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diff --git a/8662-h/8662-h.htm b/8662-h/8662-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c24d2d7 --- /dev/null +++ b/8662-h/8662-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6658 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en"> + +<head> + +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" /> + +<title> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hall, +by Margaret Vandercook +</title> + +<style type="text/css"> +body { color: black; + background: white; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +p {text-indent: 4% } + +p.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +p.t1 {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 200%; + text-align: center } + +p.t2 {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 150%; + text-align: center } + +p.t3 {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 100%; + text-align: center } + +p.t3b {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 100%; + font-weight: bold; + text-align: center } + +p.t4 {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 80%; + text-align: center } + +p.t4b {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 80%; + font-weight: bold; + text-align: center } + +p.t5 {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 60%; + text-align: center } + +h1 { text-align: center } +h2 { text-align: center } +h3 { text-align: center } +h4 { text-align: center } +h5 { text-align: center } + +p.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; } + +p.thought {text-indent: 0% ; + letter-spacing: 4em ; + text-align: center } + +p.letter {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +p.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hall, by +Margaret Vandercook + +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: The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hall + +Author: Margaret Vandercook + +Posting Date: August 24, 2014 [EBook #8662] +Release Date: August, 2005 +First Posted: July 30, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CAMP FIRE GIRLS--SUNRISE HILL *** + + + + +Produced by John Pobuda. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1> +<br /><br /><br /> +THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS AT SUNRISE HILL +</h1> + +<p class="t3b"> +By Margaret Vandercook +</p> + +<p class="t3"> +First of a series +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p class="t3"> +CONTENTS +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +I. <a href="#chap01">THE VOICE</a><br /> +II. <a href="#chap02">"METHINKS YOU ARE MY GLASS"</a><br /> +III. <a href="#chap03">"WORK, HEALTH AND LOVE"</a><br /> +IV. <a href="#chap04">"MEG"</a><br /> +V. <a href="#chap05">THEIR FIRST MEETING</a><br /> +VI. <a href="#chap06">THE LAW OF THE CAMP FIRE</a><br /> +VII. <a href="#chap07">WHITE CLOUDS</a><br /> +VIII. <a href="#chap08">OTHER GIRLS</a><br /> +IX. <a href="#chap09">THE GUARDIAN</a><br /> +X. <a href="#chap10">PIPES OF PEACE</a><br /> +XI. <a href="#chap11">UNDER THE ROSE MOON</a><br /> +XII. <a href="#chap12">NAN</a><br /> +XIII. <a href="#chap13">"NOBODY WANTS TO BE DONE GOOD TO"</a><br /> +XIV. <a href="#chap14">SURPRISING THE CAMP</a><br /> +XV. <a href="#chap15">A WARNING</a><br /> +XVI. <a href="#chap16">LEARNING TO KEEP STEP</a><br /> +XVII. <a href="#chap17">THE SUSPICION</a><br /> +XVIII. <a href="#chap18">ONE WAY TO FIND OUT</a><br /> +XIX. <a href="#chap19">THE DISAPPEARANCE</a><br /> +XX. <a href="#chap20">"POLLY"</a><br /> +XXI. <a href="#chap21">THE END OF THE SUMMER CAMP</a><br /> +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap01"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER I +</h3> + +<h3> +THE VOICE +</h3> + +<p> +Betty Ashton sighed until the leaves of the book she held in her hand +quivered, then she flung it face downward on the floor. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh dear, I do wish some one would invent something new for girls!" she +exclaimed, although there was no one in the room to hear her. "It seems +to me that all girls do nowadays is to imitate boys. We play their +games, read their old books and even do their work, when all the time +girls are really wanting girl things. I agree with King Solomon: 'The +thing that hath been, it is that which, shall be; and that which is done +is that which shall be done; and there is no new thing under the sun.' +At least not for girls!" +</p> + +<p> +Then with a laugh at her own pessimism, Betty, like Hamlet, having found +relief in soliloquy, jumped up from her chair and crossing her room +pressed the electric button near the fireplace until the noise of its +ringing reverberated through the big, quiet house. +</p> + +<p> +"There, that ought to bring some one to me at last," she announced. +"Three times have I rung that bell and yet no one has answered. Do the +maids in this house actually expect me to build my own fire? I suppose +I could do it if I tried." +</p> + +<p> +She glanced at the pile of kindling inside her wood box and then at the +sweet smelling pine logs standing nearby, but the thought of actually +doing something for herself must have struck her as impossible, for the +next moment she turned with a shiver to stare through the glass of her +closed window, first up toward the sullen May sky and then down into her +own garden. +</p> + +<p> +Outside the gray clouds were slowly pursuing one another against a +darker background and in the garden the lilacs having just opened their +white and purple blossoms were now looking pale and discouraged as +though born too soon into a world that was failing to appreciate them. +</p> + +<p> +In spite of her petulance Betty laughed. She was wearing a blue +dressing gown and her red-brown hair was caught back with a velvet +ribbon of the same shade. Her room was in blue, "Betty's Blue" as her +friends used to call it, the color that is neither light nor dark, but +has soft shadows in it. +</p> + +<p> +Betty herself was between fifteen and sixteen. She had gray eyes, a +short, straight nose and her head, which was oddly square, conveyed an +effect of refinement that was almost disdain. Her mouth was a little +discontented and somehow she gave one the impression that, though she +had most of the things other girls wish for, she was still seeking for +something. +</p> + +<p> +"The outdoors is as dismal as I am, no wonder we used to be sun +worshipers," she said after a few more minutes of waiting; "but since +Prometheus stole the fire from heaven some ages ago, I really don't see +why I should have to freeze because the sun won't shine." +</p> + +<p> +Frowning and gathering her dressing gown more closely about her with +another impatient gesture, Betty swept out into the hall. +</p> + +<p> +The house was strangely silent for the middle of a week-day afternoon; +not a sound came either from below stairs or above, not the rattle of a +window blind nor the echo of a single pair of footsteps. +</p> + +<p> +At some time has a sudden silence ever fallen upon you with a sense of +foreboding like the hour before a storm or the moment preceding some +unexpected news or change in your life? +</p> + +<p> +Betty hurried toward the back-stairs. She was leaning over the +banisters and had called once for one of the maids, when she ceased +abruptly, and stood still for several moments with her head tilted back +and her body tense with surprise. +</p> + +<p> +So long as Betty could recall, there had been a vacant room in the rear +of the old Ashton homestead, which had stood for more than a hundred +years at the comer of Elm Street in Woodford, New Hampshire. She was +stupider than other people about remembering the events of her childhood +and yet she was sure that this room had never been used for any purpose +save as a storehouse for old pieces of furniture, for discarded +pictures, for any odds and ends that found no other resting place about +the great house. It was curious because the room was a particularly +attractive one, with big windows overlooking the back garden, but then +there was some story or other connected with it (old houses have old +memories) and this must have made it unpopular. Betty did not know what +the story was and yet she had grown up with a queer, childish dread of +this room and rarely went into it unless she felt compelled. +</p> + +<p> +Now, though she was not a coward, it did give her an uncanny sensation +to hear a low, humming sound proceeding from this supposedly empty room. +</p> + +<p> +Cautiously Betty stole toward its closed door and quietly turned the +knob without making the least noise. Then she looked in. +</p> + +<p> +What transformation had taken place! The room was a store place no +longer, for most of the old furniture and all the other rubbish had been +cleared away and what was left was arranged in a comfortable, living +fashion. An old rug was spread out on the floor, a white iron bed stood +in one corner with an empty bookshelf above it. There was a vase on a +table holding a branch of blossoming pussy willow, and seated before one +of the big, open windows was a strange girl whom Betty Ashton never +remembered to have seen before in her life. +</p> + +<p> +The girl was sewing, but this was not what kept Betty silent. She was +also singing a new and strangely beautiful song. +</p> + +<p> +"Lay me to sleep in sheltering flame, O Master of the Hidden Fire; Wash +pure my heart, and cleanse for me My soul's desire." +</p> + +<p> +Unconscious of the intruder and forgetful of everything else the +singer's voice rose clearer and sweeter with the second verse. +</p> + +<p> +"In flame of sunrise bathe my mind, O Master of the Hidden Fire, That +when I wake, clear-eyed may be My soul's desire." +</p> + +<p> +Then in silence, as she leaned closer to the window to get a better +light on her sewing, an unexpected ray of sunshine managing at this +moment to break through the clouds fell directly on her bowed head. Her +hair was not auburn, like Betty's, but bright, undeniable red. +</p> + +<p> +"That is a charming song and you have lovely voice, but would you mind +telling me who you are, where you have come from and how you happen to +be so at home in a room in our house?" Betty Ashton inquired, coolly, +still keeping her position just outside the opened door. +</p> + +<p> +The stranger jumped instantly to her feet, letting fall some brown +embroidery silk and a number of bright-colored beads, then she stood +with her eyes fixed anxiously on the apparition before her, nervously +twisting her big, rather coarse-looking hands. She was a year older +than Betty Ashton and at the first glance it would have been difficult +to imagine two persons more unlike. Betty was slender but perfectly +proportioned and had an air of unusual beauty and refinement, which her +friends believed must come of her long line of distinguished ancestors, +while the new girl was thin and angular, with hands and feet that seemed +too big for her, and a pale, freckled skin. She too had gray eyes, but +while Betty's brows and lashes were the color of her hair, this girl's +were so light that they failed to give the needful shadows to her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +In order to gain time and courage the newcomer walked slowly across the +room, but when she spoke the beauty of her voice gave her unexpected +charm and dignity. +</p> + +<p> +"Hasn't your mother told you of my coming? didn't she ask you if you +wanted me to come?" she questioned slowly. "I am sorry; my name is +Esther Clark, but my name can mean nothing to you. Your mother has +asked me here to live, to take care of your clothes, to read to you, to +take walks when there is no one else--" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, you mean you are to be my maid," Betty finished, coming now into +the center of the room and studying the other girl critically, her eyes +suddenly dark with displeasure and her lips closed into a firm red line. +</p> + +<p> +"I must say it is strange no one has thought to mention your coming to +me, and as I am not a child, I think I might have been consulted as to +whether I wished to be bothered with you." Betty bit her lips, for she +did not mean to be unkind; only she was extremely provoked and was +unaccustomed not to having her wishes consulted. +</p> + +<p> +The older girl's face was no longer pale but had suddenly grown crimson. +"No, I am not to be your maid," she returned. "At least Mrs. Ashton +said I was to be a kind of companion; though I am to be useful to you in +any way you like, I am still to go to school and to have time for +studying. Of course the holidays are nearly here now, but later on I +hope to graduate. If you don't wish me to stay you will please explain +it to your mother, only--" Esther tried to speak naturally, but her +voice faltered, "I hope you will be willing to let me stay at least +until I can find some other place. I am too old to go back to the +asylum." +</p> + +<p> +"Asylum!" Betty stepped back in such genuine that her companion laughed, +showing her white, even teeth and the softer curve to her mouth that +relieved her face of some of its former plainness. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, I only meant the orphan asylum, so please don't be frightened," she +explained. "I have lived there, it is just at the edge of town, ever +since I was a little girl, because when my mother and father died, there +was nothing else to do with me. But you need not feel specially sorry, +because I have never been ill-treated in the fashion you read about in +books. Most of the people in charge have been very kind and I have been +going to school for years. Only when your mother came last week and +said she wanted me to come here to live, why it did seem kind of +wonderful to find out what a beautiful home was like, and then most of +all I wanted to know you. You will think it strange of me, but I have +been seeing you with your mother or nurse ever since you were a little +girl of three or four and I a little older, and I have always been +interested in you." +</p> + +<p> +Betty smiled, showing a dimple which sometimes appeared after an +exhibition of temper of which she felt ashamed. "Oh, you will be sorry +enough to know what I am really like," she answered, "and will probably +think I am dreadfully spoiled. But do please stay for a while if you +wish, at least until we find how we get on together." +</p> + +<p> +Since Betty's first speech at the door had startled her, Esther had +never for a moment taken her eyes from her face. Never in all her life, +even when she had seen and learned far more of the ways of the world, +could this girl learn not to speak the truth. So now she slowly shook +her head. "Your mother did say you were spoiled; it was one reason why +she wished me to come here to live," she replied. "You see, she said +that you had been too much alone and had too much done for you and that +your brother was so much older that he only helped to spoil you. But," +Esther was hardly conscious of her listener and seemed only to be +thinking aloud, "I shall not mind if you are spoiled, for how can you +help being when you are so pretty and fortunate and have all the things +that other girls have just to dream of possessing." +</p> + +<p> +It was odd, perhaps, but the new girl's speech was made so simply and +sincerely that Betty Ashton instead of feeling angry or complimented was +instead a little ashamed. Had fortune been kinder to her than to other +girls, kinder than to the awkward girl in front of her in her plain gray +linen dress? +</p> + +<p> +Betty now backed toward the door which she had so lately opened. "I am +sorry to have disturbed you, but usually this room isn't occupied and I +was curious to know who could be in here. I should have knocked. Some +day you must sing that lovely song to me, again, for I think I would +like very much to know just what my soul's desire is. The worst of life +is not knowing just what you want." +</p> + +<p> +Esther had followed Betty toward the hall. "How funny that sounds to +me," she returned shyly, "because I think the hard part of life is not +having what you want. I know very well. But can't I do something for +you now? Your mother said you were not well and perhaps would not wish +to see me this afternoon, but I could read to you or--" +</p> + +<p> +Betty's irritability returned. "Thank you very much," she returned +coldly, "but I can think of nothing in the world that would amuse me at +present. I simply wish not to freeze, and to save my life I can't get +one of our tiresome maids to answer my bell." +</p> + +<p> +Betty's grand manner had returned, but in spite of her haughtiness the +newcomer persisted. "Do let me make the fire for you. I am only a +wood-gatherer at present, but pretty soon I shall be a real fire-maker, +for I have already been working for two months." +</p> + +<p> +"A wood-gatherer and fire-maker; what extraordinary things a girl was +forced to become at an orphan asylum!" Betty's sympathies were +immediately aroused and her cheeks burned with resentment at the sudden +vision of this girl at her side trudging through the woods, her back +bent under heavy burdens. No wonder her shoulders stooped and her hands +were coarse. Betty slipped her arm through the stranger's. +</p> + +<p> +"No, I won't trouble you to make my fire, but do come into my room and +let us just talk. None of my friends have been in to see me this +afternoon, not even the faithless Polly! They are too busy getting +ready for the end of school to think about poor, ill me." And Betty +laughed gayly at the untruthfulness of this picture of herself. +</p> + +<p> +Once inside the blue room, without asking permission, Esther knelt +straightway down before the brass andirons and with deft fingers placed +a roll of twisted paper under a lattice-like pile of kindling, arranging +three small pine logs in a triangle above it. But before setting a +match to the paper she turned toward the other girl hovering about her +like a butterfly. +</p> + +<p> +"I wonder if you would like me to recite the fire-maker's song?" she +asked. "I haven't the right to say it yet, but it is so lovely that I +would like you to hear it." +</p> + +<p> +Betty stared and laughed. "Do fire-makers have songs?" she demanded. +"How queer that sounds! Perhaps the Indians used to have fire songs +long ago when a fire really meant so much. But I can't imagine a maid's +chanting a song before one's fire in the morning and I don't think I +should like being wakened up by it." +</p> + +<p> +"You would like this one," the other girl persisted. +</p> + +<p> +Little yellow spurts of flame were now creeping forth from between the +sticks, some leaping away into nothingness, others curling and enfolding +them. The paper in the grate crackled noisily as the cold May wind +swept down the chimney with a defiant roar and both girls silently +watched the newly kindled fire with the fascination that is eternal. +</p> + +<p> +Betty had also dropped down on her knees. "What is your song?" she +asked curiously an instant later, raising her hands before her face to +let the firelight shine through. +</p> + +<p> +Esther's head was bent so that her face could not be seen, but the +beauty of her speech was reflected in the other girl's changing +expression. +</p> + +<p> +"As fuel is brought to the fire, So I purpose to bring My strength, my +ambition, My heart's desire, My joy And my sorrow To the fire Of +humankind." +</p> + +<p> +Purposely Esther's voice dropped with these last words, and she did not +continue until a hand was placed gently on her shoulder and a voice +urged: "Please go on; what is the 'fire of humankind'?" +</p> + +<p> +"For I will tend As my fathers have tended And my fathers' fathers Since +time began, The fire that is called The love of man for man, The love of +man for God." +</p> + +<p> +At the end, Esther glancing around at the girl beside her was surprised +to see a kind of mist over her gray eyes. +</p> + +<p> +But Betty laughed as she got up to her feet and going over to her table +stooped to pick up the book she had thrown on the floor half an hour +before. +</p> + +<p> +"I might have made my own fire if I had known that song," she said, +switching on the electric light under the rose-colored shade. For the +clouds outside had broken at last, the rain was pouring and the blue +room save for the firelight would have been in darkness. +</p> + +<p> +Betty sat down, putting her feet under her and resting her chin on her +hands. "I wonder what it feels like to be useful?" she asked, evidently +questioning herself, for afterwards she turned toward her companion. +"You must have learned a great many things by being brought up at an +orphan asylum, how to care for, other people and all that, but I never +would have dreamed that poetry would have played any part in your +education." +</p> + +<p> +Esther had turned and was about to leave the room, but now at Betty's +words, she looked at her strangely. +</p> + +<p> +Her face had reddened again and because of the intensity of her feelings +her big hands were once more pressed nervously together. +</p> + +<p> +"Why, no, I never learned anything at the asylum but work," she answered +slowly, "just dull, hateful, routine work; doing the same things over +again every day in the same way, cooking and washing dishes and +scrubbing. I suppose I was being useful, but there isn't much fun in +being useful when nobody cares or seems to be helped by what you do. I +know I am ugly and not clever, but I love beautiful people and, +beautiful things." +</p> + +<p> +Unconsciously her glance traveled from her listener's face to the small +piano in the corner of the room. "And it never seemed to me that +things, were divided quite fairly in this world, but now that I know +about the Camp Fire Girls I am ever so much happier." +</p> + +<p> +"Camp Fire Girls?" Betty queried. "Do sit down, child, I don't wish you +to leave me, and please don't say horrid things about yourself, for it +isn't polite and you never can tell how things are going to turn out. +But who are the Camp Fire Girls; what are the Camp Fire Girls; are they +Indians or Esquimaux or the fire-maidens in 'The Nibelungen'? Perhaps, +after all, something new has been invented for girls, and a little while +ago I felt as discouraged as King Solomon and believed there was nothing +new and nothing worth while under the sun." +</p> + +<p> +Betty's eyes were dancing with fun and anticipation, her bored look had +entirely disappeared, but the other girl evidently took her question +seriously. She had seated herself in a small desk chair and kept her +eyes fixed on the fire. "It seems very queer to me that you don't know +about the 'Camp Fire Girls'," she answered slowly, "and it may take me a +long time to tell you even the little bit I know, but I think it the +most splendid thing that has ever happened." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap02"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER II +</h3> + +<h3> +"METHINKS YOU ARE MY GLASS" +</h3> + +<p> +Just across the street from the old Ashton place was another house +equally old and yet wholly unlike it, for instead of being a stately, +well-kept-up mansion with great rooms and broad halls and half an acre +of garden about it, this was a cottage of the earliest New England type. +It was low and rambling, covering a good deal of ground and yet without +any porch and very little yard, because as the village closed about it +and Elm Street became a fashionable quarter the land had been gradually +sold until now its white picket fence was only a dozen feet from the +front door and passers-by could easily have looked inside its parlor +windows save for the tall bushes that served as a shield. By immemorial +custom the cottage had always been painted white and green, but for a +good many years it had not been troubled by any paint at all, "but had +lived," as Polly said, "on its past, and like a good many persons in +Woodford had gotten considerably run down by the process." +</p> + +<p> +Now there were no lights at any of the front windows, although it was +eight o'clock in the evening, but as the warm steady glow of a lamp +shone from the rear of the house, it was plainly occupied. +</p> + +<p> +There was no doubt of this in the mind of the girl who stood knocking +noisily at the closed door, saying in an imploring voice: +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, do please hurry, Polly dear, you know it is only me and that I +can't bear to be kept waiting." +</p> + +<p> +At this moment a candle was evidently being borne down the hall, for the +door opened so quickly afterwards that two girls, one on either side the +door, fell into, one another's arms. +</p> + +<p> +"Dear me, it's 'The Princess' and she is no more ill than I am, though +we were told she couldn't possibly be at school to-day on account of her +ill health," the girl on the inside spoke first, recovering her breath. +"I suppose royal persons may lie abed and nurse their dispositions, +while poor ones have to keep on washing dishes. But come on into the +kitchen, Betty, we are in there to-night and I haven't yet finished my +chores." +</p> + +<p> +She led the way with the candle down the shabby hall until both girls +entered the lighted room. There, with a little cry of surprise, Betty +ran over and dropped down on her knees by the side of a lounge. +</p> + +<p> +The woman on the lounge was not so large as the girl, although her brown +hair showed a good deal of gray and her face looked tired and worn. She +had been holding a magazine in her hands, but evidently had not been +reading, for her eyes had turned from the girl, who stood only a few +feet away from her drying some cups and saucers, to the two others who +had just come in, without an instant's delay. +</p> + +<p> +"I am quite all right, dear," she answered the newcomer, "only the +kitchen seemed so warm and cozy after the wet day and I was tired." +</p> + +<p> +Betty was too familiar with the lovely, old-fashioned kitchen of her +dearest friends even to think about it, but to-night she did look about +her for a moment. +</p> + +<p> +The room was the largest in the cottage; the walls were of oak so dark a +brown from age that they were almost black; there were heavy rafters +across the ceiling and swinging from them bunches of dried, +sweet-smelling herbs. The windows had broad sills filled with pots of red +geraniums and ground ivy, and as they were wide open the odor of the +wet, spring earth outside mingled with the aromatic fragrance of the +flowers. +</p> + +<p> +An old stove was set deep into the farthest wall with a Dutch oven at +one side and above it a high, severely plain mantel holding a number of +venerable pots and pans of pewter and copper and two tall, copper +candlesticks. The candles were lighted, as the room was too large for +the single light of the lamp on the table near the lounge. +</p> + +<p> +Polly O'Neill had gone straight to her sister and putting both hands on +her shoulders had pushed her steadily back inch by inch until she forced +her into a large armchair. +</p> + +<p> +"Mollie Mavourneen, you know I hate washing dishes like an owl does the +day light, but I am not going to let you do my work and to-night you +know the agreeable task of cleaning up belongs to me. I asked you to +leave things alone when I went to the door and I don't think you play +fair." Polly seized a cup with such vehemence that it slipped from her +hand and crashed onto the floor, but neither her mother nor Mollie +showed the least sign of surprise and only Betty's eyes widened with +understanding. +</p> + +<p> +Strangers always insisted that there were never twin sisters in the +world so exactly alike as Mollie and Polly O'Neill (not that their names +had ever been intended to rhyme in this absurd fashion, for they had +started quite sensibly, as Mary and Pauline), but to the friends who +knew them both well this idea was absurd. It was true they were of the +same height and their hair and eyes of the same color, their noses and +mouths of somewhat the same shape, but with these superficial likenesses +the resemblance ended. Anybody should have been able to see that in each +detail Polly was the more intense; her hair was blacker and longer, her +eyes bluer, her cheek bones a little higher with brighter color and her +chin and delicate nose a trifle longer and more pointed. Of the two +girls, however, Mollie was the prettier because her features were more +regular and her expression more serene; but once under the spell of her +sister, one never thought much of her appearance. +</p> + +<p> +Polly had a temperament and she was having an attack of it to-night; the +room was fairly electric with it. From some far off Irish ancestor she +must have inherited it, for though her father had been an Irishman and +had spent forty out of the fifty years of his life in Ireland, he had +quite a different disposition and had been as amazed by Polly in her +babyhood as the rest of her family. +</p> + +<p> +Captain O'Neill had resigned from the English army eighteen years before +and crossed the ocean to spend a few years in the neighborhood of the +White Mountains on account of his health; he had no more money than most +Irish gentlemen, but had charming manners, was extremely handsome and +had soon fallen in love and married a girl twenty years younger than +himself. Mary Poindexter had been the girl most loved in Woodford, one +of its belles and heiresses, but her money had not amounted to much and +soon disappeared after her marriage, until now she had only the cottage +in which she and her daughters lived and the income earned by her work +as private secretary to Mr. Edward Wharton of "The Wharton Granite Co." +Captain O'Neill had lived only until his twin daughters were eight years +old and since then the girls and their mother had kept up their small +home together. +</p> + +<p> +"You are dead tired and Polly is cross as two sticks and poor Mollie +does not know what to do with you. Would you rather I should go away? +I only came to tell you something wonderful," Betty whispered in Mrs. +O'Neill's ear. +</p> + +<p> +The older woman shook her head. "No, you have come just at the right +time. I am not very tired, only my daughters chose to think so and +wouldn't let me help with dinner and so, as I am an obedient, well +brought-up mother, I am doing as I am told. And Polly is not in a bad +humor, at least I hope--" +</p> + +<p> +The girl, who had been picking up the bits of broken china from the +kitchen floor, now straightened up and for the first time Betty +discovered that she must have been crying a short while before. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, yes, I am anything you may like to call me," Polly announced +indifferently, "and I am not in the least ashamed to have 'The Princess' +know it. If Betty had to stand all the things I have stood to-day, she +would be in a far worse humor. She and I are not angels like Mary and +Mollie, so I suppose that is the reason why we love one another part of +the time and hate one another the rest. I am sure I never pretend not +to being dreadfully envious of 'The Princess'." +</p> + +<p> +Polly came over and sat down cross-legged on the old rug near her mother +and best friend, and though she smiled a little to remove the sting from +her words, something in her expression kept Betty from answering at +once. In the meantime Mollie joined the group, taking her place at the +foot of the lounge. +</p> + +<p> +The three girls were nearly the same age and the closest friends, and +Betty probably spent nearly as much of her waking time, at the cottage +as she did in her own home, for whenever she was lonely or bored, or, +tired perhaps of having too much done for her, she had been used to run +across the street to play or work with her friends from the time they +were children. Mrs. O'Neill had never seemed very much older than her +daughters and had always been called "Mary" by the three girls. +</p> + +<p> +Now Betty reached over and laid one and lightly on Polly. "Don't say we +hate no another just because we quarrel now and then and both have bad +tempers. I never hate Polly, do I Mary?" +</p> + +<p> +But before Mrs. O'Neill could answer, Polly suddenly faced fiercely +about. "I hate you to-night, Betty," she insisted, and then to make her +words entirely unlike her actions, slipped one arm around her friend. +"Oh, you know that I don't really mean I hate you, I only mean that I am +horribly envious and jealous of your having all the money you want and +being able to do things without worry, not just things for yourself, but +things for other people." And Polly bit her lips and ceased speaking, +both because of the note of warning in her mother's face and because the +brightness had died away from Betty's. +</p> + +<p> +"I wish you would understand, Polly, that just having things does not +necessarily make one happy; I often think it must be nicer to be poor +and to have to help like you and Mollie do. This afternoon I was +feeling quite forlorn myself, as I had a kind of headache and no one +came to see me, and then just like magic from out our haunted chamber +there appeared well, I can hardly call her a good fairy, she was too +homely, but at least a girl who told me of something so delightful that +it sounds almost like a fairy tale. I talked of it to father at dinner +and then rushed over to tell you, as I thought you might be interested, +but perhaps I had better wait--" +</p> + +<p> +From the foot of the lounge Mollie O'Neill now interrupted. Utterly +unlike either her sister or friend in her disposition, her influence +often held them together. +</p> + +<p> +"We do want to hear what you have to tell us, Betty, most dreadfully. +Just because we happen to be specially worried about something to-night +is no reason why Polly should be so mysterious. I vote we tell you what +our trouble is and then you tell us your secret." +</p> + +<p> +Polly got up from the floor. She was always curiously intense, not +deliberately, but perhaps as a part of her inheritance. Now she made a +little bow to Betty. "I am sorry I was rude to you, Princess," she said +gently, "but tell you the reason for my special tirade against poverty +to-night, I will not and Mollie shall not tell either." +</p> + +<p> +Without replying Betty turned to pick up her blue cloak which had +dropped from her shoulders as she knelt by the lounge. It had a cap +attached with a blue silk lining and this she slipped over her head. +</p> + +<p> +"It isn't worth while for me to talk of my plan to-night, then," she +returned, "for if Polly won't be interested, you and, I could never make +a go of it by ourselves, Mollie. Good-night; I promised not to stay +very long." Passing by the lounge Mrs. O'Neill reached out, slipping +her hand in Betty's and drew her to a place beside her. Usually a girl +with the three other girls there was now and then a note in Mrs. +O'Neill's voice which they seldom failed to recognize. +</p> + +<p> +"Mollie is right, as Betty is almost one of our family, it is only fair +to tell her what has put Polly in her present mood. The truth is, dear, +the doctor thinks I am not very well and am needing a rest, so I am +being made to lie down every evening after my work, by my daughters, and +I am sure when warm weather comes I shall be all right again." +</p> + +<p> +"You won't," Polly interrupted, "and if that is all you mean to tell +Betty, why I shall certainly tell her everything now you have started." +</p> + +<p> +Polly went on quickly, with two bright spots of color in her cheeks: +"Resting in the evenings is not going to help mother; Dr. Hawkes says +she needs months and months of rest and unless she has it she will soon +be having a nervous breakdown or something else; that working for nearly +eight years in an office supporting herself and two daughters is enough +to tire any woman out. Then to-day a wonderful invitation came from my +father's relatives, who have never paid the least attention to us +before, asking mother to spend the summer with them in Ireland, and--" +</p> + +<p> +Betty's hands were clapped eagerly together as she concluded, "So you +are going to accept and Polly's blue at the thought of being separated +from you, but really I can't see any reason why I should not have been +told of this." +</p> + +<p> +Instead of replying, Polly frowned and Mrs. O'Neill shook her head, so +the explanation fell to Mollie. "No, mother is not going to accept; +that is what the trouble is and that is why Polly and I sometimes feel +cross with you, Betty, because rich people never seem to be able to +understand about poor ones. You do what you like without thinking of +the money, and we can't do anything we like without thinking of it. +Mother feels she can't afford to go." +</p> + +<p> +Looking almost as depressed as her two friends, Betty now turned her +back deliberately on both girls to whisper in the older woman's ear. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Mary, won't you, can't you; you know how happy it would make us." +But she knew her answer even before it was given and also understood +that Polly's pride would never have agreed to let her mother accept any +favor through her. Indeed, never in all the long years of their +friendship had Betty ever dared do half the things she longed to do for +her two friends, and indeed Mrs. Ashton often said that Betty accepted +far more than she was able to return, since she spent so much of her +time in Mrs. O'Neill's home. +</p> + +<p> +"You are awfully foolish, Mary," Betty argued, "because if you should +really get ill--" +</p> + +<p> +"That is just what I have been saying, Betty dear, for the past two +hours," Polly protested, forgetting the difference between herself and +her friend and edging close enough to the lounge to lay her head in, the +other girl's lap. "And the worst of it is, Mr. Wharton says mother can +have the holiday, he will pay her salary while she is away, and she only +won't go because she says she can't leave Mollie and me alone and can't +afford to pay any one to look after us. It is so foolish, when we are +old enough to be taking care of her! I suppose she wouldn't be afraid +to leave Mollie, it is just me! Sometimes it does not seem quite fair +to be born a twin, because see how things are put into Mollie divided, +all the good got and all the bad into me; so I suppose mother thinks I +would set the house on fire or run away and go on the stage as I +sometimes threaten, so soon as her back was turned. Oh, Mavourneen +darling of the world, the very name of Lake Killarney, where our cousins +live, would make you well." +</p> + +<p> +But again Polly stopped talking because Betty had seized her by both +shoulders, giving her a decided shake. "Say it again to me quickly. Is +it just because Mary does not know what to do with you and Mollie that +she won't go away?" +</p> + +<p> +And both sisters nodded silently. +</p> + +<p> +With a cry of what sounded like delight, Betty rose hurriedly to her +feet, letting the blue cloak slip away from her for the second time. +</p> + +<p> +Then dancing across the kitchen she seized the two tall candlesticks +from the mantelpiece and setting them down in the center of the floor +afterwards added the third, with which Polly had lighted their way +through the hall. Above them she made a mystic sign by flattening the +fingers of her right hand against those of her left, while slowly she +revolved about them chanting: "Wohelo, Wohelo, Wohelo, in you lies the +answer to all our difficulties," to the entire amazement of her small +audience. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap03"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER III +</h3> + +<h3> +"WORK, HEALTH AND LOVE" +</h3> + +<p> +"Much learning hath made her mad," sighed Polly mournfully, Betty being +a notoriously poor student. +</p> + +<p> +Mollie was staring thoughtfully at their visitor. "That is an Indian +folk dance; perhaps Betty is pretending to be Pocahontas," she +suggested, with such an evident attempt to explain away her friend's +eccentricities that Betty stopped in her dance to laugh, and Polly and +Mrs. O'Neill followed suit. +</p> + +<p> +"I am not mad and I am not playing at being Pocahontas, but as usual +Mollie is nearer right than her sister Polly because there is a good +deal about the Indians in what I want to tell you." Betty sat down +before the three shining candles and taking a little stick from the pile +of wood near by she pointed it at her third candle. "You are to guess +what my strange word, 'Wohelo' means. No, it is not an Indian, word, +although it sounds like it. Mary, you begin by taking the last syllable +first. What is the greatest thing in the world?" +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. O'Neill, some minutes before, had risen half way up from her lounge +and was leaning her head on her arm, while she watched Betty's curious +proceedings. "The greatest thing in the world?" she repeated softly. +"Far wiser persons than I found the answer to that question many years +ago. The greatest thing in the world is love." +</p> + +<p> +Betty nodded. "Now, Polly, you may have the next guess, though you are +sure to say the wrong thing. What is the next greatest thing to love?" +</p> + +<p> +Polly shrugged her thin shoulders, her face still moody in spite of her +recently awakened interest. "Oh, I told you the answer to that question +when you first came into this room, Betty Ashton, though none of you +chose to believe me. It is plain as a pipe-stem to me that wealth is +the next best thing to love and sometimes it is better when you happen +to love the wrong thing--or person." +</p> + +<p> +"It rhymes with wealth but begins with the letter 'h'," the questioner +returned hastily, too much in earnest to waste further time in argument. +"Now, Mollie, you have the third turn, remember you are to decide what +the first syllable stands for, 'Wo'." +</p> + +<p> +For a few seconds the third girl hesitated, her cheeks flushing +uncomfortably. Not so quick or clever with her tongue as Polly and +Betty she was far more gifted with her fingers. "I am sure I don't know +what you mean," she replied. "'Wo' is the beginning of the word +'woman', but you can't mean woman. I know you and Polly think books of +plays and novels the greatest things in the world, but I don't and +besides I can't find the right word for them. You know what I really +like best is just cooking and cleaning up and putting flowers on the +table, stupid household things that can't have anything to do with your +wonderful word." And Mollie looked so apologetic for her own domestic +tastes that her mother took both her hands and held them tight. +</p> + +<p> +"For goodness' sake, Mollie dear, even in these days of the advanced +female it is still something to be proud of, to have real womanly +tastes. Because some women go out into the world is no reason why they +should lose their womanly instincts. What we are all working for, both +men and women, is really just the making of a home, a big or a little +one. I don't know myself what word Betty is searching for, but I do +believe these very things that you like best come very close to my own +guess. For if love is the greatest thing in the world, the making of a +home to shelter it is most important. I have an idea that love would +come to a tragic end if, when it returned home to dinner, Polly should +meet it in the character of Ophelia, with wild flowers in her hair, +offering it rosemary and rue for dinner instead of meat and vegetables." +</p> + +<p> +Again the audience laughed because of Polly's well-known devotion to the +drama and because if she were left alone to look after the cooking, her +mother and Mollie often returned to find her poring over her recitations +with the dinner burning on the stove. +</p> + +<p> +"If mother is going to preach a sermon with me for a text, Betty's +candles will sputter and die out before ever she explains her word," +Polly suggested. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, the word is 'work'; Mollie wasn't so far wrong, though work may +mean different things to different people. Wohelo means 'Work, Health +and Love'," Betty explained quickly, still keeping her eyes on the +candle flames. +</p> + +<p> +But Polly rising from her place slipped over and took Betty by both +shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +"Elizabeth Ashton, more commonly known as 'The Princess,' Bettina or +Betty, will you kindly explain yourself? No doubt those are three +estimable things you are recommending to us, but please tell me how +Work, Health and Love are going to solve our present difficulties and +help mother get the rest she needs. It seems to me she has given us too +much of the first and last of your watchword already and has too little +of the middle thing left in consequence." +</p> + +<p> +Betty's long lashes swept her cheeks in a tantalizing fashion and her +color deepened as, clasping her hands over her knees, she began slowly +swaying back and forth, her eyes fastened on Polly. +</p> + +<p> +"I am dreadfully long in coming to my point," she confessed, "but it is +such fun to keep you guessing and I do so want you to be interested. +You see, I suppose you know about the Camp Fire Girls, everybody seems +to have heard except me, but now 'That light which has been given to me, +I desire to pass undimmed to others.' Will you, won't you, will you, +won't you be a Camp Fire Girl?" Her manner, which had been a queer +combination of fun and seriousness, now at last appeared entirely grave. +"Mollie and Polly," she continued quietly, "You know how often we have +talked lately of being dissatisfied, of feeling that here we are growing +older and older every day and yet not learning half the things we ought +to learn nor having half the fun we ought to have. Of course we read +novels all the time, because it is the only way for nice girls to learn +about romance or adventure, but we would like really to live the things +we think about just the same as boys do. They don't dream and scold +about the things they want to do; they go ahead and do them, teaching +one another by working things out together. They belong to things and +don't just have to have things belong to them' to make them happy like +girls do." +</p> + +<p> +"Hear, hear!" cried Polly, not exactly seeing what Betty was driving at +and desiring to tease her into greater confusion. +</p> + +<p> +But as Mrs. O'Neill shook her head encouragingly, Betty would not deign +to consider her tormentor. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it is foolish for me to try to explain all the Camp Fire idea +means," she added simply. "I couldn't if I tried, for Esther Clark, the +strange girl who has been living at the asylum and has just come to our +house, only told me what she knew this afternoon. But I want to find +out by living the Camp Fire idea, I want to see what we could get out of +forming a Camp Fire Club, the first one here in Woodford. Just take +Polly and Mollie and me, for example, Mary dear," she continued +coaxingly. "I am longing to know the things Mollie does about cooking +and housekeeping and all the rest and I can't learn at home. Think what +it means to go messing about in our kitchen with, cook and half a dozen +servants laughing at you! Then Mollie really would like to know what +Polly and I find so fascinating in books and in prowling about together +in the woods and Polly--well, I don't know that she wishes to learn +anything from Mollie or me or anybody else who joins our club, but if +she doesn't, that is just what she ought to learn." +</p> + +<p> +Polly held up both hands. "For goodness sake, Betty, stop talking, I +will join your Camp Fire Club and be made an example of at any time, +also I will use my noble influence to persuade any girls you wish to +join. All the same I don't see what your wretched club has to do with +helping us solve our problem about mother, and that is all I care about +at present." +</p> + +<p> +"Has to do,--why everything," Betty repeated slowly. But before she was +able to finish her sentence there was a sudden loud ringing of the front +door bell and the three girls jumped to their feet. In another moment +Polly had disappeared into the hall, returning with her expression +changed again to its original look of gloom. +</p> + +<p> +"It's that granite man, mother, Mr. Wharton, with his entire family, son +and daughter. I wonder why they can't leave you alone after business +hours? I had to ask them in the parlor, since we can't entertain any +one in the kitchen except 'The Princess,' but we simply can't join you +until we hear what she has to say." +</p> + +<p> +Polly sighed as her mother rose without replying and left the room, and +Betty did he her best to hide her smiles, for everybody in Woodford +believed that Mrs. O'Neill's employer had more than a friendly interest +in her, and though Polly constantly railed at their poverty and Mr. +Wharton was the richest man in the village, the very sound of his name +used often to irritate her. +</p> + +<p> +The candles had at last burned down to their sockets and softly Betty +blew out the last flickering flames. With a nod of understanding Mollie +turned down the lighted lamp and after a fashion of many years the three +girls drew three little old fashioned rockers in a semicircle up before +the kitchen fire. +</p> + +<p> +"My plan is to form our Camp Fire Club of just the right girls and to +have just the right guardian and then to spend our whole summer camping +in the woods," Betty explained quickly at last. "You see I don't want +to go to Europe with mother and father this summer one bit, I am dead +tired of hotels and sights. So at dinner to-night I talked over the +Camp Fire plan with father and though mother wasn't enthusiastic I could +see father didn't think it in the least a bad idea, so I am sure he will +give us the camping outfit if I beg very hard and we can all share +expenses afterwards. Can't you understand that if Mary lets you spend +your summer in camp she can go away and rest and think no more about you +and we can have such a wonderful time." +</p> + +<p> +In the half darkness Polly danced a shadow dance and then flung her arms +about her friend. "Oh, Princess, I might have known you were as clever +as 'Sentimental Tommy' and would surely 'find a wa'. I am sure mother +will think it a beautiful plan for us. Just to live among the trees and +the stars and hear the birds sing, and tell stories about our own camp +fire and to sing." +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, and to do our own cooking and cleaning and wood gathering and a +thousand other practical things," laughed Betty, to stop Polly's +rhapsodizing. "But the truly important part of our scheme is to find +congenial girls for our club and the right guardian." +</p> + +<p> +"There are four of us already," Mollie suggested. +</p> + +<p> +Betty appeared surprised. "Just you and Polly and me; what fourth girl +do you mean?" +</p> + +<p> +As Mollie did not answer at once, a low whistle came from between +Polly's closed lips. "Do you mean, Princess, that you do not intend to +invite the girl who told you about the Camp Fire Club, Esther Clark? I +know her by sight at school." +</p> + +<p> +Betty frowned. "Certainly I had not meant to include her; she does not +belong to our set. I don't mean to be rude, but she has been raised in +an orphan asylum and nobody knows who she is. I suppose she comes of +some very common family." +</p> + +<p> +"Common families sometimes produce very uncommon characters," Polly +returned dryly. "And s-n-o-b spells snob, but not Betty, I hope. I +wish you wouldn't think so much about 'family', Princess; I do believe +we ought to judge people by what they are themselves and not by what +their ancestors have been." +</p> + +<p> +With a quick movement Betty half overturned her chair. "Good-night," +she said, "we can talk things over to-morrow. I promised not to be too +late to-night. It isn't that I really mind having Esther in our club, +only we don't know her very well and it seems most important that we +should all be congenial." +</p> + +<p> +But Betty could not move toward the door because her skirts were held +fast. "If you go now I shall cry my eyes out all night," Polly protested +in a tone that was almost convincing. "It was horrid of me, darling, to +tell you the truth and me Irish and believin' in the blarney stone," she +apologized in her Pollyesque fashion. "Please never, never tell me the +truth about myself and have anybody in your club you like. Only if you +expect to have twelve girls who exactly agree you will have to leave +both you and me out to start with." +</p> + +<p> +Betty laughed, only half appeased, but Mollie was speaking quietly and +because she talked less frequently than the other two girls they usually +paused to listen to her. +</p> + +<p> +"I think the more unlike we girls are the more fun we will have and the +more we will help one another," she suggested. "But, Betty, do you know +who has started this Camp Fire idea in Woodford and who knows just what +we ought to do?" +</p> + +<p> +Betty groaned. "Who else could it be, my dear, but my arch-enemy, the +person I like least and who likes me even less in all this village. Ah, +is anything ever perfect in this life? Martha McMurtry, the science +teacher at the high school, who will certainly cause me to remain in the +sophomore class another year unless I learn something more than what H2O +means, is the only woman Esther could suggest." +</p> + +<p> +The sisters laughed, since Betty's battles with this teacher had kept +things lively. +</p> + +<p> +"You poor dear, we can't have her for our guardian," Polly insisted +sympathetically. "Can you imagine such a prim, scientific old maid ever +understanding anything of the beauty and romance of life in the woods? +I would like Titania, Queen of the Fairies, to be our only chaperon." +</p> + +<p> +Before the other girls could dispute the absurdity of Polly's final +suggestion, the kitchen door opened and Mrs. O'Neill returned looking +unusually cross. "Why didn't you join me, you wicked children?" she +said reproachfully. "Mr. Wharton came to ask me, since I was not going +away, to look after his little girl this summer. He has to leave on +some business trip and as Frank is to camp in the woods, there was +nothing for the poor man to do with Sylvia. I hope you won't mind very +much, for I have promised to take care of her." +</p> + +<p> +"Sylvia!" The three voices made a dismal chorus. +</p> + +<p> +"That stupid, ill-mannered child! I am sorry, dear, but you are not +going to look after anything or anybody this summer but yourself. You +see you are sailing for Ireland in a few weeks and we are going to live +in the woods and be taken care of by our old mother earth and our +father, the sun," Polly replied dramatically. +</p> + +<p> +"You are talking nonsense, Polly; please don't be tiresome any more +to-night," Mrs. O'Neill urged, lying down on the sofa again, as though +she were too weary to be up another minute. "I can't discuss the matter +with you, but Mr. Wharton has been too kind for me to refuse him this +request." +</p> + +<p> +Betty found her blue cloak again and softly slipped over to kiss the +older woman good-night. "Don't worry, what Polly told you is true, but +Sylvia shall be looked after just the same." +</p> + +<p> +She slipped away, Polly following to watch her safely across the street +as she always did. Outdoors the girls stood silent for a moment looking +up at the beauty of the night. The stars were shining and the warmth +the day had failed to bring to the earth had been followed by some +unseen messenger of the night. +</p> + +<p> +"You are going to include that hateful child in your Camp Fire Club +after what I said to you, Betty?" Polly whispered. "Oh, if only her +name wasn't Sylvia and she didn't have a snub nose and wear goggles I +could forgive her. But think how absurd the combination is! Anyhow you +are a dear, and it must be because I am Irish that I am always in the +wrong." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap04"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER IV +</h3> + +<h3> +"MEG" +</h3> + +<p> +Thump, thump, thump came the sound of a heavy object rolling slowly step +by step down a long stairway and then after an interval of ten seconds a +prolonged, ear-piercing roar. +</p> + +<p> +Immediately a girl darted out of a room on the second floor of a pretty +brick house, colliding with a young man several years older, who came +forth at the same time from his own room across the hall. +</p> + +<p> +"Great Scott, Meg, what are you doing only half-dressed at this hour of +the day?" he demanded with brotherly contempt. +</p> + +<p> +"We will discuss my costume or lack of it later," she returned, holding +her short flannel dressing sacque together and laughing over her +shoulder where one long blond plait hung neatly braided, the rest of her +hair falling loose. "Methinks that was Horace Virgil Everett trying to +break up the furniture somewhere! Was there ever such an infant born +into this suffering world? I simply never turn my back without his +getting into fresh trouble." +</p> + +<p> +While she was talking she was also running downstairs, followed in a +more leisurely manner by her brother. Both of them glanced into the +empty library and untidy dining-room as they passed and finally arrived +in a dark passageway at the end of the back stairs. +</p> + +<p> +A small object lay on the floor with its arms and legs outspread, +showing not the slightest inclination to pick itself up, and on Meg's +bending over it the wails broke out afresh. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, do shut up, 'Bumps'," Jack Everett said good-naturedly. "You +haven't killed yourself and you're much too big for Meg to carry." +</p> + +<p> +But the small boy clung desperately to his sister, his fat arms about +her neck and his legs about her waist until with difficulty she was able +to get him upstairs and into her own room. +</p> + +<p> +He was probably about three feet high and almost as broad, between three +and four years old, with brown hair that would stand up in a pompadour +simply because it was too stiff to lie down, a perfectly insignificant +nose, a Cupid's bow of a mouth and two large grave blue eyes, as +innocent of mischief as any lamb's. +</p> + +<p> +At the present moment, however, his eyes were simply raining tears, as +though they had their source in a cloudburst, and over one of them a +bump appeared as large as an egg. Indeed, Horace Virgil, named for his +Professor father's favorite Latin poets, had been rechristened 'Bumps' +by his older brother and was more commonly known by that title. +</p> + +<p> +Meg kept glancing at the clock as she dampened her small brother's +forehead with witch hazel. "I am afraid I can't go," she said in a +disappointed tone, "and I am dreadfully sorry because I promised. But +if I leave Horace with the servants now he will howl himself ill. I +don't suppose you were going to stay in for a few hours. Oh, of course +not!" she concluded, seeing that her older brother was wearing his khaki +service uniform and held a big, broad-brimmed hat in his hand. "Heigh-ho, +don't I wish I were a boy," she sighed whimsically, turning at last +toward her mirror, decorated with college flags, and beginning to braid +the second half of her hair. +</p> + +<p> +John Everett, frowned and fidgeted. "I am sorry, Meg," he replied after +a moment. "I would stay at home, only there is a meeting of my brigade +and when a fellow belongs to a thing why he owes it some of his time. I +don't see why you have to stay at home so much. Of course it is a good +deal for a girl to have to look after, a house and father and the kid +and me, but you have two maids and if you only were a better manager. +Why you don't seem even to take time to dress like other girls, you are +always kind of flying apart with a button off your waist or the braid +torn on your skirt, and I do love a spick and span girl. Why don't you +look like Betty Ashton, she's always up to the limit?" +</p> + +<p> +Margaret Everett coiled her yellow plaits about her head, keeping her +back turned to hide the trembling of her lips until she was able to +answer cheerfully. "Why yes, I should like to look like 'The Princess' +and wear clothes like she does, but in the first place I am not so good +looking as Betty, I haven't a maid to see after my clothes and fifty +dollars a month to dress on--and I haven't a mother." +</p> + +<p> +Jack Everett flushed. He was a splendid looking fellow, big and brown, +with light hair of almost the same coppery tones as his sister's, and +although but eighteen was nearly six feet tall. It was his last year at +the Male High School of which his father was President, and already he +had passed with high honors his entrance examinations for Dartmouth +College. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, I say, Meg, don't pile it on," he protested. "You are handsome +enough all right, and it was only on your own account that I was wishing +you could run things better." +</p> + +<p> +Meg had evidently given up the idea of her engagement by this time, for +she had seated herself in a big chair with her small brother on her lap +and was rocking him slowly back and forth, his head resting on her +shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +"You are right, Jack, I am not offended," she answered. "I know I am a +poor manager, but somehow I don't just take to housekeeping and +mothering naturally. Men always think girls know such things by +instinct. They don't understand that we have to learn them just as boys +learn bookkeeping or office work and I have never had any one to teach +me." +</p> + +<p> +"The late Miss Everett," a new voice called unexpectedly, apparently +coming from about midway up the front steps. "Meg, may I come on +upstairs, the front door was half open and I knew full well that you +would never keep your promise to me unless I came and got you." +</p> + +<p> +Meg put down her small burden hastily and John unconsciously stiffened +his broad shoulders until his appearance was more than ever military. +</p> + +<p> +"Come on up, Betty dear, I am sorry I am such a sight, but the baby has +just gotten hurt and I have to give up the club meeting," Meg called +back. +</p> + +<p> +The next instant Betty Ashton appeared at the open bedroom door, wearing +a light woolen motor coat, a blue hat with a red-brown wing in it +fitting close over her hair which was tucked up out of sight in a very +grown-up fashion. She had a great deal of color and her eyes were +bright with desire. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, you can't disappoint me, Meg; I shall never forgive you," she +protested, and then came to a sudden stop seeing that John Everett was +also in her friend's room. But as he bowed low to her it was impossible +for him to have observed her slight blush. +</p> + +<p> +"Do take Meg with you by force, Miss Ashton," he urged. (It was always +quite thrilling to Betty at fifteen to be called "Miss Ashton," and no +other boy of her acquaintance seemed to realize that one could grow out +of being addressed as "Betty".) "She spoils the small boy and all the +rest of us far too much. 'Bumps' has just taken another tumble." Jack +Everett then backed out of the room in soldierly fashion and at the +instant of his disappearance Betty tucked her arms about the small +Horace, critically surveying his injured eye. +</p> + +<p> +"Do hurry and get dressed, Meg, that's a dear. You know we simply can't +get on without you this afternoon. I will button you up in a jiffy and +we can take this bumptious little person along with us. He will +probably escape and fall down somewhere while we are having our meeting, +but we can both keep our eyes on him." +</p> + +<p> +"He would be too much trouble," Meg demurred, but already she was +surveying her only clean shirt waists, a blue and a white one, to see +which was in the better state of repair. The blue was faded but whole, +so she slipped into it, letting Betty button it up the back, and then +with her brother's words still rankling in her mind carefully adjusted +her skirt at, the belt. "You are awfully good to let me come this +afternoon, Betty, because I told you it would be just impossible for me +to spend the summer with you girls as it would be for me to take a trip +to the moon. John is going camping and father is to have a summer +lecture course in Boston and--" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh yes, and you are to stay at home and take care of this house and +baby! I don't think it is fair, or that your father or brother in the +least realize what you do for them. But see here, dear, if what I +thinks is true, as my old nurse used to say, and you come to be a Camp +Fire girl this summer, why you will learn an awful lot about keeping +house and being first aid to broken babies and everything you need to +know. Never mind, don't let's argue about the question now, just come +along, for the motor is waiting at the gate. Nearly all the girls I +have asked must be at home by this time, but I have to collect two more +people, Martha McMurtry--you know how I love her--and yet she carries +the information in her brain of the right way to organize a Camp Fire +club. Also there is Eleanor Meade; being a genius, you know Eleanor +can't be expected to remember anything, should a wave of inspiration +happen to flow over her." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap05"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER V +</h3> + +<h3> +THEIR FIRST MEETING +</h3> + +<p> +The drawing-room at the Ashton homestead ran the whole length of one +side of the house and on this particular May afternoon was so filled +with sunshine and light that even the old portraits on the walls +appeared to change their severe Puritanical expressions and to look +down, from out their heavy gold frames, with something almost +approaching friendliness, on the strange girl now alone in the room, +although nothing in her appearance or manner suggested the birth and +breeding partly responsible for their New England pride. +</p> + +<p> +The girl was also humbly engaged in placing fresh flowers on the tables +and mantel and in rearranging the chairs and ornaments in the room to +their best advantage. Finally, after a lingering glance out the front +window, she picked up her last vase of flowers, a single branch of apple +blossoms in a tall, green jar, and, crossing over to the grand piano so +placed it that the sunlight shone full upon it. Then she stood for a +moment looking thoughtfully at the open keyboard, which had a small +sheet of music spread before it. Esther Clark next sat down at the +piano and lightly ran her fingers over the keys so that it could +scarcely have been possible for any one farther away than the adjoining +hall to have heard her playing. The refrain was simple and repeated +itself, yet had dramatic force and lingered in one's memory, the musical +call of the watchword for the Camp Fire Girls. +</p> + +<p> +Only that morning Betty had asked Esther to try to teach this call to +her friends when they came together at her home that afternoon to form +their club, and though Esther was painfully shy she felt obliged to do +her best. Some few of Betty's friends were known to her through their +acquaintance at school, but into not one of their homes had she ever +been invited socially. +</p> + +<p> +The door of the drawing-room farthest from the piano opened quietly. +</p> + +<p> +"Betty," a young man's voice inquired reproachfully, "aren't you even +glad enough to see me to say hello? When before did I ever know you so +devoted to practicing that you wouldn't stop for any excuse, and yet +here I have come all the way home from Portsmouth on your account!" +</p> + +<p> +Richard Ashton ceased talking abruptly, for instead of the pretty figure +of his sister, Betty, he now beheld rising from the piano stool a tall +girl with bright red hair, looking as though she had been frightened +speechless. +</p> + +<p> +"Great Caesar's ghost, what a homely girl!" was his first thought, but +not a change in his expression revealed what was in the young man's mind +as he stretched forth his hand. +</p> + +<p> +"I am sorry to have interrupted you," he said quickly, "but I am Richard +Ashton, Betty's brother." +</p> + +<p> +Of course he expected that the strange girl would then answer him, at +least tell him who she was or give some explanation of her presence, but +instead Esther stood silently looking down at the floor and twisting her +hands together in a wholly unnecessary state of embarrassment. +</p> + +<p> +Richard Ashton was of medium height, slenderly built, but with broad +shoulders, and at this time of life twenty-three years old. His hair +and eyes were light brown; he bore no resemblance to Betty and had a +curiously serious expression for so young and fortunate a fellow. +Although not handsome, Dick had a look of purpose and distinction and +always had unconsciously served as the ideal for Betty's girl friends. +He was a Princeton graduate, but was now studying medicine in Portsmouth +and expected later to continue his studies in Germany. Perhaps it was +his own seriousness and settled purpose that had made him assist in +spoiling his small sister almost from her babyhood, yet lately seeing +Betty's restlessness and discontent he had begun to wonder if he and his +father and mother had been as kind to her as they had meant to be. +Betty was growing up and it might be she too needed to have something +asked of her, that she too wished to give as well as to receive. +</p> + +<p> +"I am not your sister's friend (the girl near the piano had finally made +up her mind to speak), I am only a kind of companion, to help her with +her studying or to do whatever she desires." +</p> + +<p> +Dick Ashton laughed, his face immediately losing its look of gravity. +"Well, that is no particular reason why you should not be her friend as +well, is it? At least I hope Betty won't make the task too hard for +you, but as to doing all the things she desires, I am afraid that will +keep you pretty busy. I believe I remember now, my mother did write me +about asking you to come here to stay; you have lived before--" The +young man hesitated. But Esther had now come nearer and really she +seemed almost too plain even to serve his pretty sister, Betty, the +contrast might be too hard for the homely girl. +</p> + +<p> +"You were playing something when I came in, won't you go on," Dick +continued hastily, fearing that the strange girl, with her pale eyes +fixed on his, might be able to read his inmost thoughts and not desiring +to hurt her feelings. However she had started, edging toward the door. +"I would much rather not; your sister is to have some friends here this +afternoon and wishes me to teach them a few lines of music. I hope your +mother won't mind my touching this splendid piano." +</p> + +<p> +"What on earth is the girl afraid of? I have no desire to eat her," +Richard thought to himself, continuing to observe Esther's frightened +expression and nervous manner, but only answering good-naturedly: +"Certainly she won't mind. Please use the piano whenever you like, for +Betty hates practicing and I don't care much for a man musician, +especially a poor one, though I love music." +</p> + +<p> +Just for a moment the newcomer's timidity vanished and her smile of +pleasure, showing her big, strong mouth with its white teeth, relieved +her face of its entire plainness. "I should love it more than anything +in the world; would you mind asking your mother if I may? I am afraid +to ask her." +</p> + +<p> +"But not afraid of asking me?" Richard laughed; he had made his +suggestion without any special thought, but the girl might as well be +allowed to bang at their piano if she liked. Should she get it out of +order why it could soon be straightened out again. And then kindness to +persons less fortunate than himself was second nature with Richard +Ashton. +</p> + +<p> +"Here is the mater coming, I will ask her at once," he returned, and +then seeing Esther's unspoken look of entreaty, as he went forward to +open the door for his mother, he silently agreed to postpone his +request. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Ashton was a tall, blonde, handsomely dressed woman, who rarely +showed affection for anyone save her husband and children and whose +leisure time was largely devoted to playing bridge. Neither Betty nor +her son looked like her. Richard resembled his father, while Betty must +have inherited her appearance from some more remote ancestor. In one +comer of the parlor hung an oil painting of one of Mr. Ashton's +great-aunts, a young English girl in a white muslin dress and picture +hat, whom Betty always insisted she resembled. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Ashton was frowning anxiously. +</p> + +<p> +"Hasn't Betty returned, Dick?" she inquired. "It is an hour since +luncheon and her friends may arrive at any moment. The child was not at +all well yesterday and, I do wonder if her science teacher can be +keeping her in, Miss McMurtry is so inconsiderate. I really don't know +what to do about Betty this summer, she is so opposed to going to Europe +with us again and wants to form a club or a camp, something perfectly +extraordinary, so as to spend her summer in the woods. She almost +talked your father into the idea last evening, but I do hope, dear +Richard, that you will oppose her. You have such influence with Betty." +</p> + +<p> +Dick and his mother were standing together by the window now on the +lookout, for the truant. "Don't be such a weakling, mother," the young +man replied teasingly. "If you really wish Betty to go to Europe with +you and father say so and let that settle the matter, but I am not so +sure this new scheme of hers is a bad one. Betty sent me a night +telegram at bedtime last night (telephoned it, I suppose, when you +thought she was in bed) asking me to come home for the day and help her +get her own way. Living out of doors all summer, mother, and learning +to look after herself and to rub up against other girls may be the best +thing in the world for Betty. I am afraid she has been growing up to be +more ornamental than useful." +</p> + +<p> +"There is no reason why Betty should be anything but ornamental," Mrs. +Ashton argued, although plainly thinking over her son's words. +</p> + +<p> +Dick Ashton shook his head. "No, mother, the modern world has no place +in it but for useful people nowadays. And somehow it seems to me that +even more is going to be asked of women than has been asked of men. +They have got to do their own housekeeping and some of the world's too, +pretty soon." +</p> + +<p> +Before the young fellow finished speaking he and his mother were both +smiling and waving their hands toward Mollie and Polly O'Neill, who were +at this moment crossing the street with several other girl friends. +Before they entered the house, however, Betty's automobile, driven by +herself, dashed into sight, containing five other passengers: Margaret +Everett and her small brother; Miss McMurtry, the science teacher at the +high school; a tall girl with a clever face and a far-away expression in +her near-sighted blue eyes; and a fifth girl, an entire stranger both to +Mrs. Ashton and Dick and until a short while before an equal stranger to +Betty. +</p> + +<p> +Almost before the car stopped Betty was out of her seat and ushering her +visitors into their big, sweet-smelling drawing-room. There Esther +stood close against the wall, trying her best to shrink out of sight +even while she reproached herself for her unnecessary awkwardness and +fear. Suppose she had had no home and no social training like the +greater number of these other girls, yet did she not mean to follow +forever the law of the Camp Fire and would it not teach her in time to +gain the knowledge necessary to happiness? +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap06"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER VI +</h3> + +<h3> +THE LAW OF THE CAMP FIRE +</h3> + +<p> +"Esther, won't you repeat the Law of the Camp Fire for the girls?" Miss +McMurtry asked, fifteen minutes later, when Betty's guests were seated +in a close circle about the drawing-room, their faces eager with +curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +Esther alone sat at some distance from the others, so that Betty was +compelled to draw her forward toward the center of their group. How she +longed to refuse to recite, for instead of a dozen pairs of eyes +fastened upon her she felt there must be at least a hundred! Yet +catching an expression of amused sympathy on Dick Ashton's face somehow +she felt encouraged to go on. +</p> + +<p> +"Esther and I have been studying the plan of the Camp Fire organization +for the past two months and it is really very simple," Miss McMurtry +continued. "One must just follow certain general rules and then add +whatever seems appropriate to give one's special camp originality and +character. I had been hoping to form a club in the village this summer, +but of course if we can carry out Betty's idea and spend our summer +together in the woods, why we will learn in a few months what it might +have taken us years to find out in weekly meetings in town." The young +woman stopped, turning toward Esther, and the girl then felt obliged to +speak. Esther's voice was low, but had that rare quality given to but a +few voices of being heard at even a great distance without being raised. +</p> + +<p> +"Seek beauty. Give service. Pursue knowledge. Be trustworthy. Hold on to +health. Glorify work. Be happy." +</p> + +<p> +With each line, feeling the sympathy of her small audience increase, +Esther gained courage until at last she was able to finish her verse +with fervor and conviction. +</p> + +<p> +After her conclusion most of the faces near her were unusually +thoughtful until Polly O'Neill, seated next Mrs. Ashton, gave a +characteristic laugh followed by a sigh. +</p> + +<p> +"My dear children, if we ever learn to live up to that law of the Camp +Fire, then shall we be angels and not girls!" she exclaimed. +</p> + +<p> +And she might have added more had not an imploring frown from Betty +silenced her. Of course some of the girls would understand that Polly +rarely meant what she said, but there we're other members of the little +company with whom Betty wished to take no risks. Besides, Polly's laugh +could sometimes dampen even her own enthusiasm! And had she not placed +her friend next her mother in order that she might interest Mrs. Ashton +in their plan, for Polly was a great favorite with the older woman and +never afraid of using her pretty blarney stone with her. +</p> + +<p> +However, except for a laugh no one seemed in the least influenced by +Polly's skepticism. +</p> + +<p> +"We can at least try to live up to the law," Mollie replied quietly, +answering from her chair a few feet away. +</p> + +<p> +In a few moments, however, Betty no longer feared the effect of her +friend's attitude. Perhaps to some of the girls the idea of a summer +camp seemed too beautiful to be possible, yet plainly the ideals of the +Camp Fire organization, as Miss McMurtry explained them more fully, had +fired their imaginations, filling them with new hopes and enthusiasm. +</p> + +<p> +Meg had been listening to what had been said with glowing cheeks, +meaning to become a Camp Fire girl even though it was entirely +impossible for her to join the summer camp. She was holding her small +brother tight in her arms, trying to distract his attention with objects +to be seen out the front window, and so entirely oblivious of the fact +that the hastily adjusted hairpins had been slipping out of her hair, +until one yellow braid now dangled over her pink ear. +</p> + +<p> +Mollie O'Neill's cheeks were also flushed, but she sat perfectly still, +keeping her hands clasped tight together in a fashion she had when +desiring a thing greatly and not feeling sure she would receive it. +</p> + +<p> +Eleanor Meade had even forgiven Betty for dragging her away from her +unfinished painting of the May, sky (a painting which Meg and Betty had +assured her resembled soap suds), so enthralled had she become with the +summer plan. If her parents could be persuaded to allow her to stay in +camp with the girls during the summer, why then surely she need not be +bothered with having to take exercise and help with the housework, as +her mother insisted, she could simply give up all her time to her +drawing and painting. You see Eleanor, like a good many other girls, +did not at once grasp the meaning of the Camp Fire idea. +</p> + +<p> +Apparently only one person in Mrs. Ashton's drawing-room up to this time +seemed to have gotten nothing at all out of Miss McMurtry's explanations +and the girls' discussion of a Camp Fire club. But then how could she, +for Sylvia Wharton apparently had not listened and certainly had never +taken her eyes from Polly's face? She appeared a stupid child, short +and stout and, although fourteen, hardly seemed more than twelve. Her +clothes were expensive but always inappropriate, indeed they were far +too handsome for such a plain little girl. However, they were in accord +with her father's taste, and although Mr. Wharton was now a wealthy man, +he had begun life as a stone-cutter and could hardly be expected to know +much about the proper way to dress a small, motherless daughter. +</p> + +<p> +Several times in the past half hour Polly had almost yielded to the +inclination to implore Sylvia to take her eyes off her, for the little +girl did not look sensitive and her eyes were so large and +expressionless they made one uncomfortable, but then Polly forbore, +until, as her own interest in their meeting proceeded, she forgot all +about her inquisitor. +</p> + +<p> +It must have been about five o'clock when Betty at last arose and +holding a curiously wrought silver ring, a bracelet and a pin in her +hand, started to walk slowly about among the circle of her guests. +</p> + +<p> +"If you wish to join our Camp Fire club this afternoon," she invited +coaxingly, "you are simply to repeat the lines Esther has just recited +for us. Then Miss McMurtry says you may each receive a woodgatherers' +ring. Afterwards, when we have acquired sufficient honors in the seven +crafts, 'Health Craft, Home Craft, Nature Lore, Camp Craft, Business and +Patriotism'," (Betty repeated the list slowly as though not quite +certain of herself), "why then we may attain next to the rank of +Fire-Makers and wear their bracelets. The highest honor of all, which I +for one shall probably never attain, is to become a Torch Bearer and +receive the Torch Bearer's pin. It is all right for me to give the girls +the rings, isn't it, Miss McMurtry, after they have repeated the law to +you?" Betty asked, "since you have been appointed official guardian by +the headquarters in New York? Later on I suppose the girls will tell us +when they will wish to come into camp." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry laughed. Never until this afternoon had she had any +liking for Betty Ashton. They were such utterly different types of +woman and girl! Yet, now Betty's habit of expecting to have her own +way, which her teacher so disliked, was assuredly making their Camp Fire +plans go ahead with a rush. +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, I am a properly appointed guardian," Miss McMurtry answered +slowly, "and Esther and I have been studying the Camp Fire program until +she is almost ready to become a Fire-Maker, but I wonder if, you girls +wish me to be your guardian in camp this summer? Perhaps I am not +suited to it!" She turned to look at Betty, but failing to catch her +eye, looked toward Polly. For the same reason both girls kept their +heads bowed, until Betty was finally able to reply with as much +enthusiasm as she could muster: +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, of course we wish you, and we shall try to give as little trouble +as possible." Really in her present enthusiasm Betty believed that she +and her science teacher would be able to put away all past differences +and live in perfect accord under the influence of their new ideals. +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry now turned again to Esther; there were special reasons for +her unusual interest in this girl, although even Esther herself was +unaware of them. +</p> + +<p> +"You are wearing your bead chains, aren't you?" the new guardian asked, +slipping two narrow strips of leather, one strung with orange and the +other with bright red beads, from about Esther's throat. "You see each +one of these beads represents some honor a girl has attained in the Camp +Fire," she explained, "so the girl who finally arrives at the rank of +Torch Bearer, really an assistant to the guardian, may own seven +different chains of bead, one color for each of the seven crafts." +</p> + +<p> +"My honors so far have been won in health and home craft because of what +I was taught at the orphan asylum," Esther added frankly and then +blushed uncomfortably, for several of Betty's friends were staring at +her curiously. What had inspired Mrs. Ashton and Betty, supposed to be +the most exclusive persons in Woodford, to introduce this unknown girl +into their home as though she were a member of their family? +</p> + +<p> +Moreover, Betty must have suffered another change of heart for she was +now engaged in almost forcing a Wood-Gatherer's ring upon the stranger +whom she had lately brought home in the automobile with her. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Ashton lifted her lorgnettes to gaze at the visitor. "Tell me, +Polly dear," she whispered, "who is that girl with whom Betty is now +talking? She is not one of her school friends and yet I feel I have seen +her somewhere before, though I am not able to place her." +</p> + +<p> +Polly smiled, shaking her head. "You have seen her, I know I have many +times, although she is not a friend or even an acquaintance of mine. +But I don't know what has happened to 'The Princess', so I would rather +you would put your question to her after we go away." +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Ashton kept hold of Polly's hand. Two maids had just come into the +drawing-room at this moment and were passing plates of cake and cups of +hot chocolate about among the guests. The greater number of the girls +were crowding around Miss McMurtry and Betty, so only Dick Ashton +happened to notice that no one, not even a maid, had come near Esther. +Securing chocolate and cake for her himself, he sat down next her, +talking but asking no questions, since he feared to embarrass her as he +had earlier in the afternoon. +</p> + +<p> +"Do you think, Polly, that this is really a good plan of Betty's?" Mrs. +Ashton inquired thoughtfully. "She has seemed so restless and +dissatisfied lately. Of course I don't understand all this Camp Fire +idea seems to mean to her, I suppose I would have to be a girl again to +understand thoroughly, but there may be possibilities in it. Even a +conventional society woman longs sometimes to get away from her +monotonous life, and surely you will find romance and adventure awaiting +you in the woods. I have decided I shall not stand in Betty's way, I +shall go away this summer and leave you girls to work things out +together, then when I return I may be able to discover what miracles +have been wrought in you." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, you will find us entirely reformed," Polly answered carelessly, not +realizing that she of all the girls in the room would be the one to bear +the ordeal of fire, the symbol that cleanses and purifies. +</p> + +<p> +But both the girl and woman suddenly became silent, for Dick Ashton had +persuaded Esther Clark to the piano and now the entire group of guests +closed in about her. +</p> + +<p> +Once again she was singing the morning and evening hymn of the Camp Fire +Girls' "My Soul's Desire." +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Ashton sat listening intently with an odd expression of something +almost like relief crossing her face. "Polly dear," she whispered +unexpectedly at the close of Esther's song, "perhaps life does even +things up more justly than we know, for this strange girl, Esther Clark, +has a truly remarkable voice." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap07"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER VII +</h3> + +<h3> +WHITE CLOUDS +</h3> + +<p> +"White clouds, whose shadows haunt the deep, Light mists, whose soft +embraces keep The sunshine on the bills asleep." +</p> + +<p> +The sun was just rising above the crests of a group of the White +Mountains called long ago by the indians "Waumbek" because of their +snowy foreheads. But this morning, instead of shining like crystal, the +snow at their summits was opal tinted rose, yellow and violet from the +early rays of the June sun. +</p> + +<p> +Sunrise Hill, standing in the foreground, seemed to catch an even +stronger reflection from the sky, for the colors drained down its sides +until they emptied into a small, wooded lake at its base. +</p> + +<p> +On either side this hill the sloping lands were a soft green and the +meadows beyond golden with the new summer grain, but only fifty yards +away a grove of pine trees made a deep mass of shade, and with the birds +in their branches singing their daily matins, suggested an old cathedral +choir. +</p> + +<p> +The singers were evidently indifferent to intruders, for, close by, four +white tents were pitched in a square as though a caravan had halted on +its travels. But the caravaneers must have been in the place for some +days and showed no intention of moving on, for their arrangements had +been made with the idea of permanent comfort. +</p> + +<p> +Around each tent a narrow trench several inches deep had been dug to +prevent flooding in case of rain, farther off two large bins held all +rubbish until such time as it could be conveniently burned. The camp +ground was also beautifully clean, not a scrap of paper nor a tin can +could be seen anywhere, and even the grass itself had been swept with a +novel, but at the same time, a very old-fashioned broom, for a stake +tightly bound with a few sprigs of birch rested against one of the +tents, plainly--from the evidences about it--the kitchen tent. At a +safe distance a camp fire was smoldering, a fire built according to the +best scout methods. Two stout stakes driven slantwise in the ground +with three logs cut the same length, one on top the other, resting +against these stakes. On either side this elevation two logs lay on the +ground like fire logs, with a third crossing them in front, and inside +this enclosure a bed of ashes still glowed, carefully covered over for +the night. On the lake two birch bark canoes were moored to willow +stakes, and hanging on a line stretching from a tree to a pole a number +of girls' bathing suits flapped and danced in the air, but no human +being was yet in sight. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly there came a ripple of music from one of the pine trees, +"Whee-you, whee-you," a small bird with a spotted breast and a cream-buff +coat sang to itself and then began a whistling, ringing monotone that for +a moment silenced the other bird chorus. +</p> + +<p> +A girl in a dark red dressing gown quietly opened a tent flap. +</p> + +<p> +"There, the morning has come at last, for that is the voice of +'Oopehanka', the thrush. So after a week in the woods I really am +beginning to recognize some of the birds and the Indian names for them." +She clapped her hands softly together. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Princess, do wake up and let us have a swim before any one else +wakens," she whispered imploringly. +</p> + +<p> +Then disappearing inside her tent, she knelt by a bed of hemlock +branches covered with soft blue blankets. "Princess," she whispered +again. +</p> + +<p> +A sleepy voice answered. "Polly child, please go back to bed, it must +be the middle of the night and I ache all over from carrying water and +digging trenches. Who could have supposed camping would be such a lot +of work!" +</p> + +<p> +"Or such a lot of joy!" Polly laughed. "Ah, Betty, I thought you were +yearning to be useful; think of the honor beads you mean to earn! But +come now and be useful to me; do let us have a swim together." +</p> + +<p> +Betty was never proof against her friend's pleading. "All right," she +agreed, searching about near her bed for her sandals while Polly wrapped +a light woolen gown about her, "I don't know whether Miss McMurtry will +like our going off by ourselves, but I don't remember her having said we +should not, though Camp Fire life does mean doing things together." +</p> + +<p> +The two girls had been talking in the lowest possible tones and were now +tiptoeing softly out of their tent, when another voice from another bed +interrupted them. +</p> + +<p> +"Betty and Polly, you are sneaks!" Mollie O'Neill exclaimed indignantly. +"Just because I can't swim as well as you do and Esther can't swim at +all, you are going off without us. You are fine Camp Fire girls; please +bring our bathing suits here, too." +</p> + +<p> +Both girls nodded and laughed in rather an abashed fashion. But at a +safe distance away Betty turned to Polly. "Won't you confess, please, +that it is rather a nuisance having Esther Clark in the tent with us? I +don't see why Martha McMurtry insisted upon it when we might have had +Meg or most anybody else." +</p> + +<p> +Polly looked unusually grave. "You don't care for Esther, do you?" she +questioned. "It is curious, because though you haven't been +particularly nice to her, she is devoted to you and I believe would do +anything in the world for you." +</p> + +<p> +Ten minutes later the four girls in their Camp Fire bathing suits were +in the waters of the lake near their camp, Polly and Betty swimming with +long even strokes toward its center, Mollie hovering near the shore, +while Esther stood shivering in a foot of water trying vainly to warm +herself by splashing and throwing handfuls of water on her chest and +face. +</p> + +<p> +Half a mile out Betty turned over on her side. "Say the Law of the Camp +Fire to yourself, Polly. I have just said it and I am going back toward +shore. I suppose if one makes a vow to 'give service' it is little +enough to show another girl how to swim. If Esther didn't look so big +and wasn't so horribly shy, I am sure I should like her better, but here +goes!" +</p> + +<p> +It wasn't easy work teaching Esther to swim, for she was so much larger +than Betty and had such an absurd fashion of keeping both feet down and +splashing the water into her own and her teacher's face. Polly laughed +softly to herself as she swam slowly forward to offer her assistance. +She was wondering if a single week in camp had really begun to reform +her spoiled Betty and if it had, had any change also been wrought in +her? She was to find out in a very few minutes. +</p> + +<p> +One Camp Fire law, that there was no escaping, was that the girls were +not to spend but fifteen minutes in bathing. Really it hardly seemed +like half that time before the four girls were once again on land +getting into their bathing gowns which had been left hanging on a willow +tree nearby. They were to dress later on in their tent, so they were +hardly on shore more than a few moments, but even in that short space of +time a noise a few yards away startled them. The four girls turned +indignantly. In the entire week of their stay in camp they had not been +disturbed by a single intruder. Sunrise Hill, with its tall pines--the +emblem of the Camp Fire--its wooded lake for fishing, bathing and +canoeing, and its utter seclusion, had seemed, after several weeks of +careful search in the neighborhood about Woodford, the ideal place for +the girls' summer camp. So far not even a friend, man or woman, had been +allowed to visit them, because the camp was to be in running order +before they received any outside criticism. +</p> + +<p> +Now a young fellow of perhaps sixteen stood only a short distance off +from the lake with an expression of superior amusement on his face. He +was a country boy, for he wore no hat and his hair was burnt to a light +straw color at the ends, his skin was almost bronze. +</p> + +<p> +"Please go away," Polly demanded haughtily. She had gathered her +bathing gown about her as though it were a Roman matron's robe and was +feeling that her presence must be impressive although her hair was +extremely wet and drops of water were trickling down her face. +</p> + +<p> +However, the intruder paid not the least attention to her request, +except to laugh as though her indignation gave him special pleasure. He +was carrying a large tin pail on one arm and a basket on the other and +of course his behavior was hardly that of a gentleman. +</p> + +<p> +Anger for the moment kept Polly speechless, but a chorus of protests +arose from Betty, Mollie and Esther. "We are camping here and we would +rather not have visitors, so would you mind going back the way you have +come?" Betty requested in her most Princess-like fashion. +</p> + +<p> +"Not until I have seen the sights," the newcomer answered. He did not +really look impertinent, only mischievous, and his eyes were as blue as +Polly's. +</p> + +<p> +"You don't suppose that I have walked a mile before breakfast and +carried these heavy things except to find out what on the face of the +earth you crazy girls are doing here, trying to pretend you are scouts +or Indian squaws. Of all the foolishness!" +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps even this short acquaintance with Polly O'Neill has suggested +that she had, what is for some reason or other called an Irish temper, +though temper does not belong wholly to Irish people. Polly herself did +not know when this temper would take possession of her nor where it +would lead her. At present the young man continued to walk slowly on +toward the white tents, whistling to show his complete indifference, +while the four girls could see that their friends were now stirring +about in camp evidently getting ready to start breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +Without reflecting Polly stooped. There on the ground before her lay a +sharp rock, ground and polished by the waters of the lake, and like a +shot from a bow she flung this stone whistling through the air at the +intruder. +</p> + +<p> +Whether she thought her stone would strike the young man or what +particular effect her childish bad manners would have if it should, +Polly herself did not know. However, she was startled and flushed hotly +when, with an exclamation of pain, the boy put down his pail, placing +one hand quickly to his head. +</p> + +<p> +The four girls had started for their camp, but now Mollie, first +flashing a look of surprise and scorn at her usually beloved sister, ran +on ahead of the others. "I am so sorry," she said in a gentle, reserved +manner peculiar to her, "you were rude not to go away when we asked you, +but it is far worse for one of us to have been so childish as to strike +you. I am dreadfully ashamed." +</p> + +<p> +The young man smiled, not very cheerfully it must be admitted, but at +least not looking so angry as he had the right to. "Did you throw the +stone?" he inquired. "I never would have believed a girl could throw +straight if I hadn't felt the blow, so perhaps you are learning one or +two things by living like boys. Never mind, I can see you are not the +guilty one." +</p> + +<p> +"We are not trying to live in the least like boys, only like sensible +girls," Mollie started in to reply quietly, but the last part of her +sentence trailed off into a faint whisper, for the young man had just +taken his hand down from his head and his fingers were covered with +blood, a few drops were even trickling down the back of his neck inside +his soft flannel shirt. +</p> + +<p> +The other three girls had now come close enough to see the blood also, +and except for Betty, Pony would everlastingly have disgraced herself. +There are many persons in the world whom the sight of blood fills with a +strange shrinking and terror that is almost like faintness, and Polly +was one of them. Now she wanted to run away, she even turned to fly, +when her friend caught hold of her. "Don't be utterly stupid, Polly, +you have done a foolish trick and you've got to face the music, for if +you don't, you know Mollie is apt to take the blame upon herself." +</p> + +<p> +Polly's knees were shaking and her thin expressive face so pale that she +looked quite unlike herself. However, she managed to save a part of her +dignity by saying with an attempt at a smile, as she stopped alongside +Mollie and the young fellow, "I am sorry, I cannot tell a lie, I did it +with my little hatchet, so please feel all the anger against me. I do +hope I haven't hurt you very much." +</p> + +<p> +The young man now stared at Polly and then at Mollie and afterwards back +again from one to the other. He started to whistle but stopped himself +in time. "Gee, but you are alike--with a difference," he returned, +neither accepting nor refusing to accept Polly's half-hearted apology. +</p> + +<p> +Hardly knowing why, except that the back of his neck was apparently +covered with perspiration when there was no heat to explain it, the boy +again put up his hand to his head. This time it was impossible to +ignore the amount of blood that covered his hand nor the horrified faces +of his small audience. +</p> + +<p> +"I expect I can't go up to your camp, after all, when I am in such a +fix, so you've come kind of close to getting your own way. I guess you, +usually do!" he said, frowning up at Polly. "I wonder if it is too much +to ask you girls to carry these things up to your tents; the pail has +your morning's milk and is pretty heavy; the basket is only filled with +strawberries. My father is the farmer who owns the land about here and +I thought it would be a lark to find out what you campers were trying to +do. Didn't mean anything serious but I guess you'll have to come for +your own supplies after this as there ain't no one but me to bring 'em." +He spoke rather churlishly, but then he did have cause. +</p> + +<p> +"Hadn't you better wash your cut at the lake or come on up to the tent +and let us do something there for you," Betty proposed, not knowing +exactly what they should do in the present situation and yet feeling +that something ought to be done. "I am afraid walking home in the sun +with your head in that condition may make you ill." +</p> + +<p> +The young man shook his head and then winced. "It ain't anything," he +replied, beginning to back away, but at the same moment Mollie O'Neill +took firm hold on his sleeve. "Come down to the water," she demanded +quietly, "you are cut pretty badly, but I think I can stop the bleeding. +I suppose the other girls will laugh at me, but ever since I have been +in camp I have been carrying some gauze bandage about in my pocket and +finding out what to do in case of accidents. I won't hurt you." +</p> + +<p> +The young fellow had intended utterly to decline Mollie's kindly offer, +but now her suggestion of not hurting amused him, besides he was +sensible enough to know she was right. It was embarrassing, however, to +have three other girls looking on during the operation, so whatever +anguish Mollie caused him he felt prepared to endure in silence. +</p> + +<p> +In a very business-like fashion the young girl drew her roll of +surgeon's lint from an inside pocket of her bathing gown and a small +pair of scissors. Then she made her patient sit down on the ground by +the water's edge while she carefully examined his cut. +</p> + +<p> +"I ought to help, Mollie," her sister suggested faintly, but Mollie +shook her head and the young man appeared grateful. "I don't mind blood +and you do, Polly," she returned, "besides if anybody is to help I would +rather have Esther. I am afraid, if you don't mind, I have got to cut +your hair away, it is already so matted with blood." +</p> + +<p> +To almost any suggestion the patient would have agreed, since he had but +one desire now, and that to get away from the strange girls about whom +he had been so curious an hour before. +</p> + +<p> +Mollie cheerfully snipped away several locks of his hair covering a +space about as large as a dollar. The cut she discovered was deeper +than she had expected and, as it was still bleeding profusely, she next +called Esther for advice. Very carefully then the two girls washed out +the cut with clean water and then Mollie, finding a flat stone, made a +pad by wrapping it a number of times with gauze. This she placed over +the wound, binding the young man's head, Esther assisting in making the +bandage as tight as he could endure. +</p> + +<p> +All this time Polly, with Betty's hand firmly clutching hers, had stood +quietly looking on at the scene. She was feeling penitent and ashamed, +and yet her Irish sense of humor made her a little bit amused as well. +Mollie was so entirely unconscious, but she did seem to be intensely +enjoying her first opportunity to prove herself a worthy Camp Fire Girl. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps the young man vaguely felt Polly's amusement, although he did +not look at her and certainly did not give her the satisfaction of +knowing whether or not she had been forgiven. But he managed to thank +Mollie and Esther more politely for what they had done for him, than his +boorish manners earlier in the morning suggested, and even insisted on +going on up to the camp with them in order to carry the heavy pail. +</p> + +<p> +Several others of the Camp Fire girls, were by this time engaged in +getting break fast and although they could hardly help showing surprise +at the unexpected appearance of a wounded hero no questions were then +asked. +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry did not seem annoyed at seeing the young man, indeed it +turned out that she and several of the girls had walked over to Mr. +Webster's farm the day before to ask as a special favor that milk be +sent their camp each day. If she felt any displeasure, Betty and Polly +were sure it was directed toward them, for the first week of Camp Fire +life had not been altogether smooth and there were still adjustments to +be made between some of the girls and their guardian. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap08"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER VIII +</h3> + +<h3> +OTHER GIRLS +</h3> + +<p> +Besides the four girls who have just returned from the lake there were +six others in the camp at Sunrise Hill, their guardian, Miss McMurtry +and one small imp or angel, according to one's way of looking at things. +For Margaret Everett had joined the summer campers and, in order to +accomplish it, had brought her small brother, Horace Virgil Everett, +along with her. You see, the girls felt they simply must have Meg, so +after a great deal of discussion it was decided that Horace Virgil would +be an excellent person to practice mother craft upon and would certainly +bring into service whatever first aid information might be required. +</p> + +<p> +Meg was so gay, so sweet tempered and so utterly inconsequential. If +things were going well in camp, if the sun was shining and everybody was +feeling amiable then she was entirely happy, but if things were going +wrong, then it was that Meg counted, for she kept her temper through +almost any kind of stress. She did not have so many moods as Polly, she +was not so quiet and reserved as Mollie, nor did she expect the world to +move according to her desires, as Betty Ashton did. Meg's faults were +that she was not a good manager and did try to do too many things at +once and so did none of them well, but she had not had an easy time +since her mother died two years ago. Although her father and older +brother adored her, they were selfish in unconscious masculine ways, +President Everett in devoting too much time to his school and John to +his studies and amusements. Unfortunately neither of them realized that +Meg might now and then grow weary of having a small brother, capable of +originating new kind of mischief at least once an hour, everlastingly +tagging after her. But Meg's cares (if she ever called them by that +name) had for the present been entirely lifted from her, for she had ten +other people now to help, her take care of "Bumps," whom the girls had +rechristened "Hai-yi" or "Little Brother," and if Meg had been asked to +vote upon the happiest week of her life since her mother's death she +would instantly have voted her first week in camp with her own club of +Camp Fire Girls. +</p> + +<p> +Then there was Sylvia Wharton! Did Sylvia really enjoy the change in +her life from staying cooped up in a great house, looked after by +servants and alone a great part of the time when her father was away? +Her brother Frank, who was several years older, seldom paid the least +attention to her. If the little girl did enjoy the woods and the +companionship of the other girls and all the opportunities that the camp +fire life offered her, so far she showed not the slightest sign. Her +one pleasure must have been her chance to haunt Polly O'Neill, for +although she did not seem particularly happy when she was with Polly, +certainly she never left her side unless she were compelled to do her +share of the camp work and only then when Polly insisted upon it. +Already Miss McMurtry felt that Sylvia might become difficult, but then +the child had had no training, and besides Miss McMurtry shared the +belief of almost all other persons that Sylvia was simply stupid. +Curiously enough Eleanor Meade now appeared to have been invited into +the first Woodford Camp Fire circle under a false impression. You see, +the girls at the high school where Eleanor was also a student considered +her a genius, and it is agreeable for a community to have one genius in +its midst. Eleanor did have talent for drawing, and besides she had a +number of characteristics which many persons associate with genius. She +was entirely careless of her other responsibilities, and, if she +happened to wish to paint, considered it entirely unreasonable that +anything or anybody should interfere with her desire. She was often in +the habit of forgetting engagements and at times there was a faraway +expression in her eyes, which may have come from having neglected to +wear her glasses, but which her friends believed due to the thrall of +some wonderful creative idea which might be presented to the world some +day in the form of a great picture. And Eleanor, being but human and +seventeen, had done her best to foster this belief. She would not dress +in modern fashions like the other girls; her parents had little money, +but Eleanor's mother was a clever needlewoman and her eldest daughter +always appeared in gowns made after exactly the same pattern and of some +soft clinging material, whether cashmere or cheesecloth, they were +always short waisted with a folded girdle and deep hem and cut low in +the neck. Then Eleanor's hair, which was heavy and straight and a kind +of ashen brown, was always worn parted in the middle and fixed in a +great loose knot at the back of her neck. Eleanor was not pretty like +Betty and Meg and Mollie and, at times, Polly O'Neill, but she would +have scorned to have been thought pretty--interesting was the adjective +she preferred. +</p> + +<p> +However, since Eleanor's appearance in camp for almost a week she had +forgotten to be a genius. For one thing the girls were all wearing the +regulation Camp Fire uniform, a loose blouse and dark blue serge skirt, +and so she could not dress the part. Then, although the Camp Fire +official log book had been given her to illustrate she had not even +started to paint the totem of the Sunrise Camp on its brown leather +cover, although Sunrise Hill stood, always before her in its changing +beauty. The girls had taken its name for their camp with the thought +that the hill might symbolize their own efforts to look upward always to +the highest and most beautiful things. +</p> + +<p> +But Eleanor should hardly be blamed for not having done much painting so +far, there, had been such a lot of other work to do, in helping to put +things in order in camp, and besides she had developed the most +surprising talent for making an Irish stew, that was the envy and +delight of all the other girls. Eleanor said it was because she had a +soul above science and used her imagination in her stew, but whatever +the reason, since the first day when the cooking of dinner fell to her, +this stew had been one of the greatest successes in camp and Eleanor +received her first honor bead for her genius in cooking instead of in +art. +</p> + +<p> +Besides these seven girls already described, there was an eighth girl in +the Sunrise camp, the stranger whom Betty had brought home with her on +the day their club had first been discussed--the girl whose face was so +familiar to Mrs. Ashton but whose name was unknown. There had been a +question as to whether or not this particular girl could come to summer +camp, not because the other girls were unwilling to have her, but because +she worked in a milliner's shop in Woodford and had to go back and forth +to be at work every day. Quite by accident on the eventful afternoon +Betty had stooped by this shop in her journey to Meg's to ask about her +new spring hat, and being so full of her plan had poured it into Edith +Norton's ear, while the little milliner was trying on her hat. +Naturally Edith thought it a wonderful plan, so Betty, with one of her +sudden impulses, immediately insisted that the young milliner come home +with her to become a member of their new Camp Fire club. This seemed at +the time a perfectly impossible dream to Edith, who was a poor girl with +her own living to make, but then she did not understand Betty's ability +to make things happen. Every obstacle had been smoothed away, Edith was +now riding Betty's bicycle back and forth from camp to town every day +and, already the headaches, which had first wakened Betty's sympathy, +because of the pallor of her face and the dark circles under her eyes, +had begun to grow better from the daily fresh air and exercise. Of the +Camp Fire Girls Edith was the oldest; she was about eighteen and had +blonde hair and delicate features, with brown eyes. She might have been +pretty, but that she needed to grow stronger in body and character, and +already the girls and their guardian had discovered that Edith was too +fond of tea and coffee and sweets and modern novels for her own health +or happiness. The trouble was that her home was too filled with small +brothers and sisters and a father and mother too poor to make them +comfortable, so that the eldest daughter had been forced to find her own +pleasures. +</p> + +<p> +The last two members of the Sunrise Hill camp were unknown to the other +girls until a few days before. They were two sisters, daughters of a +favorite doctor, cousin of Miss McMurtry's, who had been pupils in a +fashionable boarding school in Philadelphia. They were not alike, +either in appearance or character, for the older one of them thought too +much about clothes and wealth and position, and so immediately fell to +admiring and imitating Betty, while the other was an impossible tomboy, +more like a feminine Puck, the very incarnation of mischief, whose one +idea of happiness seemed to lie in playing pranks. +</p> + +<p> +Juliet Field, the older girl, had light brown hair and eyes, was rather +pretty and had a plump girlish figure, round fat cheeks with a good deal +of color and a piquant, turned-up nose, while Beatrice, whom everybody +called "Bee," wore her curly dark hair cut short, had a melancholy brown +face entirely unlike her character and was as slender and small and +quick in her movements as a tiny wren. +</p> + +<p> +The two sisters and Sylvia Wharton slept in the tent with Miss McMurtry, +while the third tent sheltered Eleanor, Edith, Meg and, of course, +"little brother". +</p> + +<p> +When Miss McMurtry had wakened to discover that four of the Camp Fire +girls had gone in swimming without the others, she had not been pleased, +more because she felt that Betty and Polly were too much inclined to be +leaders among the girls and to disregard her advice. They had not yet +openly disobeyed her, so of course she had been unable to say anything +to them, but now she made up her mind to hang in each tent the rules for +each day's camp routine so that there could be no more uncertainty. +Miss McMurtry had merely been waiting to decide what rules were wisest +before making her schedule. +</p> + +<p> +As soon as their first masculine visitor departed Eleanor, Meg and +Juliet announced breakfast. At a comfortable distance from the kitchen +fire a large white cloth had been spread on the grass and in the center +stood the great basket of fresh strawberries just brought over by the +young man to whom Polly had given such an uncomfortable reception. A +big coffee pot and two jugs of milk stood at opposite ends of the cloth +besides toast and a dozen boiled eggs in a chafing dish, while from the +nearby fire came the most delicious food odor in the world: bacon fried +before open coals. Nevertheless the girls did not sit down to breakfast +at once although they were dreadfully hungry. Already they had +established certain Camp Fire customs, and one was their morning habit +of reciting some verse of thanksgiving in unison before beginning the +real living of their day. The hymn, which first introduced Betty to +Esther was always sung at the close of each day, but this morning verse +had always to be original and one girl at a time was allowed to make the +selection. To-day it had fallen to Polly's lot and she had taught it to +the other girls over their camp fire the night before. +</p> + +<p> +So now the ten girls with their guardian in the center stood in a +semicircle facing Sunrise Hill. The sun had fully risen and the earth, +as the Indians used to say, had "become white." Led by Polly they +slowly recited this ancient chant: +</p> + +<p> +"Shine on our gardens and fields, Shine on our working and weaving; +Shine on the whole race of man, Believing and unbelieving; Shine on us +now through the night, Shine on us now in Thy might, The flame of our +holy love And the song of our worship receiving." +</p> + +<p> +And when they had finished, Polly O'Neill, with a note of reverence in +her voice that gave it an unconscious dramatic quality she would have +vainly tried to have at any other time, added: "We Camp Fire girls +worship not the fire but Him of whom in ages past it was the chosen +symbol because it was the purest of all created things." +</p> + +<p> +And then without further ceremony there was a sudden rush for breakfast. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap09"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER IX +</h3> + +<h3> +THE GUARDIAN +</h3> + +<p> +Miss Martha McMurtry was an odd guardian for a Camp Fire club which owed +its existence to Betty Ashton's enthusiasm, for two more different +persons cannot well be imagined. Of course the girls in the club were +of many kinds and characters and it would have been almost impossible +for any guardian to have been congenial with all of them, but it was +unfortunate that the head of the Sunrise Camp and the two girls who were +its leading spirits had at the beginning of the summer so little in +common. For there was no question but that Betty and Polly were +leaders, one week in camp had been more than sufficient to prove this. +</p> + +<p> +Betty's influence was of course easy to understand, for she was +uncommonly pretty and wealthy, and though spoiled and wayward, given to +sudden generous impulses and affections which made her friends willing +to overlook her faults. With Polly, O'Neill the case was different, she +had no money and was not particularly good looking, it was simply that +the intensity of her emotions would always, whether as a woman or child, +make her a force for good or evil. When Polly was happy persons about +her found it almost impossible not to share in her mood, she had such a +delicious sense of humor and was so full of clever jokes and delicate, +unconscious flatterings. Then when an ugly mood descended upon her, +and, as Polly in Irish fashion used to say, "a witch rode on her +shoulders," it was almost equally impossible to ignore her foolishly +tragic points of view. There is an old name for Ireland, Innis Fodhla, +which means the Island of Destiny, and though Polly had been born in a +little New England village, nevertheless, in her blood there was a +strain of those inheritances which have made the Irish nation so unlike +all others. +</p> + +<p> +While Betty and Polly were friends there was apt to be peace among all +the girls in camp, but if they should disagree? Ah well, they had never +really had any serious differences of opinion in their lives which +Mollie, after the passing of a day or two, had not been able to smooth +over. And they both had every intention of making themselves as +agreeable as possible to their guardian. +</p> + +<p> +Of course from the beginning of things it had been perfectly apparent +that Betty would never voluntarily have chosen Miss McMurtry for their +camp guardian, but finding that her science teacher was the only woman +in Woodford who knew about the Camp Fire movement and was able to spend +the summer with them, she had accepted the situation with as good a +grace as possible. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Martha McMurtry was not an attractive woman when she first came +into the Sunrise Camp. Names have an odd fashion of describing the +persons who own them and Miss McMurtry's exactly described her. Have +you not a mental picture of a tall, learned young woman, with straight +black hair, which she wore pulled back very tight, forming an +unattractive knot at the back of her head? Of course she also wore +glasses, having spent all her life inside of books until her pupils were +convinced that she knew everything in the world. She did know a great +deal and because of her knowledge was a splendid Camp Fire guardian, but +there were a few things about human nature which her girls were to teach +her in exchange for her science. Her information covered a number of +fields, for while she taught botany and chemistry at the Girls' High +School, she had also taken a two years' course in domestic science +before beginning her teaching. Miss McMurtry was only twenty-six, had +no family and lived all alone in a small house in Woodford. However, she +appeared much older, and one of the questions her pupils were never able +to answer was whether she had ever had a man call on her in her life. +About her early history there was very little known, as she did not care +to talk about herself and no one asked about her past. +</p> + +<p> +About five o'clock on the next afternoon Miss McMurtry and Esther Clark +were seated not far from a small fire which they had lately built near +their pine grove. The day was not cold, but New Hampshire is seldom +very warm in June and, besides, no one in camp ever tried to resist the +opportunity for having a fire when most of their pleasure in being in +camp centered around it. +</p> + +<p> +Back and forth from the pine grove to his friends Hai-ya, Little +Brother, traveled. He was cheerfully engaged in bringing pine cones to +Miss McMurtry, and piling them into a small mound, later to be thrown on +the fire. On the ground between the woman and girl were some odd pieces +of khaki galatea, bits of leather fringe, shells and beads, and Esther +was busily sewing. Miss McMurtry was writing: several times she had +torn up what she had written, throwing the waste paper into the fire, +but finally she handed a sheet to Esther in a hesitating way. +</p> + +<p> +"See what you think of this, Esther?" she asked. "You see the Camp +Guardians are advised to follow certain rules and regulations in camp +life and I have been trying to decide what would best suit us. Please +tell me what you think?" +</p> + +<p> +Esther looked the paper over thoughtfully, and then began reading it +aloud. +</p> + +<p> +6:30 A.M. Arise, wash, either bathing in lake or tent, then air bedding +thoroughly. Hoist American flag, salute it. Three girls prepare +breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +7:30 A.M. Recite in unison morning verse, eat breakfast, make up own +bed and clean tent, also do whatever share of work is apportioned for +the day. +</p> + +<p> +10 to 12 A.M. Devote to practice in one of the seven Camp Fire crafts +for obtaining honors. +</p> + +<p> +12 to 1 P.M. Three girls prepare dinner. +</p> + +<p> +1 to 2 P.M. Dinner served. +</p> + +<p> +2 to 3 P.M. Rest. +</p> + +<p> +3 to 5:30 P.M. Recreation. +</p> + +<p> +5:30 to 6:30 P.M. Three girls prepare tea. +</p> + +<p> +6:30 to 7 P.M. Tea served. +</p> + +<p> +7:00 to 8:30 P.M. Camp Fire, stories, songs, confidences, etc. +</p> + +<p> +8:30 P.M. Milk and crackers, bed. +</p> + +<p> +9 P.M. Lights out. +</p> + +<p> +Ester read the schedule over the second time and then nodded her head +approvingly. "It's splendid and I am sure the girls will think it can't +be improved upon," she answered, adding the latter part of her speech as +she handed the paper back, for Miss McMurtry was looking troubled and +Ester half guessed the cause. +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry said nothing, however, only picking up a piece of Ester's +sewing. +</p> + +<p> +"What is this you're making, Ester?" she inquired. "I thought you had +made your ceremonial Camp Fire dress some time ago!" +</p> + +<p> +Ester did not reply at once as she bent more closely over her work, but +on being asked the question the second time returned with an attempt at +speaking carelessly: "Oh, it's Betty's costume, I hope you won't mind, +but she says really she never has had time to do any sewing since our +club was formed. So, as we are to have our June Council Fire to-night, +I promised to finished it for her. You see this is our most important +meeting because that afternoon in town we did not have an opportunity to +arrange appropriate ceremonies." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry nodded, "Yes, but I thought it was part of our plan to +have each girl make her own dress. Even Sylvia Wharton has done her +best to help." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry picked up a portion of the neglected dress, however, and +began to assist Esther. "I wonder if it is a good thing for you and +Betty to be together," she remarked thoughtfully. "Of course I know +Mrs. Aston's intentions were for the best in taking you to live with +them at this late date and they will probably be very kind to you, but +really there isn't any reason, Esther, why you should take all the cares +away from Betty. She seems to be one of the persons in the world for +whom nothing is ever made difficult, while you--" Breaking off abruptly +she turned to see if her small charge was still busy and then shaded her +eyes from the sun. +</p> + +<p> +Esther laughed happily. Not so shy and awkward here in the woods with +the other girls, she had lately thought little of her own lack of +advantages. "You needn't worry about me," she now replied, stopping her +work for a moment to look off across the fields for the return of the +other Camp Fire Girls. "Already I perfectly adore Betty. Of course she +does not care a great deal for me, for there is nothing in me to attract +her, but all my life I have wanted some one to love, and sort of take +care of and do things for. Of course Betty has so many people she does +not need me much now, but some day. Oh well, as she herself says, one +never can tell just how things may turn out in this world." +</p> + +<p> +"Wohelo, Wohelo, Wohelo!" A far cry from several voices sounded across +the fields and a few moments later Betty Ashton, Meg, Eleanor and Juliet +Field came into view. Betty was wearing her every day Camp Fire costume +with the official hat of blue cloth embroidered with a silver gray "W" +on a dark red background and over her shoulder was strapped a smart +knapsack. She seemed to dance away from the other girls, although she +was not dancing but running. Yet such was her grace and slenderness +that somehow she appeared: +</p> + +<p> +Like to a lady turning in the dance, Foot before foot from earth so +slightly moved, That scarce perceptible her advance. +</p> + +<p> +Arriving first she threw herself down on the ground near Esther, tossing +off her hat and resting her head on the other girl's lap. +</p> + +<p> +"I am nearly dead!" she exclaimed rather irritably. "Two miles walk +into town and two miles back is a good deal when one has been doing a +thousand things beforehand. Besides, I didn't find a letter from mother +or father, and Mollie and Polly have seven from Mrs. O'Neill, one for +each day of her trip from New York to Queenstown. Of course it does +take longer for a ship to land in Naples, so I am silly to be +disappointed, yet I am just the same! Besides, Polly was dreadfully +obstinate and would insist on coming back to camp by another route, said +it was shorter and much more adventurous than the open road. So we +parted, and Mollie and Sylvia and Bee axe returning with her. She may +be having more adventures than we did, but the way is not shorter, for +we appear to have arrived first." +</p> + +<p> +Opening her knapsack Betty then handed two letters to Miss McMurtry and +gave a little rolled package to Esther. "Here is something for you from +Dick; he doesn't seem to have written me either." +</p> + +<p> +Esther unwrapped her parcel. "It is just a piece of music your brother +told me about, an Indian love song. He thought perhaps I could learn it +and we could sing it together in camp. He is very kind." +</p> + +<p> +Betty shrugged her shoulders. "Oh yes, Dick is kind to nearly +everybody, except to me sometimes when he thinks I need discipline. But +he and mother both think you have a remarkable voice, Esther, and that +it will be a pity if you don't have it cultivated some day." +</p> + +<p> +Esther laughed, touching Betty's auburn hair affectionately. It was +loosened from her walk and curling round her face. "That is my soul's +desire, Betty," she whispered, surprised at her sudden burst of +confidence. But Betty's manner with her was unexpectedly more intimate +than it had been since their first meeting. She could hardly have known +that it was owing to the fact that she had just quarreled with her +adored Polly. Of course Betty did not intend to be deceitful, she was +simply in the habit of seeking consolation from some source, whenever +things went wrong with her. +</p> + +<p> +Now she put her hand the second time into her knapsack and, drawing +forth a square white box, she proceeded to open it in a slightly +shamefaced fashion and then handed it to Miss McMurtry. "I am a +dreadful backslider from Camp Fire rules, but I just had to have some +candy this afternoon. Do eat some with me, so I won't be the only +sinner in camp," she begged. +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry shook her head. "Don't tempt Esther or any of the other +girls, Betty," she replied in a tone that Betty was familiar with at +school. "One of the health craft rules you girls have promised to +observe is to give up candy between meals for three months. Of course +if you wish to break your word you may, but I had rather you would not +try to influence any one else." +</p> + +<p> +Betty banged the lid back on her box. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh," she replied unsteadily. "I am sorry you feel about me in that +way. I didn't mean to be a mischief maker, but you need not worry about +Esther, for she is not the kind that falls from grace." +</p> + +<p> +She sat a few moments longer leaning her chin on her hand and looking +toward the grove of pine trees where the shadows were now growing longer +and darker as the afternoon lengthened. Sorry to have fallen from grace +herself, Betty at this moment would have perished rather than confess +it. +</p> + +<p> +The other three girls had gone straight on up to the tents, Meg taking +"Little Brother" with her. But now Eleanor appeared at the opening +before their kitchen tent and began vigorously ringing a large dinner +bell. +</p> + +<p> +"Betty Ashton," she called, "it is half-past five o'clock and time to +begin dinner. You know it is your turn to help with Juliet and me. Meg +is putting the baby to bed." +</p> + +<p> +Betty encircled her hand above her lips forming a small trumpet. "I am +not going to help with dinner to-night, I am too dead tired," she +halloed back. "I will help to-morrow instead." +</p> + +<p> +"To-morrow?" Eleanor cried indignantly. "What has to-morrow, got to do +with it? You are no more tired than the rest of us and besides it is +your turn to-night and we have promised not to try to get out of things +unless we are ill." Eleanor said nothing more, but even at a distance +of a good many yards it was plain that she had flounced back inside the +tent. When she came out again with some pots and pans her air was one +of conscious and offended virtue. +</p> + +<p> +A moment later Betty sighed. "I wonder if you would mind taking my +place this afternoon, Esther?" she inquired. "I am very tired and you +haven't been doing anything. Would you mind, Miss Martha?" +</p> + +<p> +Betty made her request very prettily and really without the least idea +that it could be refused, for she was not in the habit of being made to +do what she did not wish. With her own family to have said she was +tired would have been regarded as a sufficient excuse for any change of +plan. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps Miss McMurtry would have been wiser had she agreed to Betty's +request, and had she been another girl she possibly might have been more +lenient. Now she decided that Betty was simply trying to shirk her +responsibilities and so slowly shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +"Of course if you are not well, Betty, I will be glad to take your place +myself," she answered, trying to speak kindly. "However, if I were you, +I would hardly say that Esther has been doing nothing since she has been +sewing all afternoon on the ceremonial dress you promised to make your +self, so that you may wear it to our Council Fire to-night." +</p> + +<p> +Betty got up quickly. "Please don't do any further work for me while we +are in camp together, Esther," she demanded, "for it is evident that +Miss McMurtry thinks I spend my time trying to impose upon you. As far +as the dress is concerned, I shall not need it to-night, for I shall not +come to the Council Fire. I will do my part in helping to get dinner, +of course, but I prefer to rest afterwards." +</p> + +<p> +Hardly, knowing what she was doing because of her anger, Betty yet +managed to get up quietly from her place and start toward camp without +glancing at either Esther or Miss McMurtry, although she heard Esther +following close behind her. "Please don't disappoint us, dear," Esther +pleaded. "I know Miss Martha will be willing to let me do your work +to-night, if we ask her again, and it will quite ruin our Council Fire if +you are not with us. What will Polly say when you and she have planned +the whole ceremony? And I--I shall be so disappointed, for I am to be +made a Fire-Maker to-night. Besides, you know we are to talk over the +names we hope to be known by in our club." +</p> + +<p> +But Betty only walked steadily on as though deaf to the other girl's +entreaty. Near her own tent she turned at last and Esther could see +that her eyes were full of tears. "You are mistaken, Esther, though I +am sure you are very kind," she insisted with her offended Princess air, +about which Polly used so often to tease her. "I am sure no one will +miss me in the least and my absence will give you a chance to bestow on +me the title you think really belongs to me, such as: 'Betty who won't +bear her own burdens' or anything you prefer. Please leave me alone +now." +</p> + +<p> +So there was nothing more for Esther to do but to return to her work, +knowing how little influence she had with Betty at any time. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap10"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER X +</h3> + +<h3> +PIPES OF PEACE +</h3> + +<p> +Half an hour later Polly discovered Esther seated alone by her slowly +perishing fire taking the last stitches in Betty's rejected ceremonial +dress. She had even embroidered on the left sleeve a small crown in +gold colored silk, since Betty's old title "The Princess" would scarcely +be changed whatever new names might be awarded to the other girls in +their Camp Fire. +</p> + +<p> +"Where's Betty?" Polly inquired carelessly. "I hope she wasn't cross; I +suppose it was not kind of me to leave her and return another way, and +she was right, it did make us late, but we had a delicious adventure!" +Polly had dropped down on the ground and put her arms about her, knees, +slowly rocking herself back and forth, her face shining with mischief +and excitement, so that her color came and went quickly and tiny sparks +appeared to dart forth from the blueness of her eyes and the blackness +of her hair. +</p> + +<p> +But as Esther neither answered nor asked any questions Polly stared at +her in amazement. She had no particular emotion for Esther one way or +the other, perhaps because she was not yet a rival in Betty's +affections, but she had always tried to make herself agreeable to her +and to have her feel like one of them; moreover, she did not enjoy being +disregarded. +</p> + +<p> +Halfway up on her feet a glance at Esther's face made her drop back into +her old position, except that she put one hand under the girl's chin, +turning her face toward her. +</p> + +<p> +"For goodness' sake, Esther, what is the matter?" she demanded. "I +suppose it is Betty!" +</p> + +<p> +And Esther nodded, feeling an absurd disposition to shed actual tears of +disappointment. So much had been planned for to-night's Council Fire +and this was the first disagreement in their camp. Should Betty fail to +appear, the other girls, learning the cause, were sure to take sides and +no one would be really happy. +</p> + +<p> +Until Esther finished her story Polly listened without comment, although +her face flushed and her lips were pressed close together. +</p> + +<p> +"I do think Miss McMurtry was a little hard," she said finally. "It +isn't fair to expect us to reform all at once and she might remember +that Betty has never had the discipline of having to do things when she +didn't wish to before. It is different when one has been poor, isn't +it, Esther? Never mind, I will do my best. Betty hasn't any right to +make everybody uncomfortable just because she is offended, particularly +when she has had so much to do with our plans for to-night." +</p> + +<p> +Polly disappeared, but when tea was served a short time later a signal +to Esther reported that she had met with no success. Betty helped with +the evening work, saying nothing but looking pale and tired, so that +Miss McMurtry wondered if she had been too severe. Perhaps Betty was +used up by her walk! She would have liked to have talked to her but had +no opportunity, for as soon as supper was over (and three other girls +always did the clearing up) Betty immediately disappeared inside her +tent, and when her three friends came in to dress for their meeting they +found her in bed covered up with her blue blankets and not in the mood +for conversation. +</p> + +<p> +Vainly Mollie and Esther attempted persuasion, reproaches, they received +always the same answer--fatigue and not ill temper kept Betty from their +entertainment. She was sorry of course but they would probably have a +better time without her. +</p> + +<p> +Curious, but in the half hour required by the three girls for their +dressing, Polly, in spite of her promise, added not a single word of +regret or entreaty in spite of Esther's pleading looks and Mollie's +outspoken demands that her sister exert her influence. Appearing +utterly absorbed in her own costume and in admiring Esther's and +Mollie's, Polly only shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +The June afternoon was a long one, so there still remained sufficient +daylight for the girls to see to dress in their tent. Over the crest of +Sunrise Hill a pale crescent moon with a single star glowing beneath it +had now arisen and the moonlight later on promised to be radiant. +</p> + +<p> +There were bursts of laughter, cries of admiration floating from one +open tent to the other, for this was the first time the girls had seen +one another dressed in their new costumes. +</p> + +<p> +Polly plaited her long black hair in two braids, twining it in and out +with narrow strips of bright orange ribbon, and then around her head she +bound a broader band of ribbon the same color with a single black +feather just above her forehead on the left side. With her dark hair +and high cheek bones, which to-night were crimson with excitement, she +made an unusually picturesque Indian girl. Mollie's hair was softer in +texture and less heavy, so that she wore it hanging loose over her +shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +At first, however, Esther's appearance was not much of a success. +Although, apparently lost in languor and uninterested in anything, from +her couch Betty observed her, wondering what could be done. For Esther +to look so awkward and plain to-night, when as the first of their Camp +Fire girls to be raised to the rank of Fire Maker she would be the +center of all eyes, did seem hardly fair. +</p> + +<p> +Trying to make the best of herself and without the gift most girls have +in this direction, Esther had also arranged her hair in two braids, but +while her hair was thick it was too short to be effective in this style, +and parted in the middle accentuated the plainness of her long face with +its irregular features, light blue eyes and large mouth; moreover, the +bright yellow of her khaki costume with its red fringes, gay shell and +beads made her complexion appear in contrast paler than ever. In +despair she was twisting a band of bright red cotton decorated in brass +spangles about her forehead, when a cry from Polly, who happened at this +moment to catch sight of her, made her drop her head-dress. +</p> + +<p> +"Stop, and don't you ever so long as you live, Esther Clark, dare to put +a touch of red near your face," Polly demanded autocratically, rummaging +at the same time in a small box on a table which she knew held a number +of trinkets belonging to Betty. The next moment drawing forth a band of +dull silver embroidery about an inch and a half wide, she crossed over +to the older girl. +</p> + +<p> +"Please let me fix you a little differently," she urged coaxingly, +beginning at once to unwind Esther's hair and combing it out over her +shoulders; then loosening it in front she put the silver band like a +crown about it. Esther's hair wag red, of this there could be no +denial, but now unbound it showed bright strands of gold and darker +shades of red that could never have been discovered when tightly +fastened to her head. Perhaps it was partly due to Polly's little act of +friendliness making the other girl happier, but certainly there was a +marked change for the better in Esther's appearance, so much so that +Betty decided she looked almost pretty when a few moments afterwards her +three friends bidding farewell to her went out leaving her alone in her +tent, where the darkness was now closing in. In parting, Mollie and +Esther had added a final plea to Betty to join them, but still Polly had +spoken no word. +</p> + +<p> +Lying alone on her couch Betty wondered why? Of course Polly was always +being swept off her feet by new people and new interests and so after +ten days in camp would not be so fond of her, but it was odd that she +cared nothing for her presence at their Council Fire to-night, since +they had planned the whole ceremony together and were to play leading +parts. +</p> + +<p> +Partly to close out the moonlight, which was now shining faintly inside +her tent, and partly to shut her ears to the voices and laughter of her +friends, Betty turned over on her balsam pillow with her face to the +tent side, and there covering up her head lay perfectly still, so still +that she would not even put her handkerchief to her eyes, although for +some reason or other they were uncomfortably moist. +</p> + +<p> +Fifteen minutes passed and there was no noise of a returning footfall, +but presently there was a faint, sweet odor in the lodge and Betty heard +a low call such as a boy would make on a wild reed whistle. +</p> + +<p> +She did not stir, so the sound was repeated more shrilly, and by and by +a pair of hands forcibly pulled the blankets down from her face. +</p> + +<p> +There stood Polly in her Indian costume with her intense love for the +dramatic shining in her eager face and holding above Betty's head two +perforated sticks, one painted blue to represent the sky, the other +green to represent the earth, and both of them decorated in tiny +feathers of birds and a pair of wing-like pendants. +</p> + +<p> +"Betty," Polly asked quietly, "do you remember the names of these two +Indian treasures and how hard we have worked to make them as like the +originals as we could?" +</p> + +<p> +"Of course, they are the calumets you are to use in the Council Fire +ceremony to-night. They are pretty!" Betty conceded. +</p> + +<p> +But Polly had dropped down by the side of her bed. "They have another +name, Betty, which isn't calumets and you know it, and we were to use +them at our Council Fire to-night. They are called 'pipes of peace' and +I can't very well lead the party that is to bring them to camp and also +the children who are to receive them." +</p> + +<p> +A silence in the tent then followed, lasting several moments. +</p> + +<p> +"Aren't you a little ashamed, Princess, thinking of the character of our +ceremony this evening, not to be willing to be present? It is to be war +and not peace then, isn't it?" +</p> + +<p> +Betty laughed. "I only said I was tired," she argued faintly. "I am +sure no one has the least reason for thinking I am angry if I happen to +prefer to rest." +</p> + +<p> +Then Polly began to feel that her case was won. Very quietly she +slipped over to a wooden dress-good's box covered with bright cretonne +and, opening it, drew forth the ceremonial dress so recently finished by +Esther, then she lighted two candles on either side the table underneath +their small mirror. Betty's head-dress was there, a band of her +favorite blue velvet ribbon with three white feathers crossed in front. +Catching it up Polly waved it temptingly. +</p> + +<p> +"Come on, Betty, and let me help you dress, everybody is waiting for us +and there never was such a night!" But seeing that her friend still +hesitated, added in a tone which was a question, not a reproach: "Don't +you think, dear, that so long as you really originated our Camp Fire +club and asked Miss McMurtry to be our guardian, it is rather a pity for +you to make the first break? Isn't one of the Camp Fire ideas to learn +to put the happiness of a good many people before our own personal +desires?" +</p> + +<p> +In a half minute Betty was out of bed with her Camp Fire dress nearly +on. "If you are going to turn preacher and reform at this time of life, +Polly O'Neill, then goodness knows what is to become of me! Once you +were my partner in crime, but now--well, it is hard to think of you even +yet as 'Saint Polly'!" +</p> + +<p> +"And will be to the end, me darling," Polly agreed, dropping into her +Irish brogue from sheer pleasure that her purpose was accomplished. +</p> + +<p> +Five minutes later the two friends were hurrying forth toward a circular +piece of ground some yards from their tent, which to-night the girls +wished known as their "earth lodge." There the other Camp Fire members +had already assembled with a great pile of wood in their midst waiting +to be kindled. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap11"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XI +</h3> + +<h3> +UNDER THE ROSE MOON +</h3> + +<p> +In June the moon of the Camp Fire girls is known as the Rose Moon. But +there were no roses blooming near their camping grounds at Sunrise Hill +to-night and only the odor of the pines made the night air fragrant. +</p> + +<p> +Betty went straight up to Miss McMurtry, however, and in her hand +carried a small cluster of pink roses. +</p> + +<p> +"I brought you these from our garden at home this afternoon; the house +is closed, but our old gardener is miserable because no one is about to +enjoy his flowers. Please wear them." +</p> + +<p> +Then before the older woman could do more than murmur "Thank you," Betty +had slipped away and taken her place in the circle of girls between Meg +and Esther, not without noticing, however, that their guardian looked +unusually well in a dress of plain white serge with her dark hair bound +about her head like a coronet. Also she saw that Miss McMurtry's face +had brightened, as she placed the flowers in her belt and felt that +peace was restored between them even before the beginning of their +ceremony of peace. +</p> + +<p> +The little company had evidently been waiting for the appearance of +Betty and Polly, for now Miss McMurtry stepped into the center of their +group and there was instant silence. She looked slowly about at the ten +faces gazing upon her with rapt attention and then sang in a low tone, +and yet one that could be distinctly heard, this ancient Indian chant. +</p> + +<p> +"To-day our Father (Sun) shone into our lodge, his power is very strong, +To-night our mother (Moon) shines into our lodge, her power is very +strong, I pray the Morning Star (their Son) that when he rises at +daybreak, he too will shine in to bless us and give us long life." +</p> + +<p> +This chant signified the opening of the Council Fire. For the next +moment Miss McMurtry turned toward the heap of wood carefully placed in +the center of the circle, by the wood-gatherers. A little pile of paper +with some small chips and dried twigs on top of it lay on the ground, +above which leaned a pyramid of larger logs, waiting to be lighted. +</p> + +<p> +Kneeling close by this pile the guardian of the Sunrise Camp Fire took +from her pocket a bit of flint and a piece of steel, striking them +sharply together. Tiny sparks flew forth but no answering crackle +resounded from the wood and paper, although the sparks darted in and out +among them like miniature fireflies. Once more Miss McMurtry tried her +flint and steel according to the prescribed rules, but again the result +was failure. +</p> + +<p> +Of course matches were not a luxury at Sunrise Camp and in the making of +their daily fires the campers were not superior to the using of them, +but this lighting of their first real Council Fire was to be a truly +important ceremony and greatly the members desired to return to the +primitive method of fire-making. +</p> + +<p> +There must be something more than superstition in the old axiom that the +third time is charm, perhaps three efforts are required for the training +of the human will; but however that may be, at the third striking +together of the metal and the flint the Sunrise Council fire sprang into +life, stick by stick it blazed forth, until at last a tongue of flame +leaping up in the air encircled the whole pyramid, setting the pine logs +into a splendid flare. +</p> + +<p> +On ten different faces it shone, revealing as many characters when, +seated in Indian fashion on straw mats upon the ground, the Camp Fire +girls now repeated in unison their "Ode to Fire." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Fire! Long years ago when our fathers fought with great animals you +were their protection. From the cruel cold of winter, you saved them. +When they needed food you changed the flesh of beasts into savory meat +for them. During all the ages your mysterious flame has been a symbol to +them for Spirit. So (to-night) we light our fire in remembrance of the +Great Spirit who gave you to us." +</p> + +<p> +Then Polly slowly arose from her place, approached the flames and cast +upon them a great bunch of sweet dried grass; a moment later the rising +smoke filled the air with an odor like incense. +</p> + +<p> +But the chief feature of to-night's ceremony was to be the elevation of +Esther Clark to the rank of Fire-Maker. For three months had she been +working to gain the fourteen necessary requirements and the twenty +elective honors, yet now as the moment for receiving her reward drew +near she felt a strong disposition to run away. Betty must have guessed +her feeling, for at the critical moment she slipped her arm through the +older girl's, smiling at her and pressing her hand encouragingly. +</p> + +<p> +"Don't be foolish and don't be frightened, Esther," she whispered +encouragingly, "for you are only to receive the honor that is your just +due!" +</p> + +<p> +Curious how often in the years that would follow, these same simple +words of Betty's were to be repeated in almost the same form to the girl +now seated at her side! +</p> + +<p> +Seeing that Esther was too timid to approach the center of the circle +alone, Betty accompanied her, standing a little to one side, while +Esther, in order to show her complete understanding of the whole Camp +Fire idea, repeated once again in her low beautiful voice (almost her +only attraction at this time of her life) "The Firemaker's Desire," the +same verse she had recited to Betty Ashton over her own fire on the day +of their first meeting in the Ashton home. Then Miss McMurtry slipped +over Esther's head a string of twenty shining beads representing her new +honors, and amid much clapping of hands from their small audience the +two girls returned to their places, Esther wondering if she were not +almost as happy in Betty's companionship as in her new title. For +remember, she had never had any intimate tie in her life, no father or +mother, no sisters or brothers, and only the care and kindness of +strangers until Miss McMurtry had made of her a friend. +</p> + +<p> +All this time Polly O'Neill has been vainly trying to pretend that she +is devoutly interested in what is taking place, although any one knowing +her would have understood that Polly's real attention was absorbed in +the feature of their Council Fire ceremony in which she was to play the +leading role. Now without further delay, and followed by Meg, Eleanor, +Beatrice and the faithful Sylvia, she disappeared into the Pine grove +not far from the gathering of the Council, while the remaining girls and +their guardian drew nearer to their own fire, heaping it with fresh pine +branches. +</p> + +<p> +And by and by, from the edge of the trees, the same notes from the +reed-like whistle that had called Betty to her place in the ceremony of +peace, now about to take place, were repeated. Then along a white path +of moonlight, in their Indian costumes, the five girls led by Polly, +swaying her pipes of peace slowly above her head, came dancing with a +queer, rhythmical movement of their bodies, arms and feet. +</p> + +<p> +A strange spectacle for these modern days, and yet many such an Indian +dance had taken place in these same New England hills hundreds of years +before! +</p> + +<p> +As they drew near enough to be plainly seen by the little party waiting +in their "earth lodge," Betty got up from her place, lifting on high a +fluttering white handkerchief tied to a birch pole. +</p> + +<p> +In the old days there were always two parties to this ancient Indian +ceremony of peace: those bringing the calumets were called "the fathers" +and those receiving them "the children". So it was necessary that Betty +should now indicate that "the children" were willing to receive the +blessing the other party desired to bring. +</p> + +<p> +The five visiting girls stood facing those seated on the ground; Polly +standing before their guardian and still waving her blue and green +perforated sticks made her carefully memorized speech with the dramatic +intensity dear to her theatrical soul. +</p> + +<p> +"These pipes of peace once symbolized heaven and earth to the Indians +and the mysterious power that permeates all nature. In their presence +the Indians were taught to care for their children, to think of the +future welfare of their people and to live at peace with one another. +The Indians were supposed to be a savage race and yet their prayer seems +to come very near to the ideals of the Camp Fire girls. May we also +live in peace with one another, learning from the women of the past all +that was best in their lives and refitting it to the needs of the now +women of to-day and to-morrow." +</p> + +<p> +Then at the end of her invocation she moved quietly from one Camp Fire +girl to the other, waving her blessing of peace over each bowed head. +And as she moved she sang the Indian song of peace, the other girls +straightway joining in, but it was not Polly's voice but Esther's that +carried the music of the refrain far out over the fields, carried it at +last to the ears of some one who had been seeking the home of the +Sunrise Camp for the past two hours. +</p> + +<p> +"Down through the ages vast On wings strong and true, From great +Wa-kon-da comes Good will to you--Peace that shall here remain." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap12"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XII +</h3> + +<h3> +NAN +</h3> + +<p> +At the close of the calumet ceremony the girls immediately drew closer +together about the fire, making ready for an informal discussion. Of +course they had been uncommonly serious for the past hour, but the night +was so mystically beautiful with the new moon casting a silver radiance +over the hills and fields, that there in the yellow glow of the Council +Fire the girls had felt the inspiration of its beauty and their own +seclusion. +</p> + +<p> +Since darkness had fallen there had been no noise save the murmur of +their own voices and the cry of "Hinakaga", the owl, like a sentry at +his post making his report from the grove of pines. +</p> + +<p> +Once or twice as the time slipped away Miss McMurtry had faintly +suggested that the hour had come for retiring, but always the girls, led +by Polly O'Neill, had pleaded that to-night was not like other nights, +and they must be allowed a slightly longer respite. During the earlier +part of the evening, when she had believed no one observing her, Polly +had evidently been on the lookout for something or some one, for she had +kept glancing slyly out across the country toward the path leading to +their camp; now, however, this idea must have passed from her mind, for +she was as completely absorbed as her companions in the selection of the +new names, which the girls might hope to bear in their Camp Fire club. +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry talked very little--persons who are deep students rarely +do; far more apt are those of us who play upon the surface of life to +like to do our thinking aloud. So now, the Council was surprised to +hear her speak in so earnest a tone that every one else was silenced: +</p> + +<p> +"Girls, I want you to do me a favor to-night. I don't know whether it +is usual for the guardian of a Camp Fire club to have a new title +awarded her, but nevertheless I want you to give me one. You see I am +Miss Martha or Miss McMurtry to most of you at school and really I wish +to forget that I am a schoolmarm this summer and to have you forget it. +I have been finding out a good many things since I came into camp, +though it hasn't been very long, and one of them is that a guardian does +not need so much to be a teacher as a friend to her girls. You see no +guardian can know everything that you girls are studying to gain your +elective honors, but, if we are friends we can work them out together." +</p> + +<p> +Deeply grateful was Betty Ashton for the night and the shadows of the +firelight that were playing on her face while Miss McMurtry was making +this little speech, which she could hardly help knowing was directed in +a large measure to her. However, she could not refrain from giving +Esther's arm a knowing pinch and then raising her eyes to intercept a +returning glance from Polly. +</p> + +<p> +Possibly Miss McMurtry expected Betty's point of view, even if she did +not see her express her surprise, for although some distance away from +her place in the circle her next remark was addressed to Betty. +</p> + +<p> +"Betty, can't you think of a name for me?" she asked deliberately, +wondering what answer under the circumstances she would be apt to +receive. "I know you and Polly have been reading a good deal in order to +find new names to suggest to the girls, so haven't you come across a +name that might be suitable for me? There are astrologers and fortune +tellers who believe that one's good or evil fate depends on bearing an +appropriate name and I have always hated mine." +</p> + +<p> +"But it exactly suits you and doesn't make you ridiculous like my name +does me!" Sylvia Wharton announced unexpectedly, breaking into the +conversation for the first time during the evening in her dull, even +tones. "What is really horrid is to have a name that suggests some one +very beautiful and graceful--a name that sounds like water running over +pebbles in a brook and then to look like I do. I wish everybody would +call me Mary Jane! I would like to have a plain, homely name." +</p> + +<p> +Such was the astonishment following Sylvia's protest that no one spoke +for at least half a minute. Who could have supposed her capable of +developing so much of an idea? For once in their acquaintance Polly +(for of course Sylvia managed to be next her) laughed with the little +girl instead of at her, at the same time taking the trouble to give one +of her stiff flaxen braids an amused tug, while Miss McMurtry, in order +to break the silence, went on talking about herself. +</p> + +<p> +"Of course my name suits me, Sylvia, that is the worst of it," she +laughed. "How can any one named Martha escape being a Martha? Oh, I +presume the name taken by itself is a good old-fashioned one, but in +combination with McMurtry it has such an old-maidy, school-teachery +sound that I have been compelled to live up to it. Now, Betty, please +make a suggestion." +</p> + +<p> +Betty flushed and at the same time smiled to herself. The Indian name +"Pokamp" or catbird had come to her mind shortly after her quarrel with +Miss McMurtry during the afternoon. "Minerva," she now proposed +faintly, "she was the Goddess of Wisdom." +</p> + +<p> +"Gracious no, that is worse than Martha to live up to!" Miss McMurtry +objected and also declined just as decisively the dignity of "Hypatia" +and "Aspasia', when those learned ladies of ancient times were offered +for her consideration. +</p> + +<p> +"We might call you 'Our Lady Protector'; it is just another expression +for guardian," Mollie O'Neill proposed uncertainly, not because she had +any enthusiasm for her idea but because no one else had anything better +to introduce, but before Miss McMurtry could answer, Polly's laugh had +settled the proposition. +</p> + +<p> +"Or we might call Miss Martha 'Chest Protector' or 'Bella Donna +Plaster', which is a very soothing title, meaning 'Beautiful Lady +Covering'," she teased. "Suppose, Miss Martha, that we just wait and +perhaps follow the old Indian custom of choosing your name through a +dream or the first object we see at an appointed time. But I must be +allowed to bestow Mollie's new name upon her," she added, gazing +sentimentally up into the sky and putting her arm apologetically about +her sister, riot knowing how much she might have enjoyed being laughed +at in public. +</p> + +<p> +This time, however, it was Mollie who plainly scored, for she only +laughed good humouredly saying: "Go ahead, Polly, you have arranged +everything else for me in my life except my name and you only didn't do +that at baptism because you were but a few weeks old!" +</p> + +<p> +During the shouts of merriment, Polly, acknowledging her autocratic +tendencies, could only hide her diminished head on her sister's +shoulder; nevertheless, sitting up again a few moments later she pointed +one hand in a dramatic fashion toward the heavens. "Only hear the name +I have found for you and you will forgive me much, Mollie Mavourneen," +she pleaded. "It is a part of our Camp Fire education to study the +stars, isn't it? Well, see the Seven Brothers, the Great Bear family +forming the Big Dipper in the northern sky. How many of us know that +those stars were shot up there to escape the wrath of their terrible +brother, Grizzly Bear, according to Indian astronomy. Now see that +small star just at one side of the handle of the Dipper, known as +'Sinopa'. Don't you think we ought to call Mollie, 'Sinopa,' when it +means 'Little Sister'?" +</p> + +<p> +Overwhelmed by the general approval of Polly's suggestion, Mollie would +never have had the courage to oppose it, but fortunately had no such +desire and so as usual agreed to her sister's wishes. +</p> + +<p> +"Marjoram" the girls next voted an appropriate new name for Margaret +Everett if she needed one, because in the first place the word was like +her own name and more important was its pretty German meaning, +"happy-minded", one of those rare plants that has no single ugly quality. +</p> + +<p> +Edith Norton agreed to be called "Apoi-a-kimi," because the Indian word +meant "light hair" and she was particularly proud of her own fluffy +blonde hair even though since becoming a Camp Fire girl she had felt +compelled to hide away her puffs. +</p> + +<p> +Very easily might the girls have continued this discussion of their +titles until the sun rose beyond their Sunrise Hill, had not Miss +McMurtry suddenly looked at her watch by bending close to the light of +their fire. Then she rose so quickly and with such a sharp exclamation +of surprise that several of the girls got up with her. +</p> + +<p> +"Camp Fire maidens, what are we thinking of? It is after ten o'clock +and we must say good-night and extinguish our fire. What a wonderful +night it has been, so quiet, so serene that I think no one of us will +soon forget it!" Very naturally she looked away from the group of girls +close about her for a wider view of the landscape, hoping that this +vision of its beauty might remain with her. Already the early splendor +of the night was beginning to fade and although the moonlight still made +the objects near by fairly distinct, farther off they were black and +ghostlike. Perhaps for this reason Miss McMurtry at first made no sign, +though believing she saw a small object dart forth from the shelter of +the pine trees, run a few steps, crouch down and then getting up again +run on a few feet more. +</p> + +<p> +Of course she and the Camp Fire girls felt perfectly safe in their +retreat in the woods, although just at the beginning of their +encampment, when the nights closed down upon them, some few of the girls +had felt awed and nervous, now after ten such experiences the sense of +unfamiliarity was quite gone. +</p> + +<p> +Sunrise Hill was on the border of the Webster farm, two miles from the +village and well out of the way of trespassers. There were no wild +animals about in these New Hampshire hills, for hunters had long since +driven them away, and yet Miss McMurtry wondered dimly if the object +plainly intending to come up to them could be an animal. She did not +have to wonder very long, however, for the object soon rose on two legs +and was plainly a human being. +</p> + +<p> +What should be done? Miss McMurtry did not wish to alarm the younger +girls, when there was no possible reason for fear, and yet she was +annoyed, for if some one were trying to spy upon them at this hour the +intruder must be summarily dealt with. Fortunately, Polly O'Neill had +risen when her guardian did and happened to be standing next her at this +minute. Slipping her arm through Polly's a slight movement drew her +aside. +</p> + +<p> +"Polly," she whispered, "there is something or someone coming toward us; +let us go forward quietly and find out what or who it is." +</p> + +<p> +Instantly catching the direction of Miss McMurtry's guarded glance, +Polly, not hesitating a second, broke away and ran forward alone to meet +the advancing figure. Nevertheless, the older woman followed so +promptly that she was able to catch the girl's first words even before +seeing the person to whom they were addressed. +</p> + +<p> +"Why, Nan Graham, what do you mean by coming out here so late?" Polly +demanded. "When I told you that you might look on at our Council Fire +to-night I thought of course that you would come to camp before dark so +that I could ask permission and explain." +</p> + +<p> +Half leading, half pulling the newcomer, who after all was only another +young girl, Polly drew her closer to the circle of their slowly dying +fire. First she looked appealingly at their guardian, who had walked +forward with them, and then from one of her friends' faces to the other +until she found Betty's. There were no returning glances of sympathy +from a single one of the Camp Fire girls. +</p> + +<p> +Unfortunately, Nan Graham was not a stranger to any member of the +Sunrise Hill club except to Juliet and Beatrice Field, who were +themselves strangers in Woodford. Had Nan been, her reception would +have been more cordial, even though appearing at night in so +unconventional a fashion. But the newcomer had been a student with most +of the girls at the high school the winter before and had been expelled +for supposed dishonesty. Her family was impossible, the father, a man of +good birth fallen so low that his own people would have nothing to do +with him, had married an emigrant woman and Nan was one of many +children. The girl had tried working in the village, but no one cared +to trouble with her long. And yet she was just a little more than +fifteen years old and not an unattractive looking girl, although her +face was curiously older than any other girl's in the group about her. +To-night she was wearing a shabby black frock, torn and dusty, and her +coarse short black hair was unpleasantly disheveled. +</p> + +<p> +"I couldn't leave home until late and then I lost my way," she replied +finally, answering Polly's question in a sullen fashion because of the +weight of disapproval. +</p> + +<p> +"What right had you to say she could come, Polly O'Neill, when you +understand that we like to keep our Council Fires to ourselves?" flashed +Betty, and then stopped, knowing that it was plainly not her place to +speak first. +</p> + +<p> +"You should have returned home when you found you had mistaken the way," +Miss McMurtry frowned. "You ought not to have come through the woods +alone at this hour of the night, Nan, as you know perfectly well. But +there is no way now for me to send you back to-night, though I am sure I +don't know what to do with you. Polly, I think you owe it to us to +explain why you invited a guest to camp and then gave us no warning so +that we might have been prepared." +</p> + +<p> +Under the influence of the meeting of the Council Fire and perhaps more +under the spell of Polly's magnetism than she realized, Miss McMurtry, +although it was plain that she was a good deal vexed, did not put her +question severely. +</p> + +<p> +So it was naturally irritating, not only to her but to a number of the +girls as well, to have Polly, in the midst of the general disapproval, +suddenly shrug her shoulders and give a characteristic laugh. "Oh, for +goodness' sake, don't let us make a mountain out of a molehill!" she +begged. "I was coming back to camp this afternoon and happening to pass +Nan's home, she told me something that I thought it great fun for us to +know. Some of our boy friends are coming out to camp to-morrow +disguised as Indians and mean to take us by surprise. We can be +prepared for them and so turn the joke around the other way. Well, +after Nan told me this we talked for a little while, while Mollie and +Bee and Sylvia walked on ahead. She seemed desperately anxious to hear +about our camp and how we were living and what we were doing, so I told +her to come along and see us. I really don't see that she can do us any +harm. As far as to-night is concerned, why I will make up beds for us +just outside our tent, for I have been wishing to sleep outdoors ever +since we came into camp." +</p> + +<p> +"And then I can go back home again in the morning," the newcomer said +with a scowl. "I wasn't meaning to do any harm just by looking on." +</p> + +<p> +Polly would have liked to have embraced Margaret Everett on the spot, +for now separating herself from her friends she came shyly forward +taking the strange girl's hand. "I am sorry you have had such a +tiresome walk," she said kindly; "come let us all get ready for bed." +</p> + +<p> +Mollie and Sylvia Wharton followed Meg's example in speaking to their +unwelcome visitor, but Betty set the example for the others, by merely +passing her by with a nod of her head. +</p> + +<p> +However, when Esther and Mollie were both asleep, Betty came out from +her tent and stood for a moment looking down at the two figures on their +hastily improvised beds only a few feet away from her own tent. +</p> + +<p> +One of them stirring, she bent over her whispering: "Good-night, Polly; +of course there is no harm in Nan's being here one night, but please +don't ask her to stay longer." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap13"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XIII +</h3> + +<h3> +"NOBODY WANTS TO BE DONE GOOD TO" +</h3> + +<p> +A canoe containing three girls had been out on the waters of the lake +near the foot of Sunrise Hill for the past two hours. A part of the +time it had been swiftly shot through the water only to rest afterwards +in certain shadowed places, where fishing lines were quietly dropped +over its sides, until now a flat birch basket in its stern was filled +with freshly caught fish. +</p> + +<p> +There had been little conversation during this time, but now Polly +O'Neill, letting her paddle rest for a moment, said to her fellow +oarsman: +</p> + +<p> +"Come, Betty, let us drift for a while. We don't have to get back to +camp just yet, for it will be another two hours probably before our +supposedly unexpected guests arrive, so we will have plenty of time to +help with the preparations, to fry the fish and have Mollie make her +inspired corn dodgers. It will be rather good fun when the Indian +chiefs appear to strike terror to our hospitality, if not to our souls, +for us to be ready and waiting for them, Semper paratus, always +prepared, we can assure them is a Camp Fire girl's motto. But just now +I wish to talk." +</p> + +<p> +Betty's back was turned to the speaker, but her sister, Mollie, sat +facing her midway between the other two seats. Quietly and without +replying Betty acquiesced in the request, permitting their canoe to +glide slowly toward a small island and getting her kodak ready for +action. One of her summer amusements was the making of a collection of +animal and bird pictures, and now a large nest overhanging the water +attracted her attention. +</p> + +<p> +Therefore it was Mollie who replied to her sister, although the remark +had not been made directly to her. +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, Polly, we know you want to talk and we think we know what you want +to talk about. I saw it on your face at breakfast even if Betty didn't +and knew perfectly well why you persuaded Miss Martha to let us come +with you for the fishing and no one else, even when Sylvia Wharton was +almost in tears at being left behind." +</p> + +<p> +"You don't know what I want to talk about, do you, Princess? Mollie is +absurd, for I am sure I was not thinking of it at breakfast," Polly +halloed, wishing that her friend's face was toward her so that she might +gain something from her expression. A moment longer she had to wait for +her answer because a great heron, startled by the noise, rose out of its +nest flapping its great wings and ungainly legs and Betty's kodak +instantly clicked with its appearance. Then she shook her head slowly, +still not turning around, as she replied: +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, I do know, Polly. That is why I would not agree to come with you +until I had first had a little talk with Miss McMurtry. I didn't want +to be obstinate if I am wrong, but she feels exactly as I do." +</p> + +<p> +Polly whistled softly, two bright spots of color showing on her high +cheek bones, a signal with her of being desperately in earnest. +Nevertheless she returned indifferently: "Of course if Betty and our +guardian agree, then have righteousness and truth met together and there +is no use wasting my breath by putting in my poor little plea." +</p> + +<p> +"There is no use in your being disagreeable, Polly," Mollie advised, who +was not in the least afraid of scolding her sister, although rarely +quarreling with her. "In this case I think Betty is entirely in the +right, for this is not a question of money or family or many of the +things you and Betty disagree about, it is a question of the person!" +</p> + +<p> +"Gracious, what person?" Polly protested. "You are both talking +riddles. Have I mentioned anybody's name or proposed any mortal thing? +If I happen to be interested in this Nan Graham and to believe that +things have been made pretty hard for her, is it anybody's business? I +don't know just what it is about her that makes me feel as if she were a +poor little hunted animal. I really don't think anybody has ever been +even decently kind to her in her life; she has always had a bad name, +and it must be a pretty hard thing to have to grow up in the shadow of +one with no one to give you a boost. Take that affair at school; it was +never positively proven that Nan was dishonest. Only she had told a few +lies and her family was so horrid. Another girl might have been given +another chance!" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, we can't give her a chance at our Camp Fire club this summer, +dear, Miss Martha is positive about it, so don't pretend that is not +what you have on your mind," Betty interrupted. "I am sorry, but Miss +Martha says she is a very different type of girl from the rest of us and +might get us into trouble, and she is afraid our parents would not like +her being with us." +</p> + +<p> +"I don't know about parents, but I am sure mother wouldn't mind our +helping another girl, perhaps just because she is different." And +Polly's eyes filled with quick tears at the thought of her first long +separation from her mother. +</p> + +<p> +But Mollie shook her head slowly though not unsympathetically. "I am +not so sure, Polly," she argued. "You know mother is always urging you +to be sensible first and sentimental afterwards, and says that half the +trouble in your life will come from working the other way round. Just +take the question of the money; Nan Graham would never be able to pay +her share, and although we let Mr. Ashton give us our camping outfit, +each one of us is to pay her portion of our expenses and to try and find +out how economical we can be. It isn't fair to impose a girl on Betty--" +</p> + +<p> +"I have no idea of imposing Nan Graham on Betty," Polly interrupted +hastily. "If it ever comes to be just a question of money, why I will +promise to pay her expenses and to try to be responsible for her." +</p> + +<p> +"You?" Mollie stared. "Polly O'Neill, you must be out of your senses. +You know we have just barely enough for ourselves and are even trying to +save a bit out of that, besides working at basket making and anything +else we can do, to send mother some extra money." +</p> + +<p> +Polly smiled in a superior fashion. "There are more ways for making +money, Sinopa, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. I have my own +reasons for not telling you, but I expect to come into a sum of money +shortly which will certainly be more than enough to pay this poor Nan's +expenses." +</p> + +<p> +"But it is not the money that I care about in the least, Poay," Betty +exclaimed, "and you know it! Somehow I am just afraid that in some way +Nan will bring unhappiness among us." +</p> + +<p> +"Of course it is not the money you care about, Princess." (Polly's +apology was as ardent as her suggestion.) "Sometimes I wonder what +would happen to you if you should ever be poor and have to learn to +think about such an ugly, commonplace thing as money. Never mind, I am +going to be an American Sarah Bernhardt and you and Mollie can travel +about in my private car with me. But you understand if you agree to let +Nan Graham stay in camp with us, I can't let her be an expense to you or +the other girls." +</p> + +<p> +By way of answer Betty looked at her watch. "It is getting pretty late, +Polly, don't you think we had better get back to camp?" she proposed. +</p> + +<p> +In perfect accord the two girls now swept their canoe back to their +landing place, for they could row perfectly together, swim, paddle a +canoe, ride, play tennis, in fact do everything except have the same +opinions. +</p> + +<p> +The two girls carried the basket of fish, leaving Mollie to tie up the +canoe. +</p> + +<p> +"I hope you don't feel very disappointed, Polly, it was because I was +afraid you might think it a good idea to have Nan Graham join our Camp +Fire club that I asked you not to think of it last night," Betty said, +apologetically, sorry as always to disappoint her friend and not +unaffected by her point of view. +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, but you put it in my head, Betty Ashton. Really I never dreamed at +first of letting Nan do anything more than come and see what our Camp +Fire life was like. She was so eager and so interested when I met her +yesterday that she seemed kind of pitiful to me. She told me she was +dreadfully lonely because nice girls wouldn't have anything more to do +with her now and yet she didn't want really to be bad. No one will take +her to work, so she couldn't think what she could do with herself all +summer. Last night when you went in to bed I kept on thinking about her +and about what our Camp Fire may mean some day when we are older and +stronger ourselves and understand more about it. Of course no one wants +to be done good to, that is horrid and patronizing, but everybody wants +to be made happier, rich people: and poor people too. Remember how you +once said that Wohelo, Work, Health and Love, solved all life's +difficulties. +</p> + +<p> +"Wohelo means love. We love Love, for love is life, and light and joy +and sweetness, And love is comradeship and motherhood, and fatherhood, +and all dear Kinship. Love is the joy of kinship so deep that self is +forgotten." +</p> + +<p> +"Now I wonder if comradeship and kinship really mean just caring about +the people we would have had to care about anyway, our own friends or +our own family?" +</p> + +<p> +Having unconsciously touched upon one of the biggest questions in the +world and having no answer, the two girls were both silent for a moment. +Then Polly added in a surrender unusual to her: +</p> + +<p> +"Don't worry, Betty, perhaps you are, right after all. Nobody can live +up to all the things we preach. Anyhow it was, good of you to ask Miss +Martha to let Nan spend the day with us. She says she will never get +over the pleasure of it as long as she lives." +</p> + +<p> +"Don't, Polly, really I do not think I can be expected to bear any more. +You, have made me feel already that if Nan Graham ever does anything +wrong or brings any sorrow on herself by her behavior, why it will +somehow be my fault. Why do you make me responsible when you know Miss +McMurtry and most of the other girls are just as opposed to having her +with us as I am?" said Betty, realizing that her defense was a sign of +weakness and yet feeling that Polly had somehow driven her to the wall. +</p> + +<p> +"Because, Betty, you know that if you try you can bring some of the +girls to your way of thinking and I can work on the others. Then +together if we promise to be responsible for Nan's good behavior, why we +may be able to influence Miss Martha." +</p> + +<p> +Betty sighed. Mollie was catching up with them and they had almost +reached camp, which was a scene of the most amazing activity. +</p> + +<p> +"Ask me again to-night, Polly, I will try to think things over a little +more." +</p> + +<p> +There was no opportunity for any further discussion, for at this instant +Meg and Eleanor swept down upon them. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap14"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XIV +</h3> + +<h3> +SURPRISING THE CAMP +</h3> + +<p> +In the middle of the camping grounds on their return the girls now +beheld Miss Martha McMurtry waving a large kitchen spoon in somewhat the +same fashion that a conductor uses his baton to direct the energies of +his orchestra. Rushing from one spot to the other her aides were +engaged in putting fresh wood on one smoldering camp fire, stirring up +slumbering ashes in another, removing kettles to different points of +vantage and generally giving the impression that they were preparing for +the feeding of an army. However, they were only getting ready for the +entertainment of a few of their Boy Scout friends. +</p> + +<p> +Early that morning Nan Graham had been made to explain more fully the +information bestowed on Polly the day before. It seemed that her father +had been engaged to do odd jobs at the camp of the Scouts several miles +away from Sunrise Hill and had overheard the plan of the young men to +test the mettle of the Camp Fire girls. Take them by surprise, bear +down upon them without warning, that was the way to discover whether the +girls were lolling about reading novels and eating sweets as they +suspected, or attending to the sterner duties of camp life. Subject +them to the trial of preparing an impromptu meal for hungry guests, in +short, see whether the effort of the girls to effect an organization +similar in many respects to the Boy Scouts wasn't sheer bluff. +</p> + +<p> +Nothing had been said, because of course it must have been so easy to +surmise the amount of criticism and discussion that arose in Woodford +when the village learned of the decision of the first Camp Fire girls' +club to spend the summer together in the woods. And sternest of all +critics were the brothers, boy cousins and friends, most of whom +belonged to the Boy Scout brigades, spending most of their spare time +and money in them. For of course the thing that was good for a boy was +for that very reason bad for a girl, an age old argument, beginning with +the question of educating women at all and extending now to their right +to the vote. +</p> + +<p> +Curiously John Everett, Margaret's brother, was at first more bitterly +opposed to the Camp Fire idea than any one else in Woodford. Meg's +place was at home, every girl's was, even though there was no one at +home with her. It was hard lines that his father had to be in Boston +the greater part of the summer and that he would be in camp, but he was +not going to have Meg getting drowned or burned up or worn out without +masculine protection--away from home. Should any one of these +misfortunes overtake her at home--why somehow it would be different. +</p> + +<p> +But fortunately for Meg's summer happiness, her Professor father did not +share in his son's opinions and after John had a long talk with Betty +Ashton he became well, not convinced, but at least more open to +conviction. Usually Betty did have this effect upon him, which was +perhaps fortunate for them both. +</p> + +<p> +So John Everett might certainly be expected as one of the surprise party +and probably Jim Meade, Eleanor's brother Frank Wharton, and Ralph and +Hugh Bowles, who belonged to the same group of friends, besides, well, +it was the entire uncertainty in regard to the actual number of their +visitors which was keeping the Camp Fire girls so extraordinarily busy, +their idea being to have everything prepared and hidden away and then +produced as though they were in the habit of having just such a +magnificent supply of rations always on hand. +</p> + +<p> +Eleanor and Meg had made an Irish stew of half their week's supply of +meat and vegetables; Esther, assisted by Juliet Field, had baked enough +beans for feeding half Beacon Street; while Miss McMurtry herself had +presided over the giant loaves of brown bread, which can be easily +boiled in closed tins and make specially superior camp food. +</p> + +<p> +Upon Beatrice, Sylvia and the unwelcome newcomer, Nan Graham, had +devolved the cleaning up of the camp grounds and their work had been +most thoroughly done, but indeed no one could be accused, of anything +approaching sloth this morning when so much of their future reputation +was at stake. Only Edith Norton had been unable to help because of her +work in town, but she hoped to be able to return to camp by noon so as +not to miss the good times. +</p> + +<p> +At eleven o'clock every bit of the work, of preparation had been +accomplished and Nan's report had said that the Scouts expected to +appear just about the noon luncheon hour. The food was hidden away in +the kitchen tent and the girls rearranged their costumes, then after +posting Nan, Beatrice and Sylvia as sentinels to give warning of the +first approach of their guests, the other girls settled themselves to +whatever occupations they considered might make the best impression. +</p> + +<p> +Eleanor got out the Camp Fire log book, whose cover she had previously +decorated with a wonderful sunrise appearing above the summit of a +purple hill, and now began to illustrate some of the inside pages with +scenes recalling the events of the past ten days. Mollie's tastes were +too domestic for any deception, so she went on with her pretty basket +weaving, while Esther sat near her studying the Indian song received the +day before. However, the really impressive occupation was conceived and +engineered by Polly's dramatic sense, for she engaged Miss McMurtry and +the rest of the girls in the mysteries of knot tying, one of the +difficult feats of camp craft, since there are a good many more +varieties of knots than one has fingers. For example, there is the +square knot, bowline, alpine, kite string, half hitch, clove hitch for +tying two ends together, and as many more for making knots at the end of +a rope, and yet, unless one happens to be a Camp Fire girl, these +comparatively simple accomplishments are entirely closed arts. +</p> + +<p> +Now everybody at Sunrise Camp is accounted for excepting its solitary +masculine member--Little Brother. During all the morning preparations +he had been a very difficult problem, but finally washed and arrayed in +a stiff white Russian blouse, Meg conceived the brilliant idea of +attaching him to the camp totem pole. The pole was simply a tree +cleared of its branches at the present time, which the girls hoped later +on to develop into a real Indian totem pole, but standing just a few +yards in front of the group of tents it formed a center for all eyes and +therefore seemed the best possible place for keeping a little boy always +in sight. Little Brother was at first very happy because he had with +him the things he loved best: a discarded bathing shoe, a bottle of hard +brown beans and an old cream whipper, that made the most delectable +noises as one turned it about. Indeed, so soothing did its noises become +that, on returning for the sixth time from her game to see that the +small boy was safe, Meg discovered him fast asleep in a patch of +sunshine on the grass. +</p> + +<p> +Five minutes before noon Sylvia Wharton came running breathless with +excitement from her sentry post. Dust was rising at some distance off +in the curve of the lane where a path led across the fields to Sunrise +Camp. Harder and faster the girls continued at their work, of course +appearing superbly unconscious of possible interruption and yet ten +minutes later, when Edith Norton returned from the village on her +bicycle along the way of Sylvia's warning, there was a sort of general +let-down feeling though no one confessed to it. +</p> + +<p> +Then half an hour passed, noon was in the background of the day and +hunger was laying fierce hold on the camp members. Their practice of +knot tying abruptly ceased, Eleanor put her book and paints aside with a +sense of relief, Mollie and Esther arose sighing. +</p> + +<p> +"We have got to have our own lunch, girls, we simply can't wait any +longer," Miss McMurtry insisted, and no one seemed sufficiently +inspirited to discuss the question, when unexpectedly a cry from Meg +brought everybody to life. +</p> + +<p> +Little Brother had disappeared! In spite of the professional knot-tying +he had managed to slip away, leaving his moorings still attached to the +pole. Ten seconds afterwards as many girls were searching for him, only +Esther remaining behind with Miss McMurtry. As his small footprints led +directly to the grove of pines, his favorite playing ground, the entire +party sought him there, and after running about for an eighth of a mile +searching and calling, they came across the young man throned high on +the shoulders of a six-foot Scout, clothed in khaki and leather boots +but wearing a perfectly absurd Indian head-dress and false-face. He was +followed by ten other youths, gotten up in equally absurd fashions for +the complete bewilderment of the Camp Fire girls. +</p> + +<p> +"Do take those ridiculous things off at once, John Everett," Betty +demanded first, as she happened to be in advance of the other girls, and +on John's immediately complying with her request, his companions +followed his example. Then gaily the entire procession made for camp, +but as Miss McMurtry and Esther heard them coming when some distance +off, they did not seem particularly surprised at their advance. Indeed, +the ridiculous fact was that the Scouts failed altogether to mention +that their intention had been to steal into Sunrise Camp unperceived, +and the girls were equally negligent in not expressing more profound +amazement at their wholly unlooked-for visit. +</p> + +<p> +Only there was one special bit of surprise for Betty Ashton and possibly +for Esther as well. Richard Ashton had come down from Portsmouth to +find out how Betty was getting on, and on hearing of the scouting +expedition had joined their party. Of course he only spoke to Esther in +the same fashion that he did to his sister's other friends, nevertheless +she felt more at her ease, perhaps because he was her one acquaintance +in the group of young men. +</p> + +<p> +And Polly also had a surprise, though not so pleasant a one, for the +youth whom she had tried to slay, like David did Goliath, was one of +their Boy Scout guests and Polly wondered if it were her duty to inquire +in regard to his wounded feelings or to pretend that to-day's more +formal meeting was in reality their first? +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap15"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XV +</h3> + +<h3> +A WARNING +</h3> + +<p> +But the girl did not have to decide the problem, for the young man +solved it for her. +</p> + +<p> +They were in the midst of luncheon, which was spread out on a vast +table-cloth covering ten or fifteen square feet of ground, when he arose +solemnly and bearing his plate in his hand came over and sat down on the +grass alongside of Polly. In his khaki uniform, with his hair, skin and +clothes so much the same color, he was far less countrified, indeed, +almost good looking the girl conceded to herself, while waiting for him +to speak first, giving her the clue to his attitude toward her. +</p> + +<p> +"You were awfully kind the other day and, I am much obliged to you," he +said a trifle awkwardly, but with gracious intention. "I am afraid I +should have had rather an uncomfortable time of it but for you." +</p> + +<p> +Polly cast her eyes demurely toward her lap, turning her head slightly +to one side, "I am afraid you did have an uncomfortable time anyhow. I +was very sorry." She had flushed the least little bit, but her lips +were twitching with amusement. +</p> + +<p> +The young fellow smiled. "Oh, don't you be sorry," he protested, "leave +that to the guilty person, or I am afraid she may keep you being sorry +for her sins all the days of your life." +</p> + +<p> +"I will not!" Polly snapped, in such evident irritation that the young +man leaned deliberately over her shoulder staring into her face. Then +he actually laughed. "I am sorry myself now," he apologized, "but I +thought you were the pretty one." +</p> + +<p> +"Well I am not and that is a horrid way to get even!" +</p> + +<p> +Again the young man laughed. "I beg your pardon, I mean I thought you +were the nice one!" And this time Polly happening to catch his eye, +which had some of her own sense of humor in it, laughed to herself and +then swung round to talk to him more directly. +</p> + +<p> +"No, I am neither the pretty one nor the nice one," she avowed. "There +is Mollie sitting between Ralph Bowles and Frank Wharton and you can go +talk to her in a moment. But just the same I am sorry that I happened +to hit you the other day and I was just as much surprised at its having +happened as you could possibly have been." +</p> + +<p> +Her companion nodded as though to dismiss the subject. "If Mollie is +the nice one and the pretty one, would you mind telling me your name, +then perhaps next time I may be able to tell you apart without your +giving me such strenuous examples of your differences in character." +</p> + +<p> +The girl shrugged her shoulders pretending to be entirely indifferent +and yet a little piqued at the suggestion in the last sentence. The +difference between herself and Mollie, all in her opinion in her +sister's favor, was a sensitive subject. +</p> + +<p> +"I was christened Pauline in baptism but I am usually known as Polly. +However, my sister and I both recognize ourselves when called Miss +O'Neill." This was such an evident attempt on Polly's part to put her +questioner in his proper place that he could not rise entirely superior +to it, even though her intention to hit back was so transparent. +</p> + +<p> +"May I tell you my name now?" he asked in a more humble tone, as though +wishful to make peace. +</p> + +<p> +"You don't have to tell me your name for I am very sure I know it +already," the girl answered in a provoking manner, for which she had a +peculiar talent. "You see our guardian told us that you were the son of +the Mr. Webster who owns the land on which we are camping, and I am +convinced that there is no young man in New Hampshire boasting the last +name, Webster, whose first name isn't Daniel! Do you think we would so +fail to commemorate our greatest statesman? It must be rather dreary to +be named for so great a person that you know whatever you may achieve +yourself you must always sound like an anti-climax." +</p> + +<p> +This time it was surely Polly who had struck home, for the young man +colored and applied himself to the food on his plate for at least a +moment before he replied: "You are right, my name is Daniel and I have +felt about it a little as you say, but then I am also called William, +which is a better name for a farmer." +</p> + +<p> +"Farmer?" Polly forgot that she and her companion had been sparring and +let a genuine interest creep into her tone. "Do you really mean that +you are going to be content to be a farmer all the days of your life, to +stay right on here and never see anything or be anything else? It +sounds so strange to me--for a man to have no ambition!" Almost she +forgot her companion and sat frowning with her eyes more serious than +usual and her thin face with its sensitive features and high cheek bones +turned upward toward the peak of Sunrise Hill. "I am a girl, but I am +going all over the world and I am going to be an actress and do ten +thousand delightful things just as fast as I can before I have a chance +to get old." +</p> + +<p> +Gazing at her more intently than ever before in their conversation, the +young fellow shook his head. "No you won't,"' he said bluntly, "you +will never be strong enough and you had better stay here in the hills +and let some one look after you, your sister or--some one. Yet you need +not talk as though being a farmer was a thing to look down upon. I am +sure our great men all used to be farmers, George Washington and the +rest of 'em. You must know their names better than I do. So please +bear in mind that I intend to do my best to make things grow--hayseed!" +he laughed good humouredly, guessing Polly's secret scorn of him, "but +at the same time I expect to see something and if I'm lucky to be +something, though if I'm a first-class farmer it isn't so worse. Do +give me your plate, you have eaten very little and the rest of the crowd +is getting dreadfully ahead of us." +</p> + +<p> +But Polly, jumping up hastily and the young man following her, led him +over and introduced him to Mollie, with whom he spent the greater part +of the afternoon. +</p> + +<p> +From two o'clock till sundown the hours at Sunrise, Camp were fairly +strenuous ones since the Camp Fire girls insisted on comparative tests +of skill with their Boy Scout guests. Of course the young men agreed, +although they were pleasantly scornful, until possibly owing to their +morning's contest the girls actually won out in the knot-tying contest, +which was supposed to be a peculiarly masculine accomplishment. In +running, jumping and feats of marksmanship the girls of course were +easily outclassed by their opponents; however, Beatrice Field, who was +so light and so small that no one considered her in the race, did come +in second in a short thirty-yard dash. Then Miss McMurtry held a kind +of impromptu examination in questions of patriotism and nature lore, the +girls and men managing to about equally divide the honors. But the +really extraordinary feature of the afternoon was that dull little +Sylvia Wharton, the youngest member of the company, was easily first in +half a dozen observation games most important in the training of Camp +Fire girls and Boy Scouts. For instance, in a Quick-sight experiment, +the girls and boys walking rapidly from the camping ground to the shores +of the lake, Sylvia had seen eight small objects more than any one else +and she was so quiet and looked so stolid while doing it that Polly +wanted to laugh, and began to doubt her stupidity. +</p> + +<p> +At six o'clock it still appeared as though the Boy Scouts intended +remaining for the evening meal and camp fire; however, Miss McMurtry +kindly but firmly bade them farewell. The girls were tired and it was a +long tramp back to the Scout camp. There had been no suggestion from +any one that the surprise visit had been made in any spirit of criticism +and yet John Everett made a half-hearted apology to Betty and his +sister. +</p> + +<p> +When the farewells were being said all round, he called the two girls +aside: +</p> + +<p> +"I say," he murmured boyishly, in spite of his years and six feet, "I +have got to confess that I never saw you girls looking so well, so kind +of up to the limit before, and I thought by this time you would surely +be fagged out, or bored, or sick of trying things out together. Now I +don't say I approve of this Camp Fire business, I won't go so far as +that, but it does not seem to have done either of you any harm yet." +</p> + +<p> +And then laughing at his grudging attitude the three of them rejoined +their friends, who were waiting to end their day together by singing "My +Country, 'Tis of Thee." And they were waiting because Esther Clark was +needed for leading the song and in the last few moments she had +disappeared with Richard Ashton, who had been watching the proceedings +all day with an expression that was sometimes amused but the greater +part of the time grave. He had no opportunity for speaking to Betty or +to any one else alone and only to Esther because he had just made a +deliberate effort. As they came slowly back from the pine grove +together, Betty felt cross at Dick's choice of a companion when any one +of her other friends would have been pleased by his attention. +</p> + +<p> +Then, too, Esther looked as serious as her brother and Betty hated +unnecessary seriousness, besides Dick needed some one to make him gay, +not an awkward, uninteresting acquaintance like Esther. But there was +no use in arguing with Dick, for he would always be kind to the people +who were left out of things and seemed most to require kindness. Sorry +to have seen so little of her brother during his short visit, Betty now +slipped her hand into his and held it tight while Esther, standing some +distance apart from them, started the air for their parting hymn. The +girl was not thinking of herself and so was unconscious that the others, +even while singing, were also listening with surprise and pleasure to +the clear, rounded tones of her beautiful mezzo-soprano voice. In +reality Esther Clark was thinking only of Betty and the news that Dick +Ashton had just told her. Mr. Ashton, his father, had been taken ill in +Italy and, though there was no immediate danger, might never be well +again. For the present it was thought best that he remain indefinitely +in Europe, so the family had not decided whether or not to tell the +facts to Betty. She could do no good; even Dick was not going to him, +and it was always best to keep every possible sorrow from Betty. But +really, because Dick Ashton could not make up his mind just what was the +wisest course, he confided his secret to Esther, asking her to think +matters over and write him her judgment. You see there was no question +of Esther's unusual devotion to Betty and readiness to sacrifice +everything for her, though there seemed to be no reason, and surely +Betty was entirely careless of it. +</p> + +<p> +Before the twilight of the long afternoon had entirely faded into night, +every Camp Fire girl, including Nan Graham, who was not a member, had +vanished into bed. The child was too tired to be sent home to-night and +word would be taken to her parents by one of the boys. Miss McMurtry +herself was asleep as soon as her girls. And indeed Polly entirely +forgot that Betty had suggested she put the question of Nan's remaining +in camp with them to her again during the evening. +</p> + +<p> +How many hours Polly had been asleep outside her tent with the newcomer +by her side she did not know, but suddenly she was awakened by a sound +that was like a sob. Sitting up quickly she saw Nan kneeling on the +ground and looking up at the sky. +</p> + +<p> +Polly waited in silence until the girl, feeling her wakefulness, came +slowly back to her own bed and somehow Polly could see that her face had +lost its sharp, old look and was like a child's. +</p> + +<p> +"I was praying you'd keep me in camp with you long enough to give me a +try," she explained. +</p> + +<p> +Like a flash Betty's suggestion that she might change her opinion after +thinking things over came back to Polly's mind. Of course the day had +not been conducive to reflection, but perhaps it might be just as well +not to give Betty too much time to think. +</p> + +<p> +Half an hour afterwards Polly crawled under the blue blankets and +putting her arms about her friend whispered her request. And just at +first Betty was too sleepy to know what was being asked of her and later +on was possibly too tired to resist, for she yawned an agreement. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh yes, I will do my best to persuade the girls to let her stay on if +you want her and Miss Martha consents. But if there is trouble, Polly--" +and she was almost asleep again. +</p> + +<p> +Polly gave her another gentle shake. "Promise to keep your money hidden +and not put temptation in her way. Esther says she found your +pocketbook stuffed with money in the middle of the tent floor." +</p> + +<p> +"I promise," Betty ended hardly knowing what she said. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap16"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XVI +</h3> + +<h3> +LEARNING TO KEEP STEP +</h3> + +<p> +Six weeks had passed by and it was now early August in the New Hampshire +hills. Six wonderful weeks for the Camp Fire girls at Sunrise Hill, +moving so swiftly that it seemed almost incredible so much time could +have gone by. Everybody had kept well, nothing had ruffled their +harmonies, except occasional differences of opinion which were easily +adjusted, and yet Nan Graham had continued a member of the camp. +</p> + +<p> +By this time the new influences in many ways showed their effect upon +her. At first she was inclined to use language that shocked and annoyed +both the girls and their guardian. She was not lazy and yet regular +hours for work seemed irksome to her; she wanted to work when it was +play time and play when work should be accomplished, and then her +personal habits were not pleasant; but this was because she had never +been taught better, for very soon she grew to be as neat as any of her +companions and though her clothes were worn and shabby they were +carefully washed twice a week by her own hands because she had fewer +possessions than the other girls. In the beginning Betty had given her +several blouses and some underclothes and would have done far more +except that Miss McMurtry advised her to cease. For it was not fair that +Nan should not also learn a spirit of independence and the desire to +earn her own way. Miss McMurtry hoped that the Camp Fire might teach +the girls this as one of its best lessons. Always we have believed that +the American boy can make his own place in the world, given an education +and a healthy body, then why not the American girl as well, now that she +is to have almost the same opportunity and encouragement? +</p> + +<p> +Notwithstanding that, there was one serious, indeed most serious, fault +that the new Camp Fire member had not yet man aged to overcome: she was +not always truthful. The stories she told did not appear to be +malicious or very important, they merely explained why she was late when +her hour came for work, how she had gained certain elective honors when +no one was by to witness them, and yet they caused a general feeling of +distrust when evidence upon a question depended solely on Nan's word. +Miss McMurtry had talked to her many times and always she had promised +never to offend again and yet a habit of untruthfulness is not so easily +conquered. In reality, Polly O'Neill had more influence with the girl +whose cause she had championed than anyone else in camp, so that once or +twice Miss Martha had been tempted to ask Polly to talk to her and then +had given up the idea, thinking that perhaps it was hardly fair for one +girl to be told to lecture another. +</p> + +<p> +However, it was surprising to see how kind and sympathetic the little +group of Camp Fire members tried to be to their least fortunate member +and up to the present time Miss McMurtry felt glad that she had yielded +her first judgment in the matter and allowed Nan to stay on with them. +Even Betty, although unable to be intimate with a girl whose family +connections and manners so tried her aristocratic soul, was always +considerate and certainly at the end of each week it had been Betty who +had quietly paid Nan's share of their expenses without a word. That +there had ever been a question of any one else's doing it, no one except +Betty, Polly and Mollie knew. And just what Polly had suffered at the +end of each week when she had failed to fulfill her contract no one +except a girl with exactly her disposition can understand. For the +money which she had spoken of so mysteriously to her sister and friend +had up till now failed to materialize. Nevertheless Polly had not lost +hope, but several times had assured Betty that she would pay her the +entire amount advanced for Nan almost any day, and the very fact that +Betty begged her not to think of this made her the more insistent. +</p> + +<p> +Thirteen was Polly O'Neill's lucky number. Possibly because it was +regarded as an unlucky figure by other people Polly had selected and +cherished it for her own, and with the Irish ability to prove things, +because one wishes them to be true, she could give a long list of happy +events in her past history all taking place on the thirteenth day of the +mouth. Besides, had she and Molly not been born on the thirteenth, +naturally fitting the date to her star? +</p> + +<p> +So on the thirteenth of August (although no one else in camp happened to +have thought of that day of the month) Polly begged leave of their +guardian to go alone into Woodford on a most important errand. The +girls were not in the habit of going into town alone; perhaps because +the walk was a long one no one had ever wished before to go without +company. However, there was no conspicuous objection since the way led +through the Webster farm and then on to the high road into the village, +and, moreover, Polly insisted that her reason for wishing to go +unaccompanied was a highly important one. +</p> + +<p> +Nevertheless, with a slight feeling of discomfort, Miss McMurtry saw her +start off after lunch. Though the subject was not discussed she +realized that Polly O'Neill was physically less strong than most girls +and that her high spirits and nervous energy often gave a wrong +impression. +</p> + +<p> +To-day, however, Polly seemed particularly well and curiously eager, so +that the other girls teased her all through luncheon endeavoring to find +out the cause of her mysterious errand, without gaining the least clue. +Betty and Mollie were both offended by her secrecy in spite of her +promise to tell them everything should matters turn out as she expected. +</p> + +<p> +Polly believed in destiny, or at least in her own destiny as we all +should, but now and then, fear taking possession, her faith was less +secure. +</p> + +<p> +There had been a few of these hours in the past six weeks while she had +prayed, hoped and willed one thing, but almost always she had believed +in it with her whole heart. Waking at daylight on this morning of the +thirteenth of August and seeing a particularly wonderful sunrise, a +curious wave of conviction had swept over her. To-day she would see her +desire fulfilled! +</p> + +<p> +Truly the day was a beautiful one, a day for all lovely dreams to come +true, and as Polly walked through the fields, heavy and golden with the +ripened grain, the Irish buoyancy of her temperament asserting itself, +made each object appear an omen of good luck--the sight of a bluebird +meant happiness of course, the flight of a carrier pigeon the arrival of +a longed-for message. Weary finally of thinking delightful things Polly +fell to reciting poetry aloud. As a small girl and in spite of her +mother's and sister's protests she had made up her mind to be an actress +and had devoted all her spare hours to the memorizing of poetry and +plays. Therefore there were many hours when she loved dearly to be +alone just in order to repeat some of the lines over and over, trying to +read into them their deeper meaning, without an audience to be either +bored or amused. +</p> + +<p> +Particularly had she loved and learned the strange, musical Irish poetry +of William Butler Yeats. Perhaps because the Irish believed in fairies +Polly did too, although she called her fairies by other names. +</p> + +<p> +Now all alone in the yellow fields she recited the closing lines of "The +Land of Heart's Desire," doing her level best to put into it some little +portion of its mystical beauty. She was not altogether successful +because she was only a girl without any training or knowledge of her +art, but perhaps because of her youth she was less afraid and filled +with a sincerer enthusiasm. +</p> + +<p> +"The wind blows out of the gates of the day, The wind blows over the +lonely of heart, And the lonely of heart is withered away While the +faeries dance in a place apart, Shaking their milk-white feet in a ring, +Tossing their milk-white arms in the air; For they hear the wind laugh +and murmur and sing Of a land where even the old are fair, And even the +wise are merry of tongue; But I heard a reed of Coolaney say, When the +wind has laughed and murmured and sung, The lonely of heart is withered +away." +</p> + +<p> +And then, after having repeated her verse three times and feeling that +she was no nearer than at first to expressing its beauty, Polly found +herself through the fields and after passing by a small stretch of +woodlands would be out on the high road and therefore no longer alone. +</p> + +<p> +And here, just at the entrance to the woodland, Polly's foot struck +against something, and stooping over she picked up from the ground the +answer to her desire, not the expected answer but one that would do as +well in its stead. +</p> + +<p> +Naturally she forgot to be reasonable or sensible, forgot everything +save the good luck that seemed to come as an answer to prayer. +</p> + +<p> +At the village post-office she did not even think to ask for her mail, +although stopping long enough to write a short letter to her mother, +enclosing a portion of her discovery and asking that it be used to +purchase a present for the new English cousin about whom her mother had +lately written so much. +</p> + +<p> +Neither was there a confession made either to Mollie or Betty or any one +else at camp that evening, since it was far pleasanter to appear cloaked +in mystery; but Polly secured peace for herself by bringing back with +her a large basket of peaches to glorify their supper party, and then +later that evening quietly presented Betty with the amount in full +advanced for Nan Graham's expenses. She said nothing about the way in +which the money had been obtained and although Betty was curious to +know, good taste forbade her asking questions. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap17"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XVII +</h3> + +<h3> +THE SUSPICION +</h3> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry and Betty had been alone together in one of the tents for +the past half hour. Not that this was in any way remarkable or at first +excited any suspicion, for the young woman and girl had become good +friends in the past weeks, often consulting with one another concerning +questions of camp life. Indeed Betty had been chiefly responsible for +bestowing on their guardian her pretty new title, although the name had +really developed from the suggestion first made by Mollie O'Neill and +later turned into a jest by her sister. +</p> + +<p> +"Our Lady of the Hill" was now Miss McMurtry's title as guardian of the +Sunrise Camp. But because the expression was too long a one for +ordinary conversation, "Donna," the soft Italian word for "lady," was +more often substituted. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't think I can be mistaken, Donna," Betty now returned seriously, +her face flushed and her gray eyes unusually grave. "I don't want you +to think I would make trouble in camp for all the world, as it is all +probably my fault, but Esther was with me and has the same impression I +have. She thought I ought to speak to you as a kind of warning to the +other girls. I wish you would let me call Esther." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry agreed, frowning uncomfortably and resting her head on one +hand. Since outdoor life gives one whatever help is needed, she had +grown far less thin with her months of fresh air, her figure was less +angular, her expression less learned and her whole manner more like a +girl's than an old maid's. Possibly the gracious dignity of her new +title was also worth living up to. +</p> + +<p> +"I must not be in too much of a hurry or too severe," she afterwards +murmured to herself, "but from the first I have been dreadfully afraid +of something like this." +</p> + +<p> +Esther was discovered sitting with the other girls in a group +surrounding Polly, who had been reading aloud an old folk tale while the +others worked at their various hand crafts. Betty apologized for the +interruption in leaning over to whisper to Esther, but half guessed at +Polly's irritation as they hurried off together. However, if it could +be prevented, Polly was to hear of their trouble last of all! +</p> + +<p> +And Polly, although not acknowledging it, was annoyed, for lately Betty +and Esther had seemed more intimate than she could ever have dreamed +they might be. Not that Betty appeared to feel any affection for the +older girl, but having heard through her of her father's illness they +had been drawn together by Esther's constant sympathy and devotion, and +although Mr. Ashton was now better Betty had not yet forgotten. Of +course Polly was not jealous, that would be too small minded and absurd, +only it was curious for her dearest friend to be sharing her secrets +with other persons than herself. +</p> + +<p> +Inside the tent with their guardian, Esther was being more explicit in +her explanation than Betty had been. +</p> + +<p> +"You see," she said, "I understand better about temptations of that kind +than Betty, because I have been brought up so differently, so when the +letter came I begged her to be particularly careful, and we hid it +together in a small lock-box in our tent. The strange thing is that the +letter is still there and the outside envelope, but the envelope in +which the package was enclosed I found crumpled up near Nan's cot when I +was cleaning this morning." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry shook her head more cheerfully. "That isn't enough +evidence, children, to use against any human being! And just because +this poor Nan has one story against her, don't you think we ought to be +especially careful about adding another?" +</p> + +<p> +Instead of replying at once Betty looked more miserable instead of less, +and then biting her lips for an instant answered steadily: +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, you are quite right, Donna, and we won't say another word about +the loss. I am sorry and I confess a little disappointed, for father +wished us to have a party in honor of his being better, but the party +couldn't make us nearly as happy as this story would make us unhappy +once we allowed it to be told." +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry caught Betty's hand and kissed it unexpectedly. Betty was +spoiled, accepting love and good fortune too much as a matter of course, +but when it came to a question either of generosity or good breeding +Betty Ashton could always be counted upon. +</p> + +<p> +However, Esther Clark was not so persuaded. "I am afraid Betty may be +angry with me and that you will be more uncomfortable, Miss McMurtry," +she added after a moment's hesitation. "But this is not all the +evidence we have. You see Mollie told us yesterday that just the next +day after we girls made our trip to town and returned with the mail, she +came across Nan in our tent with Betty's bunch of keys in her hand. It +is true that Betty had left her keys out on the table, but I don't see +what Nan could have wanted with them?" +</p> + +<p> +"She told Mollie that she wanted to peep in my trunk to look at a dress +I have because she wanted some day to make herself one like it and did +not know just how," Betty interposed, using no effort to hide the tears +that had been gathering in her gray eyes and were now coursing down her +cheeks. "Oh dear me, I do wish I had not brought the wretched money into +camp, for I promised Polly I would not put temptation in Nan's way and +she will be dreadfully cross with me if she hears!" +</p> + +<p> +"I don't think you should blame yourself, dear," Miss McMurtry +interrupted, drawing Betty closer to her and looking almost ready to cry +herself as they both turned toward Esther for advice. For somehow +Esther might have a shy and awkward personality and not seem of much +importance when things were going happily, yet in sorrow or difficulty, +insensibly her gravity and unselfishness counted. +</p> + +<p> +"Don't you think we had better send for Nan and let her offer us some +explanation," Esther unhesitatingly suggested, "perhaps she will be able +to make everything clear?" +</p> + +<p> +Miss McMurtry and, Betty were both silent and Betty moved quietly toward +the opening of the tent. "You really will have to let me go away," she +pleaded, "for I can't stand up and accuse one of our own Camp Fire girls +of having--" Her sentence remained unfinished, but Miss McMurtry was +able to catch hold of her skirt. "You can't leave us in the lurch, +Betty, child, though I do understand your feelings, you must stand by to +help Esther and me out. Certainly we shall not accuse poor Nan of +anything, merely ask her a question. Esther, will you find her for us?" +</p> + +<p> +Betty smiled tearfully as Esther went away on the errand, wondering if +this time Miss Martha feared to trust her. +</p> + +<p> +Ten minutes passed and then fifteen and yet neither Esther nor Nan +appeared. Finally, however, Esther returned looking unusually angry and +crestfallen. "Nan says she won't come until Polly has finished the +story she is reading, and that probably may take another half hour," she +reported. "I told her that you wished her particularly, Miss McMurtry, +and waited as long as I could, but she showed no sign of obeying." +</p> + +<p> +"That isn't true, or at least it is only half true, which is as bad," a +voice declared at this instant at Esther's elbow, and Nan Graham pushed +her way saucily into the tent, rather pleased at making serious Esther +flush with displeasure. But at the sight of Betty, whom she always +admired, and their guardian, whom she a little feared, her expression +became less bold and, indeed, before any one spoke the girl's face had a +strange look of guilt. Why else should she toss her head and bridle so +unnecessarily, why stare into Miss McMurtry's eyes with her own hard and +defiant, even while her lips trembled with nervousness? +</p> + +<p> +"I haven't done anything; what do you want with me?" she asked quickly. +</p> + +<p> +"No, Nan, we only want to ask you a question," Miss McMurtry answered, +speaking as gently as she knew how. "Would you mind telling us what you +were doing with Betty Ashton's keys the other afternoon and how you +happened to get hold of them?" +</p> + +<p> +"I didn't have her keys, that's a lie," Nan returned fiercely, taken off +her guard and using a word she had always been accustomed to hear in her +home. +</p> + +<p> +To save the situation Betty came quickly forward. "Please don't say +that, Nan," she begged, "for Mollie has already told us you merely +wanted to look at my blue dress and that was quite all right. But if +you deny it, why--" +</p> + +<p> +"Why what?" Nan demanded sullenly, her black eyes on the ground and her +face, which had turned a healthier color with her weeks in the woods, +now white and drawn. +</p> + +<p> +"Why we might not believe you when asking a more important question," +Miss McMurtry said sternly, angered in spite of herself by the girl's +disagreeable manner. "How many times have I told you that when people +are untruthful about little things one does not believe them in large. +The fact is that Betty has lost a large sum of money and--" +</p> + +<p> +"And you believe I stole it!" Nan burst into such a violent storm of +weeping at this suggestion that Betty for the first time in their +acquaintance actually put her arm about her. +</p> + +<p> +"No, we don't believe you took it just because it has vanished," she +whispered comfortingly, casting appealing glances at her guardian and +Esther, "only we want to ask you to try to help us find out about it. I +wouldn't be in the least surprised if it should turn up again!" +</p> + +<p> +Neither Miss McMurtry nor Esther spoke, but Nan was not to be so +appeased. +</p> + +<p> +"I am sure you are very kind to give me this opportunity to put your old +money back," she answered bitterly, "but as I did not take it I should +find that pretty difficult. I didn't even know you had any money, +although I confess I did look into your trunk when perhaps I ought to +have asked permission and I did take out an old blouse, but I was sorry +the next minute and put it back again. But I expect I might as well +have kept it and anything else I could lay my hands on. It is the old +story, if a girl does a wrong thing once no one ever believes in her +when she tries to be straight again. I suppose you will be telling your +suspicion to Polly O'Neill and the other girls so they won't let me stay +any longer in camp. I don't care, I am innocent!" Nan's voice rose to a +shrill cry of protest, but in spite of this there was a note of +sincerity in it that almost convinced Betty, although unfortunately the +effect was not the same upon Miss McMurtry and Esther. +</p> + +<p> +"No one shall say anything against you, Nan, nor spread this story in +any possible way until more is found out," Miss McMurtry now remarked, +briefly dismissing them. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap18"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XVIII +</h3> + +<h3> +ONE WAY TO FIND OUT +</h3> + +<p> +Nevertheless within a few days the story had been circulated about the +camp. Not a word, however, had been spoken concerning it by Betty, +Esther or Miss McMurtry, but poor Nan Graham had betrayed herself. For +in her effort to gain sympathizers, unfortunately a wider suspicion was +aroused. +</p> + +<p> +Sore and unhappy over what she insisted was a totally unjust +supposition, it was but natural that she should turn to another girl for +consolation. Not to Polly, however; Nan said not a word to her, for +Polly had given no evidence of having heard of her ill-timed visit to +Betty's trunk, having been on her way to the village at the time the +offence was committed, and above everything Nan desired to remain fixed +in Polly's good graces. No, she confided the account of her interview +first to Beatrice Field, making so tragic a tale of it that Bee, who was +quite young and only a mischievous tomboy in her disposition and never +having heard anything of Nan's past mistakes, was deeply indignant. +</p> + +<p> +"A Camp Fire girl accused of stealing, well not exactly accused but +suspected!" Honestly Bee had never conceived of anything so dreadful, +and so straightway put the whole case before her sister, Juliet. Then +to her surprise Juliet, who was a far more worldly wise person, did not +accept the story from the same point of view, indeed Juliet became +immediately indignant for Betty's sake, declaring that she was being a +martyr in not spreading the news of her loss abroad and at least +endeavoring to recover her lost property. +</p> + +<p> +Something of Juliet's impression must have crept into Bee, for in her +next conversation with Nan there was a certain cooling off in sympathy +that made Nan feel the need of another partisan. This time she was more +unwise in selecting Edith Norton, for Edith had always particularly +disliked Nan's presence in the Sunrise Camp and, even while hearing her +side of the story, had unhesitatingly revealed not only a want of pity +for her but a plain lack of faith. +</p> + +<p> +Nan had forgotten to require at the beginning of their conversation that +Edith keep her confidence a secret and so the older girl made no +pretence of doing so. In her bitterness Nan had not hesitated to say +hard things of Betty, Esther and even of their guardian in speaking of +the injustice of their attitude toward her, and these remarks Edith felt +free to add to her own account. Not that she really meant to be cruel +or unfair, but honestly feeling it best that Nan stay no longer in their +camp she started a campaign toward that end. Perhaps because Edith was +poor and self-supporting herself, unconsciously she resented the +presence of another girl whose poverty was of so much less honorable a +kind, for it is more difficult to be fair to persons almost in our own +state of life than to those in far different ones. +</p> + +<p> +Not long did Edith remain alone in her conviction, for the layer of real +faith and affection for poor little Nan in camp was so thin that the +first effort broke through it. In point of fact no one had actually +wanted her at Sunrise Camp and had only been persuaded into it by Polly +and Betty and by Miss McMurtry's approval, and really these three +persons were still the only three who continued her champions. +</p> + +<p> +Betty would not hear for an instant of Nan's being sent away, threatened +to leave herself rather than be responsible for such an act of +injustice. Miss McMurtry was equally firm, although she added that Nan +was not to be condemned until further proof was secured against her. +Meanwhile Polly O'Neill was really unaware for some time of the actual +circumstances of the case. In the first place Betty had begged that the +story be kept from Polly as Nan was her especial protegee, and seeing +what a storm had been aroused in camp she herself felt more than sorry +ever to have mentioned her loss. Of course Polly heard vaguely that +Betty had lost something or other about camp, but she did not know +exactly what, but then Betty had so many possessions that she was always +losing something. Also she began to suspect, dimly at first, that the +girls were in some kind of quandary, but as no one mentioned the cause +to her, she felt rather too proud to inquire, besides having a problem +of her own on her mind which taxed most of her waking hours, although +she too kept her own counsel. +</p> + +<p> +But now a sufficient time had gone by, until the date of the meeting of +the August Council Fire had arrived when the original number of Camp +Fire members were to be promoted to the rank of Fire-Makers and Esther +was to be first of the Sunrise Hill girls to be given the highest Camp +Fire title--Torch Bearer. +</p> + +<p> +One of Miss McMurtry's plans for her camp was to leave to three girls +each month the arrangements for the original features of their Council +Fire and in August, the month of the Red or Green Corn Moon, it so +happened that Mollie, Eleanor and Edith Norton formed the special +committee. Just what their plans were no one knew until the morning +before their meeting, not even the camp guardian, or Miss McMurtry might +possibly have interfered, although I hardly believe it. +</p> + +<p> +Shortly after breakfast, even before the other girls had a chance to +disperse for their morning's work, Eleanor, Mollie and Edith Norton +disappeared inside their tents. +</p> + +<p> +Edith had been chosen to help at this meeting rather than any other +because she was now having her two weeks' August vacation. Ten minutes +later the girls came out again into the open air, arrayed in their +ceremonial costumes and carrying three Indian baskets which were +solemnly passed about from one girl to the other. And these baskets +contained invitations to the evening Council Fire painted on bits of +birch bark in crimson lettering by Eleanor Meade. +</p> + +<p> +At the top of the scroll were the three words "The Maidens' Feast." +Then below, the invitation read: "Sinopa the Little Sister, Apoi-a-kimi, +the Light Hair, and Eleanor, the Painter of Sunrises, invite all the +maidens of all the tribes to come and partake of their feast this +evening at the close of the regular Council Fire ceremonies. It will be +in the Sunrise Camp before the moon reaches the middle sky. All pure +maidens are invited." +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap19"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XIX +</h3> + +<h3> +THE DISAPPEARANCE +</h3> + +<p> +The August moon had never been more radiant, indeed it flooded the +Sunrise Camp grounds with a brightness that made it appear almost like +day. And now the regular Council Fire proceedings were over and the +Indian custom of "The Maidens' Feast" about to begin. +</p> + +<p> +In a circle about a cone-shaped rock, which had been brought with +infinite difficulty to its position in the camp grounds, Miss McMurtry +and the maidens were seated, each person bearing in her lap a round +wooden bowl, while from the smoldering ashes of the Council Fire arose a +delicious odor of roasting ears of corn. +</p> + +<p> +But before the feast could be eaten a ceremony of as grave importance to +the Camp Fire girls as to the Indian maidens of long ago must take +place. Each girl was to take the oath of purity and honor, and then the +maidens' song would be sung and four times they would dance around the +altar. +</p> + +<p> +No one of the group of Camp Fire members and no more their guardian +really knew at first whether in this plan of Eleanor's, Mollie's and +Edith's there was any deeper motive than the entertainment of their +friends and the revival of an old Indian custom seemingly appropriate +and beautiful. But as the details unfolded themselves the suspicion in +the minds of most of them grew almost into certainty. Once or twice +Miss McMurtry had thought of stopping the proceedings altogether, but +then she did not feel satisfied that this method of the three girls for +testing the innocence or guilt of their companions was not an admirable +one. More than she would have acknowledged, since worry is not +permitted in Camp Fire rules, had Miss McMurtry puzzled over what should +be done in their present dilemma. Betty's money had certainly +disappeared and some one must have stolen it; if not Nan, then who else? +For they had had no guests since Esther and Betty returned with the +money from the village post-office. +</p> + +<p> +So by the time Edith Norton, with her light hair hanging loose about her +shoulders and a circle of red about her head, stepped forth into the +center of the circle, looking unusually white and nervous, there was not +but one member of her audience who did not at least partially guess at +what was about to take place. And this was of course Polly O'Neill! +For not only did she fail to understand Betty's actual money loss and +the suspicion against Nan, but so deeply had she been involved in her +own perplexity that she had hardly been aware of anything that had taken +place that evening. Now, however, having at last made up her mind to +take Miss McMurtry into her confidence when the girls had gone to bed, +she did look up with interest at the picturesque figure of Edith. +</p> + +<p> +Near the cone-shaped rock two arrows had been lightly stuck into the +ground, this forming a sort of altar to which each maiden must come, +touching first the stone and then the arrows as she declares her purity. +</p> + +<p> +As she stood by the side of this altar Edith's voice trembled so that it +was with difficulty her first words could be understood. The girls who +knew pretty well what to expect understood her immediately, however, but +not Polly! +</p> + +<p> +"Sorrow and much uneasiness have lately crept into our midst, my +maidens," she announced, trying to preserve a certain likeness to the +Indian speech in the form of her words, "and many of us there are who go +about heavy of heart because the sin of one of us must be the burden of +us all, until guilt is established and the innocent cleared. Some days +ago there vanished from the possession of one of us fifty dollars in +bank notes enclosed in an envelope containing no address. This money +has not been found, but the envelope has been recognized as crumpled up +and thrown away a few feet from the tent of its rightful owner. Now no +member of the Sunrise Camp can feel it possible that any one of its +members has been guilty of this sin and yet no visitor has stepped foot +within our camp limits within the time when the deed must have occurred. +Therefore have we three maidens, after deep thought, appointed this +evening wherein the innocent may declare her innocence and the wrong-doer +confess her sin. For only in confession and by the return of the +money can she ever hope to be at peace with herself. Moreover, we +believe that no Camp Fire girl will take this oath of purity without +telling the entire truth. Betty Ashton will you come forward first." +</p> + +<p> +Betty jumped up quickly. During Edith's long harangue her group of +listeners had been supremely uncomfortable, so that no one of them dared +do more than barely glance at Nan, who sat with her knees up to her +chin, her eyes cast upon the ground and her black hair covering her face +like a veil. If she felt, and of course she did, that Edith's speech was +directed toward her rather than toward any other girl, neither by a +sound nor a movement did she betray it. Not even when Betty, having +finished with her part in the ceremony, deliberately forsaking her +former place in the circle came back and sitting down next her +deliberately laid her arm across Nan's bowed shoulders. There was +nothing to do or say, she would only make things worse by any protest +now, and yet Betty was bitterly grieved and offended. If Nan had done +wrong this public method of making her either confess or perjure herself +she felt to be wholly unkind. +</p> + +<p> +So as Nan was in everybody's thoughts during this time no one happened +to glance toward Polly O'Neill or, seeing her, to observe anything +unusual in her manner or appearance, for Polly also neither moved nor +spoke during Edith's recital, although her face turned suddenly white. +</p> + +<p> +Fifty dollars in an envelope, the money in bank notes and the envelope +crumpled up and thrown away near their tent! Her discovery in the woods +that day had been just this and she herself had thrown away that same +envelope. Betty of course had lost the enclosure out of her letter in +bringing it home from the post office and, hiding the letter away +afterwards, believed the money still there. +</p> + +<p> +Why did not Polly get up and make this announcement at once? It would +have been very simple except for one thing, she had spent the money, and +in the first moment of surprised horror had no idea how she would ever +be able to return it. +</p> + +<p> +Like a good many impetuous people Polly O'Neill sometimes had the +misfortune to do her thinking when it was too late. Finding the money +in the woods, when she felt she needed it so much, had seemed to her +like a miracle, so that it never occurred to her, either that afternoon +or evening, that she should have tried to find out to whom the money +rightfully belonged before using it, although she had been thinking of +little else since then. That this money should have been Betty's of all +people, and that it was now her duty to stand up and confess her mistake +before her friends. +</p> + +<p> +Polly set her teeth, the circle of girls revolved before her eyes, she +had been worrying too much to be either reasonable or well. And at any +moment Edith Norton might demand that she step forward and take the oath +which was meant to proclaim that she had had nothing to do with the loss +of Betty's money. Truly she did not understand that the charge had been +directed against poor Nan, so watching her opportunity Polly slipped +away without being noticed. +</p> + +<p> +When Nan Graham's name was called from the center of the circle the +silence was oppressive. But the girl rose up quietly, pushing her +coarse black hair from her face, and as quietly walked forward to the +cone-shaped rock where the two arrows were still standing fixed in the +ground. Before laying her hand on these objects, however, she stood +perfectly still for a moment, letting her accusing eyes sweep from the +face of one of her girl judges to the other and then, touching the stone +and the arrows, came back quickly to her old place. Not till then did +she betray how deeply the atmosphere of distrust and unfaith had hurt +her, but when Betty's arm came round her for the second time, she burst +into weeping, hiding her face on Betty's shoulder, and hearing her +whisper comfortingly: "I believe with all my heart that you know nothing +of my wretched money, Nan, and I beg your pardon if I even made you +think I suspected you." +</p> + +<p> +Just before the time for Polly to take the oath her absence was +discovered, but not until the feast of the corn had actually begun did +Mollie and Betty go back to their tent to look for her and they did not +return for so long a time that Miss McMurtry, fearing Polly might be +ill, rose up to follow them. However, she had only gone a few steps +before the two girls joined her. +</p> + +<p> +"We can't find Polly anywhere, Donna," Mollie said in an extremely +annoyed tone. "We have looked in all the tents and called and even gone +down to the pine grove. What silly mood do you suppose has overtaken +her? For the one thing mother most objects to is for Polly to wander +off alone at night. She did it once when she was a very little girl." +</p> + +<p> +"Don't worry, Mollie, she is sure to be back in half a minute when she +remembers," the older woman replied. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap20"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XX +</h3> + +<h3> +"POLLY" +</h3> + +<p> +But Polly did not come back within the hour or indeed all night. +Naturally there was little sleep among the Camp Fire girls or their +guardian who imagined all possible tragedies. Miss McMurtry wondered if +Polly could have gone down to the lake and in the darkness fallen into +the water, but then the moon was shining brilliantly and she could swim +with perfect ease. This idea was only brought on by fear. What had +probably happened was that she had wandered off for a walk, lost her way +and decided that it was far wiser to spend the night quietly in the +woods rather than wear herself out with tramping. When the sunrise came +she would return. +</p> + +<p> +With this idea Miss McMurtry comforted and encouraged the girls, for it +was impossible that they should do more than search for their companion +in the near-by woods and fields. It is true that Betty wanted to +attempt to climb Sunrise Hill, taking lanterns with her, fearing that +Polly had attempted a short walk and managed to sprain her ankle, and +that Esther and Sylvia Wharton were more than anxious to go with her, +but Miss McMurtry would not hear of it, having a vision of four lost +girls instead of one. There was nothing to do but wait the few hours +now until daybreak and then if Polly did not return, properly organize +searching parties to seek for her. If the Camp Fire girls had learned +anything of scouting methods, this would be their opportunity. +</p> + +<p> +Mollie O'Neill was of course the person who required the tenderest care +during the night. She and Polly were closer than other sisters, so +unlike in temperament and yet one another's shadows. If only she could +have imagined some explanation for her sister's disappearance, for of +course everybody knew of Polly's sudden vagaries and yet it was unlike +her to be so inconsiderate without cause. +</p> + +<p> +Although Betty Ashton probably understood her friend even better than +her sister did, as she sat quietly by Mollie's side for several hours +insisting that there was really nothing alarming in Polly's flight and +that she would doubtless be both vexed and ashamed of herself in the +morning, she too was equally puzzled. For naturally she was not so +confident as she pretended, although not until her hour came for rest +and after she had actually tumbled into bed did she break down. Then +Esther and Sylvia Wharton, who in some strange, quiet fashion seemed a +comfort to everyone to-night, had insisted that they relieve Betty's +watch with Mollie. +</p> + +<p> +Dropping on her couch, not to sleep but to gain strength for the next +day's quest, quite by accident Betty's hand slipped under her pillow. +With a low exclamation, overheard by the other three girls in the tent, +she drew out folded square of paper. Her name was on the outside, +apparently hurriedly addressed in Polly's handwriting. It read: +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +<br /> +DEAR BETTY: +</p> + +<p> +Your money was stolen, at least not in the way you think it was, but +perhaps in another almost as bad. For I found it in the woods on the +day when I went into the village alone and I made no effort to find out +to whom it belonged. You must have dropped it out of your letter on +your way back to camp, for there was no mark on the envelope in which I +found it. But I do not mean this as an excuse, I do not think it one. +If I had not felt like a thief perhaps I would not have been ashamed to +confess my fault before the other girls as I should have done before our +altar fire to-night. I tried but I did not have the courage, so I am +going away from camp. Please tell Miss McMurtry, Mollie and the other +girls and do not ask me to come back, for it is impossible. If I could +return your money, Betty, I should not feel so bitterly humiliated, but +as I cannot at present I would rather not see you until I can. Of +course we are no longer friends, for you cannot wish it, and always it +has seemed to me that your wealth and my poverty makes the gulf between +us. I can only say that I am truly sorry. +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +Yours sincerely, +<br /> + POLLY +<br /><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Having finished this ungracious note of apology Betty handed it without +comment to Esther and then buried her own head in the pillow. If Polly +could feel toward her in this manner because of a mistake which they had +both made, then nothing she could do or say would make any difference. +For to insist to Polly that she had a perfect right to use the money +found by accident would not be altogether true and would not change her +point of view, while to declare that the return of the money to its +rightful owner was a matter of indifference would only deepen the +misunderstanding. +</p> + +<p> +Less accustomed to Polly's writing Esther read the note aloud slowly and +then it was that Mollie's and Betty's positions were changed, and Mollie +became instead of the comforted--the comforter. +</p> + +<p> +"That is exactly like Polly O'Neill," she announced indignantly, "here +she has done something she ought not to do without thinking, like +spending that money without trying to find its owner, and now because +she is so sorry she goes ahead and makes things worse for everybody +instead of better." Mollie slid off her own hemlock bed and crossing +the tent sat down by Betty. "Don't you worry, dear, or feel in the least +responsible," she whispered, "you know Polly is hateful sometimes just +because she is so ashamed and miserable she does not know how to be +anything else. She does care for you more than anyone and you know that +she will do almost anything to make peace with you as soon as she comes +to her senses. Of course, Betty, I understand you don't care for the +money part, why you would give either of us ten times that amount if you +could and we would accept it, but you won't mind my writing mother to +make things all right." +</p> + +<p> +Then after a few words of explanation to their guardian the Camp Fire +girls slept quietly until daylight, but even after they had eaten a +hurried breakfast together the wanderer had not returned. +</p> + +<p> +So immediately afterwards three parties set out, leaving Edith Norton +and Juliet Field behind to protect the camp and to announce by the +ringing of a bell if Polly should return or if they were in any need. +</p> + +<p> +Betty, Sylvia and Esther went off in one direction, Miss McMurtry and +the two younger girls, Nan and Beatrice, in another, while Mollie, Meg +and Eleanor took the interior of the Webster farm. The chief obstacle +in their search being that it was apparently impossible to discover the +direction of Polly's footprints on first leaving camp, the grass in the +neighborhood being so constantly trodden down by the feet of so many +girls. +</p> + +<p> +Billy Webster, as he preferred to be called, was in a wheat field with +his reaper just about to start to work, when a Camp Fire girl, whether +Mollie or Polly he could not tell at first, came running toward him in +apparent distress. So as not to make another mistake he let the girl +speak first, only smiling at her in a sufficiently friendly fashion to +make it very simple. +</p> + +<p> +Mollie's first words were luminous. "Have you seen anything of Polly? +She is lost or gone away or at least we can't find her!" +</p> + +<p> +Therefore until lunch time Billy kept up the search over the farm with +the three girls. And though they were not successful in making any +discovery it was surprising what a comfort the girls found him, +particularly Mollie, who seemed to depend on him as though he had been +an old friend. +</p> + +<p> +"I am sure there isn't the least reason to be seriously alarmed," he +assured her half a dozen times with a curious understanding of Polly's +character; "you see your sister has got a funny streak in her that makes +her mighty interesting and mighty uncertain." (How angry Polly would +have been could she have heard him!) "She has got a lot to learn before +she settles down." +</p> + +<p> +By noon, finding his three companions nearly exhausted, the young man +persuaded them to go up to the big, comfortable farmhouse, see his +mother, have their luncheon and rest. And straightway on meeting her, +Mrs. Webster took a liking to Mollie that was to last all the rest of +her life. +</p> + +<p> +During this time Betty, Esther and Sylvia were going slowly along the +main path that led through the fields and finally on to the high road +into the village. Miss McMurtry and her assistants were climbing +Sunrise Hill. +</p> + +<p> +But Sylvia Wharton was so tediously slow. About every five minutes she +would stop and kneel down in the dirt, attempting to fit an old shoe of +Polly's into any fresh track she happened to observe. The other two +girls wandered off into bits of woods or meadows near by, calling and +hunting, but Sylvia never went with them. +</p> + +<p> +"There is no use," she explained, "Polly has gone straight into Woodford +and because it was night had to take the regular path instead of going +through the fields as she usually does." +</p> + +<p> +Claiming to have exactly traced her footsteps Esther and Betty were +still not convinced. "It is such a stupid idea, Sylvia," Betty argued, +"for there isn't anybody in town now to whom Polly would go in the +middle of the night, and besides she would be ashamed to let people know +she had run away from camp." +</p> + +<p> +Nevertheless Sylvia kept stolidly on and because her companions had +nothing better to suggest they followed after her. +</p> + +<p> +On the high road Sylvia, who would still creep like a tortoise, suddenly +stooped down. The August dust was very thick along the way and wagons +had already been traveling into town, and yet she picked up a string of +red, white and blue beads, which surely were Polly's, since patriotism +had been one of her chief studies during the summer. +</p> + +<p> +It was also Sylvia's suggestion that led the little party of friends +straight to Mrs. O'Neill's closed cottage. The doors and windows in +front of the house were sealed, but Betty found the door of the old +kitchen halfway open. And there inside on her mother's lounge lay +Polly! She seemed to be almost asleep when the girls entered, but +awakened immediately and in a wholly different frame of mind. +</p> + +<p> +Realizing in the last few hours, when it was too late, how great an +anxiety her disappearance must have caused, she wanted to go back to +camp, to confess her fault and at least to persuade Betty to forgive +her. Yet she dared not trust herself to go alone, for Polly's head was +aching furiously, her face was hot and flushed and any attempt to walk +made her sick and dizzy. +</p> + +<p> +While Betty and Esther were discussing what had best be done, Polly +having trusted herself wholly to their hands, neither of them noticed +Sylvia Wharton's withdrawal. +</p> + +<p> +When they did there was hardly time to comment upon it before she +reappeared at the back door with her round face covered with dust and +looking more freckled and homelier than ever. +</p> + +<p> +"A carriage will be here in five minutes to take us to camp; I have +ordered it," she announced. +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<p><a id="chap21"></a></p> +<h3> +CHAPTER XXI +</h3> + +<h3> + +</h3> + +<p> +Good-by to summer, good-by, good-by, Good-by to summer +</p> + +<p> +Esther's plaintive song ceased abruptly, for Betty Ashton leaning over +suddenly put her hand to her lips. And at the same moment Meg Everett +holding fast to Little Brother dropped down on the ground by the girls +with one arm full of early goldenrod and Michaelmas daisies. +</p> + +<p> +"No use to make Esther stop singing, it won't help matters, Betty, dear, +the summer has gone," she exclaimed. "Little Brother and I have just +seen quail whirring about in the underbrush. See I lay our autumn +bouquet at your feet," and she tossed her flowers over to Betty. "Where +is Miss McMurtry?" +</p> + +<p> +Betty made a wry face. "Gone into town, if you please, to see about +some books--school books. Oh, it wasn't because I didn't agree with +Esther's song that I made her stop singing, it was because it was so +dreadfully true that I felt at the moment I couldn't bear it. You are +sorry too, aren't you, Nan?" she queried, turning to the girl on the +other side of her who was sewing industriously on a soft blue cashmere +frock, almost similar in color and texture to the one Betty had at this +moment inside her trunk. The gown represented the complete restoration +of peace between Nan and Betty. At first there had been some difficulty +in persuading Nan to accept it, but after all Betty had been kinder than +most of the other girls! Moreover, there had been many other expressions +of apology in words and deeds that Nan had accepted and stored away in +her heart. +</p> + +<p> +"I just can't bear to think of it either," she replied slowly, letting +her hands rest idly in her lap for a moment. "I guess you other girls +can't ever know what these weeks in camp have been to me and what a lot +I've learned. I hope I ain't going to forget it ever and Miss Martha +says she is going to try to get them to let me come back to the High +School. It will be all right if any one will trust me enough to give me +work to do afternoons." +</p> + +<p> +Before replying Esther Clark put several pine logs and a great bundle of +pine cones on the fire around which she and her friends were seated, and +the girls were quiet for a moment watching them sparkle and blaze. +</p> + +<p> +"I expect I know, Nan, at least better than any one else," Esther +answered finally, "for you see this is the first summer of my whole life +that I haven't spent at the asylum scrubbing and cooking and nobody +caring anything about my work except that I got it done. Work this +summer has seemed like play, hasn't it? And I wouldn't be here, except +for The Princess. I wonder if I shall ever be able to repay her?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, wonder something else, Esther," Betty returned ungraciously, for +references of this kind always made her uncomfortable. "Here comes +Polly and Mollie and, of course Sylvia. Bee, will you go find Eleanor +and Juliet and let us have tea here by the camp fire. Donna and Edith +will probably be here before we finish. Suppose each one of us places a +stick on the fire and while it burns make a good wish for the Sunrise +Camp. Hello, Polly, yes Sylvia is perfectly right, you must not sit +down on the ground without something under you, yes, and you must let +her put that wrap over your shoulders, the sun will be going down pretty +soon and then it will be quite cool." +</p> + +<p> +Polly submitted to Sylvia's attentions none too graciously, but a moment +later turned toward the younger girl. "You are a trump, Sylvia," she +murmured. "I am sure I don't know what I should have done without you +these past two weeks while I will have been ill. It is funny how you +should happen to know just what to do for people who are sick when you +are so young!" +</p> + +<p> +Sylvia sat stolidly down next the speaker. "I am going to be a trained +nurse when I am old enough, that's why," she answered calmly, apparently +not even observing the surprise of her companions. "You see if I +thought I had sense enough I would try to be a doctor, but as I haven't +I shall just take care of sick people. I have already learned a good +many things this summer." +</p> + +<p> +Polly whistled and several of the girls laughed. "I don't doubt it for +a moment, Sylvia Wharton!" Polly exclaimed, "for heaven alone can tell +what you do know! But it is absurd to talk about your being a nurse, +when you will be the richest one of us, child, perhaps even richer than +'The Princess'." +</p> + +<p> +There was no reply from Sylvia, only her lips shut tight and her chin +looked oddly square and determined for a young girl. But then Sylvia +looked like her father, who, one must remember, was a self-made man. +And sometimes the daughter also inherits the traits of character that +have made the father a success. +</p> + +<p> +Eleanor and Juliet at this moment appearing with the tea things, the +kettle was hung above the fire on an arrangement of three pronged sticks +and not until tea was over did the girls or Betty remember her +suggestion. Then she handed Polly a pine knot first. "Thrust this into +the fire, Polly, dear, and make a parting wish for Sunrise Camp," Betty +explained, "for a few days more you know, and we must fold our tents and +say farewell to our summer." +</p> + +<p> +Polly quickly thrust her torch into the hottest blaze. "I wish," she +said at once, her cheeks hot from the closeness of the flames and from +her own thoughts, "that everybody in Sunrise Camp would promise to +forgive me for my foolish behavior two weeks ago and all the anxiety and +trouble I caused. The camp has given me a new motto this summer that I +shall at least try to live up to. It reads: 'Think first!" +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, and if you had only thought second and asked for your mail at the +post office that day after finding Betty's money, Polly, you would have +had your own fifty dollar prize for the best essay on 'A Summer Camp +Fire in the Woods'," Mollie added in her usual practical fashion, and +then she gave a little sigh of relief that the money had been paid back +to Betty without troubling the mother still so far away. +</p> + +<p> +"I wonder if Polly is going to be our genius as well as Eleanor," Esther +next suggested quietly, "every Camp Fire club is sure to turn out at +least one extraordinary person and of course ours will have two or +three." Then she blushed hotly in her old embarrassed, fashion, +clasping her big hands closely together as Betty, half laughing at her +own suggestion, whispered something in her ear. +</p> + +<p> +Juliet Field wished the Sunrise Camp long life, and Meg that they might +keep up their work together in town during the coming winter, Eleanor +that they might spend the next summer together, and then Betty, +happening quite by chance to observe a wistful expression on Nan's face, +passed the fifth pine stick to her. +</p> + +<p> +"Tell us what you are thinking of, Nan," she said, speaking with special +friendliness to the one girl who had not had entirely fair treatment at +their hands. "I have an idea you have something special on your mind." +</p> + +<p> +Nan shook her head, although she did what was asked of her. "Oh no," +she explained, "or at least I am afraid you will think my wish very +silly. I was just wishing that we were not going back to the village +but were going to spend our winter together amid the snows." +</p> + +<p> +Nan's suggestion was so surprising that everybody stared at her for one, +almost two minutes before Betty spoke. +</p> + +<p> +"Very well, Nan, let's stay," she returned, as though making a perfectly +ordinary remark. "I can't bear for Esther and me to have to go back +alone to our great, empty house with mother and father away and no +knowing when they may come back." (There was a catch in Betty's voice +that her friends understood, for Mr. Ashton was again seriously ill and +there was no hope of his returning to America at present.) "We can't +live in our tents of course, but I don't know why we can't build a log +cabin and somehow manage to get back and forth to school. When the snow +comes we can use our big sled." +</p> + +<p> +"You are quite mad, Betty Ashton; Esther, please tie a handkerchief +around her lips before she makes us all equally so," Polly requested, +"for there is no hope of our doing anything so impossible, as she +suggests." And then because she caught an expression almost of +agreement on her sister Mollie's face, Polly paused, almost overcome +with surprise. Mollie, the sensible; Mollie, the practical--it was +incredible. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't see that Betty's idea is so foolish, for at least some of us +might be able to live in camp this winter," Mollie thinking aloud as she +talked. "For you see, the doctor has said that Polly must be out of +doors as much as possible for the next year, and mother writes she would +rather not come home at present if we can possibly get on without her, +for there is something or other going on in Ireland that she has not +explained to us, but she says if she can stay a few months longer it may +make a difference in all our futures. I believe she would be glad to +let us remain in Sunrise Camp for the winter if your mother and father +are willing and we can make things comfortable, Betty," she concluded. +</p> + +<p> +The mental conception of a group of girls living together in a winter's +camp in the woods was evidently too surprising to be grasped all at +once, for no one else at the moment had anything to say, and then +Esther, glancing off across the fields where a soft September haze +suggested the approach of the twilight, exclaimed. "See, there are Miss +McMurtry and Edith returning from town. Let us give them our Camp Fire +call to welcome them home." +</p> + +<p> +"Wohelo for work, Wohelo for health, Wohelo for love!" +</p> + +<p> +The ten voices carried the refrain far across the country and somehow +the echo returning to them from Sunrise Hill brought with it the +suggestion of even happier days to come. +</p> + +<p> +The second volume in the Camp Fire Girls' Series will be called "The +Camp Fire Girls Amid the Snows." In this book the history of the girls +will be revealed under very different conditions. More than ever will +their life be built around the fire which has always been the center of +the home. Various important changes will take place in the circumstances +of the leading characters and mysteries merely suggested in the first +story will be developed in the second. +</p> + +<p class="t3"> +The End +</p> + +<p><br /><br /><br /><br /></p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hall, by +Margaret Vandercook + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CAMP FIRE GIRLS--SUNRISE HILL *** + +***** This file should be named 8662-h.htm or 8662-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/8/6/6/8662/ + +Produced by John Pobuda. 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