown speck on the pupil of one eye, -just one—he has to have a sense of humor,” she murmured to herself.</p> -<p>Treff was airing his humor upon Una—his cousin—just now.</p> -<p>“Say! oughtn’t they to be tried first on the Society for the Prevention -of Cruelty to Animals?” he suggested, pointing to a rough sheet of tin, -dotted with little creamy mushrooms of batter, which Una, supported by -Naomi, was slipping on to a red-hot iron grating between the stone arms -of the fireplace.</p> -<p>“The biscuits you mean? Seeing Una mixed them!” Pemrose blinked at the -two.</p> -<p>Treff nodded. “The surprise to me is that she’s ‘sticking it’, at all, -as we fellows say,” he muttered, staring critically at his dark-eyed -cousin, a white rose when she started upon this camping trip, a red -carnation now. “The touch of hardship in the first days’ camping, before -you reached here, hiking, sleeping out at night!” he rambled on. “A -girl, like her, brought up in a flower-pot! If it had been a boy, he’d -have kicked the pot to pieces long ago.”</p> -<p>“That’s what she’s doing now—trying to do,” broke in Pemrose. “She still -has her worry-cows,” laughingly, “foolish fears, but she’s ‘sticking it’ -at cooking and camp lessons—even at code, telegraphy, that horrid -teaser, to her,” with a little shrug, “just because her father asked it. -And—and she wouldn’t be Una without her little ‘crinkams’,” merrily.</p> -<p>“Her ‘fancy’ curves with a trimming of blue funk!” The boy’s lips were -pursed. “She never could pull herself out of any mess.”</p> -<p>“She pulled Donnie away from Cartoon’s heels.”</p> -<p>“Bah! That was a mere flash, a fluke; it surprised herself more than -anybody else.” He blinked through the bushes at his cousin. “The trouble -with her”—the young aviator whistled shrewdly—“is that she has just been -wheeled through life in a cushioned chair—and she always will be. If -anything happened to the chair, she’d just—drop through,” with a -collapsing shrug.</p> -<p>“But she’s the dearest girl, for all that!” fired up Pemrose. “Think of -this pageant—party—she’s giving for the mountain people to-morrow -night—her birthday, you know! She has been planning it for ages, a -lovely Wild Flower Pageant, to be given in our open-air theatre,” -grandly, “down the mountain, where a grassy bank forms a natural stage, -with trees for a background. And our dresses—if they aren’t fetching!”</p> -<p>“I’ll say so—when I see them,” murmured the lad, with a fervent glance.</p> -<p>“It’s to be a representation, as far as we can, of that blooming -democracy, Una’s flower clock.” The blue eyes winked—but there was dew -on the lashes. “And it’s all because—because, she has heard, her father, -others, talk, of the hard time the mountain farmers, have, clearing -land. And she wants to remind them that where rocks ‘grow’—and -back-aches—flowers grow, too,” quiveringly; “find the beauty around -them, for them—perhaps, in future, they’ll see some of it, when the day -begins, the hard day.” Pem brushed her hand across her eyes now.</p> -<p>“Pretty idea—if any of it sticks,” muttered the boy.</p> -<p>“And Una has coaxed out of the Guardian almost all the money that was -left for her, for her own entertainment, to spend it upon ice cream, oh! -and all sorts of ‘eats’ for them—their wives and little children—who -have so little in their lives—that’s—lovely.”</p> -<p>“Well! with ice cream for a fertilizer—” began young Treff.</p> -<p>“Come! You’d better not sneer. You’re to be scene shifter—general -electrician, properties’ man—”</p> -<p>“Merciful hop-toads! what else?”</p> -<p>“Anything you like—‘Hop’,” laughed the girl.</p> -<p>“Well! there’s one comfort, I shan’t be the only ‘hop-toad’, not if that -old farmer comes who chased you up a ladder—and then let you fall from a -hayloft on to a horse’s back.”</p> -<p>“And who came within a cow’s thumb of shooting us, because his wife gave -his slippers away to.... Oh! cock-a-luraloo!” The girl jumped up. -“There’s supper! And I’m hungry.”</p> -<p>“So am I,” acknowledged Treff. “It’s low tide in me, I confess.”</p> -<p>But it was a high tide while the feast lasted—a sweeping tide race of -fun and laughter, joke and story.</p> -<p>“We might have had a concert up here,” remarked young Treff, when he was -disposing very appreciatively of his last biscuit, the biscuit sneered -at in its doughboy day, “we might have had the ghost of a concert up -here—if only you had brought that—that talisman ring up with you.” He -looked down at Pemrose’s right forefinger, without the insignia of her -father’s genius. “Humph! when it comes to radio, you’re the ‘Nello’.”</p> -<p>“‘Wireless’ for winner, eh?” laughed the girl. “Somehow, I don’t think -you, really, believe that I can get any results with the witch-ring, at -all,” laughingly. “And I can! I can! Up here, we’d be too far from any -strong sending station I’m afraid. A five-mile radius is about my limit, -even for dot an’ dash—for any faint little gleamings of speech or song -it must be nearer—” the black eyebrows went up over the rapt blue -eyes—“and then—then it’s a whisper, seems to come from the other side of -the world, or—or from the farthest little blinking star,” dreamily. “But -Una—Una and I did—the morning we started—pick up something, just the -faintest little ‘queak’,”—half-laughingly—“singing ‘queak’—but we made -words out of it; didn’t we?” She glanced flutteringly at her friend.</p> -<p>“Awfully funny what you do pick up, at times,” said Treff, “from all the -hotchpotch, all the stuff, broadcasted, shot out into the air, sometimes -by amateurs not licensed to broadcast—but who do it, just the same. I -cut in on some ‘queaky’ singing myself, a few nights ago.” He locked his -brown hands at the memory, looking down from the Balcony ledge. “Some -honey-head—radio bug—amateur, I guess, was shooting off something about -‘dewy flowers’—as well as I could get it—and ‘holding’ somebody ‘in a -hand—by the hand.’ Now, what little girl....” The brown speck winked.</p> -<p>“Oh! go on—was there any more?” breathed Pemrose gasping—and she dared -not look at Una.</p> -<p>“Oh! I kept getting snatches of the same ‘blarney’, whenever I could -blank out other sounds.... I’ve rigged up a pretty powerful set at our -camp, you know—wire enough to send a message to Mars.” He kicked a stone -down the ledge.</p> -<p>“Go—on!” There was a queer little tickling in Pemrose’s throat.</p> -<p>“Well! later—later it seemed as if the ‘bug’ was blowing about radio: I -caught the word ‘Air’ distinctly; and something about:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>... ‘Waves you cannot see,</div> -<div class='verse'>Bring you, at last—nearer to me.’</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p style='text-indent:0'>Funny—”</p> -<p>He stopped. Two girls were sitting bolt upright upon the Balcony ledge, -one staring blankly with blue eyes—the other fearfully with black.</p> -<p>“Where’s—Una?” said the Guardian, ten minutes later. “She ought not to -go off like that, alone.”</p> -<p>Under cover of the general clearing up, one girl was missing.</p> -<p>“She has never had the chance before,” said Pemrose. “In camp, we hunt -in couples,” gayly. “But she’s off after harebells, I suppose. Some of -the loveliest—loveliest bluebells you ever saw growing just on the edge -of the precipice—a wing of the precipice, over there near the wood! -Shall I go and look for her?”</p> -<p>“I’ll go, too,” said young Treff, as the Guardian nodded.</p> -<p>“Oh! do let us stop, for a minute, to look at the view.” He caught at -Pemrose’s hand, presently, to steady her upon the shelving rock. “Una’s -all right! There she is!”</p> -<p>“The Guardian is going after her, too,” murmured the girl. “She wouldn’t -be the one to help ‘wheel Una through life’— but she feels her a handful -on her heart, just the same.”</p> -<p>“No wonder, as Uncle Dwight, Una’s Dad, has fitted up that jolly camp -for you. Done it in such high-powered style, too—radio, horses, -everything! But the view!” The young aviator caught his breath. -“Fine—fine as from that Lenox Pinnacle, where I pulled you up out of the -Devil’s Chair!”</p> -<p>“And cut me afterwards—Jack at a pinch!” dimpling mischievously. “But -the Pinnacle—the Pinnacle was nothing to this,” breathed Pemrose. -“Three—three tiers of mountains, rising one behind the other! Oh-h! they -look like three orders of angels; don’t they?”</p> -<p>“In the sunset they are—‘ripping’!”</p> -<p>The faces of both were transfigured as they gazed breathlessly off at -green, spangled foothills grading up into tinseled peaks, which, in -turn, did homage to the mighty, misty Archangel—Mount Mansfield, in the -distance, with wings of pearl.</p> -<p>“He seems to be waving his Big Trump at us,” said Pemrose.</p> -<p>“‘Say it with music’!” gasped the boy, his ear pricked towards the -woods. “What—what’s that. A murmur? Queer murmur! Didn’t you hear it?”</p> -<p>It was, indeed, as if faint music—the vague ghost of murmuring music—was -being wafted to them from that golden trump.</p> -<p>“Merciful hop-toads—green hop-toads!” It was Treff’s characteristic -explosion. “What does it mean? Where does it come from—on the wind—up -the mountain—from the woods?... But the wood doesn’t—own—it.”</p> -<p>“No-o,” gasped the girl. “It isn’t the trees—nor any bird—nor insect.”</p> -<p>“It’s as distinct from them—” the young aviator was breathing -heavily—“as—my soul! as the voice of a song sparrow down by the surf. -What.... The wind’s fetching it up to us—helping it. If—if this isn’t -eerie!”</p> -<p>They stared blankly, boy and girl, each into the other’s face, trying to -tear thence the meaning of it: of that wild, wandering organ note—ghost -of disembodied music—a succession of piping notes stealing upon the -breeze up the mountain—hypnotizing, beguiling.</p> -<p>Now the dim spruce wood below them became, as it seemed, a “roaring -buckie”, a hollow, reverberating sea shell, faintly throbbing with old -ocean’s murmur! Now, from it came a wee, high piping—undulating -piping—as of elfin singing, against which no evening sound in Nature -could hold its own for sweetness.</p> -<p>“Well, I’m ding-wizzled!” Treff blew his bewilderment from eyes, ears -and nose together—blew it upon the roseate air. “At this hour—by George! -it makes one’s heart slip around in one’s body, like—like—”</p> -<p>“Una’s—Una’s is slipping round in hers!” Pemrose caught her lip between -her teeth. “Look—will you? There—she’s off into the wood, to find -it—find out what it means! She so timid!... Una—come back!” she cried -sharply.</p> -<p>At that moment there leaped into the blue eyes something that rather -dazzled young Treff.</p> -<p>It had the flash of a bridge over a torrent—a flinty bridge.</p> -<p>Not for nothing had this girl a father who had bridged even space itself -with his discoveries; it was her nature to build bridges—span the -incredible.</p> -<p>“Una—come back,” she cried again—and sprang down the mountain towards -her friend, in her the same feeling that had possessed her yesterday, as -if her head and shoulders were being jerked backward, the rest of her -going with the horse—with something runaway. “Una—that’s that’s nothing! -I—I believe I know—” in half-mystified tones—“I believe I could—”</p> -<p>As if a spell were broken, Una turned. On the very verge of losing -herself among the thick spruces, thick as hops near the precipice’s -edge, she paused uncertainly.</p> -<p>The lovely harebells she had gathered, growing in such profusion in this -wild spot—a bunch almost as big as her head—stood out, like a fluttering -bluebird, against the green.</p> -<p>Suddenly she tossed them from her. With a frightened cry—an awakening -cry—she began running blindly, climbing recklessly—not up towards -Pemrose—but in the direction of the mothering arms of the Guardian, wide -open to receive her.</p> -<p>But, again, she was “sparrow-blasted”, mystified—quivering to the core -now. And the sunset drew a red muffler across her eyes.</p> -<p>She caught her foot in a moss-seamed crack of the sloping rock that -skirted this right wing of the precipice.</p> -<p>In the effort to dislodge it she set herself rolling.</p> -<p>Before a hand could reach her, before an eye could take in just what had -happened, she was rolling downward—a scapegoat doll—from the brow to the -lip of nothing.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXVI' title='XVI: The Lip'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XVI</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Lip</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>It was the Guardian who reached her first, almost stepping over the edge -of the abyss herself—in her recklessness about anything but saving the -girl.</p> -<p>So quickly, had that girl rolled down the moss-seamed rock, a dummy—a -bundle of inanimate clothing—that such wild clutchings as her poor hands -made at moss and grass and helpless leaf seemed but mechanical -twitchings!</p> -<p>Automatic twitchings to those who watched her, without a cry—lest a cry, -should cut the last chance!</p> -<p>But in the human dummy, when consciousness is swooning, there is a -something which looks after that last chance.</p> -<p>Over the first fold of the terrible lip, in the very teeth of the -precipice, earth-embedded, there grew a little tree—a stunted little -midget of a birch tree.</p> -<p>That which took care of Una’s last chance, clutched it—and hung on.</p> -<p>It bent—bent like everything—but it did not break.</p> -<p>And in the same minute the Guardian reached her, realizing her own -rashness, her own danger, just in time to start back, kneel down upon -the edge of nothing and, leaning over, grasp the girl’s wrists.</p> -<p>“Lord, don’t fail me. Don’t let me turn dizzy,” moaned the woman, -clinging in her agony to a tree, too—the Tree of Life.</p> -<p>It was a branch of that Tree which answered—a very vital branch.</p> -<p>Almost instantaneously a presence was beside her, a fearless presence. A -lad who could do flying stunts a few thousand feet in the air was -stretched out at her right hand, his shoulders over the brink.</p> -<p>His voice, though edgy, was perfectly cool.</p> -<p>“Keep quiet,” he said tensely. “Hang on. Great guns! hang on tight until -I can get a good grip of you. Now—now I have your wrist, just hang—as -easily as possible,” to the girl into whose up-staring dark eyes a -glazed reason was coming back. “There—I have you. Now we come! Let’s -lift her up!”</p> -<p>A human chain of girls lying flat, had meanwhile formed, was holding on -to the Guardian’s feet; if she—or Una—had sounded the depth of the -waterfall, hundreds of feet below, it is probable that all would have -done so.</p> -<p>Thanks to the little birch tree and that limb of daring, young Treff, -all were, presently, safe back upon the Balcony, Una wrapped in -Pemrose’s arms.</p> -<p>“There now, darling! There now—don’t look down,” cooed the latter. -“You’re s-safe now. Quite safe now. And wasn’t the Guardian a -‘brick’?... Treff, too—oh! Treff, too, of course,” with an arch wink at -the latter, “but he’s seasoned—he’d stand on his head in a soaring -balloon—I—believe.”</p> -<p>“Not ex-actly,” protested the hero a little breathlessly. “Stunt-flying -a thousand feet up would—would be a three-legged race on a Sunday School -picnic, compared to that ledge there—a girl hanging over—mean -proposition,” behind his teeth.</p> -<p>“Ugh!” Pemrose shuddered. “Why—why did you go wandering off by yourself -like that?” She clasped her girl chum tighter.</p> -<p>“Wander-ing—off!” But, with that, Una sat up; and now it seemed as if -the recent shock was but the unsealing of a greater terror behind it, in -her eyes.</p> -<p>“Did you hear-r it?” she gasped, pushing herself away and staring at -Pem. “Now—now you heard it for yourself,” in feverish triumph. “That -strange hum; that pip-ing sound. ’Twas—’twas the same that I heard in -the wood, at home. And you wouldn’t believe me! I wanted to find out -where it—came—from. But it isn’t earthly,” in a low whimper. “I think -it’s trying—trying to get—hold—”</p> -<p>“Not earthly!” hooted Pemrose. “I could make it.”</p> -<p>“I c-can’t believe you,” hiccoughed the girl, who had been hypnotized -into following it.</p> -<p>“Make it a dare—will you?” challenged the other—although, perhaps, with -a tiny “niggling” doubt in her blue eyes. “What will you bet me that -Treff and I together can’t ‘pull off that stunt’?”</p> -<hr class='tbk' /> -<p>That night a great scientist’s daughter talked long with her father by -radio, handling her message as cleverly as she did before, for the -edification and envy of her companions.</p> -<p>It was a pact between them that on certain mornings and evenings—after -dark, in the latter case—they should try to tune in on a conversation -with each other.</p> -<p>To-night, again, the experiment was an exciting success, for expense had -not been spared on the “outfit” installed in this mountain camp by Mr. -Grosvenor for the diversion and development of summering girls—his own -rather ineffectual daughter among them—and at the laboratory end, a -hundred miles away, was a powerful sending station.</p> -<p>As the girl pulled her switches, after good-nights had been exchanged -through the air, with much badinage of “Y. L.” “O. M.” and jokes about -hearing with the phones on the table when they were over her straining -ears, Pemrose Lorry turned to her young knight and abettor, Treff -Graham, with the white light, just shut off from the bulbs, switched on -in her eyes.</p> -<p>“Father—father says we can get the wherewithal at Roslyn College,” she -cried mysteriously. “He’ll telephone to one of his friends who’s -conducting a summer school there. And it’s only seventy miles away. -But—” anxiously—“could you go and come in the same day? The Flower -Pageant will be to-morrow evening.”</p> -<p>“Yes, and that would be a ‘peach’ of a time to loose the pipes. Crowning -feature! Seventy miles! Why that’s only a little hop,” protested the -youth blithely. “I’ll be back with the pibroch, sleeping pibroch, in the -tail of the plane.”</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXVII' title='XVII: Wild Flowers'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XVII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Wild Flowers</span> -</h2> -</div> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Wake up, wake up, to greet the day!</div> -<div class='verse'>Is what the morning glories say</div> -<div class='verse'>And open at the sun’s first ray.”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>It was Una, a bell-shaped white flower, striped with pink, the light, -filmy costume divided into the three-lobed corolla and five-sepaled -calyx of the erratic little wild flower which, in traveling, always goes -in a contrary direction to its sun-god, although it rises with him—Una, -trailing triangular green leaves, who came floating on to the outdoor -stage.</p> -<p>Spectators wildly cheered the girl Morning Glory as she flung her green -tendrils over a rock, symbol of beauty, indigenous beauty, to eyes tired -with fighting Nature for a farm-hold in a region where Mother Earth -seemed at times to set her foot down grimly and say: “Here, I don’t want -men, houses, corn fields; I want my uncut forests, boulders—untamed -mountains.”</p> -<p>“Ain’t it a purty play-act, though—a dum fine show?” gasped the old -farmer who had “come, within the breadth of a cow’s thumb of shooting -her” when he believed her flower-like feet to be those which had walked -off in his floral slippers.</p> -<p>“Gosh! when, at early mornin’ the sweat’s rolling off’n a man, grubbing -up rocks an’ stumps, and each one taken out means a fresh back ache, I -dunno as I’ll miss the little morning glory trailin’ over the rock—jest -opening its eye to the sun—seems as if, from now on, I’d see an’ not -trample on it,” he murmured pathetically to himself.</p> -<p>“Well, it’s rising sunblink now, Si. Look!” said his wife beside him—his -impressionable wife, who had on what he called her prim, muslin mouth -that went with her Sunday dress—she pointed to the glaring mock-sun -rising, red, flamboyant, behind pine tree and beech that, formed the -background of the natural stage.</p> -<p>While in a bosky dell Treff Graham played Sun Father, manipulating those -flamboyant effects, obtained by wiring the backs of the trees for -electricity, in a twilight that by a long stretch of the imagination -might be made to serve as dawn, not evening, another horological flower -of those that favor the sand-man, was murmuring her winsome Reveille.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“I am the eye of summer days,</div> -<div class='verse'>Once a great poet sang in praise</div> -<div class='verse'>Of my gold heart and pink-tipt rays.”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Daisy! Day’s Eye!” applauded the farmers’ wives delightedly, as -fair-haired Dorothy flitted forth through the artificial sun-gates, a -lovely composite of white ray florets rimming a shining, yellow heart.</p> -<p>While the Guardian, in lacy white as tall meadow-sweet, queen of the -meadow, was explaining to rustic ears—of which about fifty pairs, in -all, had assembled in the open-air theatre—that the yellow heart was a -whole flower family in miniature, another girl, in azure, glided from -behind a beech tree on to the stage with its borrowed plumes.</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“By every dusty roadside see</div> -<div class='verse'>The bright blue flowers of chicory,</div> -<div class='verse'>That wayside friend I choose to be.”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Wayside friend—mark ye! Wal! I wouldn’t say that she hasn’t got her -wish—would you?” The farmer—the farmer who would no more trample upon -the morning glory—winked slyly, nudged his wife, jerked his thumb in the -direction of broad tables among the trees, whose ware and glass -suggested junketing as well as pageantry.</p> -<p>“That’s you, Si; always thinking o’ foddering!” expostulated his -wife—the wife who succumbed to spell-women and “fore-goes.” “Dear me -sass! what have we here—golden mouse-ear.” She expanded into delight. “I -was a-picking of it in the woods only yesterday an ’twill light ’em on -into September—devil’s paint brush the children call it.”</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“I light the mountain’s grassy knolls</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>With stars of gorgeous hue,</div> -<div class='verse'>Burnt orange in a sky of green</div> -<div class='verse indent2'>Instead of gold in blue.”</div> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>It was Lura who, as tawny hawkweed, that wild flower of many nicknames, -delivered this account of herself—her “copper nob” shining as burnt -orange, indeed.</p> -<p>Dandelion, poppy, humble chickweed, lovely wild rose, field marigold, -pimpernel, others—all the sleepy flowers that favor the sand-man—were -represented.</p> -<p>But, as they were for the most part early risers, it was the one thorn -in the wild bouquet to Una, whose fête this was, that she could not have -a perfect representation of her garden flower clock—to find a flower -whose awaking corresponded to each number upon the sundial she had to -turn to garden aristocrats.</p> -<p>But when early pond lily, late evening primrose blended together in the -dance, the final dance of breeze-blown wild flowers, going through the -pretty pantomime of falling asleep—nodding—heads upon each other’s -shoulders, the thorn was sheathed.</p> -<p>“Oh! hasn’t it been a success? As long as I live I shall love to think -of this—my sixteenth birthday.” Una clung adoringly to the Guardian, a -lovely Morning Glory, tender, dreamy, her eyes going down among the -spectators to single out faces of little children, mountain children to -whom even a moving picture display was a rare treat. “They’re all on -tiptoe for the ice cream now,” she said, feeling little pulses in her -throat at the pleasure she was giving. “But—what’s that?”</p> -<p>Was there a bee in the bouquet—the wild flower bouquet? Had every -honeybee that visited the real flowers upon the mountain that day, in -return for sweets acquired, stored up in the blossoms its hum, to be -reproduced this evening?</p> -<p>From behind the scenes stole a murmur, faint at first, swelling, -surging, until the air was full of it—that elfin hum.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! where is it coming from—<i>now</i>?” Una stiffened distractedly, -shivering—blanching.</p> -<p>“Patience—just for a moment, darling!” said the Guardian—and put an arm -round her.</p> -<p>“The—the Murmuration, by heck!” the old farmer was exclaiming: “Is it a -bee-hive, a wild bees’ nest, anywheres near?” He started up, staring -everywhere in the gloaming. “No-o, ba gosh! ’tain’t any bee swarm—bee -tree—it’s too sweet. Sweet as honey from St. Peter’s garden!”</p> -<p>In the gloaming he looked half-wild.</p> -<p>“Sit down—you fool!” His wife caught him by the coat-tails; her prim -muslin mouth was all pleats and puckers, as if she could tell the source -of the honeyed hum, if she would—and that it did hail from St. Peter’s -garden—wasn’t earthly.</p> -<p>Other of the farmers’ wives shared her air of awe—of mystery—as if the -air held something untellable—but, for them, not quite unfamiliar.</p> -<p>The fascination grew upon their faces as the silvery murmuration became -a wild, sweet, wandering organ-note—a faint piping, as of elfin singing, -trembling off into inaudibility over spell-bound heads—while rough hands -clutched at the air, as if, could they but reach up high enough, they -could bring it back again.</p> -<p>“Gosh! I’m bewiddied—I am,” gasped the farmer, beginning to think that, -possibly, his wife had more insight than he had.</p> -<p>Upon his bewilderment broke a laugh—elfin in its mischief, but human.</p> -<p>Forth from the background of trees danced a girl—a girl arrayed as a -bluebell—a mountain harebell.</p> -<p>She carried a rather heavy box which she set down behind the -footlights—among the quivering Wild Flowers. She pressed a button. The -stage—all the open-air theatre for a couple of hundred feet -around—became a reverberating sea shell. Another! All the elves in -Christendom were piping!</p> -<p>“Behold,” cried Pemrose Lorry, “the source of the elfin music; a simple -arrangement of tuning forks, magnets and a battery!... There, Unie, -isn’t that what you heard, last night?”</p> -<p>“It sounds like it,” admitted Una doubtfully, her pulses galloping, -beginning to gallop, as she thought of the Lenox garden at home.</p> -<p>“Weird enough in the gloaming—eh?” laughed a youth who knelt by Pemrose, -flourishing his hands as if he were pulling the joy-stick in his plane. -“Oh! we’re proud of our fairy music, pipes of Pan—anything you like to -call it—we had a great time rigging them up, after I got back with the -stuff. You see the forks—there are two pairs here, one low-pitched, the -other high and shrill—are not in tune, not quite of the same pitch, each -pair, so that when that pair is set vibrating, the magnet between them -carrying the sound, it—it makes a wave with a hump in it,” gleefully, -“that hollow sea shell crooning—elfin ringing.”</p> -<p>“But how—how did you hit it off, clever children?” The Guardian was -flatly gasping.</p> -<p>“Oh-h, such an old story to me,” dimpled Pemrose, “being brought up in a -laboratory! Father has every musical fork imaginable—experiments with -them—up to those brittle quartz ones which, set vibrating, give an -angel’s note, so pure and high. Some of them he loved to take out of -doors, at times, and match the pitch against Nature’s sounds. We’ve -tried it in the woods—and often down by the seashore, where we could -almost—almost hit it off with the tide—have a duet in the same key,” -laughingly. “But—up here—who could have been doing it?”</p> -<p>“Some eccentric musician with the same hobby,” suggested the Guardian. -“There are camps here and there upon the mountain.”</p> -<p>The girl nodded. “Dad hasn’t tried it for a long time now, our pipes o’ -Pan,” she said, with a tremble in her triumph—her face blue-lit, as -always when she spoke of her father. “He has been all taken up with his -inventions. But, sometimes—before—if I teased him, he’d take those rare, -wavy quartz tuning forks along, with their sound that nothing in Nature -could match, so pure, so crystal-clear it was! Heavenly!” The blue eyes -dimmed. “Perhaps, whoever was playing with it, last night—playing Pied -Piper....” She glanced at Una. “But who <i>was</i> playing—with—it?” -Passionately the question forced itself again.</p> -<p>From the low-pitched tuning forks was suddenly struck a murmur, vague, -unaccountable, carried by some magnet into her finger tips, her toes: “I -wish—I wish Una’s Father and Mother were back,” it said.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXVIII' title='XVIII: Mondamin'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XVIII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Mondamin</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Hurrah! Isn’t it fun to see our bonfire put the stars out?”</p> -<p>It was Dorothy who gave vent to this extinguisher, piling on more dry -brush and resinous pine logs until not a spark in the firmament, planet -or fixed star, dared to vie with the blaze below—upon the wild mountain -top.</p> -<p>“And when it dies down a little and the flames blow aside, you can see -old Orion, up there, stretched lazily, on watch,” said the Guardian. -“Well! whose ear is the most nearly roasted? I don’t mean an auricular -cavity,” laughingly. “I mean ‘Mondamin.’”</p> -<p>Mondamin, great Corn Spirit, they were toasting him, in style, upon the -summit of Mount Pocohosette, while the two lesser peaks, Little Brother -and Little Sister Mountain, as the girls called them, retired into the -shadows of right and left.</p> -<p>Carrying, each, half-a-dozen ears of the sweet, early corn, in its coat -of bishop’s purple, procured from the outskirts of the horse-farm, the -girls had climbed the mountain in the golden September afternoon, by a -trail which sidetracking Balcony and precipice, led almost to the very -top.</p> -<p>Twenty-six hundred steep feet above sea level, fifteen hundred above -their cosy camp upon the sidehill, with its exciting proximity to the -Long Pasture, they had cut down wood with their Camp Fire axes, piled -high the brush—for it takes much fuel to toast Mondamin—and brought -water wherewith to wash him down, from a little lake of the clouds which -could almost compete with the famous one of that name upon Mount -Mansfield.</p> -<p>Mount Mansfield, giant of the Green Mountains, they had waved him -goodnight before their bonfire put out the stars, so that lazy Orion’s -nose was, for the most part, out of joint.</p> -<p>A teakettle sang its song upon a little red nest of its own, to the -right of the main blaze, around which eighteen girls, each with a -browning corn-ear upon the end of a stick, were preparing the jolly corn -roast.</p> -<p>The first corn roast of the season—above the clouds!</p> -<p>The wind, now sibilant, soft, now swelling to a summit roar, sang -through dark spruce and mountain ash of the heights—bringing out the red -cheeks of the latter, the ripening berry clusters.</p> -<p>The mystery of night, young night, the girls had never before so felt -it—so reveled in it.</p> -<p>Sparks played, firefly-like, among the trees. Potatoes hissed softly -among red embers. Flames flickered upon great piles of husks, rosetting -Mondamin’s bishop’s purple, his silken undercoats of pale green and -cream, stripped off before roasting him.</p> -<p>Ever and anon, a toasting chorus to him rang out, led by Dorothy—the -mountain top guild of glee, laughing girls, airing their own -improvisations:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -<div class='verse'>“Snap and crackle, blazing bonfire,</div> -<div class='verse'>Pile the brush and pine logs high,</div> -<div class='verse'>Till the flames wax bolder—bolder,</div> -<div class='verse'>Scaring stars out of the sky!</div> -<div class='verse'></div> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>Roasted he was royally and absorbed—devoured—too, with various -accompaniments, while the flames sank to a flicker—and Orion came into -his own again, with a belt of dark clouds around him.</p> -<p>The wind muttered strangely now; muttered a “fore-go”, if girlish ears -had been attuned to its meaning.</p> -<p>Faces, black and buttery—not beautiful, but very happy—gathered round a -core of red, soon to be extinguished, when the descent of the mountain -should begin.</p> -<p>“It’s too bad that we didn’t bring ponchos and sleeping bags—spend the -night up here on the mountain top,” said Dorothy. “We’d have been comfy -enough in that open camp, over there—although it has no front wall, only -two gray wings, with a gap in the middle.”</p> -<p>“How many of those camps you do run across among the Green Mountains,” -said Pemrose, “nearly all left generously open for the ‘next fellow,’” -laughingly; “some quite snug, with gray bunks and doors—others with no -face, like that!”</p> -<p>“And haven’t we sampled the hard knocks,—hard bunks—too, by sleeping in -them?” murmured Madeline. “Well—hard or soft—it has been a great old -time. A wonderful summer! And now it’s—nearly—over.”</p> -<p>“Some queer things have happened, too,” half-whispered Naomi.</p> -<p>“Nothing very exciting since the night somebody played Pied Piper upon -the mountain—and coaxed Una almost over the precipice-edge! I wonder -who....” Lura leaned forward to stir the fire—her murmur breathlessly -low.</p> -<p>“It was the same sound—the very same—I heard before in the -garden—at—home.” Una shivered a little, caught in a rose-lined pocket of -darkness—as the night became more overcast.</p> -<p>“But now, pshaw! it’s so easily explained.” Pemrose shrugged her -shoulders impatiently, poking at the fire, too. “The Guardian was -right—just some crack-brained musician, off on a holiday, seized with a -fancy for sorting sounds out-of-doors,” laughingly, “testing old Nature -with a tuning fork—or a variety of them—to see what key she sang in—what -pitch she liked best. If father and I hadn’t done it before—”</p> -<p>“But early—early morning.” Una’s whisper was still restless.</p> -<p>“Trying to get the exact key of a bird’s song—waking song!”</p> -<p>“Seems to me the bird didn’t get much of a chance!” The dark-eyed girl’s -whisper was whimsical now; that slight, near-sighted peculiarity in her -right eye, which the girls pronounced “fetching”, was fixed half -fearfully, as she stared into the fire, but she was trying—Una—to get -the better of what Pem called her little “crinkams”, her cousin Treff -her cowardly curves.</p> -<p>“Well—well, we haven’t heard it again,” said Madeline.</p> -<p>“I—I thought <i>I</i> did—one night, near camp—one starry night—”</p> -<p>Perhaps only the fire caught Una’s broken whisper, now, for the wind -suddenly shrieked into its ear, so that the flames leaped up again -noisily.</p> -<p>“<i>Goodness!</i> I hope we’re not going to have a storm,” said the Guardian. -“That would be too bad after all the fun.”</p> -<p>“Huh! The thunder-plump comes on so quickly here,” hooted Madeline. -“Seems as if the mountains just heaved a long, sullen breath—and comes -the storm!”</p> -<p>“Ouch! angry teeth, already!” quivered another, as the night wind took -her by the hair—and lightning grinned below her.</p> -<p>“It is coming, sure enough—and we never would have time to get home -before it!” Girlish forms cowered towards the fire now, -trembling—trembling before the night’s angry teeth.</p> -<p>“If I don’t mistake, ’twill make every storm we’ve witnessed before seem -mild as a Sunday School picnic—even the one the night the flash light -fainted,” said Pemrose, creeping round the fire on hands and knees, to -sit near Una.</p> -<p>Presently, when the storm broke upon them—or below them, rather—they -were locked in each other’s arms, cheek to cheek.</p> -<p>“They’re always ‘twosing’, those two,” Dorothy threw a little grimace -into the fire’s heart, as she shrank into her heavy sweater. “Pemrose -would stand up for Una against everything in the world—a good thing, -too, for Una could never stand up for herself!”</p> -<p>But, as a matter of fact, every girl would have stood up for Una—would -have shielded her with a warm breast from mountain rain and storm—and -Dorothy knew it.</p> -<p>“I suppose that’s what it means to be ‘born in the purple’,” she -murmured impishly to herself now; “it’s all gratitude to her -‘high-powered’ father,” with a low gasp, “for this wonderful, wonderful -summer: radio concerts, horseback riding—everything! Una isn’t spoiled, -though, I’ll admit; she loves us all, but she just swings like a -pendulum between Pemrose and the Guardian.”</p> -<p>She had been privileged to go out alone with the Guardian—Dorothy -remembered that now—on sundry occasions when the other older girls had -undertaken climbing feats that were a little beyond her endurance—or her -energy—as when they had stormed Little Poco, Little Brother Mountain, a -precipitous peak, with a face rough as Esau’s hands—to interview the -spell-woman.</p> -<p>They had not found her at home. And, contrary to custom, her camp on -Little Brother’s shoulder was not wide open for the “next fellow.” It -was securely locked.</p> -<p>The girls, led by their Assistant Guardian, had come back almost -hysterical with fatigue, anathematizing the inhospitable “heather cat”, -whose roaming propensities were familiar to them, for occasionally they -saw her again—the Little Lone Lady—with Nature’s heavy cross, the lump -between her shoulders, climbing some lonely bridle path, always on -horseback—the camper’s pack across her saddle, the bloated umbrella in -her stirrup strap.</p> -<p>But the interests, the growing pastimes, of their camp life were too -many and varied—chase and capture in the Long Pasture, riding the air -with a whisper by telephony and telegraphy, as most of them could now -do—for them to waste much thought upon that lonely—eccentric—little -figure.</p> -<p>Yet, somehow, it rode before Pemrose to-night upon the lightning’s vivid -broomstick; she caught herself wondering what its background had -been—what sort of life had left it imposing upon the superstitions of -mountain people—living upon their crumbs, in return.</p> -<p>At a certain point in her speculations the girl, staring into the fire -with eyes of blue patchwork, started—snorted. She always did snort and -shy, like Revelation at trail tumbleweed, when she thought long upon -that figure of a waif-woman who dabbled in radio like herself.</p> -<p>“I’d like to see the inside of her umbrella,” thought Pemrose.</p> -<p>And with that the world fell in beneath her. The clouds, for the most -part below them, were ripped by a terrible light.</p> -<p>Like a thief in the night the mountain storm was on—and it was such a -thunderplump, sudden, banging electric storm, as these girls had never -beheld before.</p> -<p>A blue-black darkness herded them together around their cowering -fire—feeling as if the Day of Judgment were upon them—and every minute -that bruised darkness spit flame; a flame so dazzling that the eyeballs -caught it and saw by it after it had passed.</p> -<p>“We must seek shelter in that wooden camp,” said the Guardian, putting -her arm around Una. “The rain—I suppose it will ‘rain pitchforks’ -presently—may drift in upon us, but at least we shall have a roof.”</p> -<p>And from there they watched the world pitchforked beneath them—torn, -racked, groaning, blazing.</p> -<p>“<i>Goodness!</i> It’s like fifty days of judgment rolled into one,” moaned -Dorothy—and hid her eyes against the Guardian. “Hide me! Hide me!”</p> -<p>But the trees in the dark forest beneath them found no hiding place, no -rocks to fall on them and cover them from the wrath of the sky.</p> -<p>A blazing fireball fell among them and one tree, sometimes two, jumped -into the air—clearly in the glare the girls saw them—then fell, riven.</p> -<p>“Oh! those fireballs they seem to open my head ... every time one -strikes,” said Pemrose—a weak, bird-mouthed twitter.</p> -<p>Una sat still as the planks beneath her, cheeks as white as the sudden -white light which, at the heart of the storm, weirdly cleft the -clouds—and reigned for minutes upon the mountainside, upon the torn, -staggering forest, and in the sky.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! this is aw-ful. I wish I had been a better girl,” whined Dorothy. -“The black tops of those pines! There—there goes another fireball.... I -can’t bear to see them strike.”</p> -<p>“‘When thou passest through the waters I will be with thee ... and -through the rivers they shall not overflow thee,’” said the Guardian -finding nothing more applicable to her steadfast faith. “We may be -thankful to be, so far, above the storm—only the lightning climbing—”</p> -<p>The lightning, forked, blue, zigzagging up and down the shuddering -mountain, as the white light faded, counted every coral berry-bunch on -the mountain ash, every needle on the grinning spruces; but, although it -was so vivid—so lingering its dazzle—it was but the tail end of a flash -which climbed to this summit camp on old Pocohosette, two thousand feet -above the valley—almost three thousand above sea level.</p> -<p>“Oh, my! The horses! The horses in the Long Pasture! I wonder how -they’re taking it? If one of them should be struck! Rev-el-a-tion!” -Pemrose felt as if the fireball, now striking, was in her heart.</p> -<p>Far away, on a hilltop, a barn blazed.</p> -<p>“<i>Revel!</i>” whimpered Una. “Revel!” It was the first sound she had made. -“If—anything—should happen to her-r!”</p> -<p>“Oh! come,” said the Guardian; “don’t think of such things.” She, -forthwith, pinned a smile upon her lips, which the lightning, as -promptly, unpinned.</p> -<p>“I—I can fancy them all crowding together against the fence,” droned -Pemrose again, “and nickering nervously—even Cartoon. And the little, -trembling foals hiding under their mothers! I wonder whether a -mother-horse would desert its baby?”</p> -<p>“In danger, I hardly think so—although I don’t know that it has ever -been tested,” said the Guardian. “Ha! Now for the rain! The deluge! I -doubt whether our Ark will ride that, as it did the lightning.”</p> -<p>The black rain clouds drifting through the lightning-ripped dusk, like -soot through smoke, floated higher than the thundershutters.</p> -<p>Presently, girls were shrinking into themselves, trying to dwindle to -the sheltering capacity of their sweaters, cowering in corners, the -Guardian attempting to shield her brood, as fingers of rain came seeking -them out, curdling courage.</p> -<p>They had escaped peril of fire bolt and fork-lightning which, to-night, -had killed many a noble tree. The thunder storm was now abating.</p> -<p>But to spend the night here, unprovided—on the sodden floor of an open -camp! Or to attempt the descent of a washed-out trail through those -blindly dripping forests!</p> -<p>Well! it was the first time that the Guardian wished herself back at her -teacher’s desk—in the stuffiest schoolroom imaginable—wished that she -had not undertaken the charge of eighteen girls through these summer -months.</p> -<p>It was the first time that the girls, themselves, felt -flinching—breaking—before the “fiery stick” of reality with which Andrew -had threatened them—of deadly hardship.</p> -<p>“And there may be a washout below us on the mountain, between here and -camp,” said the Guardian feebly, “an impassable washout. We’d better -wait for a while, anyway, before attempting the trail.”</p> -<p>Slowly the sodden minutes dragged along, to the jeer of the rain -sweeping past the camp, occasionally into it, pecking, a merciless -rain-crow, in every corner.</p> -<p>It took all the grit of the boldest hearts to say to themselves: “What -of it? The rain isn’t going to ‘come it all over me.’ I am a Camp Fire -Girl; I will not flinch nor falter!”</p> -<p>The Guardian felt that she had one thought that cowed her, Una: Una whom -she had hoped to return proudly to her parents, a few days later, -rosier, healthier in body, if not hardier of soul—Una, possibly, laid up -ill, as a result of to-night’s exposure.</p> -<p>By-and-by—an hour had passed—she was heavily, miserably, debating within -herself as to whether it were better to tackle the washout with draggled -girls on foot, or to try to light a fire again—stick it out on the -mountain top until morning.</p> -<p>“We’ll have to wait a little longer, anyhow, before we could possibly -find anything ‘spunky’ enough to burn,” she murmured almost deciding -upon the latter course.</p> -<p>Again the wet blanket of watching fell upon the camp. Suddenly—it was -well on into the second hour—a corner of it was lifted ... lifted by a -sound.</p> -<p>Light—light so dazzling as to be unbelievable was stealing under that -blanket of misery.</p> -<p>“Klopsh! Klopsh! Klopsh!... Klopsh!” There were distant heavy sounds -upon the mountainside. Something—something was struggling upward, in -heavy travail.</p> -<p>“We saw bear signs upon the mountain, coming up,” moaned Una, -“stumps—torn—apart; bushes—”</p> -<p>“Hush! Hush—listen!” The Guardian was sitting bolt upright—with a look -upon her face such as young Moses, of old, might have worn, when he saw -deliverance for his people.</p> -<p>“Klopsh! Klopsh! Klopsh! <i>Klopsh!</i>” And now—now, with that nearing, -splashing crescendo mingled other sounds: whistling and complaining of -branches, upper branches, the sullen swish of lower boughs, through -which a passage was being forced; a rattling of little twigs against.... -What?</p> -<p>And not one—not one of the wet and weary girls dared yet even to name it -to herself: “Wagon!”?</p> -<p>Then, suddenly, one of them was on her feet and out of the cabin, flash -light in hand, in time to see a great, reeking farm horse, eyes rolling, -jaws foaming, lip rolled back from the dauntless teeth, plunge forth -from the mountain top spruces.</p> -<p>Game leader, he was followed by a sweating, snorting wheel horse!</p> -<p>“Tandem,” gasped Pemrose Lorry—and reeled against a tree, which splashed -her all Over.</p> -<p>“Well! I reckon this storm would make the Day o’ Judgment seem a Sunday -School picnic, eh?” roared Donald Menzies, who managed the horse-farm -for Mr. Grosvenor.</p> -<p>A giant figure, six-feet-four, in oilskins and sou’wester, he wavered -before the girls’ eyes—a beatific vision.</p> -<p>“Pile in! <i>Pile in!</i>” he shouted. “Miss Una!... Where’s Miss Una?”</p> -<p>“I guess the rest of us might have dr-rowned before he’d have come all -the way up the mountain—after—us,” pouted Dorothy. “Well! if we aren’t -the princess, we’re lucky to come in on her innings. Girls! A great hay -wagon—dry hay—a rubber covering to spread over us.... Talk of the -seventh heaven!”</p> -<p>“I’d rather have this than—heaven.” Lura was creeping under that dark -rubber blanket in among the fresh, sweet hay, so dry and warm.</p> -<p>“Gosh! I started in the thick of it,” Menzies was proclaiming. “An’ hard -work I had to make the top, with this mud-crunching outfit.” He pointed -to the dripping leader, whose whinnying snorts told the story of that -upward, raving struggle, amid peril of fireball and falling tree.</p> -<p>“Did you walk beside them—climb beside them, all the way?” asked the -Guardian.</p> -<p>“Yes’m. And I could hardly hold ’em to the trail, even then, lightning -searing their eyeballs—trees going up around ’em! But Mr. Grosvenor’s -daughter! To think o’ her being exposed up here!” The farmer’s voice -rocked to the swish of the “shoe-bree”, the water that filled his -waist-high boots.</p> -<p>“Pshaw! ’twouldn’t hurt her—didn’t hurt her. We were above the storm—for -the most part,” declared Pemrose stoutly. “This is the cushioned chair -in which Treff said she was wheeled through life—always would be,” she -murmured to herself, with a cogitative wink, settling down beside Una in -what stood just now for the lap of the “chair”—luxury’s lap—this year’s -perfumed hay. “To-night, aren’t we in luck to occupy it with her?”</p> -<p>“I can’t get ye back to yer camp ’fore morning. A washout on the old -mountain ’tween here and there!” The farmer was wheeling his sputtering -tandem, drawing the fifteen-foot hay wagon, now full, girls blissfully -cuddling close to each other, putting the rubber covering between them -and the last peckings of the angry rain-crow. “But, luck with us, we can -reach the valley—the horse-farm—by a roundabout trail ... though it may -be a ‘wild-bear’ game, going down,” with a grin.</p> -<p>“Some tear-in-two jolts I expect,” prophesied Lura. “Ouch! -Beginning—already,” as she fell over on Naomi. “I always wanted to ride -behind a tandem—never thought ’twould be like this!”</p> -<p>“That tall leader is a hero. I’m in love with him.” Dorothy lifted a -corner of the rubber coverlet, to peep out at the black form of the -plunging horse, tackling the miry, downward trail, lightning tickling -his ears, spent thunder hooting at him. “Oh-h! the wild-bear game is -beginning, indeed,” she screamed, a minute later, as the whole -mud-crunching outfit stuck fast in a quagmire.</p> -<p>“Don’t mind if ye overhear some swearing in the teeth o’ judgment!” -growled Menzies whimsically, hauling upon his groaning tandem, in to its -knees. “Hi! there, you Yank,” to the game leader, “You’re all right; -you’ll come through.”</p> -<p>“The Yanks are pulling through—pulling out!” gasped Pemrose. “But, -goodness! what an Adventure this is!” as the wagon resumed its way -through the torn, dark woods.</p> -<p>“Lucky for ye all that this happened to-night—if ’twas bound to happen,” -murmured Menzies, ages later, as the mountain trail plunged downward -into a gutted road. “To-morrow, I’d ha’ been away.”</p> -<p>“Oh! do you expect to be gone long?” asked the Guardian, leaning out, -with grateful interest.</p> -<p>“No, ma’am. Not with two o’ my help missing,” came the grim answer; “one -off on a vacation, t’ other on his back with a ‘busted’ leg, broken by a -kick from a bad horse down in one of those concrete boxes—outdoor -boxes.”</p> -<p>The girls, listening eagerly, knew well those great concrete-lined -“horse-boxes”, where outlaws moped and half-civilized horses, not good -enough to be trusted up on the range.</p> -<p>“I guess, for one night, my son, Sanbie, and old ‘Burn-the-wind’, the -blacksmith, can hold the fort,” laughed Menzies. “I’m just making a -flying trip to Bennington, to buy grain,” came back the floating -accents; “double header—thinking of selling Revelation.”</p> -<p>Double header! Kill two birds with one stone! But that stone hit -something in its way—the heart of Pemrose Lorry.</p> -<p>Sell Revelation! The horse she had ridden all the summer. The horse who -had come to know her so well that, while he still coquetted with oats -and halter, once she had him caught, and saddled, he would look round at -her out of his almost human eyes, curiously saying: “Well! are we going -now? I’m—ready.”</p> -<p>Now was when she got her tear-in-two jolt. Her heart jumped like a riven -tree—sank blighted.</p> -<p>And here was where Una scored again; she owned her horse. Revel would be -sent up to the city, for her to ride.</p> -<p>“But it wouldn’t be ‘sporty’ to show it—show anything,” murmured Pemrose -to her riven heart. “I’m too lucky to have ridden him—all—summer!”</p> -<p>“Best—best horse in the Long Pasture,” went on Menzies’ musing croak. -“Expect to get five hundred for him. Only waiting till Mr. Grosvenor -gets back to clinch the bargain. And he’s expected home to-morrow; isn’t -he, Miss Una?”</p> -<p>“Ye-es,” nodded Una sleepily, from the hay. “Ha! Farm lights, at last!” -She roused a little. “Horses stamping!”</p> -<p>One horse stamped upon Pemrose’s heart all that night. She felt sorry -she had given it to him, to trample, thus.</p> -<p>“But I believe he’ll miss me, too—Revelation,” she said to herself. -“Sometimes, when we were out riding, if we lay down under the pines, -he’d come and feel me over with his nose, to make sure that I was there; -I believe he’d have driven off anybody who attacked me.... Ah! lucky -Una.... But it wouldn’t be ‘sporty’ to show it.”</p> -<p>It came almost as a relief, affording an excuse for pent-up feeling, -that when the campers got back to their own log cabin, at noon the next -day, a second loss confronted her, over which she might puzzle and rave -without breach of code.</p> -<p>“Look! Look! Look!” she cried—and became, in a moment, the center of a -sensation, whirlwind sensation. “Somebody has been in here. In here -to-day! There’s a window open in our sleeping room—marks on the floor; -and my picture of Una, the one I had by my cot, is—gone.”</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXIX' title='XIX: A Girl Brigade'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XIX</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>A Girl Brigade</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Smoke! Smoke!” It was a cry from Frances Goddard and Naomi, the artist, -together. “Smoke! Smoke! Don’t you smell it? There’s a brush -fire—somewhere.”</p> -<p>“It seems—near! The air’s thick—getting thicker,” the responsive scream -was from others, “oh! choking thickness.... Heavens! The—shed!”</p> -<p>A banner of flame flung forth challengingly to the night air, at the -moment, left no doubt as to where the heavy reek was coming from.</p> -<p>The gray shed at the corner of the Long Pasture!</p> -<p>Twenty campers, twenty in all, had been preparing for bed—Devotions -over. Devotions and the singing of the Camp Fire hymn, so dear to -girlish hearts:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>And, lo! in a moment it was a consuming fire they were called upon to -fight.</p> -<p>A fire—the realization swept these twenty chips of that grand old block -called Woman, like a wind which made their teeth chatter—a fire which -had unusual elements of horror in it.</p> -<p>“The Pasture! The Sidehill! The Horses!... Revel!” The last blanched cry -came from Una.</p> -<p>“If—the grass catches, they’d have hard work to save them. And the -farmer—the farmer is away—at Bennington. And his assistant was kicked by -a horse, has a broken leg. Only his son, Sanbie—seventeen!... Long -before help could come from the Fire Warden—anywhere.... Girls! Quick! -Dress! ‘Up to us’!”</p> -<p>They were scrambling into their clothes again in a hurry, even as the -Guardian spoke.</p> -<p>“Plen-ty of water! But the stream’s oh! a hundred feet from the shed,” -panted Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, helping Dorothy into her -sweater—then tugging on Una’s, fine and soft as the figurative cotton -wool in which this girl-heiress had been always wrapped. “Buckets, -girls! Every bucket you can find!”</p> -<p>“Only—four!” Pemrose’s eyes in the emergency had the blue of the blind, -or bottled gentian, cowering in the smoke without,—the heavy reek -driving upon fickle gusts up the mountain or across it, now with the -awful carmine on its wings.</p> -<p>Girls moaned softly at the sight. But there was no confusion. They were -accustomed to fire drill.</p> -<p>“Our camp may go, if it spreads up the mountain. But—the horses!... -Brooms, too, to beat out the fire; dip them, wet them, in the stream, as -you run! Scrub—evergreen scrub—that’s good for beating out a brush fire; -break it off as you pass.... Could it, possibly, have been that awful -lightning?”</p> -<p>“The storm last night! Nonsense!” Thus Terry Ross, Assistant Guardian, -answered the excited chorus, which had in it no disorder. “The fire seed -couldn’t have smouldered so long. The barn we saw blazed right off. But -the wood of the shed—that may have been damp, still, from the -deluge—didn’t dry up like the scrub and grass ... caused the heavy -smoke. But—now!”</p> -<p>Now the flames were rising red-mad—and gaining every moment.</p> -<p>Pine, spruce, hemlock-scrub, the girls tore it off, broke it off as they -ran, those who, at the Guardian’s heels, were not armed with buckets or -brooms—in six minutes from the alarm the vanguard had reached the corner -of the Long Pasture, the eastern corner where the tool shed, a gray -twenty by twenty structure, had withstood gales for forty years.</p> -<p>But they were not the earliest fire fighters.</p> -<p>“There—there’s old ‘Burn-the-Wind’,” said Pemrose. “‘Burn-the-Wind’—and -Sanbie. They—they’re getting the stuff out—stuff out of the shed!”</p> -<p>Mowing machine, tractor, harrow, plows, the two male figures were -hurling them out, the latter a long-legged high school boy—the former a -gray-haired, bare-armed blacksmith—the “wind” was now having its turn at -“burning” him. Both had galloped, barebacked, up from the farm. -“Burn-the-wind”—the nickname sounded cheering, in a fight frivolity has -its uses—who could, at seventy-odd, shoe a horse with his eyes shut, was -not in other respects very spry.</p> -<p>It was Sanbie of the shankums, the long ungainly limbs, who had a -“leg-on” in the red fight.</p> -<p>He had played the one can of chemical, with the little hose attached, -upon the flames—and still they gained—red-mad.</p> -<p>The grass around the shed was catching—had caught.</p> -<p>“Water!” They heard him shriek, Guardian and girls, as they reached the -scene. “Water! Buckets! Oh! fill ’em first and think about it -afterwards.”</p> -<p>“He’s game,” gasped Pem. “If he was burning up himself, he’d joke. -Ugh-h!” She coughed and sputtered as the red smoke caught her.</p> -<p>“Here—here’s another bucket,” screamed the Guardian. “That makes five. -Ten of you girls fall in, form a line, quick—bucket brigade,—ten feet -between you to the stream.” Already, at a hundred-foot dash, she had -filled two buckets herself, passed them to Sanbie who tossed them up to -the blazing roof. “Eight girls beat out—beat out the brush fire, the -grass ... take care you don’t get in among the frightened horses. Terry -and I will help the men.”</p> -<p>The “wickering” horses were a menace. They added the last element of -wildness to the scene. Bunched together, in terror or curiosity, they -rushed up to the fence, along by the four-foot fence, at a corner of -which was the raging blaze. Necks arched, whinnying low and nervously, -or snorting madly, they would come to within fifteen feet of the Red -Horror, stamping even upon the lighting grass; the leaders, then, in a -panic, would wheel and dart off again, circling, cavorting round—the -mother horses stamping protest, with their fluffy foals beneath, or -their half-weaned colts beside them.</p> -<p>Somewhere among them was Revel. Was that her plaintive “wicker”, her -whinny? It sounded as if she had been caught—protestingly caught—in the -darkness, the spark-swarming darkness, thought Una as, with a frenzy of -saving her more than anything else, the girl who had been wheeled -through life, softly shielded, took her place in the bucket line.</p> -<p>Across the pasture to the little bush-fringed stream the night was -seized with a changeable blush, now a deep, furious black-burning that -faded out into moonless darkness, mystifying darkness, as the water -dashed upon the shed roof beat the flames down.</p> -<p>There was not much hope of saving the gray old building, but, burning -furiously, it was a fire-brand to the whole mountainside.</p> -<p>“Maybe, this isn’t some blaze! Bring on the ice water. Talk of your -broiled lobster, I’m a pretty good imitation!... Oh! shake it up down -there—in the brigade. Slide the buckets along—along—slide ’em faster ... -faster, if you can!” It was Sanbie’s prayer, with ever the note of -levity, to meet the flames’ hiss.</p> -<p>And the brigade of ten rose to meet it, in ever-shifting line, the -momentary head of the procession of girls, stationed ten feet apart, -passing her full bucket to the Guardian, in the forefront of battle, who -handed it on to the scorched men—they throwing it as high as they could -on to the hissing roof—then the bucket was passed back to the breathless -girl who wheeling, made for the stream with it again.</p> -<p>Thus making the most of their five buckets, Dorothy, Naomi, Beulah, -Robin, Frances—others—had all, in turn, headed the single line, for a -burning half-minute, seeing the brush fighters working in the red glare, -beating in towards the blaze.</p> -<p>It was Una’s turn now.</p> -<p>Her eyes very wide—fugitive and dark—her skin, naturally white and -transparent, glowing like a filmy lamp shade in the glare—panting—she -gave her brimming bucket into the Guardian’s hands.</p> -<p>“Well done, dear! You girls are—doing—splendidly. Look out for the -horses, as you run back,” breathed the half-charred older woman, -grasping the handle.</p> -<p>The fascinated horses were at that moment making another inquisitive -rush. They galloped up to within fourteen feet of the center of -excitement, threatening the brush fighters.</p> -<p>Their “wickering” snorts circled round Una in the fiery seconds while -she stood waiting—waiting for her bucket to be returned. Awful seconds!</p> -<p>A beam fell in and frightened them—frightened her, too—as flame and -sparks flew up; they wheeled and dashed off a hundred yards.</p> -<p>“I wonder if Revel was among them,” breathed the trembling girl to -herself. “That sound she made a while ago—I’d know her soft ‘wicker’ -anywhere—it sounded just as if she had been caught—<i>caught</i> against her -will.... Oh-h! I must save Revel. If the whole pasture were to -blaze....”</p> -<p>Grasping the handle of her empty bucket again, she wheeled, too, and -made a dash for the distant stream edge. The brilliant patchwork with -which it glowed as the beam fell in darkened now into ebony gloom—the -red checkers fading out when the flames sank again.</p> -<p>“If the fire spread through the whole pasture, Revel might not think of -jumping the fence,” she whispered to herself again, with the soft -earth-din of the horses’ hoofs in her ears—in her brain, it seemed, -maddening it.</p> -<p>The ground was hummocky here—low mounds! And she was running very fast, -as she had never run before, to reach the stream-edge, leaving other -girls’ fleet footsteps behind.</p> -<p>In a dark little bush-belt girdling a mound she suddenly tripped—there -had been nothing to trip on before. The bucket rolled away from her, -down into a hollow, black as a pit.</p> -<p>The swift fall was stupefying. She lay for a minute—numb. A dark, soft -form brushed by her—she felt it was Dorothy, next in line to her, and -made no outcry; they were saving Revel.</p> -<p>Picking herself up, presently, she groped for the bucket—found it.</p> -<p>What! was the metal handle on fire, too? Red hot. It stung her—stung her -furiously.</p> -<p>She rubbed her fingers across her lips.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXX' title='XX: No Answer'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XX</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>No Answer</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Una Grosvenor!” A weary Guardian, who had done the work of ten women, -in saving the sidehill, in saving thousands of dollars worth of -thoroughbred horseflesh, in saving the whole mountain, was calling the -roll—a panting victory-roll.</p> -<p>One after another her girls answered, some from the charred, wet ground -where they had wearily thrown themselves flat, without another breath in -their bodies.</p> -<p>It came to the last name on the alphabetical roll; a name which to each -of them had a sort of lily-like aroma about it, savoring of a choice -lily who toiled not neither did she spin, nor look after young brothers -and sisters, nor earn her Camp Fire favors, yet who lacked nothing -lovely that Life could give—for whose sake a grim horse-breeder would -drive his tandem up the mountain in the thick of a raving -“thunder-plump”, to save her from exposure.</p> -<p>“Una Grosvenor!... Gros-ven-or!”</p> -<p>There was no answer, save the pounding earth-din of the horses’ hoofs, -still circling, restlessly—their blowing snorts, now quieting down.</p> -<p>“Goodness! it’s as if she had dug a hole and buried herself,” said the -scorched Sanbie who, counting his burns upon the grass, forgot for a -moment the solicitude due to his employer’s daughter.</p> -<p>“Hush!” said the Guardian sharply. “She must be somewhere near. Nothing -could have happened to her.... Oh! I should not have let her take part -in it at all. She was too precious.”</p> -<p>“T-too precious!” sighed the hiss of the dying flames mockingly, curling -where a shed had been—it was the only answer.</p> -<p>“Una! Un-a! Where are you? Oh! where are you, dear? Can’t you answer? -Don’t play with us!... Who saw her last?”</p> -<p>But it was not like Una to play. Her nature was more woven of fancies -than frolic—even were frolic thinkable at such a time. And so the -Guardian felt, with a thousand pricks of burning in her body now, as she -put the desperate question as to who had seen her last.</p> -<p>“Let me think; I guess I did—I may have done so,” said Dorothy. “I was -the next girl to her when she passed the bucket to you at the time that -beam fell in—and the horses kicked up such a shindy. I was behind her, -as she ran back to the stream, to fill it again—she was running very -fast. But when I got to the brook, in the dark, I couldn’t find her so I -helped Naomi fill her bucket—and we passed that back along the line. -Sanbie was yelling to us to ‘shake it up there!’ so I thought I -did—right,” wailed Dorothy.</p> -<p>No one had any later news—not Pemrose, her play-marrow. <i>She</i> had been -fighting brush fire.</p> -<p>“Perhaps—perhaps she fell, slipped and hurt herself or fainted—fainted -with the fright and rush,” said Theresa. “We’d better scatter and look -for her. She couldn’t, she couldn’t have been kicked by one of the -horses—trampled?”</p> -<p>The pasture burned anew at the thought, shriveled to a cinder, it -seemed, where the fire had been conquered, with the withering of girls’ -hearts within their breasts.</p> -<p>Dividing into two search parties, one led by the old blacksmith, -breathing like his own forge, furnace-fed, the other by Sanbie—both of -whom knew the ways of excited horses better than the womanhood which had -helped them—they searched the Long Pasture, from end to end, hummock and -hollow and found no trace.</p> -<p>Nothing but a wooden bucket in the dim brook—where it had been whirled a -little way downstream and caught among stones. The water had played over -it for an hour. It told no tales.</p> -<p>“Ding-me-davel—knock me flat! The stream isn’t deep enough to drown -her!” puffed the exhausted blacksmith, drawing his bare arm, with the -whipcord muscles, across his forehead, dripping as it had never dripped -over an anvil in his life.</p> -<p>“Some pretty deep holes further down,” moaned Sanbie, licking his burns, -like a dog. “Gosh! now you see her—and now you don’t,” peering into the -darkness. “There’s hardly any breath left in my wind-works.” He looked -piteously at the Guardian. “But we can’t do much without a strong -lantern—light—I didn’t bring one, galloping up; carried behind him, -’twould have startled the horse. Now....”</p> -<p>Now, with hands scorched raw and lungs a desert, the young fire-fighter -was circling in the darkness until he cornered old King, most -good-natured of the bunch of horses on the sidehill—fast, too.</p> -<p>Jumping on without even a halter, weaving his blistered fingers in the -cool mane, he started to gallop back to the farm.</p> -<p>It was ages before he reappeared—while Guardian and girls searched -wearily in short circles—long ages before he reappeared with his dark -lantern carefully screened, so that no ray flung from behind ahead, -might startle even old King into shying into the ditch.</p> -<p>And now his parched “wind-works” were swelled to bursting with a -discovery which, for a long minute, rocking deliriously upon his -bareback, he could not bring forth.</p> -<p>“Hea-vens!” he gasped, at length. “Seems as if Something had visited us. -I counted the horses, coming back, Revel’s gone, too.”</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXXI' title='XXI: The Call of the Air'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XXI</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Call of the Air</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>In the dawn-blink the gray dawn-blink, Pemrose Lorry sat before her -radio instruments. All night long, when she was not out searching upon -the mountain, she had been sending out the call-letters of every -station, near-by, within her New England district, seeking to get one -where she “came in strong enough” upon the air, to ask whether any one -had seen a girl upon a bay horse passing.</p> -<p>At last came the answer from one mountain farm, “blanked out”, at first, -by a whining in the set.</p> -<p>“Bah! like chickens squealing—that tube-howling!” she murmured restively -to herself—and dropped her head, with a dry sob, upon her receiver, for -she remembered how Una had once laughed at that simile.</p> -<p>But the air had played true. Her call had gone home, home to hearts -among the Green Mountains. That young farmer had not even a telephone. -Radio was his one ear, listening afar to the world’s pulse. “Mr. -Grosvenor’s daughter—only daughter!” He flung himself upon a tired -farmhorse. A new Revere, he galloped to the next farm—to the lonely one -beyond that. He held up every belated pedestrian.</p> -<p>Among these mountaineers whom the lost girl had entertained at her -flower party, were strugglers whom her father, out of his munificence, -had helped; now, it was a loan obtained on easy terms for one who wanted -to fight Nature for a farm and oust the “growing” rocks with backaches, -again it was a mortgage paid up on the eve of foreclosure. “We’ll find -his daughter, for him, if she’s above ground,” so stern men pledged -themselves.</p> -<p>And, here and there, the mountains burned with lights, following upon -that call of the air.</p> -<p>But, as yet, no signal had been sent up to say that she was found.</p> -<p>During the earlier part of the night, following upon the arrival of -Sanbie and his lantern, Guardian and girls had sought up and down, but -without a clue. Una was not in camp. She was nowhere. Girl and horse had -vanished in the darkness as if the mountain swallowed them.</p> -<p>“Perhaps she got distracted with the excitement—the terror—of the fire -and started to ride home—all that distance,” suggested one and another -of the girls blankly.</p> -<p>Pemrose shook her head: “Never! She never would have done that. Una is -timid and fanciful, doesn’t depend on herself very much—has never -depended on herself—but to ride off, and leave me—us—in danger fighting -fire....” The girl shook her dew-wet head again, choking.</p> -<p>And the Camp Fire sisters admitted that her play-marrow, heart of her -heart, knew her best.</p> -<p>“But, still....” Here came the Guardian’s ordeal, from which she must -not flinch, but which, at the bitter moment, she would rather have died -than face. “But, still I had better go down myself to the horse-farm and -telephone her home. Her parents have just got back.”</p> -<p>And now, in the dawn-blink Mr. Grosvenor was expected here, at any -minute. The Guardian and Sanbie, in whose young heart the laugh seemed -forever frozen black by the consciousness that he had better have let -all the choice “stock” on the mountainside perish than incur this loss, -were out searching slope and stream-edge hopelessly again.</p> -<p>Weary girls, purple-lipped from exhaustion—heavy-lidded—white-cheeked, -had been condemned, as they felt it, to rest, or try to rest, a little.</p> -<p>Pemrose flatly rebelled. “If anything, has happened to Una, I don’t want -to live,” she said in her passionate, tearless way. “I—I shouldn’t want -to live on,” with a quaver, “but I suppose—they’d make me.”</p> -<p>Who was to enforce the boon of Life? Her father—her other -joke-fellow—play-fellow—Treff?</p> -<p>There was a sudden sound of hoofs without the camp, hoofs slipping upon -rolling stones—striking flinty flashes out of the dawn, the pale, -primrose dawn?</p> -<p>Pemrose was at the door, feeling suffocated.</p> -<p>A haggard youth threw himself off a lame horse. It was not Sanbie.</p> -<p>“Treff-ff!”</p> -<p>The boy as he saw her face, held out his arms to her. She threw herself -into them. She caught him by the shoulders convulsively. And in the dawn -the tears came—washed her blue eyes in a silent flood, a silent, -helpless stream.</p> -<p>“Treff!”</p> -<p>“Una! Have you found—her?” His voice was hoarse.</p> -<p>“No.” The girl shook him. “You-ou! How did <i>you</i> know? Have you—heard—”</p> -<p>“Anything about her—no! But I got your radio. Cut in when you were -talking with Station Y.V.Z. that farmer-fellow. Picked up enough, just -enough to know who was missing. Oh—heavens!” The young aviator threw up -his hands, rocking, groaning—looking as if the destruction of his plane -by fire had been a light “note”, compared to this. “Dad—you see he had -been telling me things—s-such things!” he finished lamely.</p> -<p>“W-what had he been telling—you?” Through the girl’s lips, bruised by -suffering, the whisper could scarcely creep.</p> -<p>“Merciful hop.... I mean don’t ask me; I don’t know where—how—to begin. -He only got back from his fishing trip last night—Dad.”</p> -<p>“Yes?”</p> -<p>“And he got me so worked up—talking, talking—that I couldn’t sleep, so I -was just making an owl’s night over the outfit—radio—for fun, you know—” -the young fellow threw out his hands again—“when I tuned in on your talk -with the other station. After midnight then,” he licked his dry lips, -“but I made a howling dash for the nearest farm, borrowed that ‘plug’,” -pointing to a lathered, drooping horse—“at night, wouldn’t trust the -plane.... Water! Is there any?” He caught at the collar of his khaki -shirt.</p> -<p>“Oh! heavens—if I could only—begin to tell you, b-but—but I feel -up-choked.” He drained the last drop of water.</p> -<p>“Don’t be a mope.” Pemrose grinned it at him, in fury. “Una!... Una!”</p> -<p>“Well, you know that little figure we saw, queer little figure on -horseback, the day—the day I flew over the Gap, stampeded the -outfit—woman I said looked as if she wanted it ‘here’?” He touched his -forehead.</p> -<p>“Yes! Oh! I don’t know why, but, somehow, I’ve been thinking of her, on -and off—all night. The—Little Lone Lady—all the names they give her!” -The girl’s teeth were just chattering now.</p> -<p>“I mentioned her to Dad last evening, described her, you know—the slight -deformity, the big, queer eyes, made you feel as if she had a -‘nick-in-the-neck’ somehow—a peculiarity within, as without—oh-h! I’ve -met her once or twice on the trail—since—then.” He panted heavily.</p> -<p>“And—and Dad he just leaped to his feet and caught at the camp table, so -that he pulled it over: ‘I’ll bet my life,’ he said, ‘I’ll bet my living -body! it’s that queer stepsister of Grosvenor’s—back—again ... not that -I would have called her queer long ago,’ he went on; ‘she had some -strange gifts—powers—that may be as natural as radio; she influenced all -our young set, in which she was, with them; she had a way of telling -what was going on inside us, boy, what we were thinking of—and sometimes -what was going to happen to us, too, that took our breath away.’</p> -<p>“Then—my gracious! he described her as if he had seen her only -yesterday—yesterday.” The boy caught at his collar again,—at his working -throat. “She was the daughter of Uncle Dwight Grosvenor’s mother, by a -first marriage, he said. Her name was Margaret Deane.”</p> -<p>“They call her ‘Margot’ here—some of the mountain folk,” screamed -Pemrose.</p> -<p>“And she always lived with Uncle Dwight, swayed him as she swayed the -rest, but he—he’s my uncle by marriage, you know—married father’s -sister, and that sister, Aunt Carolyn, simply couldn’t bear her. And -when Una was born—this was after Dad went out West, but he heard about -it since he came back—the feeling between the two women grew, for this -peculiar step-aunt just worshiped the baby, would sit staring at it as -if she saw something akin to herself in the little mite—Una—and wanted -to bring it out.</p> -<p>“At last Aunt Carolyn couldn’t stand it any longer. She told Uncle -Dwight that his stepsister had got to go. She wouldn’t have her child -brought up under such influence. They were keeping it dark, until they -could find a nice home for her—but she cleared out of herself, without -saying good-by.”</p> -<p>“And haven’t they seen her since—oh! since long ago?” Pemrose was -staring weirdly.</p> -<p>“No—nor heard from her, either. She drew a little money that she had, -not enough Dad says, to support her, eked it out, he supposes by using -her strange powers in distant cities, as—as this woman has done among -the mountain people; and, in time, got to eking <i>them</i> out by trickery; -she’d be a witch at that, he said, for she had a good education—knew -something of chemistry and physics.”</p> -<p>“But Una—Una—you don’t think—” Pemrose was catching at her throat now.</p> -<p>“Well—when I told my old Dad about that ‘elfin music’ we heard on the -old mountain—how we showed it up, played ‘choir invisible’ with tuning -forks—his lips worked for quite a while silently—you know he was a -terror at queer tricks himself—then he turned a sly cheek on me and -said: ‘That <i>may</i> have been no crank of a musician, boy, out testing -bird-songs, or pine-songs—or pipes o’ Pan—or any of the rest of it. If -this queer little figure <i>is</i> Margaret Deane and she’s lonely—longing to -see Una, the baby she so worshiped, and thinks the parents won’t let -her, she would be quite likely to work upon Una’s curiosity—or her -“hifalutin” imagination—in some fantastic way ... if only to pay your -Aunt Carolyn out. Or, perhaps, to get the girl off by herself into the -woods. She would have done it even when I knew her—and she isn’t likely -to have gathered balance, “a rolling stone.”’”</p> -<p>“But—but you don’t think—he doesn’t think—that she would go the -length—the length of carrying Una off—doing anything to her?” Pem’s -voice rose to a shriek now.</p> -<p>“I can’t help feeling that she has something—something to do with it.” -The boy choked. “Dad was frightened, too, when I woke him—told him. He -said for me to tear right over here— he’d follow when he got his car out -of hospital.”</p> -<p>“But how could she—even in the confusion of the fire? The last Dorothy -saw of Una her bucket had rolled away.”</p> -<p>“She managed to stupefy her in some way, slide something into -her—perhaps rubbed it on the bucket.” The boy was roughly pacing the -floor. “Got her, in a dazed state, on her horse.”</p> -<p>“But why—why ... such a hor-ri-ble thing—”</p> -<p>“Brooding resentment, perhaps,” said Treff moodily, “to get even with -her parents. Maybe a wild yearning to get Una to herself for a while. -Maybe because she has become quite unbalanced—Dad says people of her -temperament generally do.”</p> -<p>“But Una—” Pem was fairly screaming now, her hands clutching at the pale -air, opening, closing—“Una—why! she’ll go mad herself, carried off like -that—by a strange, wild woman—away from us all. And she’ll be so -helpless,” it was a choking sob, “any other girl, Madeline, Naomi, -Frances—even Dorothy—might think of something to do—but Una—”</p> -<p>“No-o, the bottom will be out of everything; she’ll just drop through.” -Treff stared gloomily out of the window. “But we’ll find her—together.” -He caught at Pemrose’s hands. “Oh-h! there isn’t cover enough on the old -mountain, nor kinks enough in the brain of that crazy creature, to -prevent.... Gosh! Automobile wheels on the road below—her father! I—I’d -rather crawl through an air hole, five thousand feet up, than have to -tell him this!” The young aviator’s neck writhed in its khaki collar. -“He idolizes Una—and his sister ... always a sore subject, Dad said!”</p> -<p>“That’s why-y he looked so worried that day in the sun-parlor, when Una -had a story about hearing something strange, unearthly, in the wood; she -reminded him of his stepsister.” Pemrose’s lips were uncontrollably -twitching.</p> -<p>“Well!” Treff was bracing himself for an ordeal, “I guess old Andrew -hasn’t let much grass grow under that car—has got here as fast as God -and gasolene would let him!”</p> -<p>“Andrew!” It was a new cry from the girl’s lips. “Oh! Andrew would go -through fire and water for her; she makes him think of his own daughter -that he lost away back in Scotland. And he was brought up among -mountains—wild mountains!</p> -<p>“He knows these hills, too—has fished among them—sent father and me the -trout, last year.” Pem’s hands were clasped against her lips, as she -watched the climbing figures. “Oh: Andrew! he can hear so far, see so -far ... it’s as if he saw into things, too.”</p> -<p>“He’s a canny chauffeur, anyway,” said Treff.</p> -<p>But it was no chauffeur who stood among them now, while Treff’s story -was repeated to Una’s stricken father; it was a Church Elder and a -passionate Highlander to boot—released from all ceremony and convention.</p> -<p>“Gosh! I wouldn’t give much for Margot’s chances—wretched kidnapper—if -he tracks her among the mountains and finds that she has injured Una, -directly or indirectly; he’d wring her neck, as he’d wring a hen’s,” -said Treff, half-aloud, watching the ex-chauffeur’s grim face.</p> -<p>But the latter was thinking of rescue, not revenge now; of the girl who -in her sweet democratic way had called him her “fuffle-daddy”, the girl -who was eye-sweet, the girl whom his wife and he had taken to their -hearts as a symbol of their own daughter.</p> -<p>He clasped his hands. He flung his long arms to heaven—towering among -the reassembling search party.</p> -<p>But the prayer which he prayed was the same which had sprung to his lips -when, a shepherd-boy among his native hills, he had missed a tender one -from his flock:</p> -<p>“Noo, gin onything be lost or strayed—gin ony lamb be lost or strayed, -may the Almighty in his mercies fetch it back!</p> -<p>“An’, noo, I’m awa’ to find her!” said Andrew, the Scot.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXXII' title='XXII: On Little Sister'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XXII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>On Little Sister</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>In a gray bunk of a mountain camp a girl lay, like death.</p> -<p>The pink flush of dawn stealing through a small square that stood for a -window brushed her face, like a wing—and only made it more pallid.</p> -<p>Near by a woman stood staring at her; a woman whose transient likeness -to herself, as the light caught her face, too—her too brilliant dark -eyes—made her a thousand times the more terrible.</p> -<p>“Don’t shrink from me—honey,” said a voice whose scorching wildness had -a low hiss in it, like the hiss of flame around green wood in a fire. -“Don’t—oh! don’t turn away from me; I have been trying to draw you to me -for so long—influencing you, influencing you at a distance; some day I -knew I would get hold of you—have you to myself, to myself, for a -while—no matter how your parents might guard you.... And now—now—I -have!”</p> -<p>The eager flame died down; and the poor green wood in the bunk, lay -charred by it, until the very sap in its veins seemed dried up—life -blood, as it were, ceased to flow.</p> -<p>“I have hovered near you—near you for a year, precious—ever since I came -back to these mountains, my own hills where I was born.” The woman’s -figure, so pitiably “hulgy-backed”, round-shouldered, came to the edge -of the bunk.</p> -<p>The kidnapped girl twitched, twitched spasmodically—a quiver only -noticeable in her toes and in the dark, curly eyelashes flickering -upward for a second to the red, spotted handkerchief around her captor’s -neck, but so full of horrified repugnance that the latter involuntarily -retreated a step.</p> -<p>“I—I came to know your ways; I would watch for you early in the morning -on the edge of the wood near your home—which used to be my home until -your mother turned me out; but now—now I’m even with her!” It was a -bitter snap. “I watched you among your flowers, dew-wet flowers—and -wondered whether you had ever heard of me.... No-o, I suppose you -didn’t,” sorely, “but I’m your Aunt, Una, your father’s sister—half -sister, I suppose, the world would say—but I loved him as a brother and -could influence him—the powers I had!” The woman’s dark eyes flashed.</p> -<p>Una shrank flatter—flatter—until in her abject terror she became one -with the wooden bunk.</p> -<p>“But you, when you were a baby, a mite of a dark-eyed child, I loved -best of all—and your mother, she feared my influence over you. She -turned me out. I have had no home for fourteen years. I have been -lonely—hungry. But—always—I have dreamed of you; that, some day, I would -have you again, quite to myself—darling!” It was a hungry sob.</p> -<p>“But I suppose people will say I was mad—mad—to carry you off, like -this, and because of means—means I have taken to try and draw you to -me—”</p> -<p>“You—ar-re—mad,” whispered something in Una—and her flesh crept.</p> -<p>“I knew your parents would not let me see you, but distance—distance is -no longer such a barrier, when a whisper can cross it.” In the wildness -of the woman’s look there was now a mixture of practical shrewdness, -normal enthusiasm, as her glance roved to what Una, in a lifeless way, -perceived was the “shack corner” of the cabin—radio instruments upon a -bench, or shelf, nailed to the log wall.</p> -<p>“Oh! I’m not behind any amateur in that art,” said the Little Lone Lady, -with a flash of cunning, as if she had made use of it a good deal. -“Sometimes, as I rode near and far among the mountains, visiting -people—poor and rich—who wished to see me, I talked to <i>you</i> by radio. -Occasionally—occasionally I sang to you, as I did when you were a little -baby, sometimes—sometimes from a station quite near your home.”</p> -<p>The woman opened the door now to let in the daylight. Her eyes went -feverishly to the sky. Her wild croon floated back to Una:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>“Uk-k!” It was an unintelligible cluck from Una; the little “stand” in -her right dark eye was weirdly set, in even blanker terror than -before—she lay in the bunk as in a coffin.</p> -<p>Her captor looked at her; and the half-tender, whimsical smile which had -played about her lips, blew away like an erratic breeze.</p> -<p>“But—but this isn’t my camp—” she tried to straighten her round -shoulders—“and—and when you’ve had some refreshment, honey, we’ve got to -ride on—on—your own horse is here—to where you and I can be -together—together—hidden for a while.... The Gypsies would hide us, -their encampment is over on Bald Mountain,” she muttered, speaking aloud -to herself, as she fidgeted round the cabin. “I’ve done favors for -them.... And search parties will look for her on the other little -mountain first, anyhow, if they suspect me, at all,” she added, with -that flash of needle-nosed cunning before which Una’s cold flesh crept.</p> -<p>The woman was ferreting out a water bucket, as she spoke, moving, -indeed, as if the camp, a pine-log cabin, was not hers, although she had -made her own of it and kindled a fire there.</p> -<p>It belonged as she knew, to two young city men, college professors, who -had locked their cabin before going off on a fishing trip, to prevent -amateurs from meddling with the transmitter and receiver of a very -powerful sending station with which they experimented overseas.</p> -<p>Somehow, however, “Magic Margot,” with the cleverness of a burglar, had -found entrance through a connecting woodshed, the night before, because -she saw that the half-drugged girl whom she was holding on her horse -could go no further.</p> -<p>“No! Even if the farmers should suspect me, at all—connect me with her -disappearance,” she flashed a sidelong glance at Una, “they would not be -likely to look for her <i>here</i> first, on Speckle Mountain—Little Speckle -Mountain,” muttering more vehemently as she stirred up the fire on the -hearth and lifted the bucket.</p> -<p>“Speckle Mountain ... Little Speckle Mountain!” Una was not distinctly -conscious of hearing anything; and yet the words sank into her -subconsciousness, as she lay perfectly passive, almost a dead girl, -while her captor opened the door, with a final:</p> -<p>“The spring is some distance off, dear one. But I shan’t be very long. -Try to sleep a little—before we ride on.”</p> -<p>She was closing the door as she spoke—tying it on the outside.</p> -<p>Suddenly, as if remembering something, she slipped inside again, -fastened a steel creeper upon the heel of her shoe, took a bulky -umbrella from a corner—an umbrella that looked as if it had an unnatural -growth among its ribs, with bright ear-phones dangling from it, flashed -one half-doubtful glance at the stark girl in the bunk—another at the -complete wireless outfit upon that rough deal shelf—and was gone.</p> -<p>In the same dim subconscious way that she had absorbed the remark that -she was on Little Speckle—Little Sister Mountain—as the girls called it, -Una felt the meaning of these maneuvers soak in through her clammy -pores: she had become too familiar with radio practices, during the -summer, to miss it.</p> -<p>She was still beyond conscious thought. But, relieved of the flame of -that scorching presence beside her, lying a poor, staring dummy, upon -her back, against the rough logs above her, she began to see -pictures—and caught her breath convulsively at each.</p> -<p>She saw the grass of the Long Pasture burning. She saw the gray shed -ablaze. She saw herself, running with others, to the stream, to fill -buckets. She saw black, shadowy forms of circling horses, stampeding, -galloping; even here, in the bunk upon Little Sister, she seemed to hear -the soft earth-din of excited hoofs—to wonder whether Revel was among -them.</p> -<p>But, no—no, Revel was here—a captive, too!</p> -<p>The last picture painted by daylight, growing daylight, possessed her; -she made her first hoarse sound, after night-long silence—a cluck! She -saw, did she see, herself tripping where the pasture was very dark, felt -the bucket roll away from her—now her cold hands clutched at the sides -of the bunk—roll away down a mound, while somebody shouted—shouted: -“Shake it up there, Brigade!”</p> -<p>She saw a flurried girl picking up that runaway bucket, felt the handle -sting her, sting fiercely, saw her rub her fingers across her lips, -sucking them a little ... saw the fire become a red phantom, the meadow -a white mist.</p> -<p>She knew that in the same bewildering mist, not unconscious, but numb, -powerless to resist, she had been led by a firm arm to her horse and -lifted upon it, while, as in a dream, the rush and noises of the fire -went on.</p> -<p>And there had been a long ride up a mountain, while a hand held her on -Revel—guiding the horse by a lead strap.</p> -<p>Only now was she remembering—thinking! Beginning to think!</p> -<p>“And—she says we must ride further—further—where they won’t—where they -can’t find me. Gypsies—Encampment! Bald Mountain! And she’s mad—mad! -Maybe, ’twas she who made those strange sounds in the wood.... Oh! -I—I’ll go mad, too; I’m so-o frightened—”</p> -<p>The poor green wood of girlhood rolled over in the bunk, fairly hissing -in the flame of that scorching presence still beside her—she felt it -beside her.</p> -<p>She had a feeling that out of such a fire nothing could come alive. She -couldn’t, anyway—if it was really She who lay here, at daybreak, in a -lonely mountain-top cabin, with two gray bunks on either side—and a red -fire-cheek upon the hearth.</p> -<p>But, no! The nightmare was too monstrous. The bunk held only a shell.</p> -<p>The real Una, the guarded girl, was away, far away, with her Camp Fire -sisters. Why! she could hear them singing, singing their good-night -hymn, before the first foot of the nightmare caught her—before smoke -rushed up the sidehill and the glare burst forth in the Long Pasture:</p> -<div class='poetry-container'> -<div class='poetry'> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -<div class='stanza'> -</div> -</div> -</div> -<p>Ah! she had loved that hymn—dearest of Camp Fire songs.</p> -<p>But suddenly—suddenly—her whole being became again a fiery stick, -shriveling, consuming, for, watching that changing fire-cheek, the red -glow upon the hearth, while daylight broadened, she realized that it was -Una—incredibly it was—who lay here, in a beyond-the-beyond of utter -terror—helplessness.</p> -<p>Una who would be put upon her horse and forced to ride further, away -from father, mother—Pemrose—trapped—trapped....</p> -<p>“Master!... Master of the Hidden Fire!” She was feeling for the -life-tie, at last—wide awake, at last—gibbering, clutching with her cold -hands at the gray sides of the bunk, the outer bunk of two—with, -somewhere, a memory of a red fox trapped by the roadside.</p> -<p>“Master! Master! Master!” Was there a Sheltering Flame? A Hidden Fire? -Anything that could save a girl now—burn up the trap?</p> -<p>“Master! Master! Master!” She called it out loud, kneeling up in the -bunk, in the yellowing dawn, catching with both hands at her breast, her -blouse. “Master, help me! Save—me!”</p> -<p>Where did the light come from; it seemed to flash all round her, beyond -daylight.</p> -<p>“Help yourself,” it said. “Save—yourself! There must be something you -can do. Think—hard!”</p> -<p>And the light fell full upon needle and dial on the face of the radio -transmitter, against a log wall, eight feet distant.</p> -<p>She cowered in the bunk, cowered, as if she had been struck, looking up -in a ghastly way at the familiar antennæ running round the logs above -her head.</p> -<p>“I never—could!” Yet, somehow, she was out of the gray bunk where she -had lain, coffined—the girl who would have to be wheeled through life in -a cushioned chair.</p> -<p>“Master of the Hidden Fire! Now! Now!” She tottered, gripping its -side—but she reached that shining “shack corner”, the shelf with its -wireless litter.</p> -<p>Amid a medley of plugs and jacks, used for connecting varied circuits, -amid shining brass and bakelite, was a little telegraph key. Study, -practice, at Camp Chicolee, had made it a pal—almost a pal.</p> -<p>“If—I only ... could! But I never could—remember! But Master of the -Hidden Fire!” She tumbled on to a high stool against that shelf, the -table nailed to the log wall, dropping her head amid the litter. “We—we -had a private sign we always used, we girls. <i>She</i> has a little receiver -in that umbrella, I know; if I speak, she’ll pick it up ... dot an’ -dash, maybe, she can’t! Oh-h! what first: light the bulbs, start the -generator.”</p> -<p>Mechanically, with a glance at that dark generator under the table, -garner of power, she was throwing the switch, turning the rheostat knob -in the panel of the transmitting set, not slowly, carefully, as she had -been taught to do, to prolong the life of the bulbs to which she was -turning on the strong current.</p> -<p>Much did a girl in her kidnapped plight care about bulbs—bulbs that talk -overseas!</p> -<p>She slammed the rheostat on full, so that the fairy filaments in those -electric bulbs—the sending vacuum tubes of the powerful transmitter—just -leaped from dim to brightest—almost in a moment to white heat, the grids -and plates about them glowing cherry red.</p> -<p>It was a cheerful cherry. It blinded her—her dull eyes.</p> -<p>But it gave the girl with a face like a white cameo, who had been kept -all her life, as a gem, in cotton wool, a sense of power she had never -known before.</p> -<p>“Master of the Hidden Fire!”</p> -<p>She began to feel she was on top.</p> -<p>Quite steadily she did the next half-familiar thing, closed the aërial -switch, connecting the whole set, cast a glance at the dial with the -needle on it in the face of the panel-like transmitter, to see if now -the miracle was working—the powerful set in action.</p> -<p>“It is. The needle moves.... The message! If I can only send it out, -tell where I am, Pemrose—somebody—will g-get it! If only my head weren’t -so ‘whirley-hirly’!” piteously. “Our sign, the sign with which we always -begin a message: Di-dit-di-dit-di-dit! Dah-dah-dah-dah! That’s—it. Six -dots, four dashes.” The two first fingers of her right hand, pressing -the key, were ticking it off now, while her swollen lips murmured, -talking aloud, like her captor. “Now—if I can only give my name—or the -first letter of it! They’d know. ‘Dot-dot-dash’: di-dit-dah; yes, I -guess that stands for ‘U’. Where—am I? Oh! on Speckle Mountain—I never -can spell that all out ... and she’ll be coming back. What—what was the -abbreviation we had for it: ‘L. S’?”</p> -<p>Straining memory to a white heat now, she ticked that off—both letters -clearly.</p> -<p>“But—I must give it again. Pemrose—that’s what she said. Three times. A -distress signal! And that woman—”</p> -<p>Again—again—she ticked it off, the bulbs glaring at her until she felt -their incandescence in her brain—light-headed, delirious—as if she were -sending herself out into the ether, while she tried to add to her -message and give the call-letters of the home-camp, beginning at the -wrong end, as she would be sure to do.</p> -<p>“She—she’s coming!”</p> -<p>Just enough presence of mind remained for her to pull the switches—turn -the rheostat knob again.</p> -<p>“It will take a few seconds to cool off. But she can’t call it back—the -message.”</p> -<p>Slowly those radiant bulbs, the shining vacuum tubes dimmed—became blind -eyes, the cherry-red plates fading out.</p> -<p>But the current turned off from them was switched on—for ever—in the -eyes of the girl-prisoner, little white filaments glowing in their -lamp-like blackness as she shot back to the bunk.</p> -<p>A knife, an old camp-knife, lay on a stool in the way. She whipped that -back with her.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXXIII' title='XXIII: The Ring'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XXIII</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Ring</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“I tell you I’m not going a step further—not going to ride any -further—until I stop and ‘listen in!’ This—this lit-tle ring-set,” -chokingly, “that’s why I brought it—brought it on the search.”</p> -<p>“But, heavens, dear-oh! I know you’re in torture about her—but it seems -like—Jove! like shooting off peas at a battleship ... a time like this.”</p> -<p>The nineteen-year-old boy looked distractedly at the white-faced girl, -who flung herself off her horse upon the mountainside—her eyes a “blue -day”, flinty—determined.</p> -<p>“But it isn’t: it isn’t just fiddle-faddle—fooling! Your ‘soft-boiled -peas at a battleship’!” She stamped her foot.</p> -<p>“I didn’t say anything about ‘soft-boiled’,” contradicted the youth. -“And I’m as anxious about her as you are.”</p> -<p>“But, look here! it isn’t wasting time.” She caught at her throat. -“Father’s—father’s new crystal, you know—more sensitive than galena!”</p> -<p>“Oh! I know your father is a Wizard.”</p> -<p>“Then—be a dear boy and do this for me,” Pemrose looked up at him, -sidelong, coaxingly; “loop this aërial around that tree.”</p> -<p>The boy was accustomed to find those blue eyes “too sweet for music”, as -he freakishly put it; before the agony in them and the wild suspense, he -found himself weakening.</p> -<p>“But—but we ought to tear right up there.” He pointed along the rough -bridle path to a steep summit above. “It—it’s on this mountain, Little -Poco, as the farmers call it, that miserable thief-animal, -kidnapper—horrible aunt—who stole Una’s picture before she stole her—has -her shack—cabin—so-o they say.”</p> -<p>“The farmers, three or four of them, are searching this m-mountain.” -Pemrose tried to speak calmly. “Her father has ridden—is riding—up the -other trail to the top. And we don’t know—we don’t know that she’s here, -at all, or near here. Word—word has gone out to every radio station in -this district, describing Una, asking whether any one has seen a girl on -a bay horse—so early in the morning we might be able to pick up -something, a hint of news; even—even this tiny—receiving—set—”</p> -<p>She looked down at her outstretched forefinger—at the amber, bakelite -ring, coiled with the hundreds of turns of hairwire; at the “radio soul” -of the great inventor’s new crystal, shining softly—softly in the early -light.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! I say—drop this foolishness and ride on.” The boy-aviator threw -up his hands. “See! The horses—they don’t know what to make of it. -Cartoon is looking round at me—like a nervous individual, with glasses -on.” He tried to laugh.</p> -<p>Cartoon was bending his stubborn Roman nose to the edge of the dark -mountain swamp now, to nibble—failing to make sense of the halt.</p> -<p>Revelation, long, lean, fast—shining in every hair, wet amber—rolled the -whites of his eyes, too, at his girl-rider, with a remonstrating: “Well! -aren’t we going on? Why stop here, on the edge of a black bog, where I’m -in to my hocks—the mountain before us?”</p> -<p>But for once, Pemrose ignored that prudent horse-sense.</p> -<p>“Will you stretch the wire, the antenna, out to the tree for me? Or must -I do it myself?”</p> -<p>She pressed the fishing-reel, coiled with two hundred feet of outdoor -antenna—upon her companion, slipped the steel creeper upon her heel, -driving its spikes into the wet ground—the radio headpiece, carved with -Camp Fire symbols, upon her head.</p> -<p>“Merciful—green—hop-toads!” The boy ground his teeth. “Folly—raving -folly, but I suppose I’ll do it.... Oh! so ear-rly in the morning, of -course you may pick up a murmur—dim murmur—but as for anything -important!” He shook his head—needing badly the support of the -hop-toads, as he uncoiled the bright, bronze wire upon the air. “Not six -o’clock—y-yet.” He glanced around.</p> -<p>Six o’clock—six o’clock on a September morning, lacking that a little, -and a girl standing, presently, with her heel in the mountain bog, with -her aërial out to a gnarled pine tree—one of the scattered pines and -maples around her—with the red of the mountain fire-weed on her hectic -lips—a little faded, a little drooping, a little yellow at the corners.</p> -<p>All around her the golden-rod dreamed—a shining dream.</p> -<p>“She’s more stubborn than you are—old Sickle Face!” The boy bent to -Cartoon’s ear, flinging his arm over the horse’s neck, as he watched -her. “This is—mulish.... Oh-h! you may come in on a whisper, I -suppose—just the parings of a whisper from one of those boiled owls -who—who sit up all night over it and keep on into daylight—I’ve -done—it—myself,” he softly hissed.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! hush.... Your—racket!”</p> -<div id='i003' class='figcenter im013' > - <img src='images/i003.jpg' alt='' style='width:100%' /> -<p class='caption'>Pemrose was standing with her aërial out to a gnarled pine-tree.</p> -</div> -<p>“Well! I like that. <i>My</i> whisper couldn’t be heard a foot off.... Um-m! -I’ve kept the hush up long enough. Are you getting anything?” he -stormed, a minute later—a low, growling storm.</p> -<p>The girl amateur’s lips grew a little more faded, a little more -drooping, at the corners.</p> -<p>“Just a ghost—ghost of dot an’ dash,” she pleaded. “Very f-faint—far—”</p> -<p>“Bah! Give it up then—come on!” He jerked Cartoon’s head up. “Let’s get -going! Give up this foolishness!”</p> -<p>She half withdrew her heel from the black swamp—then drove it deeper, -the bog swishing around her.</p> -<p>“I haven’t been five minutes yet—barely five.” She glanced down at her -little gold wrist watch—calm link with normal life—it was one which Una -had given her.</p> -<p>“And I suppose you’ll waste another five—ten.” He resigned himself to -staring at the dim forest, pine and maple half way up the mountain side, -dark spruce above—in between the golden-rods dreaming—dreaming against -all the black spots on the horizon.</p> -<p>Was he dreaming with them? His heart began to creep, to creep along the -waiting minutes—as it had not crept when he felt his plane side-slipping -under him, knew that he was doomed to a fiery fall to earth.</p> -<p>The girl was pointing a finger at him—pointing it straight. Something -had come into her face which made his knees bend above their khaki -leggings.</p> -<p>“Have.... Are you getting—anything?” Only his moving lips, his stretched -neck asked the question.</p> -<p>A nod! A nod in which strange, bright crystals formed in the blue eyes, -to reinforce the listening one upon the finger. Above them the black -eyebrows were drawn together fiercely. The face, in its straining -effort, was pale as the meadow-sweet around.</p> -<p>“Then—then stick with it,” he heard himself say hoarsely: oh! he <i>was</i> -sharing the golden-rods’ dream.</p> -<p>The horses seemed sharing it, too—they softly snorted.</p> -<p>“Oh! can’t you—can’t you say a—blamed—thing?”</p> -<p>“<i>Una!...</i> Our private call—I got it.” The crystals, dissolving now into -tears, rolled down a face, set as ice.</p> -<p>“I can’t—believe—you,” raved the boy, half silently—sullenly.</p> -<p>“Faintly—clearly—distinctly—I got it: six dots, four dashes, the first -time. Second—that was indistinct; I picked up ‘U’; I know it was ‘U, -di-dit-dah’! Third time, ‘S’, I think; ‘L. S: di-dah-di-dit: -di-dit-dit’! Oh-h!” The fireweed lips were trembling awfully.</p> -<p>“Location! Location—try to get it!” The aviator’s whisper was weird.</p> -<p>Silence ensued, moments—ages.</p> -<p>“Location—I did get it! It’s—Una. She seemed to be trying to spell out -‘Speckle’—I could only pick up a letter or two. But ‘L. S’, that was our -abbreviation for Little Speckle—Little Sister Mountain, over there; -sending a ‘radio’—a message—we always sent it, code or speech.... Oh! -she’s not here, at all—and, somehow, I knew she wasn’t all the time. -She’s on Little Speckle—at some camp on Little Sister—and she has -managed to send out a message ... Una!”</p> -<p>A gulf yawned between the girl and boy into which all their previous -ideas dropped—out of which rose the most wonderful sunrise they had ever -seen; they stared at each other stupidly across it.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! you may ride north, south, east or west, if you like—but I’m -going over there.” Suddenly Pemrose Lorry tore her spiked heel out of -the mud—out of the ground connection which had done its work.</p> -<p>“Oh! unhitch the antenna—quick,” she screamed.</p> -<p>“But—it beats me—” The boy hesitated a moment—blankly.</p> -<p>“Nothing did ‘beat’ you! Even if I didn’t—didn’t get the ‘location’,” -she stamped her foot, “those two letters, the bungled rest of it, -there’s only one strong station really near enough for me to pick up -anything—distinctly—with the ring. That—that’s the new one over on -Speckle Mountain, just rigged up by college professors—can’t see their -camp from here—closed a few days ago, when we rode up there. -But—now....”</p> -<p>She was restoring the ring to its case—that to her breast, as she spoke, -preparing to mount her horse.</p> -<p>“Oh! you—you may ride to the top—go to the right and follow your left -ear, if you like!” The blue eyes snapped at him impudently—as did the -girl’s crop—in the incredible excitement of the moment. “But I—”</p> -<p>He was going to the right, unlooping the aërial from the pine tree—in a -bewitched, protesting way.</p> -<p>“But, for heaven’s sake! look out <i>how</i> you go—where you’re going,” he -cried, five minutes later, following Pemrose on horseback down the steep -trail. “Don’t—don’t try to run him downhill! Better get there late than -not at all!”</p> -<p>For the girl rider had started Revelation off at such a pace that he -stepped upon a rolling stone and almost slipped upon his haunches with -it, down the pebbly trail—sparks flying out, a galaxy, from his -hindfeet.</p> -<p>“Hold his head up. Try-y to hold his head up. Bah! going down, -Revelation will leave Cartoon in the dust.” The boy rider ground his -teeth.</p> -<p>“I’ll change with you, if you like!”</p> -<p>“Do you think I’m such a cad—such a bounder?”</p> -<p>But the passionate sincerity of the offer did more than anything else to -convince Treff Graham, aviator, that this whole thing was more than a -mere dream of the golden-rods.</p> -<p>Sparks flew in front of hoofs now—whole constellations of them—hind feet -slid, Cartoon grunted stubbornly, the white star on his forehead moody.</p> -<p>“Yes, going up, old Roman Nose, you could hold your own, because of -muscle; going down you’re not ‘in it’ with Revelation—not so nimble. -But, heavens! if that girl doesn’t ‘come a cropper’ before—the—bottom.”</p> -<p>Treffrey, stroking his horse’s throbbing neck, grunted, too, appalled; -for his girl-leader, her hand on her saddle, was whirling round on him -again and the blue triumph of her eyes in the chalky whiteness of her -face made him feel queer.</p> -<p>“Do you realize,” she cried—and rose in her stirrups, “do you realize -that if Una sent out that message—and I know she did—she isn’t dropping -through, as you said she would, she’s coming through?”</p> -<p>“By the powers o’ pluck! It begins to look as if she was <i>crashing -through</i>.” The boy-aviator rose, too, high in his saddle—and in the -moisture of his eye, as its humorous brown speck flashed, there was all -the world of difference that yawned for him between helplessly dropping -through and crashing through an enemy, colors flying—the difference -between cripple and soldier, glory and defeat.</p> -<p>“She—<i>she</i> has to be gently wheeled through life—everybody looking out -for her!” hooted Pemrose—just as if she had not thought the same thing -herself. “Why! she’d make many a boy look foolish. She’s a—Girl. A Camp -Fire Girl!”</p> -<p>She said it again. He said it, too, when, an hour—and more—later, a hard -climb accomplished, riders standing upright, at times, forcing the -stirrups back, to help struggling horses, the top of Little Sister was -gained ... and an empty camp.</p> -<p>But what was this fluttering in the mountain wind, an indigo butterfly—a -bit of blue rag.</p> -<p>“It looks—oh! it looks as if it might have belonged to Una’s riding -habit.” The back of Pemrose’s hand struck her lips. “She—she had riding -breeches on, that color; I helped her into them when the fire broke -out—first thing handy!”</p> -<p>For a moment she felt as did Jacob of old when he, seeing his son’s rich -coat, thought a beast had devoured him—to what evil thing might this -fragment of blue cloth, finer than that of a girl’s sisters, testify?</p> -<p>“Perhaps she bit it out, gnawed it—cut it out—left it as a clue, a clue -to searchers.” Treff was cornering the fragment.</p> -<p>“Oh-h! do you think she could have done that?”</p> -<p>“If she had presence of mind to send out the message—she could.”</p> -<p>The boy-aviator’s face wore a look now as if the spot on which he stood, -might be holy ground.</p> -<p>The next moment he knew it was.</p> -<p>He was kneeling, bareheaded. Pemrose was sobbing wildly, kissing the -ground where among rank grasses, held down by a stone or two, were a few -drowsy wild flowers, of the sort that close sleepily at night—open in -the morning.</p> -<p>Dandelion, daisy, a white clover blossom, its triple leaves unfolding, a -glow of orange, a little sprig of tawny hawkweed—devil’s -paint-brush—picked behind the camp.</p> -<p>“Mercy! She must have looked round for them, arranged them so—so that -anybody who knew her, would know it could only be she who did it—at -least, we girls would—that she had been here—lately!” Pemrose could -hardly speak now.</p> -<p>“And led that awful kidnapping aunt to believe she was only playing with -them!” The brown speck in Treff’s right eye, his seat of humor, blazed -as it had never blazed before—through a mist.</p> -<p>He knelt, an unkempt figure, in khaki riding breeches—mud-splashed -shirt.</p> -<p>“But—but her little flower clock! A ‘teeny’ bit of it!” The hand of -Pemrose caught at her throat. “Oh-h! I can’t stand this. Where is she -now?”</p> -<p>“Wherever she is, she’s on top. And coming through!” The aviator drew -his sleeve across a wet face. “And we—we must get right after them. Just -a minute for the horses to draw breath—’twill pay! Do you—know—what this -reminds me of?”</p> -<p>His voice dropped with his eyes to the flowers.</p> -<p>“No-o.”</p> -<p>“My old Dad, he was such a queer fish,” the young dare-devil’s voice had -the frankness of utter emotion now, “he could have given this hor-ri-ble -step-aunt pointers on queer tricks. Was a sort of a skeptic, too, didn’t -believe much in what he couldn’t feel or see. But—but, after that last -mad escapade, when he stole your father’s record, and lay in agony out -in the Man Killers trail, while you took care of him, he said to -himself—then—that there must be Something Very Fine back of it all—finer -than the girl herself—see?</p> -<p>“He began to think and search—and find. My old Dad!”</p> -<p>Across the fragment of a flower clock the girl’s hand stole into the -boy’s.</p> -<p>He covered it with his other palm—held the finger tips for a moment -against his lips—then leaped to his feet, to search anew.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXXIV' title='XXIV: The Race'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XXIV</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>The Race</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“If it weren’t for the trees, we ought to be able to see them now. -But—merciful hop toads! this trail is crooked enough to break a snake’s -back, isn’t it?”</p> -<p>Treff Graham grasped it, ducking low to avoid the tall bushes and small -trees that almost swept him off his plunging horse as he followed -Pemrose down the shoulder of Little Sister mountain.</p> -<p>The girl had started off recklessly at a fast trot—a chameleon-like trot -that was now a slip now a wild plunge—Revelation feeling with his fore -feet for a footing—and now a coasting gait in which he slid upon his -haunches; then the pace slackened, to become again the slip and slide -and plunge in which girl and horse, flashing amid the bright fall -foliage, turned all sorts of colors in the early light.</p> -<p>“Are you—are you coming?” she shouted impatiently over her shoulder.</p> -<p>“Sure—thing! As fast as I can come!” bellowed the boy; and then he swung -his whip and whooped, as the trail grew for a moment easier.</p> -<p>“Camp Fire Girls on top,” he yelled. “Look—there!”</p> -<p>Rising in his stirrups on the plunging horse he pointed to two white -arms stretched in benediction from the tallest tree upon the shoulder of -Little Sister.</p> -<p>“If anybody found a trace of her, he was to signal the other search -parties,” young Treff had said, two minutes before. “The sign was to be -two smokes—or a white cloth waving. We haven’t time for the smokes—and a -handkerchief won’t show up very far.”</p> -<p>“My sweater—my jersey!” Pemrose had gasped. “I can ride on in my -blouse.”</p> -<p>“Camp Fire Girls on top, eh?” Treff let out another Western yell, as he -pointed to the cream-white arms burgeoning in the wind. “And, by heaven! -they are on top,” he cried. “They have crashed through. Una—what this -summer must have been doing for her! And nobody suspected it.... There’s -another bit of blue rag!”</p> -<p>With a rearing swerve of his horse he plucked it from the bush on which -it had lit; the fine bit of cloth, true blue, cut or gnawed from a -girl’s riding habit—perhaps by the teeth of the girl whose brain had -been a fragile flower basket.</p> -<p>“I suppose she felt that there was no use in putting up, trying to put -up, any open fight against that kidnapping relative,” he said. “The only -thing she could do—all that she could do was to leave such clues as she -could behind her. Well! we’re on their track, sure enough. Horses’ -prints in that swamp there, Revel’s among them, I’ll be sworn—toes -turning out! They’ve ridden down the mountain on the opposite side from -that on which we came up—and this—this is the blamed ‘cheekyside’, -too—of all the cross trails—”</p> -<p>Already he was falling behind—gnashingly behind—upon the clumsy and -“winded” Cartoon, on the difficult trail that zigzagged over the -mountain’s shoulder among birches and red maples a few inches in -diameter, from twelve to fifteen feet in height.</p> -<p>But the slender little trees, herding together, could screen from view -any riders making headway upon the lower stretches of that corkscrew -trail.</p> -<p>“If only Una could know that we’re after her—hotfoot!” he raged to the -tormenting branches that swept his face.</p> -<p>And one minute later the world rocked to the cry:</p> -<p>“There they—are!”</p> -<p>There they were, visible, plainly visible, at an almost perpendicular -angle, half-a-mile below, the little round-shouldered figure on the bay -cob dragging another dark object along, the hanging-back figure of Una -on Revel—Revel rolling wearily, as the trail widened, and tugging upon -the lead strap.</p> -<p>“Ha-loo!” The yell which the young aviator discharged, then, just tore -at the mountain’s heart, calling on every echo in heaven and earth to -help it to reach the unwilling fugitive, the agonized girl, there below.</p> -<p>Agony was in another girlish heart, too. The whole mountain blazed like -a brush fire, as she saw them.</p> -<p>“Are—are you with me—still? Can you—see-ee....” she called back.</p> -<p>“Yes! I’m—coming. As fast as I can! Careful—now! Better l-late than not -at all!”</p> -<p>But that was the moment, the harebrained moment, when the boy rider, all -burning up within, too, disregarded his own maxim.</p> -<p>The trail, the winding trail, was steep enough, but here and there upon -the mountainside were little precipitous cross-cuts by which a daredevil -could cut corners, gain an advantage, strike in on the trail again, with -a saving of a few hundred yards.</p> -<p>One presented itself at the moment—a mere gash, lined with stones as big -as the rider’s fist.</p> -<p>“Gee whiz! If ’twas a thermometer, the mercury would have hard work -climbing it, even in July,” was his freakish thought, thrown off by the -laboring excitement—the wild heartache, too—within. “Going down, I’ll -risk—it!”</p> -<p>He put Cartoon at the stony “thermometer”—and in three seconds horse and -rider were seeing stars.</p> -<p>Cartoon had slid and fallen. And a young aviator was testing the stones -with the back of his head—finding them more heartless than the flower -clock into which he had once tumbled.</p> -<p>“Stars, moons and suns!” He sat up, gasping, rubbing his poll, while the -whole firmament whirled about him. “Merciful hop.... I hope you’re not -done for!” He blinked, half-stunned, at his horse.</p> -<p>But Cartoon, trembling all over, grunting like a cyclone, had escaped -with bruises.</p> -<p>“Well! we’re out of it now,” groaned the boy. “But Revelation won’t lose -them; he—he’ll come up after them ‘as tight as he can.’”</p> -<p>Dizzily he was leading his horse down on to the trail again—while a -girlish cry rang back in piteous accents.</p> -<p>The stony clatter had reached Pemrose. Even with those flying figures -ahead, now seen, now unseen, upon the mountain’s lower slopes, she -reined in among the baffling little trees.</p> -<p>“It’s all-ll—right. I’m coming—along. Don’t—lose—them!” She heard her -companion’s fumbling cry.</p> -<p>And now she knew, as she seemed to have known from the first, that when -it came to the last pinch, the last dash for Una’s safety, it would be a -race between Revel and Revelation.</p> -<p>She was out on a road now. The trees were taller on either side of -her—but with great gaps between them.</p> -<p>Heavenly in color they skirted the way: orange of a sugar-maple against -the quivering blue-green of a balsam, coral of a swamp maple, the tender -green of soft pines: and all reflected in the dark breast of a mountain -pool past which she galloped like a rocket.</p> -<p>In her breast was the blackness of the water—the brilliant reflections -painted her hopes of saving Una.</p> -<p>This wood road, an old lumber road, in which the zigzagging trail had -given out, wound, now, around the mountain’s side.</p> -<p>And parallel with it—just below—ran a brawling mountain stream.</p> -<p>Pem had a sort of feeling that, as long as she lived, she would never -lose the note of that stream—always it would flow parallel with her—it -and its cry as it umpired the race.</p> -<p>It was going to be a tight race, that she saw. Revelation was lathered -all over—wet as if she had ridden him through the water. In the moment -that she had reined him in, his eyes had been wild and rolling; he had -pranced about among the bushes, neck deliriously arched—nostrils -smoking.</p> -<p>The other two horsewomen were still an eighth of a mile ahead.</p> -<p>Revel seemed to be going blindly, her neck stretched out, almost level; -now and again she slipped back a step and then—again—she rocked like a -boat; a quickly rolling motion that, if slower, would have been a -pathetic wabble—and Una upon her back!</p> -<p>But the creature beside her was whipping her on, lashing her own tired -horse frantically, too.</p> -<p>And the other pursuer, the youth on whom Pemrose had leaned, was now a -hundred and fifty yards behind.</p> -<p>It was as the girl realized this and the blood seemed bursting through -the pores of her skin with the thought, the question, as to what she -should do when her gallop did bring her up with the riders, that the -stream suddenly burst into a jeer ... an awful jeer.</p> -<p>“Don’t you remember that there’s a ‘washout’ ahead,” it said, “where I, -the water, swung in, some time ago, and ate back into the road: now, -there’s no road there, but a steep bank, a wild bank—clumps of sod ... -and Una can’t keep her seat?”</p> -<p>The blood rushed back upon the girl rider’s heart now. Horrible sounds -were in her ears, as of a hurricane raging around her on a darkened -mountain as, standing in her stirrups, cowering forward, she whipped -Revelation on—coaxed him, by his love for her, on—<i>brave</i> Revelation, -coming up after them as tight as he could.</p> -<p>She saw that eaten-out bank descend at an angle of fifty degrees, its -snaring sod-clumps, wild bushes—girlish feet had once climbed it -breathlessly from below.</p> -<p>“Una could never stick on ... and the woman is mad enough to force her -down it.... And can I hold them back?”</p> -<p>But out of the hurricane came the still small Voice: “You are not -alone,” it said. “On this desperate ride you are not two—and one lagging -far behind—but Three. One is, surely, with you who was with Una when she -sent that message.”</p> -<p>“But I can’t even r-reach them,” Pemrose was sobbing, a moment later, -setting her teeth, for though Revelation was gaining, “coming up tight”, -it was not tight enough; that breakdown in the road was very near—that -chewed-out pit-bank.</p> -<p>“Father-r in—heaven!” The cry could not reach the girlish lips. The -figures ahead were but twenty feet from the washout—the deformity of one -plainly emphasized as she bent forward in the saddle, dragging Revel by -the lead strap—Revel with the martyred wabble, the neck so forlornly -straight.</p> -<p>Una—Una realized what was before her now. She was rocking, too, rocking -fiercely, even striking out at her captor, putting up a -fight—ineffectual. But....</p> -<p>Was the rock near her suddenly cleft—the great rock above the brawling -stream?</p> -<p>It seemed so—so sudden, so like a water jet, was the leap of a dripping -figure from behind it.</p> -<p>Capless, coatless, soaking from a climb along the stream’s bed, it swung -before Pemrose’s eyes—and the whole world became a blinking washout.</p> -<p>Its arm was round Una in the saddle. Its hurling grip was on her -captor’s bridle. It was between the two horsewomen. It bore down the -lead strap, like a thread.</p> -<p>“An-drew!” gasped Pemrose—and dropped forward upon Revelation’s neck.</p> -<div class='chapter'> -<h2 id='chXXV' title='XXV: Spring'> - <span style='font-size:1.2em'>CHAPTER XXV</span><br /><span style='font-size:1.0em'>Spring</span> -</h2> -</div> -<p>“Aunt Margot is getting better—Margaret her real name is—and I don’t -know that I ought to call her ‘aunt’ after what she did to me ... but do -you know I can’t help feeling sorry for her. She was really unbalanced -when she put that through—had been becoming so for some time, so the -doctors say.”</p> -<p>On the sidehill, near Camp Chicolee, on a spring day, two girls sat -talking.</p> -<p>Below them, on the mountain, their horses grazed.</p> -<p>“Wasn’t it lovely of father to arrange for us to spend our Easter -holidays, part of them, up here, at the farm—the stock farm?” remarked -Una, beginning again, on another tack. “And to have the horses sent up -here for us, too!”</p> -<p>“And to think of Revelation being my horse! I never—never can get over -that.” The eyes of Pemrose rested upon the long, lithe shape—upon the -finely curry-combed coat glistening, amberlike, in the April sunlight. -“Menzies—Donald Menzies—didn’t like it one bit,” she dimpled -mischievously, “his being given to me. He wanted to sell him.”</p> -<p>“Menzies needn’t complain,” said Una hotly, looking down at the tall -figure of the farmer out in the Long Pasture. “Father is going to send -Sanbie, his son, to college when he leaves high school, lend him the -money to go—a loan he never means to take back. They say that boy, burnt -and exhausted as he was, just searched all through the night I was lost, -saying: ‘Now you see her—and now you don’t!’”</p> -<p>A little mischief crept into the rippling tones, too—fixing a stationary -star in Una’s dark eye.</p> -<p>Pemrose sat very still upon her warm rock, crop in hand, gazing down at -the Long Pasture—its colts and horses.</p> -<p>Seven months had passed since Andrew wheeled Revel on the verge of a -washout, where the road had been eaten away—months in which the two -girls had tasted the novel excitements of boarding school life, <i>minus</i> -radio between their two rooms—and it was the first time that Una had -seemed inclined to talk freely and naturally of a wild ride up and down -Little Sister Mountain—Little Sister smiling under her April curl papers -of mist.</p> -<p>“Yes, Mr. Grosvenor said the horse which carried me after you should -never go out of the family,” dimpled Pemrose, “and that, as I was an -honorary member thereof, he was going to give him to me,” arching black -eyebrows. “He’d have made Treff a present of Cartoon, too, only ‘Hop’—I -call him that when I want to tease him—said he wouldn’t have that old -Sickle Face, at any price.... But what put Her—I’m not going to call her -your aunt—into your head now?”</p> -<p>“Father has been to see her lately.” Una’s lip corners twitched a -little. “You know she was taken to a hospital, very ill with brain -fever, after Andrew stopped the two horses on the verge of that -washed-out bank—Andrew has never stopped, calling himself a ‘fool-body’, -since, because he didn’t let her go over.”</p> -<p>There was the faintest note of a chuckle in the voice now.</p> -<p>“So you can talk about it easily; can you?” Pemrose glanced, sidelong, -at her friend, murmuring silently to herself. “It seems as if that night -in the cabin on Little Sister was a ‘canny moment’ as Andrew calls the -hour of birth,” with a mute little quiver of laughter. “And so—and so -She’s getting better,” she said aloud.</p> -<p>“Yes, she was very weak after the fever and either couldn’t or wouldn’t -remember—things. But now she seems softened—sorry for what she did.”</p> -<p>“So she jolly well may be—as Treff would say!” Pemrose kicked at the -grass with her riding-boot. “I suppose it was she who set fire to the -shed?”</p> -<p>“She—she has never owned up to that.” Una’s lip corners drooped—there -was almost a squint in the soft dark eyes which gazed down at the spot -where that tool shed had stood. “How the blaze could have started -otherwise I—I don’t know,” quiveringly. “But she has confessed to father -that when she came back to these mountains, after living in one big city -after another, it was, really, because she was lonely and wanted to see -me—see how I had grown up. But she was so bitter against father and -mother that she wouldn’t even let them know that she was alive—so she -kept spying upon me invisibly—trying to influence me. As for her mad -idea of kidnapping me—carrying me off—I think it grew out of frantic -resentment against mother.”</p> -<p>“But think how she went about it, the slyboots!” cried Pemrose. “Of -course she must have found it awfully hard to waylay you; you were so—so -‘peerie-weerie’,” laughingly; “so seldom beyond the garden, alone!”</p> -<p>“Yes, and so she maneuvered with some of the tricks she played upon the -simple mountain folk!” said Una. “Her cabin was all wired for -electricity; at half-a-dozen different points, by touching an unseen -button with an elbow or foot—some part of her anatomy—she could set -invisible tuning forks vibrating—or some other—musical device. From that -it was an easy step to playing upon my curiosity—in the rôle of ‘Magic -Margot’ she carried some of her paraphernalia around with her, I -suppose,” with a catch of the breath, half sob, half laughter.</p> -<p>“Yes, besides her radio equipment.” Pemrose’s black eyebrows drew -together. “Did she—did she confess how she managed to overcome you the -night of the fire?”</p> -<p>“Father drew it out of her, bit by bit; she rubbed something on the -handle of the bucket, when it rolled away from me—you see she was -waylaying me then—some strong acid, so that when my fingers touched the -handle again it stung me—burned, prickled! Ugh!” Una lifted her fingers -as she had raised them, long ago, in the sun parlor and looked at them. -“There was a little drug mixed with the acid, so that when I rubbed my -fingers to my lips—as she guessed I would do—I got just enough of that -to stupefy me—at least, make me powerless to resist her. If that hadn’t -‘worked’ I suppose she’d have tried some other means, but she didn’t -want to hurt or frighten me.”</p> -<p>“Well, of all the crazy cunning!” The other girl simply gasped. “I -suppose there was some of the same concoction on the little bunch of -wild flowers that fell at your feet in the wood.... And I—I wouldn’t -believe you that anything happened—anything unusual that morning! -Sometimes—” Pemrose slowly shook her head—“sometimes, Daddy says, I’m as -wilful as an acid,” laughingly, “an acid eating into salt—and it doesn’t -do to be that way, eh?” The blue eyes were mischievous, the lip corners -penitent.</p> -<p>“But You! It was you who saved me. You won out against her—with radio,” -cried the victim of that unbalanced cunning. “It was you—you who picked -up my message—how I ever ticked it off, I don’t know—remembered enough -to tick it off! But you found out where I was.” Una’s lip was trembling -now—she dashed her hand across her eyes, one bright drop, dislodged, -fell upon the mountain grass. “It was when Andrew saw your signal, your -creamy sweater, waving from the tree on Little Sister that he knew I was -somewhere on that mountain. Immediately he thought of that awful bank, -that washout, in the road—then he caught sight of us and climbed—oh! it -was an awful climb, too, right through the stream’s bed, for a short -cut—was just in time to head us off!”</p> -<p>“I know-ow.” Pemrose’s tone was very low. She caught an April cowslip in -the leather loop of her riding crop—there was silence for five minutes. -“But you—you yourself, were the real wonder,” she said, then in the same -low, thick voice. “Treff—Treff has never got over talking of the way you -came through—the clues you left behind you—bits of your habit!”</p> -<p>“I carved them out with a knife I found—and she never saw me!”</p> -<p>Was it a new Una: the mischief, shrewdness—young strength—leaking out of -the eye-corners?</p> -<p>“And the bit—the little bit of your flower clock—oh-h! when I saw -that....” Pemrose’s hand pressed her lips.</p> -<p>“In case the rags might blow away that was! She—she was watching me all -the time; she’d have noticed if I tried to pin <i>them</i> down—the flowers, -she thought I was just playing with them!” More mischief, more young -strength, the lip corners curling up towards the curly eyelashes—dark -eyes twinkling.</p> -<p>“But how on earth did you find your feet, at all?” cried Pemrose -desperately. “It’s what I’ve always wanted to ask you. How did you begin -to come through—‘crash through’?”</p> -<p>“I think I found the Hidden Fire.” It was almost a whisper with which -Una bent to the Spring in the cowslip’s heart.</p> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's Pemrose Lorry, Radio Amateur, by Isabel Hornibrook - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEMROSE LORRY, RADIO AMATEUR *** - -***** This file should be named 62371-h.htm or 62371-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/3/7/62371/ - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - - -</pre> - -</body> -<!-- created with ppr.py 20.0609 on 2020-06-11 12:24:38 GMT --> -</html> diff --git a/old/62371-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/62371-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2e2a459..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h/images/frontis.jpg b/old/62371-h/images/frontis.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a60ca6d..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/images/frontis.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h/images/i001.jpg b/old/62371-h/images/i001.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 78cb15c..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/images/i001.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h/images/i002.jpg b/old/62371-h/images/i002.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e98a211..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/images/i002.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/62371-h/images/i003.jpg b/old/62371-h/images/i003.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 29d5f6d..0000000 --- a/old/62371-h/images/i003.jpg +++ /dev/null |
