E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by
Internet Archive (https://archive.org)



Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
      file which includes the original illustrations.
      See 62654-h.htm or 62654-h.zip:
      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/62654/62654-h/62654-h.htm)
      or
      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/62654/62654-h.zip)


      Images of the original pages are available through
      Internet Archive. See
      https://archive.org/details/greycliffgirlsin00grov





THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS IN CAMP


[Illustration: Slipping her hand down further, she fished out a
queer-looking metal case of some sort.]


THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS IN CAMP

by

HARRIET PYNE GROVE

Author of
“Cathalina at Greycliff,” “The Girls of Greycliff,”
“Greycliff Heroines,” “Greycliff Wings.”






A. L. Burt Company
Publishers        New York


      *      *      *      *      *      *

   THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS SERIES
 A Series of Stories for Girls

     By HARRIET PYNE GROVE

  CATHALINA AT GREYCLIFF
  THE GIRLS OF GREYCLIFF
  THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS IN CAMP
  GREYCLIFF HEROINES
  GREYCLIFF WINGS

        Copyright, 1923
     By A. L. BURT COMPANY

  THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS IN CAMP

      *      *      *      *      *      *


Made in “U. S. A.”




                       TO MERRYMEETING GIRLS

    With warmest gratitude to Mr. and Mrs. Webster, to whom
    Merrymeeting Camp owes existence, and to Miss Cotteral,
    the other councillors, and the girls, for the interest
    and inspiration which they supplied.

    The characters are all fictitious. The setting and
    activities, with some incidents, are taken from the camp
    life.

    To my daughter, who wrote the Squirrels’ Inn
    entertainment described in chapter twenty-three, credit
    is due for those verses. The words of Camping Days were
    written by Marion Buerger of Cincinnati.




                    THE GREYCLIFF GIRLS IN CAMP




                             CHAPTER I

                          THE TRIP TO CAMP


The Greycliff girls who had decided to go to the girls’ camp in
Maine with Patricia West, their English teacher, were busy getting
ready their camp equipment in the short time which elapsed between
the close of school and their departure for camp. School had closed
early in June and Merrymeeting Camp did not open until July 5th, but
Miss West, who had been a councillor at camp for several seasons,
was to have charge of a delightful and instructive trip that was
offered by the camp authorities to any of the older girls who wanted
to take it. This would give them the opportunity to see Niagara,
Toronto, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence and Thousand Islands,
Montreal, and the White Mountains. The trip was so planned that the
girls would see the best part of the scenery by day, and would have
rest at hotels from the necessary sleeping car and boat travel. All
reservations were made on boat and train and at hotels, and in the
case of the girls leaving with the Cincinnati parties, even baggage
was called for at the homes and the tickets purchased.

Letters went back and forth. Hilary Lancaster was now living in
Cincinnati, which was also Miss West’s home. Helen Paget and Evelyn
Calvert, two Southern girls who had been at Greycliff, were to join
Hilary, visiting her a day or two and starting with her party.
Cathalina Van Buskirk and Lilian North were to join them at Buffalo;
Betty Barnes, at Toronto, where she was visiting her aunt.

“The whole ‘quartet’ of our suite will be together on this trip,”
wrote Lilian to Hilary, “and more of our special friends at
camp,—won’t it be jolly? I’ve never seen Niagara, nor ever been out
of the United States. I wrote to Eloise and urged her to come, but
she says that she can not possibly get ready so soon and will have
to meet us at camp if she gets there at all!”

It was the last Thursday in June, and the train to Buffalo was to
leave at 6:05 P.M. Cincinnati was steaming with heat during one of
those days which the beautiful Queen City can serve to its
inhabitants in summer. Perspiration shone on faces and trickled down
backs. The Central Union Station was like an oven, but cheerful,
happy faces and lively conversation, anticipatory of interesting
experiences, brightened the farewells.

Both Dr. and Mrs. Lancaster, with Mary, Gordon and Tommy, were there
to see Hilary and June off; for June, to her great delight, was
going too. Dr. Lancaster had packed the whole family, with their
guests, Helen and Evelyn, into his car, recently presented to him by
his congregation, and brought them from the parsonage to the
station. Already Miss West was there, with three first-year
high-school girls, Jean Marshall, Marjorie White and Rhoda Jenkins,
known later at camp as “Jenkie” or “Jenks”.

“Think of the cool breezes in Maine,” said Dr. Lancaster, as he
delivered several small suit-cases to their owners and took out a
big white handkerchief, “to catch his tears”, as Tommy said.

“Tommy and I are going to our aunt’s for a visit,” said Gordon to
Miss West, for he wanted it to be known that he was not entirely
left out of good times. “And Father says that p’raps we can go to
Boothbay Camp next summer. The oldest got to go first in our
family!”

Time sped on as they chatted, till presently the iron gates opened
and with Miss West and the tickets in the lead, the girls passed
through. A few friends were permitted to accompany them and escort
them to the train.

“Don’t forget your pocket-book, Jean,” admonished one auntie,
through the open window.

“Yes, do hang on to that, or let Miss West carry your money,” added
another.

“I’ve been known to leave my pocket-book,” explained Jean aside to
Hilary. “Please take this twenty-five, Miss West.”

“Be sure to write a card in Buffalo, Hilary,” said Dr. Lancaster.

“O, yes, Father, we’ll write a post-card from every single place,”
replied June, happily excited over the trip, “alone, with only
Hilary!”

It was some time before the train started, and how they longed to
get away from the hot station! The electric fans started and gave
some relief. Bags or suit-cases were arranged, hats and umbrellas
disposed of, while Miss West counted noses and saw that each girl
was in her own section or knew where it was.

“Let me see. Hilary, you and June are in number nine, right over
Helen and Evelyn. Too bad you have to double in an upper. Won’t you
take my berth?”

“No, indeed; thank you, Miss West. It was our fault that we did not
decide about June’s going till the last minute. I’m thankful that we
could get the other reservations.”

“We are nicely fixed, close together and in the center of the car.
Don’t forget your numbers.”

One of the girls had never slept in a Pullman before and longed to
ask many questions; but ashamed to appear ignorant before the
others, she foolishly would have waited to find out herself as best
she could, had not June, who was not in the least ashamed of not
having traveled at night, asked Hilary the very questions which gave
the necessary information.

At last the train started. The electric lights, which had added so
much to the heat, were turned off. “O, goody, we’re moving!”
exclaimed June, settling comfortably back by Hilary, who had put
June next to the window and was fanning them both. “Goodbye, dear
old Cincy, we’re going to see lots of rivers and lakes and boats and
things before we get back to the Ohio and the Island Queen or the
Morning Star.”

Candy boxes came out immediately and were passed around, but to Miss
West’s surprise and relief, the girls tasted sparingly.

“No, thanks,” said Marjorie, as Jean offered her a box of
chocolates, “I promised Mother not to touch candy till the trip was
at least almost over. She wanted me to get there all right. And any
way this is my summer to reduce. I have to take a dip every morning,
get to breakfast on time, go on the hikes and everything. And here
old Jean eats twice as much as I do, and see how nice and slim she
is.”

“It’s in our family to be skinny,” remarked Jean. “I like what you
say about my eating twice as much as you do,” she continued,
grinning at Marjorie. “No, thank you; I had two caramels and a
bonbon. See? I brought along an _Atlantic Monthly_ to show how
high-brow I am. Auntie bought it for me, though.”

Different magazines were produced and the girls settled down quietly
to read, chat, or watch the passing scenery. As night drew on,
cooler air came in the screened windows. The girls, tired with the
heat and the activities incident to their departure, were glad to
get to their berths as soon as the porter made them up.

“How do we ever get up there, Hilary?” asked June.

“O, the porter will bring a little ladder and will help us up; and
in the morning we’ll press a little button to ring for him and he’ll
help us down again.”

The tips of brown or black oxfords peeped from beneath the green
curtains behind which quiet, well-behaved girls were quickly
preparing for the night. “Here’s the hanger for our coats, Helen,”
whispered Evelyn. “Maybe we can get our dresses on it too.”

“Let’s use that for our dresses, they’re longer. I’ll get a hanger
out of my suit-case for the coats, or we can fold them and put them
on the shelf. See these hooks? You just pull them out straight. We
certainly shall never need that blanket!”

“No telling, when we get up near the lake. Why do they always have
the pillow on the end toward the engine?”

“I don’t know. I’m going to double mine up so I won’t break my neck
if the train bumps when it starts or stops.”

“Mother said if we wanted to sleep on our valuables not to tuck them
under our pillows where any thief could get them by slipping in a
hand, but to put them inside a pillow case and turn the open end of
that toward the inside.”

“I’d go off and leave them in the morning! The only safety for me is
to have them pinned to me, I guess.”

“All right, girls?”—in Miss West’s quiet voice, as she paused by the
various curtains. Soft replies assured her that everybody was
comfortable and soon quiet reigned in the car, except when the
porter passed through with some late arrival from one of the towns
at which the train stopped.

“I can’t go to sleep, Hilary,” whispered June about midnight.

“Are you comfy?”

“O, yes!”

“Well, don’t worry; nobody will sleep much, I suspect, this first
night. We’ll be at a hotel tomorrow night. Maybe we can rest and
doze a little. It’s getting cooler, isn’t it? Let’s draw up the
blanket.”

Assured that it could not hurt anybody if she did not sleep, June
promptly dozed off. Such is the power of suggestion.

Breakfast over at Buffalo, the girls were writing cards home while
waiting for the train to Niagara. While they were thus engaged in a
corner of the waiting room where they had deposited their baggage
and one or two parcels which had already been added to the
impedimenta, a bright face peeped around the corner. “O, here they
are, Cathalina!” and with this Lilian North, smiling and happy, made
her appearance.

Everybody jumped up. “Where _were_ you children?” inquired Hilary
from Lilian’s embrace. “We thought you had missed a train or
something.”

“No, Phil brought us in the auto, rather the chauffeur did, but
Philip was the official care-taker. Here he is, with Cathalina.”

Hilary was wondering how Lilian happened to come in the Van Buskirk
car, but there was no time to ask at this juncture.

Meanwhile Philip was saying to Cathalina, as they approached, “My,
Kitten, must I be introduced to all that bunch?”

“O, yes, and remember ’em, Phil, if you can. You know Hilary, of
course, and that is June, her little sister, and Evelyn is that
graceful little thing farthest away. You’ll know her by her Southern
speech, and Helen, too,—with her rather especial drawl. I don’t know
the rest myself. There’s Patty, too, just joining them.”

Evelyn’s eyes and lashes, drooping or raised, went into effect
immediately upon introduction, and Philip’s courtesy responded to
her grown-up ways; but as there were too many girls for one young
gentleman to entertain, he remained by Lilian most of the time,
holding her extra coat and hand-bag with entire content. At train
time, however, Philip helped as many of the girls as possible,
settled them in the train, shook hands all around, kissed Cathalina
and swung himself off in good time. Many girlish eyes followed him,
and their last view was of a tall, good-looking, dark-eyed boy,
touching his hat and looking chiefly at—Lilian.

“I never saw Phil so taken with a girl,” whispered Cathalina to
Hilary at the first chance. “We were motoring through and stopped
all night at Rochester, when whom should we meet at the hotel but
Lilian and Judge North. The Judge had business at Rochester and was
going to put Lilian on the train for Buffalo. We could have gone to
Charlotte, of course, to wait for the boat from Toronto, but both
Lilian and I wanted the whole trip with you girls. We had a fine
visit yesterday as we drove,—I was so glad for Mother to know our
Lilian better, and Lilian was at her brightest and sweetest and
prettiest.”

“And that is rather attractive,” inserted Hilary.

“You can see that the Judge just loves her to pieces.”

No sooner was the party off the train at Niagara than a capable
official appeared. Arrangements were at once made with him to
transport the party by auto to the station from which they would
next depart and to take them upon the sight-seeing tour as soon as
their baggage was safely checked.

Through the park, to different points where the American or Canadian
Falls could best be seen, the girls rode or walked with little
conversation. They stood silently before the majesty of the waters,
watching the feathery flow over the American Falls, or a glittering
green cascade on the Canadian side. On little bridges which led to
rocky islands, they watched the whirling rapids above the falls.
Sometimes the mist blew into their faces.

“May we go under the falls, Miss West?”

“No, Marjorie; we’ll just do the safer, ordinary things.”

“That suits me,” said Hilary. “I want to look at the things the
Creator made. Everything else seems like a blot on the landscape,
cheap, someway.”

“Well, perhaps,” answer Helen. “Still, we could not see the Falls as
well if they did not have the bridges, you know. Wouldn’t you’ve
liked to be the first person that ever saw Niagara Falls?”

“Prob’ly some Indian.”

“Yes, June, that didn’t know what he was coming to and went over in
his little canoe!”

“Now, Marjorie!” reproved Helen. “You can hear the thunder of it a
long way off, and I’m sure that any sensible Indian would have
landed his canoe long before he came to the big rapids.”

The falls of Niagara never cease to arouse wonder and admiration no
matter how many times the tourist may have visited them, and these
girls were no exception to the rule. The amazing whirlpool rapids,
where, tossing and tumbling, the foaming waters of Niagara river
swept through the great gorge, impressed them almost as much as the
falls themselves. The day itself, with its fresh breeze and sun upon
the dancing waters, more than compensated for the tiresome trip of
the night before.

Lewiston and a customs officer came next. At first the girls
wondered why the herding of the crowd through the little gate to the
dock, but the questions asked about their luggage made them realize
that they were temporarily leaving their native land. So
unmistakable a group of school-girls and teacher, however, with the
camp tags on suit-cases and bags, was passed on everywhere without
any trouble. They were soon on board the boat for Toronto.

Out of the Niagara River into Lake Ontario the steamer moved, and it
was not long before the water front of Toronto appeared through
gathering fog and evening shadows.

“Does Betty know that we’re coming tonight?”

“I think not, unless she looks up the time-tables. She knows that
she is to leave tomorrow afternoon, and that we are to be at the
Queen’s Hotel. You will have plenty of time to visit with Betty on
the boat tomorrow and the rest of the way,—let us have a good
night’s rest, enjoy seeing Toronto tomorrow morning,—”

“O, _please_, Miss West,” begged Cathalina. “Just let us call her
up!”

“We shall see,” returned Miss West, weakening a little.

But by the time they had reached the Queen’s Hotel, nice
conservative old place with an English atmosphere and a “royal
suite,” the girls only wanted to get to bed as soon as possible.

“I’m on foreign soil,” sleepily murmured June as Hilary tucked her
in, and Hilary herself was too sleepy to laugh.




                             CHAPTER II

                       DOMINION DAY IN CANADA


When Lilian woke the next morning, she dreamily looked toward the
light of a grey, rainy morning and noticed the lace curtains
stirring in the breeze. “How appropriate,” thought she, “a crown and
‘The Queen’s’ woven in the pattern.” She glanced at Hilary and June
sleeping in the double bed near. “Here we are, then, in Canada,”
closing her eyes. “I wonder if Philip will come up to camp as he
said he would ... isn’t he fine?... how dark his eyes are ... I
wonder ...” and Lilian dozed off into an enchanting dream of
motoring somewhere with Philip Van Buskirk, not waking till
Cathalina, who fit nicely right into the dream, was shaking her and
saying, “Wake up, Canada Lily, do you know we’ll disgrace our nation
and not get down before the dining room closes!”

Rested from their warm baths and good sleep of the night, fresh,
smiling girls gathered in the breakfast room of “The Queen’s”. Miss
West was proud of them and their quiet, dignified behaviour.

“What do you think we had for breakfast, Mother?” wrote June a
little later. “_Strawberries_ and cream—thick cream! Think of it, on
the first of July! I’m going to begin in March in Cincinnati and go
north to follow up the berries till the season ends in Canada. I
ordered ‘oatmeal porridge’ because it sounded so English, ‘bean
porridge hot’, you know,—and it was the best breakfast food I ever
ate. They had ‘English breakfast tea’ on the menu, too, but I
couldn’t order that because I wanted cocoa, m’m, so good! Some of
the cocoa you get traveling is horrid. But I’ll never forget those
big, ripe, juicy berries that the waiter brought me. I felt selfish
because mine happened to be the biggest. But you couldn’t change, of
course, anyway, in public. Our waiter looked just like the English
valet I saw the other day in a movie, so dignified and serious.

“I’ve gotten the traveler’s guide and things from the office and
have learned that Toronto was founded as a French trading post with
the Indians in 1749, and that it covers forty square miles. The name
is from an Indian word and means ‘place of meeting’. The land was
‘sold to the Crown in 1787 by the Missisauga Indians for $85.’ Think
of it. It is the capital of the Province of Ontario and has a
population of five hundred thousand. I don’t suppose I shall
remember this, but I promised Father that I’d try to learn some
little thing about each place. I may add some more to this after we
have taken our ride in the sight-seeing ’bus. Miss West has the
tickets already; you can get them right in the hotel. We are to
start about noon, for we had our breakfast so late that we shall not
want any lunch till at least two o’clock. We are all packed up now,
and leave on the boat about four o’clock, I think. We haven’t seen
Betty yet, or even called her up. When we started to, we found that
nobody, not even Cathalina, knew her aunt’s name or telephone
number, but Betty knows when we leave and I’m sure she will be here
or at the boat on time.”

“Come, girls,” said Miss West, “all ready for the trip and packed up
to start after lunch? We’ll go down to the lobby and see if the taxi
has arrived.”

And such an immense taxi it was. “I feel like a monkey,” declared
Jean, “climbing with both hands and feet up this tippy height!” The
party occupied only two of the long seats, and those in front had
been reserved for them. The man of the megaphone was hatless and
active, collecting the tickets as well as imparting information.
“There are two persons who have not surrendered their tickets,” he
announced, counting tickets and passengers.

Miss West looked up inquiringly. “I have all your tickets together,”
he assured her. As the same announcement was made several times
later, the girls concluded that it was a polite way of telling that
two fares had not been paid.

At once the girls noticed that the city was decorated with flags and
that the stores were closed. “This is Dominion Day,” announced the
megaphone, “same as your Fourth of July.” Everything was “Limited”,
“Imperial”, “Royal”, “Dominion”, or “Queen’s”, according to June. T.
Eaton’s seemed to be as important in Toronto as Marshall Field’s in
Chicago, and an unusual feature in which the girls were interested
was the display of pretty gowns or other articles for sale in the
front or bay windows of what had once been private residences, now
absorbed into the business part of the city.

“How do you feel, June,” asked Cathalina, “under the Union Jack?”

“All right. You’ve been in so many foreign countries that I suppose
it does not seem strange to you.”

“I never happened to be in Canada, and it is just as interesting as
it can be!”

Different monuments and churches, Queen’s Park, the University of
Toronto and the Parliament building engaged their attention, and as
they rode through Rosedale, a pretty residential section, the girls
wondered if Betty’s aunt lived there. At the hotel again, it was
great fun to trail after the porter who showed them the royal suite;
but time was pressing, and while Miss West settled the bills the
girls started for the dock, within easy walking distance. Still no
Betty!

“I meant to get a picture of that funny little hotel ’bus,” said
Marjorie. “Is that our boat? Isn’t it cute?”

“You’ll be the death of me yet,” laughed Jean, “A steam-boat cute!”

“What’s its name?” continued Marjorie undisturbed.

“The Toronto; see?”

“Salve, Toronto! Vale, Toronto!” remarked Hilary.

“What does that mean?” asked June.

“It means ‘hail, Toronto,’ the boat, and ‘farewell, Toronto,’ the
city.”

As they came nearer the dock, some one jumped out of a taxi and
waved. It was Betty at last.

“Why, Betty,—all alone?”

“Yes, Miss West, company came unexpectedly. I had a time to get
packed up at all. But fortunately Auntie had bought my tickets
yesterday, and my trunk came down this morning. I have been thinking
of you all and could hardly wait to see you, but Auntie said that
you would be taking in the city anyway. That was to console me.”

The girls were fortunate in getting seats out in the very front of
the deck. Their baggage had been taken to the little staterooms,
cameras and field glasses brought out, and they settled themselves
in great content for the trip by water from Toronto to Montreal. So
far there had been so much sight-seeing that the visiting had been
only incidental, though by this time the Greycliff girls felt pretty
well acquainted with the three girls—Marjorie, Jean and Rhoda—whom
they had so recently met.

Betty and Cathalina compared their adventures since they had parted
at Greycliff.

“Mother said ‘how could she spare her little Betty so soon,’ for
this little visit to Auntie first, then for nearly all summer at
camp, home for just a peep at the folks, and school at Greycliff
again!”

“Mine felt that way, too, but she said that it was a good
opportunity for me to have the experience of a girls’ camp, while so
many of us could be together and while we had darling old Patty to
take care of us.”

“O, there are lots of councillors to do that.”

“Yes, of course, but then we know Patty so well.”

“Is Isabel coming, or do you know, Cathalina?”

“Yes; I had a letter from her soon after she got home. Her father
had said that she could come. Did you know that Virginia Hope went
home with her for the summer?”

“No. I rushed off home, you know, the first minute I could. That was
lovely of Isabel, and of Mr. Hunt, too.”

“I suppose that Virginia will come to camp with Isabel, but she did
not say so, and it might be that Virginia made other plans later. We
shall know when we get there,—naturally.”

“There is Jean sitting by herself. Come on over here, Jean,” and
Betty hitched her chair along to make room for Jean’s.

“I was just dreaming and watching the water,” said Jean. “Don’t you
love it?”

“Yes, I never get tired of it,” answered Cathalina, “but Betty and I
were talking about some of the girls we know at school.”

“O, yes; what is this ‘Greycliff’ you girls talk about?”

“I’m afraid you would be sorry if we got started talking on that
subject, but it is a girls’ school, preparatory, with two years of
college work, and Patty, Miss West, you know, teaches there. That is
how some of us found out about camp, because she is a councillor
there, too. Betty and I, with Lilian and Hilary, are in a suite
together. Phil calls us the ‘suite quartet’, which is an awful pun.
Philip is my brother,—O, yes, you met him at Buffalo. Of course you
know about Helen and Evelyn, and we were just saying that perhaps
two of the younger girls at Greycliff—Isabel Hunt and Virginia
Hope—would be at camp this summer. Isabel wrote that she is coming,
but did not speak of Virginia, and Virginia is visiting there. She
wrote a scrap of a letter only and did not think of it, I suppose.
Then there is another of our especial friends whom we hope to see,
Eloise Winthrop, a lovely girl that I’m sure you will like.”

“Isn’t it funny how you always get crazy about the school you go
to?”

“O, I don’t know, Jean,” replied Betty. “You see Greycliff is
unusual!”

“Last call for the first sitting.” Thus from time to time the
different dinner calls came. Dinner on the boat started at six
o’clock, but the girls had decided that they did not want tickets.
This was contrary to their usual custom, for Miss West considered
that regular meals were a necessary part of travel. But the late and
excellent lunch at the Queen’s, together with a fine supply of
sandwiches and pickles brought by Betty, and a quantity of fruit
brought aboard by Miss West, made the girls lose all interest in
dinner.

“Besides, you know, we’d better be careful if we have to stay on the
boat all night.” This from Marjorie, as the girls were drawing their
chairs close together and Betty was passing out sandwiches and
pickles.

“Don’t give her any more pickles, then, Betty.”

“All right, you shall have the rest, Jean. I love to see you so
careful of Marjorie!”

“Let’s stay out on deck as long as possible; may we, Miss West?”

“Just as long as you like tonight,” replied Patricia, who herself
enjoyed it outside. But they had nothing to dread, for the lake was
calm; no motion of the boat was felt except the throbbing of the
engine. Gulls flew high or low or rested on the water. It was cloudy
and the sun, round and orange, slowly sank through and below the
clouds, leaving for a little while a golden glow upon the water. The
girls played a few of the guessing games when it grew dark, but
finally the time came when the little god of dreams claimed his own.
For some time June had been sitting with her head on Hilary’s
shoulders, when Miss West declared that the procession for the
staterooms would “now start”.

“Don’t ring the bell as I did,” admonished Jean, “I thought it was
the electric button. You pull down the light and press the button to
ring. After I made the mistake I locked the door and skipped out, so
I wouldn’t be there when the maid came.”

“You needn’t have worried. I was just across from you with my door
braced open to air the place, and nobody came.”

“Thanks, Betty. You take a heavy load off my conscience!”

Nothing disturbed the serenity of the night. The girls were wakened
by an early stop at Kingston and soon found themselves taking
breakfast with the second “shift” in the dining-room. They were to
transfer to the other boat at Prescott, but the Toronto was going
very slowly on account of a heavy fog, and finally anchored for
nearly an hour. When the fog lifted, however, the girls found a
bright day before them. The turning of the capstan when the anchor
was drawn up interested them not a little. The transfer was made to
the boat which was to take them through the rapids.

From now on to Montreal the scenery was beautiful. It was the broad
St. Lawrence with its Thousand Islands and rapids. The Merrymeeting
girls were down in the dining-room when the first rapids were
reached, and one or two looked anxiously at Miss West, who smiled
reassuringly, and soon the churning waters were left behind, with
nothing but one little grinding scrape to remind any one of rocks as
the boat went through. “And perhaps that was our imagination,”
admitted June, as they discussed it later.

“I’m getting enough rocks at last,” remarked Hilary.

“Why, do you like them so much?”

“Yes, Rhoda, ever since we started into the St. Lawrence I’ve been
saying ‘I love Thy rocks and rills, Thy woods and templed hills’,
even if these are not all of my own country. Look. There seems to be
a sort of red rock as the foundation of the islands. There’s a dear
little one that I’d like to own. Think of a cottage there among the
trees and a place for the water birds to build in the rocks!”

“You wouldn’t like it in winter, would you?”

“No, nor in summer without a launch. But you mustn’t be so
practical, Cathalina, can’t one have a little fancy?”

“Dear old Hilary! Purr-rr! Her shall have her little island!”

“Campbell likes the water, too. Wouldn’t Thousand Islands be a
lovely place for a honeymoon?”

“Sh-sh, Lilian, the other girls might hear and Hilary wouldn’t like
it.”

“I should think Hilary wouldn’t,” commented the young lady herself.
“Please, girls, why are you so silly?”

“Well,” said Lilian, “when a certain young man finds out that a
certain young lady is going to a camp and immediately takes steps to
get himself appointed as councillor at a camp very near and under
the same management, it looks as if there were some connection
anyhow!”

Hilary smiled, but made a little pouting face at Lilian, as she
moved over to where Marjorie and Rhoda were focusing their field
glasses on more rapids ahead.

“O, the most interesting thing, Hilary,” cried June. “I heard a
gentleman tell his wife that there is only one pilot who can take
the boat through the rapids, and he has to go up every day to do it.
He learned it from his father, and his son is watching him to learn
how.”

“And did you notice,” said Rhoda, “how he pointed out the ‘American’
or the ‘Canadian’ side? They are Canadians, too. It seems funny to
me, for they are in America as much as we are.”

“Yes,” said Hilary, “but the books do it. It seems to be general.”

“Look,” said Marjorie. “See how the steamer changes its course,
always going in the more quiet water. I can pretty nearly tell where
we’ll go. See the water tumbling over there! Big rocks, I guess.”

“Yes, and did you hear the man say what a descent there is?—I can
feel the boat going down hill!”

“We are really and truly shooting the rapids,” said June with great
satisfaction.

Mt. Royal, from which Montreal takes its name, could be seen long
before the last rapids were reached. Everybody was invited to the
front of the boat while an official talked about the rapids, the
Indian village on their right, and other points of interest. Safely
through the Lachine Rapids the boat glided and reached Montreal at
last. Some of the girls in the crowded motor ’bus, a few in a
rickety victoria, the Merrymeeting party rode to the hotel where
they were to remain two nights.




                            CHAPTER III

                         VICTORIAS AND FURS


It was eleven o’clock the next morning before the girls were finally
rounded up for breakfast or lunch, as they might choose to call it.
For this they went to an attractive place not far from the hotel
where June again found ripe strawberries, big and luscious.

“You’ll turn into a strawberry, June,” said Hilary, but June only
pointed to the dishes of the same natural product on all the other
trays in the cafeteria procession, as she replied, “I don’t eat so
many more than the rest of you,—I just say more about it.”

“By the way, Miss West,” continued Hilary, “we’re going in
victorias, aren’t we?”

“How many vote for victorias?” asked Patricia, “hands up.” Every
hand at the little table went up, and as the girls at the table
close by had heard the question, theirs as well were lifted.

“It is already arranged. Several of you had spoken of it—victorias
it is. Now for shopping. I will go with Marjorie, Jean and Rhoda,
for they seem to have the most to do. The rest of you meet us at the
hotel in not less than an hour. There is a drug store right here on
the corner, a department store half block in that direction. Keep in
mind this corner and the way to the hotel. Hilary, you are in
charge.”

Hilary pretended to be much honored and the rest of the girls began
to joke her by asking if they might do the most obviously proper
things. But they had little shopping to do and arranged to meet at
the entrance of the big store.

“Listen,” said Cathalina, as they were returning to the hotel. “That
boy has a French paper. I’m going to get one. I had no idea that
Montreal was so French, though I heard some French spoken on the
boat, of course.”

“I heard a lady say that Montreal is fifty per cent French, and that
of that fifty per cent ninety per cent can not speak English.”

“No wonder, then, Betty, that they have both French and English on
the shop signs. I should like to spend a summer up here some time.
No need of going abroad to keep up your French!” Later, Cathalina
discovered that McGill University has many such summer pupils.

Duly at two-thirty, three victorias, drivers high in the air, rolled
away from the hotel to see the Canadian city of Montreal.

“O, I feel so English,” sighed Marjorie.

“Me, too,” said Rhoda, “but I think they ought to be called ‘Queen
Marys’ now instead of victorias!”

“Did you notice, Rhoda,” drawled Helen, “what our elderly waiter
said to you last night?”

“About my ‘’am sandwich’? Wasn’t I good not even to smile?”

“You were indeed, and so were the rest of us, I think, though Lil
gave me one look that almost upset me. She kept as sober as an owl,
of course. I didn’t want to make fun of any one, but I never heard
the h’s dropped, outside of a book or a movie.”

“Did you ever _hear_ it in either?”

“Well, you know what I mean!”

“Gently, girls, the driver might hear you,” warned Miss Patty, who
made the fourth passenger in this vehicle.

The first place at which the driver stopped was in front of Notre
Dame Cathedral. The girls ran up the broad stone steps which led to
the entrance. Silently they entered, viewed the brilliant interior,
the altars and shrines with their candles, walked quietly down the
aisle to the right past a kneeling worshipper who was telling her
beads before a shrine, and into a part of the building to the rear
of the altar.

“I can translate that,” whispered Marjorie to Cathalina as they
looked at the inscriptions upon the wall. “‘Silence in the holy
place’.” (Silence dans le lieu saint.)

“Notice the Latin inscriptions, too,—‘Oculos ad nos converte’—”

Hilary lingered a little to drop a coin into a box and came out with
her eyes full of tears. “I’ve been brought up in another kind of
service,” she explained to June, “but this touches me some way.”

“It’s the Lord’s house,” replied June solemnly.

“And some people’s faith and hope.”

“Des Jardins,” read Cathalina on the windows of a store where the
victorias were stopping. “I did not catch what the man said and I
was in the last victoria,” she explained later to one of the party,
“so imagine my surprise, after having translated it ‘gardens’ and
expecting to find flowers, to see this wonderful fur store.”

A great display of furs it was. The girls all longed to buy some at
the summer prices, but had not planned for any large expenditures on
this trip.

“Mother usually buys her furs up north,” said Betty, “since Auntie
lives there, you know.”

“Look at the darling white moccasins!” Hilary and June immediately
decided to purchase a pair for Mary, and several of the party bought
the bead-trimmed, leather moccasins before they left Montreal.

The ascent of Mt. Royal was made by easy stages, around a beautiful,
winding drive, past rocks and grassy slopes, interesting varieties
of trees and bushes, skirting a bridle path part of the way, till
finally the “look out”, “La Terrasse d’Observatoire au Mont-Royal”
was reached and a fine view of the city and river obtained.

“Just see me come up here some summer,” said Cathalina, as she
leaned upon the parapet next to Betty, “and read French while I live
in some French family and talk it all the time.”

When evening came, it was decided that in view of the long trip the
next day no outside entertainment should be sought.

“Let’s make it unanimous for bed,” suggested Hilary, who intended in
any event to see that June was early in the land of dreams.

“I vote with Hilary,” said Jean. “My brain can’t hold so much at one
time. I can’t remember all I’ve seen today!”

Helen, Evelyn and the three younger girls were with Miss West in a
suite of two rooms and bath. Hilary with June and Lilian, and Betty
with Cathalina were in adjoining rooms not far away. Like the girls,
Patricia dropped to sleep early, thinking about how perfectly
everything was going about the trip, and how lovely and sensible her
girls were. “And Cathalina has had so much experience in traveling.”
But if she had known what was happening that night scarcely the
proverbial forty winks would have been hers.

Waking early, and dozing uneasily for a while for fear that she
would oversleep, Miss West rose and dressed, wakened the girls that
were with her, saw that they were really roused and getting ready,
and went to call the rest. In the room occupied by Cathalina and
Betty she heard voices as she tapped on the door. “Up already, are
you?” she said, as Betty, fully dressed, threw open the door and
several somewhat excited voices began, “O, Miss West,—”

“Where did you find the pocketbook?” Hilary was asking Cathalina.

“Right there, on the floor.”

“And was nothing but the money gone?”

“That was all.” Cathalina was quite cool.

“What is this?” asked Patricia.

“Why, Miss Patricia, I seem to have been robbed last night,—but
don’t worry. I don’t mind, really, though I wish I’d spent it
yesterday!”

Miss West sat down on the bed. “Do you mean to tell me that your
room was broken into last night? Tell me all about it. Did you wake
up and see the robber?”

“Mercy, I hadn’t thought that we might! Wouldn’t it have been
terrible? There isn’t much to tell. You see we didn’t lock the
door—”

“I thought you girls always did that.—O, if I had only come and
tucked you all in!”

“It wasn’t your fault at all, and really we meant to lock the door
as usual. Indeed we do lock it, Miss West. You see, we were waiting
for ice water and got too sleepy to have any sense, I guess. We rang
and the boy didn’t come, and then we waited a while and were just
nearly falling over with sleep,—”

“After being out in the air all day,” inserted Betty.

“But your door should have been locked until he came.”

“Yes; we didn’t know it wasn’t. I put a tip on the table to have it
ready, and I finally crawled into bed with my Kimono on, after
ringing again,—and I woke up with it on this morning! The door was
wide open, my purse on the floor and the money gone. Please don’t
scold, Miss West; truly we won’t be so careless again.”

“My dear, I never felt less like scolding, and am only too thankful
that nothing happened to you and that you were not awakened or
frightened. But it is odd, Cathalina, for I thought of going in
again to see if you were all right, then I thought ‘Cathalina has
traveled so much that she will let me know if they need anything’
and went off to sleep more peacefully than usual! Do you remember
how much was in the purse?”

“About twenty dollars, I think. I have some besides, that wasn’t in
the pocketbook, and my check-book.”

“I was going to say that I can attend to all your expenses, of
course.”

“Shall I write Mother about it?”

“I wouldn’t send a telegram,” Betty suggested with a laugh.

“When you get safely into camp she will not worry. You can write the
details then. It is safely over now and will teach us all a lesson
in making sure that it is not too easy for some thief to get our
money.”

“It must be great to have your own check-book and money in the
bank,” whispered June to Hilary. “Is Cathalina awful rich?”

“‘Very,’ not ‘awful,’” corrected June’s elder sister. “Yes, you know
how much I have told you about their lovely home and servants and
everything. Cathalina has about everything she wants.”

“I will speak to the hotel people about it, but I fancy that we
shall never see the money,” Miss West was saying to Cathalina.
“Perhaps we can find out whether the bellboy ever came or not.”

There was little time for any detective work. Breakfast must be
eaten, bags packed, and an early departure made to the train.
Cathalina dismissed the matter, and by the time the party was on the
train bound for Portland everybody else seemed to have forgotten it.
Patricia had an occasional shiver whenever she thought of her
sleeping girls with their door opened by some prowler, but the
necessary arrangements of the present often most fortunately crowd
out the too vivid memory of some unpleasant occurrence.

“Here’s our last look at Montreal,” said Evelyn, as the train drew
away from the city. “There are two square towers of Notre Dame.”

“Goodbye, Mt. Royal,” and June waved her hand blithely. Too many
good times were ahead of them all for regrets.

“This is the Canadian Pacific bridge, I suppose,” said Rhoda, “that
we saw when we came down the river,—yes, there is the Indian village
that hasn’t any streets.”

“I’ve seen my last French sign, I guess,” remarked Cathalina. “It
was at the crossing. ‘Traverse Du Chemin De Fer’ was one cross-piece
and ‘Railroad Crossing’ on the other.”

They were comfortably settled for the all day trip to Portland in a
chair car and looked very serious when an official appeared to ask
them if they had bought anything in Canada. They began to open their
suit-cases or bags and told of their moccasins at once, but in their
sincere faces the most suspicious of custom officers could find no
guile.

“It’s the Green Mountains that we see first, girls, then the White
Mountains. The conductor said so.” Jean was looking at the map in
her folder. “And we’re not in the United States right away after
crossing the St. Lawrence.”

As Hawthorne’s Tales of the White Hills are usually read in that
department of school work known as “English”, these girls were quite
interested in finding, among post cards bought on the train, a
photograph of the “Great Stone Face”. “I hadn’t thought of it
myself,” said Patty, “that these are Hawthorne’s White Hills at
last.”

“This scenery is the most lovely of all we have seen,” said Lilian.

They had been watching the clouds floating about the hill-tops,
little cascades leaping down the rugged heights, pretty glens,
little streams, lakes and rocky cliffs. Yet beautiful as the scenery
was, no one could keep in a state of rapture all the time. At
intervals Cathalina read her French papers. Other papers and
magazines were passed around, or the girls chatted happily about
many things. It was a day to be remembered, and interesting to have
celebrated “Dominion Day” in Canada, this “glorious Fourth”, or most
of it, in New England.

“What do you think about it, girls?” asked Miss West of a few near
her, as they were nearing Portland. “Was it worth the trouble to
take the trip?”

“I wouldn’t have missed it for anything,” cried Marjorie, and seemed
to express the general sentiment.

A sight-seeing trip in Portland the next day showed them its
buildings and parks, and Casco Bay with its schooners, sail-boats
and freighters of all sorts. On Congress Street they saw the home of
Longfellow, “next to Keith’s!” This struck the girls as particularly
funny. “‘From the sublime to the ridiculous’ both literally and
figuratively,” said Hilary.

The journey to Bath seemed incredibly short in comparison with the
long trips which they had been having. It was the Maine country,
with its buttercups, daisies, wild roses, evergreens, and the aged
rocks peeping out here and there,—and now they had arrived at Bath,
with nothing but a boat ride between them and camp!




                             CHAPTER IV

                            CAMP AT LAST


“Our luck has turned, girls; it poured at Portland and is drizzling
here!”

“But we’ve had lovely days for all the important sight-seeing. Do
you remember how perfectly bright and wonderful it was that day on
the St. Lawrence? The water sparkled and foamed, and the sky was so
blue,—”

“Listen to Lilian, our optimist,” spoke Hilary. “She’s our mascot
for good weather. By the way, Miss West, I have to get some sneakers
and a bathing cap in Bath.”

“So do I,” said Evelyn and Betty together, whereat they turned, made
mysterious signs and repeated “thumbs” together.

“How many million years have girls done that?” asked Patricia. “We
shall have quite a little shopping to do at Bath, but all the stores
are near together. I need ink, some tablets and magazines. Whoever
comes down the river for us will probably have a lot of errands to
do, as usual. We’ll do ours and then go down to the dock and wait.
It will not be later than four o’clock, I think, when we start up
the river.”

It was the little Papoose from the boys’ camp that came for them. On
account of the drizzle, the canopy was up, an affair not unlike the
top of a prairie schooner, but, alas, not as high. Some of the
occupants had to assume a bending posture. Helen declared that she
had a “puhmahnent cuhve” in her back, and for weeks Hilary referred
to the submarine stunt of their first arrival. But it was fun to
peep out at the water, the rocks, and the green trees that lined the
banks, and the Papoose safely chugged her way to Merrymeeting.

“Here we are; hooray for Merrymeeting!” cried Jean, as she stepped
upon Merrymeeting’s floating dock and ran lightly up to the more
solid portion above the washing of tides; for the Kennebec is
affected by the sea tides, and as far up as Merrymeeting Bay there
is a difference of from six to eight feet in the depth of the water,
according to the tide.

Up the little rise they filed to the level ground which stretches
broadly at the river front and holds the big dining hall and the
boat house; then again they proceeded up the gradual ascent to the
Club House, which is the center of Merrymeeting life. There the
girls were welcomed and assigned to the different “Klondikes” or
cottages. The other campers and councillors had only arrived at
noon, hence a scene of great activity. Basins and pitchers were
being given out. Cots and mattresses were being placed or changed in
tents and klondikes. Trunks were being delivered and directions of
all sorts given. In spite of the damp grass and misty atmosphere,
everybody seemed happy, the old campers glad to get back.

“You don’t know how lovely it is here,” said one and another to the
new comers. “Wait till the sun comes out!”

Already Marjorie, Jean and Rhoda had joined girls whom they knew in
school in Cincinnati. Hilary knew a few more of them, though she had
not lived there very long. The Greycliff girls had asked to be
together, but Patricia explained that assignments were usually made
on account of age. “We have Seniors, Intermediates and Juniors. And
then you don’t want to be in a separate group, do you? There are
girls from several different private schools and high schools in
different cities, East and West. You will lose sight of other
organizations and just be Merrymeeting campers together.”

“That is much better,” acknowledged Hilary at once. “I did not think
of it. Of course we don’t want to be a little club by ourselves!”

“However,” continued Patricia, “for another reason I want to put you
four Greycliff room-mates together. Helen and Evelyn are to be
together in a different klondike. June will have to go to
‘Laugh-a-Lot,’ and I shall be there, for a while at least.”

“O, good!” exclaimed June, who had felt a slight qualm at the idea
of being separated from Hilary.

“Here, Frances Anderson,” called Patricia to a tall, fine-looking
girl who was passing. “Aren’t you at Squirrels’ Inn? I thought so.
Please show these girls where it is—Hilary Lancaster, Cathalina Van
Buskirk, Lilian North and Betty Barnes,—” with which brief
introduction Miss West was off to see about some affairs of her own,
June’s hand tucked under her arm.

“Squirrels’ Inn!” exclaimed Lilian. “Our future residence?”

Frances was friendly and enjoyed initiating the girls into the way
of camp. They stood chatting a few minutes, then moved on over the
wrinkled gray rocks and grass around the Club House toward
Squirrels’ Inn. But a gay voice called them before they had gone
far.

“Cathalina Van Buskirk! Hil and Lil! Betty! O, joy!” From the
“Wiggly” side of the double cottage called Piggly-Wiggly, who should
come running but Isabel! “Have you seen Eloise? She’s down at her
klondike getting settled.”

“At Squirrels’ Inn?”

“No; the one down by the pine grove. May I come over with you? I was
just over with Eloise and met Helen and Evelyn going to the same
cottage. There are a lot of girls down there. We’ve got a house full
too. Such doings! I’m crazy about this place already.”

On to Squirrels’ Inn they went and met their young councillor, with
two more girls, Marion Thurman and Nora McNeil. A busy time
followed. This klondike at first arranged its cots on one side and
trunks on the other. Wiggly, where Isabel escorted the girls later,
had a cot and its trunk, then another cot with its accompanying
trunk, and so on, around the big room. “I like your cottage,” said
Isabel, “because it has that back porch hanging over the hillside,
so convenient for drying or sunning bathing suits or bathrobes.”

“Trust Isabel for finding all about a place in a few hours,”
remarked Cathalina. “It would be a month before half that Isabel
sees in two minutes would make any impression on me.”

“Why, I thought you had traveled a good deal, Cathalina; don’t you
notice things?”

“Yes, what I’m interested in, but Isabel sees everything.”

“O, Mother only put in two sheets!” This came from Betty, who was
diving into her trunk. “Yes, here are some more.”

“My, Cathalina, your steamer rug looks nice over your cot!”

“I’ve got a big grey army blanket.”

“Just look at Betty’s Indian blanket! Who gave it to you, Betty?”

“My Aunt; I got it this summer in Canada.”

“I think we’d better spread our ponchos over our cots, don’t you?
It’s so damp tonight.”

“I haven’t any.”

“Very likely there are some at the office that you can buy. You’ll
probably want one.”

“I have a good rain-coat.”

“Just the thing; spread that over your blankets tonight.”

“There’s the supper bell. We have dinner at noon, supper at six.
Come on, that’s the second bell.”

The old farm bell hung high, as it had when Merrymeeting was a farm
and was swinging and ringing cheerfully, while one of the little
girls pulled the rope, by orders from headquarters. Down hill the
girls ran or walked to the big dining-room with its long tables.

“We can look right out on the lake, can’t we?” said Betty.

“River, you mean, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course; but doesn’t it make you think of a lake someway? It
is so broad here.”

“It makes me think more of the St. Lawrence,” said Cathalina, “with
the islands and the rocks and the pretty rippling water.”

“Those little islands are the Burnt Jackets. Didn’t you notice that
your boat rocked a little coming through the Burnt Jackets? The
Indians named them.”

At supper it was announced that the first Camp Fire would be at the
Club House shortly. The bell would ring. Duly the big family
assembled, stopping, many of them to look at the glorious rainbow
which was appearing in the East. “O, it’s double, girls!” said
Isabel.

“Didn’t you ever see anything like that before?” asked one superior
damsel, going on inside.

“Chile, dat means it’s goin’ to cleah up,” replied Evelyn in her
best dialect.

Within it seemed like bedlam for a while till a whistle blew and one
of the older girls took charge as leader of songs and cheers, and
one of the councillors who sat on the floor among the girls tuned up
her “light guitar”. There was a piano, but it was not used at this
first Camp Fire. In the big fireplace the wood fire glowed and
cracked, drying a long line of shoes which stood before it, filling
the Assembly Hall with comfort and good cheer, and reminding some of
the campers from the hot cities that they were up in Maine.

“A few things to be remembered, girls,” said the head councillor.
“The first bell in the morning will be for the dip, at seven
o’clock, but there will be none tomorrow morning, not until the next
Friday morning. At five minutes of eight the bell rings for setting
up exercises. Come promptly, down by the dining-room. Breakfast is
at eight. Right after breakfast you go back to your klondikes to get
them in order for inspection. You receive a certain number of points
for neat order and a banner goes every week to the most orderly
klondike.

“The plans for the games and the teams will be announced. We are
going to have all kinds of good times. You all have a special place
to fit in and will be on a team. There will be a hare and hounds
chase soon, a Mystery Hunt that I can not tell you about or it would
not be a mystery, tournaments and a swimming meet and a picnic down
at the boys’ island. Until the canoe tests no one is allowed to go
out in a canoe. And only in groups of three or more may you go into
the pine grove. We never have had prowlers, but take no chances. No
girl ever goes off the grounds, and your councillor should always
know where you are.”

“About the candy, please?”

“When any candy is received in camp, the girl is called to the
office, opens the box herself, is given half a pound and the rest
goes into the general supply. Occasionally a dish of candy will be
on each table at the dining-room. And by the way, Lilian North has
the first box of candy. Go and get it for her, Frances. Come,
Lilian, it came before you arrived. You may open it and pass it
around now if you like.”

It was quite evident that the box was a surprise to Lilian, but she
rose to the occasion, opened the big box on the table in the little
room at the end of the assembly hall, slipped the card it contained
into her sweater pocket, and amid applause and cries of “What’s the
matter with Lilian North?” or “Speech, speech!” passed the box
around, first throwing little handfuls of bonbons into the laps and
upstretched hands of the smaller children.

“My, your father is good to you!” exclaimed June innocently, as
Lilian sat down by her chums again. Hilary looked mischievous and
Cathalina pretended to lean against Betty for support. Lilian’s
cheeks were rosy with blushes, but she carried it off well and kept
her hand on the card in her pocket till she should have a good
chance to look at it privately.

“Everybody in on this yell!” announced the cheer leader:

                    “One, two, three, four!
                    Three, two, one, four!
                      _Who_ for?
                      _What_ for?
                    What y’ going to yell for?—
                      Merrymeeting!”




                             CHAPTER V

                        FROM LILIAN’S DIARY


July 6, Thursday.

I see that this little book is going to be full before the summer is
over. It is just as well that Father gave me this pretty diary with
the key, for some of the things I shall write will be very private
and special. I do not believe, though, that I shall write out my
thoughts much. I did that once, and they seem so silly afterwards,
when you have gotten older. However, I’m nearly grown up now.

Last night there was a gorgeous rainbow and this morning when we
started down to breakfast every little spider had its cobweb out,
(tune of “ev’ry little wave had its white cap on, white cap, night
cap, white cap on”), and that means a nice day. Sure enough, it
wasn’t long before the sun shone out and showed how perfectly lovely
it is up here. I’m wild about the scenery. One of the councillors
said that the bay looked like “liquid sapphire”, which was very good
indeed, for it reflected the blue of the sky. I’ll try “liquid
sapphire” in a “pome” sometime. Merrymeeting Bay is on our right, to
the west of our point, and is where five rivers meet. It certainly
does look funny to see the current, or apparently the current, going
the wrong way between our point and that of the mainland opposite on
into the bay. I thought at first this morning that the way I had
considered down stream must be up stream and that I had been turned
around as to directions. But I soon found that this was only the
tide coming in! We are six or seven miles from Bath and almost
fourteen from the sea, I believe. There is the dearest island just
inside the bay. Somebody lives there, for we see a house and boat.

The girls call the gymnastic exercise that we have just before going
in to breakfast the “upsetting exercises”. It is fun, for the
athletic director gives us some exercises different from any I ever
had before. My voice lessons have made me able to do the deep
breathing performances easily. I didn’t take much gym last year in
school, had too much else to do, or thought I had.

At breakfast there were some announcements, about how many points
one makes in the different things, for orderly klondike, for being
quiet in rest hour, and after the last bell rings at night. I
couldn’t begin to remember it all. But I can find out gradually, I
think. Then we get points for hikes and the games, and for bringing
in the wild flowers and identifying new birds. I’m going to see how
many I can make. Each year there is a silver cup given to the best
all around camper among the seniors, among the juniors and among the
intermediates, and on your head-band you can have the cutest things
for what you have done. Frances had so many on the one she got last
year. Everybody has M. C., for Merrymeeting Camp, and two cunnin’
little pine trees on each side of those letters. Frances has a
tennis racquet, a volley ball, a baseball, a paddle, a shoe (for
hiking), and the dearest little musical notes. I think I can get the
notes, and I’m pretty good at tennis, though I’ve never played the
other games. Old Hilary will shine in basketball. How I’d love to
get the Merrymeeting ring or a pin, but not very many get those, I
guess. You can not buy them, just win them.

At eleven o’clock we had our first swim, in the cove by the pine
grove. That makes a good rhyme and I’m going to put it in a song
perhaps. It is the most fascinating place! You feel like an Indian
stepping on those generations of pine needles and do not make a bit
of noise. There is a narrow winding path with sweet fern and other
ferns and green moss and all sorts of pretty things by it, just
before you get in under the thickest trees. Then you climb down over
roots and stones to the big rocks that line the cove. This is almost
a complete circle of rocks, well, there is quite a space where they
have a rope and pole beyond which the girls do not go. Cathalina
said we all looked like mermaids. She didn’t go in this morning as
she took a bit of cold on the boat. The swimming teacher was there
and in a boat near were two more of our gentlemen, ready to rescue
us, I suppose, if we did anything foolish. The girls who can not
swim paddled around where the water is shallow. It is only at high
tide that the cove is well filled, they say. We have a swimming
teacher, an athletic director, a doctor, a nurse, and more
interesting folks that I do not know yet. All the girls that I have
met are pleasant and friendly and are of all descriptions as to size
and looks. Some of them are tutoring a little with some of the
councillors.

Now the most interesting thing of all. I had a box of candy from
Philip Van Buskirk. It seemed to be a four or five-pound box and was
full of the most delicious kinds that just melted in your mouth.
Philip certainly does know how to choose candy. It was sent from New
York and he must have mailed it as soon as he got home. Word was
sent me from the office by one of the little girls that a box was
there for me, but I thought that it was just the middies that were
to come from home, and in the midst of getting settled I forgot
about it till it was announced at the Camp Fire and the box brought
in. It flashed over me that perhaps Phil had sent it, because he had
been so perfectly lovely to me from the time we met at Rochester. We
talked music and other things almost steadily or we all sang
together and Phil has a perfectly adorable voice. And when he put
down my coat and things on the train as we started to Niagara he
bent down and said close to my ear, “You are going to hear from me
soon.” I looked up at him and laughed, and just then Cathalina spoke
to him.

Philip has been brought up to do all the nice things that gentlemen
do when they can, but I don’t believe that he is a flirtatious boy
and I do believe that he really likes me and that we can be good
chums whenever we meet. I am crazy to hear him play. Imagine having
him play an accompaniment for me!

But I’m not finishing about the box. I slipped the card quickly into
my pocket and looked at it afterward. “Philip Van Buskirk” looked so
distinguished, and so does he, for that matter. The girls were
lovely, did not ask me a word about it, although I know Hilary was
dying to be sure that it was from Philip. He is very kind indeed,
but there is no reason for being silly about it. He probably sends
candy to other girls. His manners are just perfect, and he seems so
grown up and serious, some way. I ought to write a little note of
thanks, I suppose, or would it do to tell Cathalina,—no, that
wouldn’t do. O, I didn’t bring a bit of real good stationery along!
I refused to write to any of the boys at home, said I wouldn’t have
time but would send cards to the entire crowd. They were all so good
to me the short time I was home.

This afternoon the girls had a circus in the big barn and initiated
all of us new girls. It was a circus, indeed! Some of them were
painted up as clowns and looked perfectly killing. The old girls got
it up with the help of the athletic director. We girls sat on the
hay in the high mow and slid down or climbed down when wanted to
take the center of the “stage”, which was on the main floor, also
covered with hay. Some of the stunts were very funny. Hilary and I
had to sit down back to back, with our arms locked,—in each
other’s,—and then we were to rise. We couldn’t do it at all and got
to laughing so that we just fell over in the hay! Several other
pairs of the ones to be initiated tried it and we all declared that
it couldn’t be done. Then it was announced that two councillors
would try it and show us how it could be done. We thought that it
would be a joke on the two councillors that were asked, but didn’t
they do it, though not without some trying! There was great
applause.

We had some visitors up from the boys’ camp and Brushwood Lodge,
where fathers and mothers can stay. Some of their councillors were
up, but we didn’t see anything of Campbell. If Hilary teases about
Philip, I must not forget Campbell’s interest in her!

As Isabel says, “more anon”. I’m afraid that this will be a scrappy
diary. I’m sitting on my cot to write. Nobody is in the klondike
now, but Nora McNeil, whom some of the girls call “Pat” or “Irish”.
I think that sounds a little too much like boys. Not many of the
girls have nicknames, but those that have do not seem to mind it.

It must be nearly time for the supper bell,—yes, there it is.

                 *       *       *       *       *

Isabel ran in at this moment and carried Lilian off with her. “I
brought over Cathalina’s sweater. She left it in Wiggly after the
circus. Say, Lilian, I’ve counted eighteen canoes beside the war
canoe. It holds seventeen by actual count of seats. Aren’t they the
prettiest things?—that deep blue and all painted up new!”

“You are like Shakespeare, Isabel, closing up your speech with two
lines that rhyme.”

“What?—O, ‘blue’ and ‘new’. Yes, I’m a great poet.”

“Can you paddle, Isabel?”

“Just a little, but I want to learn to do it well. I can swim if I
do tip over, but I want to be an expert, ha-ha!” and Isabel struck
an attitude of great dignity.

“I think that most of the Greycliff girls can swim, but I want to
get the strokes that this teacher will give us. I do think it
important to be a good swimmer if you have the opportunity to learn.
Father will be so delighted if I do these things.”

“We’ve been assigned to tables. Goodbye; I must hunt mine up.”

Lilian found herself with a new councillor and a group of girls
entirely unknown to her, but it does not take long for campers with
common interests to become acquainted.

“Who serves first?” asked one.

“The girls next to me,” replied the councillor. “Two serve for three
meals, then two others the next day, and so on, moving around the
table.” Little girls, as little used to responsibility as Cathalina
had been, took hold as cheerfully as could be, and brought in plates
of bread and butter, pitchers of milk, dishes of steaming potatoes
or platters of well-browned fish.

“Did you see the big fish?” asked one of the girls.

“No; what fish?”

“There was a four hundred-pound sturgeon caught up the river.”

“Four hundred pounds! You are joking.”

“No, indeed. We asked how they got it into the boat, and they said
it was just like a log, too heavy to fight. They cut it up and
shipped it to Bath in a barrel!”

“What a fish story!”

“No, honest, some people that live on the river caught it.”

“Ting-a-ling,” the bell at the head councillor’s table. First a bird
hike was announced for an early hour the next morning, the bell to
ring at a quarter to six. Our Greycliff quartet especially gave
attention to this and nodded at each other as members of the
Greycliff bird club.

The next announcement created universal joy and was to the effect
that the Aeolus and Truant would take out the campers for a ride on
the river and that the girls who had been at Merrymeeting before and
could paddle might take out the war canoe. There was great applause
and a hurrying on the part of the experienced paddlers to select
paddles and run or slide down to the dock.

As Lilian and Hilary walked down, one little girl came up the hill
crying. “O,” said Lilian, “what is the matter?”

No response.

“Come on with me and have a good time,” said Lilian coaxingly.

A councillor appeared hurrying up the slight ascent after the child.
“She is homesick,” she explained, “and when she thought she could
not sit by me she said she wouldn’t go.” Kindly the young councillor
led her along and finally got her on the boat. The girls saw her
later, contentedly watching the gulls which flew about the landing
as the boats started.

Everybody had been longing to get out on the water on this ideal
day. Blue, rosy or golden, the sunset colors stained the waters with
like reflected hues. The start of the war canoe was funny indeed. No
one was in practice and as Isabel said, the paddles were going in
ragtime in spite of the regularly called time. But by the time they
were fairly out in the river the paddles swept in unison. Girls sat
both within and on top of the Aeolus, and out on the front and rear
of the Truant. A pretty sight it was as they floated out into the
sunset, and there we may leave them, knowing that we shall find them
in their klondikes in the morning.




                             CHAPTER VI

                 A COSTUME PARTY AND A TRIP TO BATH


Squirrels’ Inn contained a congenial group. There were the four
Greycliff girls, Cathalina, Hilary, Lilian and Betty, with whose
characters and talents we are fairly familiar by this time. Frances
Anderson was one of the strongest girls in camp, a good, all-round,
dependable girl, having ideas of her own, but what the girls called
a “good sport”.

Nora McNeil was as tall as Frances and had soft, fluffy black hair,
big blue eyes, and the complexion that goes with this Irish
combination. She was slight and active, as happy as the rest to be
in camp, for this was her first year, too, and she was experiencing
all the thrills of a first time.

Marion Thurman was an Eastern girl, using the soft a’s, the r’s
omitted or softened in certain places and put in in others,
characteristic of New England speech. Her long hair was in shining
black braids that usually hung Indian fashion over her shoulders.
Large, expressive hazel eyes, a straight nose that was Isabel’s
admiration, and a sweet mouth, gave expression to a very bright,
attractive face.

All the girls were sensible, having no trouble over the daily
program of keeping the klondike in order, going for the water, and
performing the other small duties of common interest. Nobody was too
lazy or selfish to take her turn, or refused to do it at the proper
time. The Greycliff girls declared that Frances, Nora and Marion
must all come to Greycliff for the next school year. Isabel and
Virginia Hope came over once in a while to sputter about two or
three girls in Piggly-Wiggly and on this particular morning were
sitting on the top of two wardrobe trunks in Squirrels’ Inn.

“Bess Snider is a perfect baby!” Isabel was saying as she swung her
heels. “At first she was homesick. I did not blame her for that,
still when there are girls that would almost give their heads to
come up here it does seem so silly.”

“You can’t help homesickness, they say, Isabel.”

“I bet I could,—just think about something else.”

“That is what I did,” assented Cathalina.

“The next thing, Bess wanted to get out of dip and games and things
and got up headaches and pains of all sorts?”

“Are you sure she was pretending?”

“No, and I’m not telling it around, but it was awfully funny how she
could always do the things she wanted to do! But she could never
take her turn about sweeping, and we were always hanging up her
bathing suit to dry for her. If she could get anybody to do anything
for her she would. If anybody even started to the club house it was
‘O won’t you please take this, that or the other thing for me.’ I’ve
carried up her laundry and brought her a drink of water and brought
stamps for her and mailed her letters till I’m tired of it. She is
getting over some things, but when she takes off her clothes at
night she drops them right on the floor, even her good things, and
she makes us have a bad inspection every time the camp mother comes
around, unless we watch her up.”

“She is just spoiled,” laughed Cathalina, with memories of a time
not so far back when she had hated to do anything for herself.

“There are several girls here who have maids at home,” said Isabel,
“and they don’t do that way; they think it’s fun.”

“I’d like to be spoiled once,” said Virginia, glowing beneath her
second layer of freckles. She dropped from the trunk, sank upon the
nearest cot, limply fell over on the pillow, and with a drawl,
remarked, “Izzy, would you mind bringing me my comb? I left it on
your trunk. And Cathie, do bring the water for me, that’s a dear. My
head aches so this morning. I think it’s a mistake about its being
my turn, anyway. My, I’m hot after games!” and Virginia fanned
herself with the end of her middy tie.

“Pretty good imitation, Virgie,” said Isabel. “She probably wouldn’t
have played the games, though, would have had a bad ankle or arm, or
a pain somewhere.”

“I couldn’t play yesterday,” said Betty. “I had taken cold in my
shoulder or something. Do you suppose any one thought I was lazy?”

“If they did, they’ll find out differently before the summer’s
over,” replied Virgie.

Poor little Virginia had never been “spoiled” enough, or had enough
real love in her life those last hard years on the ranch. But she
had come out of it with a tough, firm little body, and a gallant
little soul with which to meet adventures, good or ill.

“I am surprised at you, Margaret Virginia Hope,” said Lilian, “that
you are so hard-hearted toward Bess and condone Betty’s sins!”

“Please cut out the Margaret, Lilian. Don’t you remember how I told
you that I had absolutely changed my personality? Margaret and
Maggie died on the ranch.”

The girls recalled Virginia’s unhappy little story, confided to
them, of the handsome-looking but rough-speaking and high-tempered
stepmother whom her father had brought to the ranch, and how at last
when her father found out the state of affairs he had sent her away
to school and promised that she should not return for a time, if he
could manage it. Virginia had been afraid that she would have to go
back this summer and help, but her father’s finances improved till
he found that he could afford to send her with the girls to camp.

“What are you going to wear, girls, at the costume party tonight?”

“I’m one of the men,” said Frances. “They always have me for one
because I’m tall and have short hair. I’m going to have Cathalina’s
scarlet sport coat and other appropriate togs, a burnt cork
mustache, and a cane. We must pick our corsage bouquets this
afternoon.”

“O, yes; you have to get one.”

“Yes, the gentlemen all send corsage bouquets to their ladies fair,
call for them, take them to the party and take them home again. My
young lady is ’way over at Pine Lodge, so I’ll call for her with my
coach and four.”

“Four feet, I suppose, yours and hers,” interpolated Virgie.

“Or I shall dazzle her with the headlight of my new Rolls Royce and
startle all the mosquitos and caterpillars abroad.”

“I remember, you just bought a big flashlight.”

“And gently convey her delicate form,—”

“May Furniss is one of the fattest girls in camp!”

“Why spoil my lovely tale, Isabel? Yes, May’s pretty plump and lots
of fun, and as I’m almost the tallest and skinniest, we’ll be quite
a pair. We couldn’t invite any girl in our own klondike, so I
selected May.”

“I’m to be a man, too,” said Betty. “I’ve gathered a lot of the
pretty red wood lilies already for the bouquet.”

“Land, Betty, don’t you remember who you’re taking?—It’s me!”
exclaimed Virginia, somewhat ungrammatically, to be sure, but
forcefully, “and wouldn’t red lilies match my hair, though!”

“Sure enough,” said Betty, frowning, “but your hair isn’t—”

“Yes it is—sandy, anyhow. And I’m really much obliged to you, Betty,
for forgetting it. I wish I could.”

“Never mind, Virgie, I’ve a lot of white elder and some pretty green
and I’ll pick some buttercups and Canada lilies—you’ll be a
‘symphony’ in white and gold. Don’t worry. Your beau’ll send you the
prettiest bouquet of the lot,” said Betty, laughing, and put her arm
around the shoulder of the little “forlorn hope” who had been so
sensitive, so hungry for love and praise, and who had worshipped at
the shrine of these older girls as much as ever Isabel, or Avalon
Moore, had done. Even Marion Thurman, who in speech and manner was
as nearly the opposite of the talkative little Westerner as could
be, had taken a great fancy to both Isabel and Virginia and enjoyed
their quite frequent visits.

“Listen, Marion; say your name for me, please.”

Marion complied.

“There! What did I tell you, Isabel. She can say r, just doesn’t in
certain places. She gets it in Marion, but leaves it out in
‘Thuhman’. See?”

“All right Virgie, you win. Say f-l-o-o-r, Marion.”

Goodnaturedly Marion repeated the word, for these youngsters amused
her, and secure of her Bostonian background, she it was who thought
their speech peculiar.

“‘Flo-uh’,” repeated Isabel. “Evelyn calls it ‘flo’. Isn’t it the
most interesting thing?”

“Turn about is fair play,” said Marion. “How do you pronounce
w-a-t-e-r?”

“Wawter,” replied Isabel promptly.

“Correct, go to the head. Some of the Western girls say ‘wahteh’, so
flat.”

“Not many of us,” said Virgie; “besides, we say wawter, not
‘wawteh’.”

“I don’t see the difference,” said Marion.

The after-dinner rest hour found some of the girls reading, some
napping, and others getting costumes ready for the evening. A few
declared that it was too much trouble to get up anything special.
“I’m just going to wear my linen camp suit,” said one of the girls
in Isabel’s klondike.

“We were told not to wear real party dresses, only simple summer
dresses.”

“O, I borrowed Marjorie’s pink georgette with lovely little flowers
on it! Marjorie wanted me to.”

“You may as well take it back, then, and put on one of your own
frocks; don’t you remember the head councillor said ‘no borrowing’
of good things?”

Helen Paget was going as Burnt Jacket, the Indian whose wet jacket,
hung too near his camp fire on the island, had given it its name.
Hilary was to be his Indian maid. Isabel was to be a pirate, and
borrowed “Mother Nature’s” rubber boots, to be decorated with red
paper.

“I don’t know whether Captain Kidd wore boots, or not, but I should
think he would,” said she.

A dangerous looking cutlass was made from a long curved stick, a
pasteboard handle attached. A cardboard knife was covered with tin
foil, which did not prove very durable when the knife was brandished
in Isabel’s most ferocious style.

The character taken was often chosen because of the possibilities
for the costume which each girl saw in her wardrobe. Evelyn said
that she would name her character after she got dressed. Perhaps the
chief fun of the party consisted in getting ready, and the wonder
was where the girls had managed to get so many ideas and such a
variety of costumes, simple but effective. But the party itself was
a great success. The girls acted out their parts with spirit, copied
the manly walk of their brothers and friends, used exaggerated
courtesy and devotion toward their companions.

One of June’s little friends in Laugh-a-Lot looked especially dainty
in her light summer frock and carried a corsage bouquet of wild
roses and daisies. Her escort was a red-cheeked Spanish gentleman
with a fierce mustache and a mild expression. The gym teacher
marshalled the couples in a grand promenade in the assembly room. By
pairs and fours, platoons or circles, they marched or wound in and
out. After this, they still promenaded and several engagements took
place quite publicly, declarations, acceptance and the placing of
the ring followed each other in rapid succession. Isabel swaggered
in a trifle late with a stunning pirate bride, veil and all, and a
“take her from me if you dare” expression.

“If the company will get quiet,” announced the cheer leader, blowing
a whistle, “while Madame Patti (Lilian) sings ‘O Dry Those Tears’,
the distinguished Captain Kidd will be united to Miss Lucretia
Borgia Vamp.”

With much harmless nonsense and laughter the costume party went on,
but closed quite early, for there was to be a trip to Bath the next
day. As girls whose day has been quite taken up with many
interesting activities are not loth to be “early to bed”, the
flashlights danced happily toward the different tents and cabins.

Everybody could go to Bath upon this first occasion. The regular
morning program, with the games, was carried out, and the girls were
to come to the noon meal ready to go to the boats. Many of them had
been planning little shopping lists.

“What have you to get, Flo?” asked Miss West of one of the “old
girls”, as she served those at her table to the hot dinner.

“I have to get a chocolate sundae and bring home a chicken
sandwich,” promptly and soberly returned that young lady, not at all
understanding why Patricia should laugh at the expression “have to
get”.

“Haven’t you any real necessities?”

“O, yes; I have to buy a present for my father.”

“O, dear,” said Betty, who happened to be at Miss West’s table this
week, “they said we could only buy a little half-pound box of
candy.”

“I’ve made a bet with my councillor that I’ll not touch a piece of
candy for a week. If I lose I have to give her a box of candy and if
I win I don’t get anything.”

“A clear conscience, Flo,” suggested Betty.

“That’s funny,” said another of the girls, “why wouldn’t you get
anything?”

“You see, I was the one that did all the betting. She wouldn’t.”

“Wait till I get home,—I’m going to have a regular candy eat!” This
was a pretty little girl from Laugh-a-lot, and so fat that she was
almost square. “But Mother said that was one reason she was sending
me to camp, so I wouldn’t want sodas and candy every other minute.”

“What are you going to buy, Marjorie?—if it’s not too inquisitive to
ask, I need to have suggestions on things I may need.” Betty pulled
out her list.

“A pair of hiking shoes, another pair of sneakers, besides, of
course, some candy and a sundae. Which is the best place for
sundaes?”

“Will the girls,” came the announcement from the head table, “whose
parents want them to have shoes in Bath, please rise? I have the
list, but want to be sure that there is no mistake. What are you
standing for, Mary?”

“I need rubbers.”

“And you, Bertha?”

“I need rubbers, too.”

“Very well. But girls that need rubbers will not go with this group.
These girls will start first with Miss West, who will buy their
shoes. They will go in the Truant and leave at once with a few
others that I will send.”

“Going to Bath” at camp is like going “down town” or “upstreet” at
home. It is surprising how many little errands one thinks of when
separated from the shops. The weather, too, makes more difference
when at camp and dependent upon boats. But how great the advantages!
How the girls all loved the camp life, enjoying all the more the
occasional trips to the towns about. Today there was perfect
weather, the river never more blue from an almost cloudless sky. An
eagle swept across above the boat. A kingfisher dived into the water
near the shore. Yellow-billed gulls floated up and down with the
movement of the waves. A little sandpiper hurried his flight from
the rocks not far away to a grassy cove. The girls sang happily the
Merrymeeting songs till all the shore dwellers must have known who
was passing. As they passed Boothbay Camp, a few of the boys who
happened to be about waved and gave the Boothbay and Merrymaking
yells.

Arrived at Bath, each feminine party, with some councillor, applied
itself to the delights of shopping, whether necessary or not.
Patricia’s party bought the desired hiking shoes or other covering
for active feet.

Just before time to go to the boat, a certain time having been
agreed upon, one of the drug stores was almost full of girls, and,
indeed, councillors, having a sundae or soda before departing.
Suddenly two of the little Juniors came rushing in and up to Miss
West.

“O, Miss West, we’ve spent all our money and have just found the
darlingest gold lockets, only five dollars and a half, and we want
to send one to our mothers. Please, Miss West! O, my daddy’ll settle
for it right away. Yes, he will. Yes, my mother will want it and I
don’t want it for myself at all. Please!”

The tears were very near, as the children worked themselves up to
the point that they must have the lockets and that it was mean that
Miss West would not lend them the camp money or her own. But
Patricia was firm, though kind, and succeeded in turning their
attention to something else. Cathalina, who sat at a little table
near whispered to Miss West that she would lend them the money. “O,
not for the world,” she replied. “Their parents have left money for
them at the office and they can spend only so much. Of course they
have no idea of the value of money, and we must manage for them.”

But it was a very well satisfied group of children that started for
Merrymeeting about four o’clock that afternoon, with their little
boxes of candy and other trifles, as well as the more important
things for which they had come.




                            CHAPTER VII

                          MORNING IN MAINE


One would not think that forty or fifty girls could go on a hike
without making such a noise that any well regulated bird would
immediately take to the deepest wood. Under the direction, however,
of the little lady whom the girls affectionately called “Mother
Nature”, “Birdie”, or “Puss in Boots” when she donned rubber boots,
the first bird hike was quite successful. The girls slipped quietly
down the grassy road, or stood on the rocks together, and the little
Maine warblers who were out getting their breakfast never paid a bit
of attention. The big pine tree by the side of the road was full of
pine siskins, and every so often a Maryland yellow-throat would pop
up from some bush, exhibit his bright yellow breast and black mask,
and drop back again.

The Greycliff girls, of course, had brought their field glasses, in
the hope of discovering new birds in a different state. “Not a bit
of wind this morning, and warm,” said Hilary, “so of course the
birds are out.”

“I don’t call this warm, this cool morning air,” returned Lilian.

“I mean the bright sunshine and everything. O, look!”

A plump little indigo bunting, shining a bright green-blue in the
sun, flew across the lane and dropped to the ground not far in front
of them.

“Hark!” whispered Lilian. A Maryland yellow-throat was singing now,
“We _greet_ you, we _greet_ you, we _greet_ you!” as Lilian
interpreted it.

“He does say that,” confirmed Hilary. “It’s funny, isn’t it? They
say he says ‘wichity’, but I almost always hear him accent the song
differently. The other day I heard one say, ‘We beat you, we beat
you, Phoebe!’”

“Let’s go over on the rocks near those birches. I hear a lot of wood
warblers singing over there.”

Silently the girls climbed across rocks and bushes. It was indeed
warbler land. Hilary, who lived where the warblers often pass
through quickly in the spring migration, on account of hot days, was
especially interested. “There are a lot of redstarts,” said she. “I
think that the ones we see near our cabin, and the yellow warbler
there, too, are nesting in those bushes by us.”

“I wish I could see the chap that’s singing that song,” said Betty,
“Listen.”

“Zee, zoo, zee-zee, zoo,” hummed Lilian. “The ‘zee-zee’ is musical,
a sort of whistle, but the other notes sound like an insect, or some
low tones on a ‘cello’.”

“Say, Lilian, aren’t you a scientist!” said Isabel, hitching along
on the same rock.

“I am. I’m getting bird songs. That ‘right here’ of the chewink is
new to me. See him?”

“Sh-sh!” The girls stopped their low conversation as the long, sweet
notes of a white-throated sparrow began. Two or three others took up
the fairy music, while the girls sat quiet to hear it.

“The dears!” exclaimed Cathalina, as the song ended.

“Of course those crows would have to caw,” said Isabel. “I call them
the dogs of the bird world, always barking like watch dogs to tell
that we are here. Once I went into a dandy woods and the crows made
such a fuss that I didn’t see a bird.”

“Did you ever see anything prettier than these blueberries?” asked
Hilary. “They look like flowers growing over there on the big rocks
and between. I shall always think of grey rocks, moss, lichens and
blueberries. They match the sky and bay, don’t they? The color of
the little green plant is pretty, too. I shall never get them mixed
with huckleberries again. These taller plants are a sort of
blueberry, too, somebody said. They are dark, almost black, when
they are ripe.”

“I think I’ve eaten a quart already. I don’t know whether to eat
blueberries or look at birds,” and Isabel put a fresh handful into
her mouth. “There is a dark berry called dog-berry, so be sure you
know the difference in the dark berries before you eat ’em when
they’re ripe. I’m not one of those that taste everything and get
poisoned. Dogberries are poisonous. But these heavenly berries!”

“Look, girls!” called Mother Nature, breaking the laws of silence
for once, that all might see the immense eagle which was flying
over. “See his white head and tail.”

The party moved on, for the hike was to cover the distance to “First
Trott’s” and back. In Merrymeeting parlance, “First Trott’s” marked
a distance of a mile and a half to where lived a family by the name
Trott, while “Second Trott’s” was located a mile further out.

Birches, arborvitæ trees, tall or tiny, balsams, white pines, oaks,
and other trees characteristic of the Maine woods lined the way.
Back in the shade of the pine trees grew that strange ghost flower,
the Indian pipe. Isabel counted the slender trunks in one clump of
young birches and found fifteen.

“I’m going to bring my camera here and take a picture of some of you
girls sitting on that wonderful big rock that slopes back above this
exquisite fern bed. These are so delicate.”

“New growth, I guess,” said Hilary. “But look at those across the
road now. They are more than half as tall as Isabel.”

“Take a leaf of this sweet fern between your fingers and squeeze it.
It is just as spicy as can be. But we’d better hurry up a little,”
continued Betty. “The rest of them are ahead of us.”

“Well, what is here!” exclaimed Isabel just then, stopping where on
each side of the road there was a row of immense, brown ant-hills,
built up high from the level ground. “They must be years old. See
how the grass is growing out from the top of that one, and look at
the big holes toward the bottom! I suppose those are the tunnels
going back from the openings.”

With interest the girls watched the busy inhabitants of this curious
apartment house. “Looks like sawdust on top,” said one.

Along the more shady portions of the pretty, winding road few birds
were seen. All seemed to be out where sunshine lit up their dining
rooms. Occasionally a squirrel or chipmunk scolded them roundly, as
the girls passed too near their place of abode. As they returned to
camp, Hilary and Lilian lingered in the rear. “It was right here in
these bushes,” Hilary was saying. “I did not get a good look at it
all over, but I hope and think that it is a black-billed cuckoo, for
I so seldom see one, that is, to be sure of it. Let’s creep up real
softly and maybe we’ll see it. I think it stays around here.”

The cuckoo proved to be a very accommodating bird, for when they
reached the neighborhood of the bushes, out it flew from one near
them, retreating to one which was farther off, but had so much less
foliage that the heavy bird was easily seen.

“It is!” whispered Hilary. “It lifted its head and I saw every bit
of its bill. And when it flew there was no sign of black in its
tail.”

“That will be another point for you, Hilary.”

“But you identified it, too.”

“Yes, but you saw it yesterday and thought it was the blackbilled.”

“All right. Maybe some other girl has seen it, though, and reported
on it first.”

“I don’t believe so. I got the black and white creeping warbler
first while we were all at the rocks, you know, and I saw the least
flycatcher first too,—two points for me on birds so far.”

“Somebody reported the tree swallow this morning before I had a
chance to, but I found its nest in the knot of that apple tree near
the club house. Come on and I’ll show you. Isn’t it pathetic that
those poor kingbirds have to watch their nest so, or think they have
to?”

“Where?”

“Didn’t you notice the kingbird’s nest on the very end of the tree
next to the klondike opposite us? There is a white string hanging
down from it. You’ll only have to look that way to see it. I suppose
they never dreamed that all this crowd of girls would come, when
they built the nest.”

“Most of the birds are so hard to see. The foliage is so thick, and
then they are nesting, too, and that makes them shy.”

“Been on the hike?” asked Nora, as the girls reached the cabin. “I
couldn’t wake up enough. It’s inhuman to expect anybody to get up
before six o’clock.”

“It was fine. Better go the next time, Pat,” said Frances.

Later Lilian found that her little “zee, zoo” bird was a
black-throated green warbler, and saw some baby ones in the bushes
near the pine grove. Hilary soon had quite a list of warblers that
nested about Merrymeeting. The gulls, chiefly the Herring Gull, came
in numbers every day to be fed. A Laughing Gull was seen near Bath,
and a Ring-Billed Gull near the boys’ island. On the Wiscasset trip
much later, a fish hawk’s nest was seen on one of the piles common
in the river. To the great amusement of the party one little city
girl asked “How do the fishes get up there?”

After the birds had been duly studied, and the bright colored
pictures put up in the club house as each bird was reported, the
attention of the girls was turned to the wild flowers, of which
there were so many. At first five flowers brought to the nature
teacher gave one point. Finally, when the common flowers had all
been reported, one of the rarer flowers made a point for its
discoverer. Some funny mistakes were made, and no wonder, for why is
not “pussy-foot” clover just as good a name as rabbit’s-foot clover,
or “scrambled eggs” as good as butter and eggs? And what is the
difference between “church steeple” and steeple bush?

It was Cathalina who showed the members of the Greycliff nature club
the wintergreen with its waxen berries and the trailing arbutus
plants along the lane.

“Are you sure it’s wintergreen?” inquired the cautious Isabel before
tasting the young leaves, as Cathalina invited her to do.

“Yes, it tastes just like wintergreen candy, or tooth paste!”

During the season, odd and beautiful bouquets adorned the tables at
meals. Indian pipe standing high in a bit of greenery; Canadian
lilies, wood lilies, meadow sweet, steeple bush, bunch berries, milk
wort, Indian paintbrush, buttercups or daisies, fall dandelions in
prickly juniper, wild roses as late as August, or the stately
cardinal flower,—all these by turns found their way into the vases
and bowls.




                            CHAPTER VIII

                    CANOE TESTS AND A CAMP FIRE


Eloise in her red and black bathing suit and scarlet cap was a
striking little figure. Lithe and active, she selected her paddle
and flew down to the dock to select her canoe, for the canoe tests
were in progress. “Wish me good luck, girls,” said she as she pushed
out her canoe from the sands and jumped in it.

Out beyond the dock and floats, toward the back water, a blue canoe,
bottom up, was being steadily pushed to shore by some swimmer, whose
bobbing head showed behind it. One girl had brought in her canoe,
pushed its nose into the sand, and while drawing herself into a
reclining position upon it declared that she was going to take a nap
then and there. Another had gone out where the current was almost
too strong for her and was having difficulty to manage a canoe that
apparently wanted to go down the Kennebec and out to sea. She was
making slight headway, while from the guarding rowboat came an
occasional word of encouragement.

“I can’t do it,” she said at last. “I could swim it, but I can’t
take the canoe in.” The rowboat approached and a dripping figure
climbed over its side. Both girl and canoe were brought to the dock.
It was Cathalina, her face solemn with disappointment.

“Better luck next time, Cathalina,” said Betty, who was almost as
disappointed as Cathalina, but would not show it.

“I’ll wait till tomorrow before I try it again. Isn’t it horrid? I
wish I were a regular Samson!”

“You’ll do it all right the next time. I don’t believe I could have
done it either if I had been where you were. Go out toward the back
water tomorrow. Here comes Lil. Good work, Lilian.”

Betty had been successful in her canoe test, and while waiting for
the other girls, was swimming or playing around in shallow water.

“Watch Eloise. There she is, just ready to tip over.” Like a scarlet
tanager in black and red, Eloise stood poised in her boat, handing
her paddle to her guardian of the row boat, and waiting till the row
boat drew off.

“There she goes!” Betty and Cathalina stood in the water watching,
and Lilian paused in drawing in her boat to see Eloise perform her
spectacular act, now on the edge of her canoe, tipping it, now going
over and down, coming up in a jiffy and turning her canoe shoreward.

“Rowing is so much harder work than paddling,” said Cathalina. “I’m
glad that I’m learning canoeing, but I wish I were more at home in
the water.”

“The only way is to do it a lot, I guess,” said Betty. “Let’s do as
much paddling as we can up here and go in for the races at school
next year.”

“I don’t believe Mother and Father would let me race,” said
Cathalina.

“O, they never get up much speed at Greycliff.”

“Anyway, I’m going to paddle all I can. Will you go out with me this
afternoon if they let us?”

“Yes, indeed.”

Wet and smiling, Eloise brought in her canoe. “Do you think I made
it, girls?”

“Of course you made it!” cried the generous Cathalina. “I hope I do
tomorrow if they have ’em again. If not, some other day. Where’s
Hilary, by the way?”

“She and Helen are together somewhere. They said they were coming
down for the tests, but must have forgotten it. They passed theirs
the other day, you know.”

“O, Cathalina—Cathalina Van Buskirk!” called one of the councillors.
The girls ran to get their bath robes and bathing caps, which were
draped over the railing at the dock.

“Miss Allen is still sick today; why can’t you take her French
class? They can’t afford to lose the time.”

“Why,—I never taught anything in my life.”

“But you have had plenty of private teaching, haven’t you?”

“Yes; shall I do it that way?”

“Certainly. Anybody that can talk French as you can ought to be able
to take these little girls through a couple of lessons. Give them
some easy conversation and take them over the ground they ought to
cover in the reader. If you feel like hearing them recite their
verbs, all the better.”

Cathalina’s discouragement over not passing the canoe test was gone
and she hurried into her clothes, planning happily just what sort of
a conversation she would conduct, delighted to be a good camper and
help in something she knew about, if she couldn’t bring in that
canoe! “But I’ll do it tomorrow, Hilary,” she told Hilary that night
in recounting the day’s exploits, “see if I don’t!” And Cathalina
did.

That afternoon there was a hare and hounds chase. During rest hour
some of the girls tore paper into pieces, to be dropped here and
there for the trail. One of the councillors led the hares, who were
to have a good start before the hounds, in charge of another
councillor or two, should take up the chase. By the time the chase
was ended there were few of the girls who did not know the ins and
outs of the pine grove, the rocks, the meadows, the lane, and the
trail along the back water.

Of the Greycliff girls, Hilary, Lilian and Virginia were among the
hounds, that started after a certain definite time had elapsed.
Everybody was talking at once and excitement was growing. As they
knew that the start was to be made through the pine grove, the line
of hounds headed that way from the club house.

“Here’s the first paper!” shouted Virgie. “Come on! Bow-wow!”

Through the bushes, over the roots and rocks, slipping through the
birches in what Hilary called Warblerville, they hurried. It was
there that a dainty little redstart sat on the edge of a tiny nest
to greet them the first day they wandered about Merrymeeting.

“Mercy! Do I have to climb that rock?” said one of the little girls.

“Over you go,” and with two or three helping hands to boost, up she
went, to slide down on the other side.

“Here’s a clear trail,” cried Frances, and the running hounds
followed to the middle of a big meadow, only to find that the trail
ended there and to return to the place where they had entered the
field.

“Hilary, you go that way, Lilian that, and I’ll go this way,” called
Frances, “and see if we can find the trail more quickly.” Lilian
found it and beckoned to the rest. At the edge of a ravine they
paused.

“I bet they never ran down there,” said Virgie. “They’d have to get
right out again; let’s go around and pick up the trail.” But her
plan was overruled. The whole party climbed or slid down, only to
find that Virgie’s surmise was correct and that the hares had
probably let one or two of their number fix this blind trail, while
the rest of them went on to drop the paper in another direction.

Further on, in a bit of woods, the trail led them in a circle, where
again the hounds lost time. Not once did they catch a glimpse of the
hares and arrived at camp headquarters to find that they had been in
for some time.

“That old engine sounds good to me,” said Virginia, for the water
was being pumped from the drilled well and pails of clear, cold
water carried down to the dining-room for supper.

Hilary and Lilian were repairing damages and washing dusty faces and
hands when Eloise; who had been a hare, came to borrow Betty’s
Indian blanket. “I’ll take good care of it, Betty,” she said. “How
do I look in it?”—draping it around her shoulders.

“What is up?” asked Hilary.

“Our klondike gives the camp fire tonight and we are going to be
Indians. Don’t miss it. Helen’s father sent boxes of the most
delicious marshmallows you ever ate. Wasn’t it nice of him?”

“Don’t you want my steamer rug?” inquired Cathalina.

“I think not. If anybody needs one I’ll send her over; thank you,
Cathie. May has a duck of a blanket, just a cotton one, such as they
make bath robes of, and it is so gay and pretty.”

“I suppose the camp fire will be on Marshmallow Point?”

“Yes; a real ‘Injun’ camp fire, where the Indians used to have
them.”

As the girls came down to the point upon the ringing of the bell
after supper, a tall, stolid “Indian” met them and waved them to the
lower rocks. Behind other rocks Indian head-dresses showed.
Presently there appeared a group of dignified Indians, much painted,
wearing feathers of a remarkable variety and draped in blankets or
what made one think of that civilized garment known as the bath
robe. While they posed, one of the girls from Pine Lodge read an
account of the early days upon the Kennebec and Merrymeeting Bay
when the point was a trading resort and place of meeting for the
Indians.

“From the lodges along the Kennebec and from the camp fires of the
Androscoggin they have come to make plans for peace upon
Merrymeeting Bay. A captive maid is to be returned to the Kennebec
lover from whom she was stolen and the wicked kidnapper, of another
tribe, is to be sentenced to exile. Behold the council fire!”

Softly from behind the rocks, in the posed Indian moccasins, other
figures joined the first group and with them marched in silent
procession before the spectators. Then they circled round the camp
fire, which was then lit by the chieftain.

After this interesting part of the ceremony had been watched by the
audience (though not in silence, for the chief had some difficulty
in getting his fire to burn), the other Indians lit their torches
(flash-lights) from the camp fire and started a weird dance upon the
rocks to the sound of an Indian drum beating in hollow tones.
Presently the dance stopped and the Indians sat down in a circle
around the chief.

“Bring forth the captive!” called the chief in a sepulchral voice.
Then came an Indian maid, well hung with beads, her hands bound, her
head bowed, as she walked between two Indian guards. While she knelt
before the chief, Lilian’s voice came from the rocks in “From the
Land of the Sky-Blue Water”. Like her prototype in the song, the
“captive maid was mute”, though she told the girls afterward that
she longed to break her bonds, for a bug was crawling up her arm and
a mosquito had just bitten her nose.

The girls played well their short Indian drama. The bonds of the
captive maid were loosened and she was restored to the arms of her
Indian lover, who glared dramatically at his rival, the captive
villain who was sentenced to exile and slunk away to his canoe, as
pointed out by the old chief:

                  Far from the smiling Kennebec,
                  Far from thy lodge and tribe,
                  I bid thee go! Thy name shall be
                  A name for jeer and gibe.

The play over at this point, the attractive Indians now brought out
the boxes of marshmallows and passed them around to the assembled
company who had previously provided themselves with sticks.
Afterward came the usual singing of the dear Merrymeeting songs and
other favorites; and while Lilian’s voice, never sweeter, floated
softly in “By the Waters of Minnetonka,” the waters of the Kennebec
rippled past, and the same old moon which had looked upon the real
Indians not so many years ago, shone down on the blithe Merrymeeting
campers.




                             CHAPTER IX

                      CHURCH AND A SUNDAY MOON


It was a glorious Sabbath morning. The waters rippled and sparkled
as the tide came hurrying in early; but there was no bell for dip on
Sunday morning and breakfast was put at a later hour. The girls had
been asked to come to breakfast prepared to leave on the launches
for church.

“Where do we go to church, Frances?” Hilary asked.

“Sometimes to one of the little churches up the river, but often to
Bath, for there we can choose churches of different denominations,
go to our own or visit others.”

Two boat loads started. Aeolus and Truant chugged their way down
stream, through the Burnt Jackets and past Boothbay Camp, where a
few boys waved and cheered; past Brushwood Lodge, quiet and lovely
in its rocks and greenery; past happily sailing gulls and shores of
solid rock and evergreens; past the little hamlet of West Woolwich,
on down the river to the now familiar little town of Bath.

Hilary, Lilian and Cathalina looked closely at the island as they
passed Boothbay Camp, to see if there were any signs of Campbell.

“I think that the church folks have already left, since there seemed
to be so few boys around,” said Cathalina in a low tone to Hilary.
“The question is, will he go to your church, hoping to see you, or
to his own church, and where will you go?”

Hilary colored a little and replied, “I should love to see Campbell,
but I think that I shall go with you girls today, as I should plan
to do in any case. Probably he can’t choose, but will have to take
some group of boys.”

“That is so,” replied Cathalina, who was deeply concerned in her
cousin Campbell’s interest in Hilary ever since he had first met her
on her visit to Cathalina. And now that Philip had been impressed
with Lilian, Cathalina felt that she was living in an atmosphere of
the highest romance. Confidences from all quarters were hers. Lilian
had looked as conscious as Hilary while passing the island, for
Philip might come at any time.

Campbell Stuart, meanwhile, trusted to no chance meeting. So far his
responsibilities and labors in the early days of camp had prevented
him from calling at Merrymeeting to see his cousin and her friends.
But here he was at the dock as the Aeolus floated in, his blue eyes
lit up with pleasure and his lips parted in smiles, as he lifted his
hat to Hilary, Cathalina, and the boat load in general. And now he
was helping the girls off and walked between Hilary and Cathalina,
while Lilian and Betty fell in behind.

“How’d you get off, Campbell?” asked Cathalina.

“I just told the ‘boss’ that I had a cousin and some friends at
Merrymeeting whom I had not yet had a chance to see, and asked if I
might not wait to walk with you all to church. Having confidence in
me, he said I might. So here we are,” he concluded, looking down at
Hilary’s demure countenance.

The walk was all too short for all that there was to say, and at the
church Campbell joined the masculine crew from Boothbay, which sat
quietly under the observing eyes of the different councillors. After
the service, however, the girls saw him for a few moments.

“I’m going to paddle up some time soon, and shall bring Phil up, of
course, as soon as he finds he can come. If I don’t come, you’ll
know it’s because I can’t help it, and I’ll be there with bells on
at the annual picnic. You be sure, girls, to come to our picnic at
Boothbay, won’t you?” Though Campbell addressed all, he looked at
Hilary, who replied, “Indeed we wouldn’t miss it for the world!” and
Cathalina added, “So say we all!”

“How much of that sermon did you hear, Hilary?” asked Cathalina
teasingly, as they climbed into the boat for the ride back to camp.

“Lots of it,” said Hilary. “Don’t think you can tease me so much,
Miss Cathalina Van Buskirk. It was a good sermon, too, and made me
think of Father in his pulpit preaching away and looking like a
saint, as he is,—and Mother sitting in the pew so sweet and nice,
and the boys, and little Mary. But I wasn’t homesick, some way, just
happy.”

“You’re a dear,” said Cathalina affectionately. “You are our pretty,
sweet old Hilary so you are, and shan’t be teased. No wonder
Campbell,—well, here I go again! Excuse me.”

“You are quite forgiven, Cathie. I don’t mind, only not much before
the other girls, please.”

“Honestly, Hilary, and no nonsense, hasn’t Campbell grown up in
these two years?”

“Yes he and Phil are both so different, I mean in the way of being
young men and not just boys. Just think, it will be two years next
Christmas since I was at your house! What fun we had! It was the
nicest visit I ever had anywhere.”

“We must have more of them. It isn’t my fault that we haven’t
already.”

“O, I know, Cathalina, but I have not been able to manage it. You
have invited me often enough.”

“I hope to take Lilian home with me from here.”

“That will be lovely. Have you asked her yet?”

“Yes, and she has written home about it. Phil wants to have a
fraternity brother, and with the cousins, we shall have quite a
party. If you only could come!—even for just over the week end would
be something. School begins a little later than usual this year.”

“That will give a little over two weeks at home,—unless we left camp
a little earlier. But we couldn’t miss the big banquet and all the
fun.”

“My, no!”

“Mother wrote that she wanted to see the camp, and I believe that we
can arrange it. Phil can do the driving, so we won’t need the
chauffeur, unless Mother wants to have him. She can fix it all up as
usual. Anyway there is plenty of room for us all. It will be a
pretty trip, Hilary, and we’d stop a day or two in Boston and see
Cambridge and Lexington and Concord, you know.”

“O, wonderful! I have been thinking that I’d write to ask Father if
I might not take that trip home with the camp folks. June can go
back with the crowd.”

“Don’t do it; go back with us instead. You haven’t been in New York
in the summer. And if possible, I want Betty to go, too. Isn’t it
funny and nice how plans grow? I thought of Lilian first on account
of Phil, then you on account of Campbell, and of all of you on my
own account.”

“This is the most wonderful world anyway. I never dreamed of having
such good times before I went to Greycliff.”

As Isabel and Virginia Hope sat at the same table this week with
Hilary, she had to answer their questions as they all ate chickens
and dressing for their Sunday dinner.

“Who was that perfectly wonderful looking councillor that was with
you girls this morning?” asked Isabel.

Hilary gave the same reply that she had already given several times
before dinner: “That is Cathalina’s cousin, Campbell Stuart.”

“Had you ever met him before?”

“Yes, when I visited Cathalina, almost two years ago. I met a number
of her cousins and know them very well.” This in an effort to
forestall any comments about possible attentions to her on
Campbell’s part.

“He looks a little like Cathalina. Isn’t he tall and skinny,
though?”

“I should say that Campbell is very well built for a young man.”

“He certainly is. Virgie, do you suppose that we’ll ever have any
one as nice to take us around? If he comes up to see you girls,
you’ll introduce him to us, won’t you?”

“I most certainly will,” laughed Hilary. “I think that Cathalina
will be very proud of both her brother and her cousin and will want
all her friends to meet them.”

“Hm-m,” said Isabel. “Smart old Hilary. Item for the ‘Moon’. Mr.
Campbell Stuart, councillor at Boothbay Camp and cousin of Cathalina
Van Buskirk, met Cathalina at the dock this morning and walked to
church with her and her friends. Nobody but Cathalina was glad to
see him.’”

“Seems to me,” replied Hilary with a twinkle, “that a lot of
interest is developing right here about Mr. Stuart. I’ll have to
tell him.”

“If you do!” threatened Isabel. “By the way, why is the camp paper
called the _Moon_?”

“Because it comes out at night.”

“Honest?”

“Yes, really. Frances said so.”

“Well how does it happen that you, a preacher’s daughter, are an
editor on a Sunday paper?”

“In the first place, it is not a ‘Sunday paper’, except that it is
read on Sunday evening; then it isn’t work, just fun, and gives us
something to do. We were nearly upset last night by one of the
contributions that was handed in just before bedtime. Patty had to
call us down twice for giggling after we were in bed. It was the
funniest thing!”

“I think that Frances will make a good editor, assistant editor, I
mean. She knows everything about camp, and with your bunch right at
hand to write poetry and all kinds of things, her part in the paper
ought to go. I’m a reporter myself!”

“Remember that all your news will be censored, particularly that
item about Campbell.”

After dinner the girls strolled to their cabins for rest hour.

“Wake me up, Hilary,” said Lilian, “in time to write my letter home
and finish my verses for the _Moon_. Chicken and dressing and gravy
and blueberry pie and things are too much for me, and I must have a
nap.”

“All right. I’m not sleepy. I’m going to read, for I have my letter
home written, except adding a little about church. We have enough
for the Moon already in, and all there is left to do is to pin any
more contributions on the pages of the magazine where they belong.
Frances is using an old _Saturday Evening Post_ and divided it off
into the different departments yesterday, leaving vacant pages for
later contributions.”

“I just wrote home yesterday, but I suppose I’ll have to write to
somebody as a ticket of admission to supper. I might write to Phil,”
she added, mischievously glancing at Lilian, “and tell him that
Lilian has succumbed to chicken and pie.”

Lilian opened a sleepy eye. “Don’t, Cathalina. It’s so delicious to
feel sleepy and if you start fun going I’ll get waked up. There
comes our councillor. Now you will have to be quiet, at least during
rest hour.”

“Not a soul shall disturb your slumbers,” declared Hilary, and
Lilian tucked one little hand under her cheek, turned over on her
cot, and was asleep in a jiffy.

When the bell rang that evening after supper at about half past
seven, it summoned the camp family to the Sunday evening gathering
at the club house. Little girls, big girls and many of the
councillors sat upon the floor to listen to the reading of the
weekly chronicle of camp life, known as the _Moon_. Chairs around
the wall or at one end held the rest of the family, and the doctor,
swimming instructor, and other gentlemen whose oversight and
assistance were quite necessary to camp comfort and success, usually
dropped in to hear the paper read.

There was little that this literary journal would not attempt.
Stories, short or continued, articles, editorials, society news,
personals, poetry and even an amusing department of questions and
answers conducted by one “Mrs. O’Brien”. Question and answer were
usually written by the same contributor or editor, but that, it is
said, is sometimes done in other periodicals. There were some
interesting editorials, one expressing welcome to all the campers
and particularly to all the new girls and councillors. Another
defined a “good sport” and gave some of the wholesome camp ideas on
helpfulness, unselfishness, and camp spirit. Reports were given on
athletics, with the names of the team captains, and the general
program of activities was outlined.

Klondike life and conversation were the subject of a few clever
sketches. In verse appeared the story of the caterpillars which had
invaded cabins, and even cots—whether alone or assisted is
uncertain—in the early days of camp. Dire pictures were drawn of
fuzzy travelers that descended from ceilings and climbed the bridges
of noses. Poetic exaggeration also made much of attacks from a
mosquito army, under captains, majors, and lieutenants who were
undaunted by the taste of insectolatum, citronella, or pennyroyal.

Anything in praise of camp was welcome to the loyal girls, as well
as the bright little personals which brought them into kindly or
joking notice.

From the junior cabin came a short story by June, which was entitled
“Lost or Kidnapped?—A True Story.”

“This is the story of a junior at Merrymeeting Camp and her
adventure. She was a very pretty little girl. Everybody liked her,
but she had one fault which shall be seen.

“One day the girls went on a hike to First Trott’s. They had a very
good time. They ate blueberries, picked flowers in the woods and
brought home plenty of Indian pipe for table bouquets. They did not
touch them for fear they would turn black, as they have a way of
doing.

“All the girls were laughing and talking and having great fun on the
way home. When the supper bell rang, everybody went to the dining
hall as usual. But when the girls at Mother Nature’s table sat down,
Dot was not there. Mother Nature told the head councillor and her
face turned white, because Dot is not very old and something might
have happened to her.

“So they slipped around and asked the juniors and some of the other
girls where they had seen Dot last. Jo remembered seeing her when
they were about half way home, but nobody knew where she was. It
seemed very serious. Somebody started out at once on the little
road. Somebody else went to the pine grove, and several girls began
to look all over camp for her. Jo happened to think of looking in
the cabin. And there was Dot, reading a book! She hadn’t even heard
the supper bell!

“Her carelessness had made a great deal of trouble for everybody,
but nobody had gotten so far away that they were not easily called
back. And everybody was so glad that it had turned out all right
that Dot did not even get a scolding.”

Lilian had had some trouble with her verses. She was undecided
whether to have a fair, round, full or high moon, and spent some
time in getting a rhyme for “reflection”. Then she hit upon
“direction”, and in thinking of the somewhat devious way which the
Kennebec followed “indirection” occurred to her. This at once
finished her last lines, and as the subject was appropriate to an
evening edition, they were used to close the “Moon”.

                         EVENING IN MAINE.

      A song sparrow drops to its nest in the bush;
        A swallow in circles is winging;
      It is evening in Maine, and where blueberries grow
        I hear a sweet yellow-throat singing.

      “We _greet_ you, we _greet_ you!” he says to the sky,
        Where the rose and the lavender mingle;
      “We _greet_ you, we _greet_ you!” he calls, as the birds
        Flit high or flit low in the dingle.

      “Now where is that nest, little yellow-throat? Say!”
        I ask as I listen and wonder;
      “O, witchery, witchery,” comes the reply,
        “I’m hid in the bushes or under.”

      The shadows grow long on the river and bay,
        And darkly the island’s reflection
      Appears in the water that shimmers and flows
        Toward the sea in strange indirection.

      But in nest or in cabin or “Little Content”,
        Enfolded in safety they’re sleeping,
      While the breezes blow cool on the broad Kennebec
        And the night watch a high moon is keeping.

The evening ended with the singing of the old hymns or of more
modern sacred songs. One councillor played the accompaniments;
another led the singing and announced the selections. Favorite hymns
were called for. The girls could remain or retire to their cabins,
but many stayed and enjoyed this fitting close to the Sabbath.




                             CHAPTER X

                          A “STUNT NIGHT”


“On the ringing of the bell,” came the announcement at supper, “each
klondike must present a ‘stunt’ at the club house. Twenty minutes
now to get up the performance. See who will have the best.” The
smiling face of the head councillor indicated her confidence in her
girls. She knew that they had plenty of interesting ideas in their
heads and expected a good entertainment.

“Mercy,” said Virgie, “I couldn’t think up anything in twenty
minutes, let alone get it ready!”

“O, yes we can,” said Isabel, “come on. Some of the old girls will
know what they do here.”

There was hurrying and scurrying to klondikes and much laughter with
the thinking and planning. “Suppose we think up the same thing some
other klondike does,” suggested Marion, as she walked from supper
with Frances. “O, we never do; don’t worry,” Frances replied.

Patty West had been transferred to Squirrels’ Inn in some shifting
of councillors, and to her the girls of that klondike rushed. Patty
was already racking her brains, she asserted, but so far nothing had
occurred to her.

“I tell you what I have, Miss Patty,” said Cathalina, “something
that Ann Maria said the girls at her school acted out one time and
Mother was so amused, for she and her cousins used to do it,—I think
it came out in the _St. Nicholas_ or something when she was a girl,
or maybe she found it in the old magazines at home. Anyway it is
just an old poem called ‘The Ballad of Mary Jane’. Of course, we
can’t learn it, but one of us can read it and the rest can take the
parts and act it out, in pantomime.”

A brief rehearsal with a quick assembling of costumes and other
necessary articles was all that was possible. Miss West was to do
the reading, while Cathalina, who was familiar with the poem, was to
be stage director, send on the actors at the proper time, cause the
pasteboard sun to rise, and do the various duties connected with her
position. Other klondikes were in the same state of interesting
hurry. Fortunately the ringing of the bell was delayed a little, but
by twenty minutes of eight, rows of big and little girls, the little
ones in front, sat facing the “stage” of the club house. This was
the little room or den at one end of the assembly room. Its walls
extended only a short way, to indicate division of a sort, and a
curtain could be drawn across if desired. Curtains were usually made
from two sheets or two big blankets hastily hemmed to permit a rope
to be drawn through, the rope then fastened to hooks or nails.

The audience was composed of those who did not take part in the
actual performance presented by their group, or who would not be
called on for some time. Clapping of hands indicated some
impatience.

“Lights out!” called some one, and the switch for the main room was
turned off. As the lights in the little room had not been turned on,
all was in total darkness. Flashlights began to be turned on and
brought a protest from the stage.

“Turn off your flashes! Don’t you know we hadn’t time to put up a
curtain, and have to fix the stage? Please, girls.” These were the
little folks from Laugh-a-lot and Little Content whose “stunt” came
first.

Presently the stage lights came on disclosing a small child washing
dishes, the dishpan on a chair, while June, dressed in a long skirt,
with a scarf pinned around her shoulders and her hair done up high,
was preparing a basket.

“Now, little Red Riding-Hood, get your cloak and let me put it on
for you. Here, my child, are some nice fruit and a fresh blueberry
pie for your grandmother. Go straight there and don’t stop to talk
to any one on the way!” June’s finger was raised impressively.

“All right, Mother,” replied Red Riding-Hood in her most sugary
tones, while the audience laughed. The mother fastened the red cape
and hood that made somebody’s little rain coat, kissed her little
girl, waved her hand to her as Red Riding-Hood set out, and followed
her to the door where she stood, still waving. Then she returned to
her rocking chair, picked up some knitting, and settled back with a
great air of responsibility. Promptly the lights went out again and
a few adjustments were made for the next scene.

When the lights went on the signs of housekeeping had been removed.
A placard placed upon the table announced “The Woods”. Little Red
Riding-Hood came strolling in, swinging her basket and looking at
the birds. “O, aren’t you pretty? I guess you’re a song sparrow. O,
what’s that?”

From the right of the stage came suddenly a terrible looking animal
whose tawny coat looked much like one of the girls’ ponchos.

“Gr-rr-rr! Where are you going, little girl? Don’t be afraid, I
won’t hurt you.”

“O, I’m just going to take some fruit to my grandmother.”

“Where does your grandmother live?”

“Just in a nice little house on the edge of the wood.”

The rest of the story proceeded in due order, the children making up
the lines as they went along, all of them, of course, being
perfectly familiar with the story. The wolf duly found the
grandmother in bed and ate her up with much scuffling and growling,
putting on her cap and getting into her bed, a pallet on the floor.
How innocently did little Red Riding-Hood ask, “What makes your
teeth so long and sharp, Grandmother?” And how fiercely did the wolf
reply, “All the better to-eat-you-all-up-with!” The scene and drama
ended with the timely coming of the woodcutters and the demise of
the snarling wolf.

Loud applause greeted the little folks who had thoroughly enjoyed
playing the parts and were pleased that the girls liked their
efforts. Hilary watching June, whispered to Lilian that she felt
like hugging the child. “She looks and acts so like Mother!”

Squirrels’ Inn then put on The Ballad of Mary Jane in pantomime.
Hilary as Mary Jane looked the prim school teacher in long dress,
stiff shirt waist, high collar. Her hair was in a tight knot. She
entered carrying a bag of school books, reading a small volume and
passed and repassed at the front of the stage to show how “To teach
the village school she walked each morning down the lane,” this maid
who “could manufacture griddle-cakes and jest in ancient Greek.”

Frances Anderson was the “stalwart Benjamin”, who leaned on his hoe
with open mouth and saw “the beauteous maiden pass at breaking of
the dawn”. Little did he look like the future pirate who was to
burst in and rescue Mary Jane, from her cruel father (Nora) with the
“fatal knife”, and his rival, Lord Mortimer (Betty). Lilian, attired
in the same poncho in which the wolf had appeared, and wearing paper
horns, represented the cow from which Mary Jane dramatically rescued
Benjamin by means of her umbrella.

A fashion show came next, requiring little stage setting but much
dressing. This was given by one of the senior klondikes and was very
pretty. Mrs. Astorbilt was first announced and entered in evening
gown. She was followed by the sport girl, the business girl, and
others for whom costumes could be prepared upon short notice, the
Merrymeeting girl closing the parade, and wearing the full costume,
with headband, armband, and a diamond upon her sweater. She carried
a big volley ball under her arm and held up to view the Merrymeeting
trophy cup. All the girls had looked so pretty that each had
received hearty applause; but the Merrymeeting girl appealed to camp
loyalty and was cheered vociferously with “rah, rah, Merrymeeting!”

An alphabetical romance was given by another cabin. In this the
lines were of the alphabet alone, repeated with varying expression,
occasional well known abbreviations, as q. e. d., i. e., or U. S.
A., included.

The last stunt was called “Five Minutes in Laugh-a-lot.” Great
curiosity was evident among the audience as in the darkness they
could dimly see a figure arranged on the table and covered with
something white. “Elaine?” “Operating room?” were suggested, but the
stage director ordered silence and the lights were not turned on.

Dim figures stole in with flashlights. “Bz-zz-zz! Bz-zz-zz!
Bz-zz-zz!” they sang, moving arms for wings and tiptoeing an insect
dance around the table. It was now evident that this was a cot in
Laugh-a-lot, the sleeper covered with mosquito netting which was
merely a bit of suggestive stage property, having no foundation in
fact. The mosquitos hovered around and now and then one would make a
dive in her direction. Then hands would wave widly and the netting
fail of its purpose. All this because little Dorothy Freneau’s plump
cheeks had exhibited several mosquito bites for a day or two.

Presently the mosquitos joined hands, danced to the front and sang
softly a mosquito song, written by the councillor under pressure in
about five minutes. At its close they went out still buzzing, while
some one from behind the table raised a large flashlight to indicate
the coming of the sun. This was the farewell song:

              We are hungry old mosquitos
                Looking for a bite;
              Dotty’s cheeks are fat and rosy,
                And they suit us quite.
              Bz, bz, bz, bz, And they suit us quite.

              But when daylight comes upon us,
                Off we go in haste,
              For they kill poor old mosquitos,
                Make ’em into paste!
              Bz, bz, bz, bz, make ’em into paste!

              We are hungry old mosquitos, etc.
                  (Last stanza repeated.)




                             CHAPTER XI

                        THE FIRST CANOE TRIP


“We want six more for the war canoe,” shouted the swimming teacher
from the stern of that long, graceful, dark blue vessel.

“Come on, Miss West.”

“Throw me a life preserver to sit on,—please—we’re going three in
this canoe.”

“You and I, Frances,” said Marion.

“No, you and I, Marion,” firmly insisted another girl, both Frances
and Marion yielding to avoid controversy.

“Four more for the war canoe,” from the megaphone again.

“All right, Betty,” said Hilary, “you and Cathalina go on in the war
canoe,—they need more and it will be easier for you, I believe. Lil
and I will take this one by ourselves. Do you want to paddle bow or
stern, Lil?”

“I don’t care, Hilary.”

“You’re not quite so husky as I am, and stern will be hard for you
if you aren’t used to it. I guess you’d better paddle bow.”

“Not for that reason, Hilary. Why should you take the hardest
place?”

A good-natured squabble followed, in which Hilary won, settled
Lilian in the bow and pushed the canoe out from the sands, jumping
in at the stern. “I’ve got that dandy stroke that Mr. Clark showed
me. It keeps the canoe going straight forward and you rest your
paddle just a second on the edge, so it’s easier.” As Hilary spoke
she gave the shore a final push with her paddle, and sent the canoe
gliding smoothly into the deeper water.

“O, isn’t this fun? I just adore canoeing!”

“Adoration, exclamation, consummation,” murmured Lilian.

“Hesitation, coronation,—there are about a hundred of ’em if you are
wanting a rhyme.”

One by one the pretty canoes were selected and launched. At first
there was apparent confusion as the girls flitted hither and
thither, choosing paddles and partners under the general oversight
of the athletic director and swimming teacher, but at last the fleet
was ready to depart.

The occasion was a picnic at Swan’s Island, a large island in
Merrymeeting Bay. As this was the first real canoe trip of any
length, only the good paddlers and swimmers were permitted to take
out the canoes. The rest went in the Aeolus and Truant, while the
Midget with a few passengers carried the lunch. Up to this time
there had been instruction, and paddling within certain limits.

Aeolus and Truant led the way. The war canoe followed, with even
strokes of the paddles, a great improvement over the first “ragtime”
efforts. Then the other canoes, by ones and twos, swept out from
shore to round the point into Merrymeeting Bay.

“Look out, Hilary, don’t go out too far. The current is awfully
strong out there. Look at Eloise and Helen. My! Are they going to
make it? They may have an upset if they are carried down to those
rocks.”

Eloise, Evelyn and Helen had gone out too far from the Merrymeeting
banks and were struggling against both current and tide, which was
going out. But they paddled away, while the Midget was watching to
see if they needed help, and had just started toward the girls when
they drew out of the stronger current and came up to the other
boats.

“Why did we start so late and against the tide?” asked Lilian.

“Didn’t you hear about the canoes? The men had to go after them this
morning. The tide came up so high last night and the girls had not
drawn them up high enough. Usually somebody goes down to see if
everything is all right, but of course on the night of an unusually
high tide it would be forgotten, by the ‘irony of fate’. Four canoes
were missing.”

“Did they find them?”

“Yes; some of the Boothbay folks got them and took them in there.”

“Look at our flotilla, Hilary. The English fleet isn’t in it with
us!”

“It is lovely, isn’t it? I just love these blue canoes. But ‘bucking
the tide’ is no joke. This is hard work. However, think of the howl
that would have gone up from one and all of us if we had had to give
up the trip!”

“Don’t you wish we had Campbell along?”

“I do indeed, and for no sentimental reason either, Miss Lilian.”

On they paddled. Soon the launches were far in advance. The distance
to the island seemed to increase. Eloise, Helen and Evelyn had
caught up with Hilary and Lilian and shouted across occasionally.

“Look at Jenkie with Mr. Clark. Isn’t she lucky? See the way he
paddles, and look at the way she just dips her oars. Listen, she’s
calling.”

“Come on, girls; this isn’t hard.”

“O, no, Jenkie, not with Mistah Clahk to do the wuhk!” replied
Evelyn.

For the first long pull it promised to be a hard one. But after the
launches had reached the island and delivered passengers and cargo,
the Truant returned to pick up girls that were too tired and tow
their canoes to port.

The picnic went on as picnics do, but not all picnickers breathe the
exhilarating air furnished by the Maine breezes. The girls were soon
quite rested, though arms and shoulders might ache a little. Bathing
suits and towels had been brought along for a good swim. The lunch
was pronounced wonderful and good appetites made quick work of
disposing of it. “Seconds” and “Thirds” were permitted for
sandwiches and fruit. Some of the girls had brought books or
magazines. Others had fancy work. Some looked for new birds or new
flowers to add to their number of points. As all the common flowers
had been brought in, each new flower counted a point. All the girls
had helped gather wood for the fire. Ah, how much better bacon
tastes cooked outdoors! Besides the fun, the consciousness of being
able to paddle one’s own canoe, both literally and figuratively, was
the chief result of this picnic, and every trip in this beautiful
country made the girls love it more.

The paddle home was almost as hard as that to the island, for a wind
came up, blew in their faces, and made the bay choppy. Tide again
was against them. In the waves made by the wind and those from
passing steamers all the skill of the paddlers was called into
requisition. But the presence of the launches gave confidence to any
of the girls who needed it, and the canoes rode the little
white-capped waves most prettily.

“Send for Edna, Cathalina, to rub my back,” exclaimed Hilary
stretched at length on her cot. “Bring on your Sloan’s liniment,
Absorbine Junior and St. Jacob’s oil! Look out, Betty!”—as Betty
plumped herself down by Hilary and began to rub a shoulder. “Deal
gently, Elizabeth; how are your own arms?”

“There were so many to paddle in the war canoe; we hardly got tired
a bit. But I’m just as hungry as if I hadn’t eaten three sandwiches
and other things in proportion at the island.”

“So’m I. Dot has a birthday tonight, so we’ll have ice cream and
cake. Maybe you will be asked to the birthday table, Hilary.”

“No, I don’t think so, too many little folks that Dot will want.”

“But she is so crazy about June.”

“True; but I’m not June. However, we’ll all have cake, even if it is
not birthday cake.”

“The supper bell; O, joyful sound! Are the rest of you lame old
ladies going to manage to get down to the dining-room on time?”

Hilary rose with exaggerated stiffness. “I’m going to apply for a
position as special guide to take venturesome tourists through the
St. Lawrence rapids in a canoe.”

The girls from Squirrels’ Inn were a little late in reaching the
dining-room, though others were still gathering and the bell for
order before grace had not yet rung. Dotty came dancing from the
birthday table to show them her birthday bouquet.

“Isn’t it lovely? The camp mother made it. See? Every little flower
is made of a dee-lish-shus piece of candy in the center, with all
colors of paper for petals, and this lacy white paper to hold it
all, twisted tinfoil and all! I wish I could have had you big girls
at my table too.”

“Thank you, Dotty,” said Hilary, “it is just as it should be.”

The birthday table was especially decorated, with fresh bouquets and
extra goodies which had been sent to Dorothy. Packages were piled at
Dorothy’s place; happy faces surrounded the table. But the supreme
moment was when the tables were cleared for the last course and Dot
went over to the kitchen for her birthday cake. The girls watched as
the candles were lit for her and the cake put into her hands. Slowly
and carefully she walked, watching lest her green candles blow out,
while the girls sang:

                   “Happy birthday to you,
                   Happy birthday to you!
                   Happy birthday, dear Dorothy,
                     Happy birthday to you!”

“Dorothy rah! Dorothy rah! Rah-rah, Dorothy!”

“Did you notice her name on the frosting?—Dorothy, in cinnamon
drops.”

“Yes, Isabel, I certainly did,” said Virgie. “I never had a birthday
celebration in my life. I wish my birthday came in camp time.”

“When does it come?”

“September first! Not even in school time!”

“My, what a pity. You could almost have one.”

“I’ve half a mind to change it, put it in August some time. Why
not?” asked Virgie, laughing.

“There was a girl that did that once,” said Frances. “She went clear
through with it, then somebody told.”

“What did they do to her?”

“Nothing. They were too kind.”

“I suppose she wanted it so awfully. But mercy, I’m having too many
kinds of good times that I never dreamed of having a year ago not to
be able to stand not having a birthday cake.”

“We’ll just have a celebration at school for you. Our first feast
shall be in your honor.”

“I thank you!” and Virgie bowed formally. “Patty said that we have
four birthdays on the same day next week with four separate birthday
cakes. Maybe we’ll get a taste of one yet, Isabel.”




                            CHAPTER XII

                            THE JUNIORS


June, of the Juniors, was having, in her own words, the “greatest
fun of her lifetime.” Never had she lived with so many other little
girls. Laugh-a-lot had overflowed into “Little Content”, a tent next
to the shingled cabin, and “Hillside Inn”, located where the name
indicates. The latter tent had its name conspicuously posted on a
board, though the sign artist found that there was not enough room
for the last “N” and put up the sign without it.

The youngest of the Juniors were two eight-year-olds, Dorothy
Freneau and Josephine Rathmell. Dorothy was short and chubby, with
appealing blue eyes and engaging ways. Josephine was taller, thin,
with olive complexion and short, fluffy, dark hair. Despite the
difference in size and complexion these little girls were called the
Twins, because of their years, their birthdays only a week or so
apart. “Dot” and “Jo” were great favorites in camp, loved but not
spoiled, for neither was babyish nor selfish and in all the camp
sports or trips each wanted to play her part well. As Dotty had
taken a special fancy to June both girls were often found in her
company.

Among June’s other friends was an enterprising child of Isabel’s
type, who had copied her brothers and who sought June’s
companionship, largely because she was so different. June, like
Hilary, was of the consoling, steady type that makes a good
confidante, and this ten-year-old had more than one woe to confide.
For June herself camp life was doing a good deal in helping her to
overcome her timidity. She learned and tried to practice the
definition of a “good sport”, which was pinned up in the
dining-room:

              “Somebody happy, jolly and kind;
              If she loses a game,—well, never mind.”

There were some things which she found it hard to take pleasantly in
this first experience with the companionship of a group. She hated
the mischievous tricks that some of them played, but tried to be
patient whenever she was the victim. She learned to look in her bed
to see if either caterpillar or pebbles were there, and made it over
pleasantly whenever it was “made French”. One child upset a box of
blueberries upon it when it was open to air, and one morning her
suit-case was missing, found later in a distant klondike, where it
had been carried “for fun”.

“They think that it is really funny,” she confided to Hilary.
“Several times I’ve had it upon the tip of my tongue to say as
Mother has said to us ‘anybody could do that; a smart person
wouldn’t even think it funny’, but I can’t do it, since I’m not
bringing them up as Mother is us, and then they’d think I was mad. I
must be different not to like it. And I did hate it about the
sheets. Will the stain come out? Of course that was just an
accident.”

“Don’t worry about that. Mother gave us common sheets and she knows
that we can’t be as careful in camp life, though there is no sense
in being destructive. Just get along as nicely as you can and keep
pleasant. We have always had to be careful, for financial reasons,
and then there is good sense in having some ‘thrift’. I don’t
imagine that the parents of these girls want them to be as careless
with their own and other people’s property as a few of them are.”

“I’ll try to do the best I can, but it seems so stingy not to lend
things to the girls, and if I do I don’t have them when I need them.
The other day when it was so wet Bess had my rubbers and I got my
feet wet, and the head councillor met me and said, ‘Why, Junie,
where are your rubbers?’ and I almost cried!”

“That is more serious. I don’t know what you will do except to
refuse to lend them. Wrap them in a paper and keep them in your
trunk if necessary.”

“Then they’ll say I’m mean.”

“Let ’em. They all have or have had the necessary things; let them
look after their own. Don’t you remember how it has been said again
and again, ‘Don’t lend; don’t borrow.’ And just yesterday the head
councillor said, ‘It is _not_ selfish to look after your own
property.’ Those few careless girls make a lot of trouble for her, I
guess. Notice all the things that are left in the office or assembly
hall.”

“I really do like that generous kind that will give anything they
have,” said June thoughtfully. “Bess would give away her head, I
guess; but her rubbers are gone and her sweater and a lot of other
things and that is why she borrows. I can’t borrow, someway, so I
come to grief if I don’t have my own things.”

“A lot of the girls just leave everything to their mothers, you
know. They haven’t lived in a minister’s family where things have to
be managed and everybody has to take a little responsibility.”

“O, Hilary, I forgot. We have to have the doings next Friday or
Saturday night. Have you any ideas? Our councillor said for each of
us to think up something if we could and we are to meet after supper
tonight to talk it over.”

“How about some Mother Goose tableaux, or some charades for the
girls to guess?”

“O, yes; that would be fun,” said June, clapping her hands. “Will
you help me get dressed that night?”

“Yes, I’ll help in whatever you get up if your councillor wants me
to. I’ll see you at supper if I have any more ideas.”

The meeting of the committee after supper was a momentous occasion.
What they were planning had to be kept a secret from the other girls
or the entertainment would lose that element of surprise in which
half the fun consists.

“I just can’t think of a thing!” declared Dot. “O, yes I can,
too,—why I can do something that we girls at school did in a drill
one time.”

“Good, Dotty,” said the councillor, “you can do it by yourself or
show one or two of the other girls how to do it with you. Now that
is your responsibility. Can we depend upon you to do it?”

“Yes, I’ll get it up all myself.”

One thought of one thing, another of something else. Hilary was
brought in, and another meeting planned for the following morning
before games. A long hike was planned for Friday, which would
probably tire the girls, and caused a postponement of the Junior
entertainment to Saturday night. But this pleased the Juniors as
giving them more time. Dot and Jo were practicing some thing very
hard to do. June was fixing something of Hilary’s to wear. Borrowing
for theatricals was considered proper!

Curtains were up for the entertainment this time. The Junior
councillors had gathered in the Juniors to dress for their parts.
Important as it seemed, some little folks will forget to note the
time which will slip away so fast!

“Isn’t it nice to have curtains?” said Jo. “When we had Little Red
Riding-Hood we had to get things ready in the dark.”

The first number on the program was a concert by the world’s
greatest artists. Madame Galli-Curci appeared first, accompanied by
Lilian with the guitar. The small prima donna had refused to sing
anything appropriate to her years. “No, sir, I won’t sing a child’s
song. Yes, of course, I know ’em. How could I help it, when we sing
them at school? But it has to be a grown-up song or else I won’t be
Galli-Curci!”

“Madame Shumann-Heink sings ‘Holy Night’.”

“I wouldn’t call that a child’s song. Besides it is summer now. What
songs do you know, Lilian? I can learn anything in two days.”

“Remarkable child!” sighed the councillor who was helping. “Get her
anything she wants, Lilian.”

Jo folded her arms and stood calmly to wait what would be done.
Lilian came to the rescue, and after trying over a number of songs
she found that Jo was familiar with the tune of “O Promise Me”.

This rendered that night in a high childish voice created quite as
much of a sensation as the real prima donna could have desired,
particularly in respect to the pronunciation of the words and
division of syllables. “You-an-dI” and “or-gunn” were especially
appreciated by the audience, who were apparently carried away by the
effective close, “O, prom-uss me, O, prom-muss me!” Enthusiastic
encores brought Jo back several times, but while she handled her
train with ease and bowed and smiled with all the graces of the
stage, she refused to repeat her effort and had not learned an
encore.

After the rest of the artists had appeared, four little girls gave a
drill as wooden dolls, while one of the councillors played
“Narcissus.” This was Dot’s idea.

The Mother Goose tableaux were especially pretty. They included Old
King Cole, Little Boy Blue and other of the well know classics which
were quickly guessed by the audience. Little Bo-peep had her crook
and was shading her eyes as she looked for her sheep. Simple Simon
was fishing in his mother’s pail. The cupboards in the wall which
had been a part of the original farm-house kitchen were just the
thing for old Mother Hubbard.

“The last two numbers will be charades,” announced Dot. “The first
is two words, in one act.”

The curtains were drawn aside, revealing one happy little girl
curled up on a rug. She was deeply absorbed in a book, and ate candy
from a box close at hand. The audience hesitated, whispered, and
finally some one called “Little Content”. That was the right answer,
and the curtains closed. When they were again drawn they disclosed
the entire group of Juniors sitting upon the floor and laughing.
Having been prepared by the previous charade, the audience at once
cried, “Laugh-a-lot! Laugh-a-lot!”




                            CHAPTER XIII

                           CAMP ATHLETICS


“Net ball.”

“Out.”

“Come on, now; she serves awfully swift; look out.”

“Come on, Jenkie! Put all your strength into it!”

“Hit it up! Hit it up! Keep it going!”

“I served then; one point for us.”

“What’s the score?”

“Five all.”

“Good! Good, Virgie!”

“Now Eight,—your turn.”

“Only one assist.”

“Come up a little further. You can stand there. Every inch counts.”

“My turn to serve?”

“Hit it!”

“O, how could I? A mile above my dear head!”

“What’s the matter with this team? That’s the third time, Isabel,
that you’ve knocked Pat over, and Betty got hit in the eye.”

“Y’see, you ran out of your place and were in my way.”

“You dropped your comb, Bertha.”

“What’s the score?”

“Twelve to seven.”

“Whose favor?”

“The Pennacooks’.”

“Come on, Kennebecs!”

“Wake up, girls; don’t let ’em beat us!”

“Did everybody serve? Begin all over? All right; I don’t want to
cheat.”

“That’s the way, keep it up; send it back.”

“Out.”

It is volley ball, in which two of the six teams are playing. Back
and forth flies the big ball. Like the flag, it must not touch the
ground. Girlish figures run hither and thither, strike the ball and
send it flying over the net to the opposite side, where the
performance is repeated. Good spirit prevails. They are playing to
win, for the sake of the team and for personal reasons as well; but
however eager or disappointed they may feel, no one shows ill will.
Pride and camp spirit prevent that. Sometimes it is a little hard to
accept the hindrances which the little girls or the less experienced
ones offer, but as a rule these are coached and encouraged by the
rest of the team. A good play is applauded by both sides.

“Now try it, June. That’s it. Put a little more strength into it
next time. Hit it hard and send it a little higher. You get another
turn. Toss it up and then bang away!”

“Send it to me and I’ll hit it over.”

June takes her stand, tosses up the ball and hits it. It goes off to
the side, but one of the girls who stands there, hits it over the
net. Back it comes and over it goes again, sent by a hard blow from
Hilary.

“They’re coming up fine.”

“Thirteen to ten.”

“Yes,” cried the captain of the Kennebecs. “Where’s some wood?” she
cries, rapping on her head. “Come on, Kennebecs!”

“Thirteen to eleven,” announces the referee, as the Kennebecs score
another point. The game grows exciting.

“Good work, Lilian.”

“Get it, Margaret. O, you weren’t quick enough!”

“Be ready.”

“Come on, Pennacooks!”

“What’s the score?”

“Fourteen to twelve.”

“Betty’s serve.”

The Pennacooks, nerved to greater effort by their higher score and
the increasing score of the Kennebecs made the fifteenth point and
won the game. Two games out of three they had thus won, and the
Kennebecs generously gave the first cheer for the winning team.

“No hurry, girls,” said Lilian, dropping down in the shade. A
red-eyed vireo in the bushes had not stopped rooting for both sides
during the game, and an olive-sided flycatcher had come out to sit
on a wire by one of the tennis courts and inquire which side beat.
So Hilary interpreted their remarks, as she pointed them out to the
girls.

Hilary, June, Eloise, Lilian and Cathalina were among the defeated
Kennebecs, while Isabel, Nora, Betty and Frances were of the
victorious Pennacooks. Helen and Marion played with the Ossipees,
who were at present playing baseball down on what might be called
Merrymeeting Green, near the water front.

“The baseball games aren’t over yet,” Lilian continued, “and besides
they’ll have to rest.” The girls stretched out or curled up where
tall bushes and some trees offered shade.

“Whom do we play in basketball?”

“The Ossipees.”

“Well, we must beat them,” declared Hilary. “I’ll simply pass away
if we can’t.”

“Team work, girls,” said Eloise, who was captain.

“My, it’s hot this morning in the sun,” said Lilian. “Cathalina,
I’ll beat you in tennis this afternoon, if we can get a court after
rest hour.”

“All right as to playing. As to beating, we’ll see.”

“You’re the two champions among the Seniors, aren’t you?”

“I guess so,” replied Lilian.

“Of course you’ll get a court, then. And you’ll have an audience,
too. Which court do you want? We’ll see that you get it. I’m
terribly thirsty. Let’s go over to the club house and get a drink.
We can sit on the porch till the girls come. There’s always a
wonderful breeze there. I suppose your team is at baseball next,
Nora?”

“Yes, and we must be going, too,—come on, girls.”

This was a busy week in athletics. The July tournaments were on.
Tennis was being played off as could be managed about the courts.
The schedule was posted in the club house. Lilian and Cathalina were
easily the best in tennis and had yet their match to play.

In volley ball, baseball and basketball, the six teams played
against each other. Every girl in camp was assigned to a team,
though a few were excused for some special reason, and only took
part in the games at times. There was not the intense excitement or
the temptation to over-strain that there is sometimes in the games
between schools; but there was great interest in these active sports
and a very human desire to excel.

Volley ball and tennis were played upon courts, which were located
on the level ground back of the camp buildings. Beyond the courts
stretched a big meadow, partly level, but sloping down to bushes and
trees along the back water of the Kennebec. On the other side of
courts and meadow were bushes and trees and the charming road or
lane which wound along past Sunset Rock, the pine grove and the
birches, through Merrymeeting boundaries, to the world of the
mainland beyond. Just back of the club house and at the beginning of
this little road were the posts and baskets for the basketball
games.

That afternoon, though the sun was still hot, the cool Maine breeze
stirred the sunny locks of Lilian and Cathalina as the girls met for
the final test of skill in tennis. Both girls played well, having
played for several years. A few councillors and a number of the
girls occupied a bench or two, or found seats on the grass beside
the favorite court, the one nearest the lane.

“Now, Lil,” said Cathalina, as swinging their racquets they walked
toward the court, “you are such a dear, that only I’m afraid of one
thing.”

“What’s that?”

“That you will hate to beat me and won’t play your best.”

“I thought that all out, Cathalina, and I think that the only fair
thing is for each of us to play her level best. And don’t you let me
beat you because you hate to beat me, or get lazy and do not care!”

“I guess that is the more likely,” acknowledged Cathalina, laughing.
“I’m a lazy-bones, but I promise to do my best. Beware!”

“Here comes the champs!”

“What’s the matter with the champions?”

“Rah, rah, Lil!”

“Rah, rah, Cathie!”

The comparatively small company gathered near the court were more
audience than rooters, and applauded impartially both players,
though Isabel never failed to cheer some good play by Cathalina, and
Virgie shouted at the top of her Western lungs for Lilian.

“Look at Lil. Good work, Lilian; you have a wicked serve!”

“Fifteen—love.”

So evenly matched were the girls that most of the games were deuce
games. Fourteen were played before Lilian won the first set.

The second set was won by Cathalina, who played with brilliance and
determination. Her most effective play was what the girls cheered as
a “slam”, almost impossible to return, which she delivered with
surprising force for one so slight. This she had learned from
Philip. But Lilian, too, had a brother, had been accustomed to
playing with Cathalina, and was not as much disturbed by this play
as were the more inexperienced girls against whom Cathalina had been
playing during these days of tournament.

“Do you read my mind, Lil,” asked Cathalina once, when Lilian so
quickly reached the particular spot back in the court where she was
needed.

“I’m sorry, Cathalina; that was a peach,” said Lilian, as one of
Cathalina’s returns went an inch or so outside.

“Great cut, Lilian,” remarked Cathalina, when Lilian’s ball went
over the net, hit the right spot, and refused to bounce to
Cathalina’s racquet.

In the third set, excitement rose among the spectators. Endurance
was not Cathalina’s strong point and she grew tired, but played on
apparently as well as ever. She had won four games, Lilian five, and
the score of the present game stood forty to thirty in Lilian’s
favor, when she returned, backhand, a difficult ball from Cathalina.
It dropped over the net and Cathalina was not quite quick enough to
reach the net from the back of the court. The game was Lilian’s and
wild applause proclaimed her winner of the tennis tournament.

Meanwhile in the bushes two deeply interested spectators had arrived
by way of the lane. Having been informed by Jo and June, who were
playing “jacks” on the club house floor, that Cathalina and Lilian
were finishing the tournament, two masculine visitors decided to go
to the courts by the back way and remain unseen if possible while
watching the progress of the game. June had suggested it, saying
that it might “fuss” the girls, since they were not expecting
company.

“You’re a bright, kind little June-bug, aren’t you?” asked Campbell,
and June gave him one of her happy smiles, as he strode off with
Philip Van Buskirk.

“Well-well! Which will you root for, Philip, sister or best girl?”

“We’ll not dare root for anybody if we have to keep out of sight.”

“Wise reply. True, and doesn’t give you away.”

Philip scarcely knew where loyalty demanded his presence. He was
proud of his pretty little sister, but every time he looked at the
graceful Lilian he fell more deeply in love.

“How about a love set with Lilian, old man?” queried Campbell.

“I’ll play one any day,” replied the unembarrassed Philip.

“But ‘love’ means ‘nothing’,” added Campbell.

“Unfortunately so.”

“Good for Cathalina!” exclaimed Campbell, with cousinly regard, at
an especially good play. Before this he had found where Hilary was
sitting, and did not find the game so engrossing that he could not
include Hilary in his line of vision.

Then came the last plays, Lilian’s victory, and Philip found himself
watching her, as she received congratulations and talked happily
with the girls. The boys waited a few moments till most of the crowd
were moving off, a few Greycliff girls still around Lilian and
Cathalina, then walked around into sight.

“A surprise for you, Cathalina,” called Campbell.

Turning, the girls saw Philip and Campbell, and with many
exclamations of wonder and pleasure, went to meet them.

“Why, Philip Van Buskirk!” exclaimed Cathalina. “Why didn’t you
write that you were coming?”

“Didn’t know it myself till the last minute, Kitten. Say I was proud
of your playing. And Lilian, that was great!”

“Were you back there all the time?”

“Just for the last two games. It was all we could do to keep still
and not join in the rooting, but June warned us not to appear before
the games were over.”

“When did you arrive, Philip?” asked Hilary.

“This morning. Campbell wrote that this would be a good time to
come, I wired him and came. He says that there is to be a picnic up
here tomorrow.”

“Yes, indeed; we entertain the Boothbay boys.”

“Let’s sit down right here and talk,” suggested Cathalina, moving
toward the benches. “Then we can show you around a little.”

“I’m afraid we’ll have to put that off till tomorrow,” said
Campbell, “if we go down to camp with the tide. But we can visit a
little while.” Thus speaking, he waved Hilary to a seat next to
Cathalina on a bench and dropped on the grass at her feet.




                            CHAPTER XIV

                   PICNICKERS FROM BOOTHBAY CAMP


“O, dear! It’s going to rain today, Eloise, look at the fog!”

“That doesn’t mean anything up here, Isabel.”

“But it was so cloudy last night, too. If anything happens to spoil
the picnic I’ll be mad.”

“Nothing will,” contributed Frances. “If it storms, they’ll wait
till the storm is over and then come. And if it keeps on raining, we
can have fun in the club house and the dining room. But I don’t
think that it will rain.”

“I want to see what happens on a picnic when the boys are here,”
said Isabel. “When do they come?”

“Right after rest hour, probably. They have to get ready, of course,
and the Aeolus won’t leave here till after dinner.”

“Why the Aeolus?”

“There are so many boys that the big boat will go after them.”

“And what do we do?”

“The program will be announced at breakfast or dinner, I think.
Probably there will be some games, different things to make us get
acquainted. We are supposed to be the hostesses and will show the
boys around the grounds if they want us to, but I imagine that the
little boys will want to tear around by themselves. The older boys
will pay more attention to us, though. They will all be very polite
and appreciative, for their head councillor is quite particular
about their manners.”

It was almost three o’clock when the boats appeared from Boothbay
Camp. The day had cleared, though occasional clouds obscured the
afternoon sun. The Aeolus came gliding in, full of boys of all
sizes, with their councillors. Many of them wore white duck in honor
of the occasion. Others were in the usual camp uniform. Standing in
or on the Aeolus, they hailed Merrymeeting, first with the Boothbay,
then with the Merrymeeting yell, and were answered by such girls as
happened to be about, for the place of reception was at the club
house.

Cathalina was watching for Philip and Campbell, whom she intended to
have a delightful time if she could manage it, and proud she was to
introduce them to all the interesting girls. Campbell, in turn,
introduced the other councillors and other boys, and the picnic was
well started. The younger boys and girls had a hare and hounds
chase, which was somewhat strenuous for the boys in white duck, but
they came out of it in good humor, if a little warm and disheveled.

“They shall have their heart’s desire, the dears,” thought
Cathalina, as she stood apart for a moment and looked at the
chatting, laughing company. It was not hard to manage it, for
Campbell never got very far from Hilary, and Phil was usually where
he could quickly reach Lilian.

“Pardon me, Philip, I want Lilian to take you around a little and
show you Marshmallow Point and the pine grove, and, Hilary, will you
take Campbell? There is Sunset Rock, too, and the lane. The boys
must see all the places we rave about. I’ll join you later.”
Cathalina had seen to it that neither Hilary nor Lilian had planned
to take part in any of the games that were arranged for, and had
frankly told them why. “I want you to be free to entertain Campbell
and Philip. The other girls and I will help with the rest.”

Neither Lilian nor Hilary, then, were surprised or embarrassed, and
the four strolled first down to Marshmallow Point, properly called
Chopp’s Point, where they viewed the remains of many a camp fire and
sat on the rocks to talk of their schools, the camps, and many other
interests both serious and amusing. But when they topped the hill
again, Lilian and Philip turned toward the pine grove, while Hilary
and Campbell walked on past the club house to the little road and
Sunset Rock. No explanation seemed necessary.

“This is where we find the cranberry plants,” Hilary was saying, as
she stooped to pick a bit of the vine with an unripe cranberry on
it. “Our prettiest blueberries are near Sunset Rock.”

“Where is that?” asked Campbell.

“Up this way.”

Lilian was just pointing out the pine grove to Philip and they had
turned to go there when they looked back to see Hilary and Campbell
turning the other way, but looking back to wave friendly hands.

“There are the most beautiful rocks of all in the pine grove,
Philip, and along the shore of Merrymeeting Bay.”

Down the narrow trail they walked into the grove, Lilian leading.
Little blueberry bushes, prickly juniper, bright green moss,
sprawling arborvitæ, tall sweet ferns and other greenery lined the
way. Then they reached the thick carpet of pine needles and climbed
down a natural stairway, none too regular, made of pine roots padded
with moss and brown pine needles.

“This is the way to the swimming cove,” said Lilian, pointing to the
rocks and the water, which appeared through the trees. “The hunters’
cabin is on in that direction, a short walk. Would you like to go on
there?”

“I’d rather sit out on the rocks, I believe, and talk to you while I
have the chance,” replied Philip quickly, “but wherever you want to
go, I’ll be glad to tag along.”

“I’d rather visit, too, Philip,” responded Lilian pleasantly, as she
looked about for the best location. “Let’s climb back up to my
favorite rock. We’ll be close at hand if the girls want us, and by
ourselves if many of the folks come down to the grove.”

Lilian’s sweater made a comfortable cushion for both as perched upon
the firm old Maine rock they began to talk to each other of their
dreams and ambitions. It was just as engrossing as it had been upon
their ride from Rochester to Buffalo. While they talked, the bell
rang for swimming.

“They are back from the hare and hounds chase and that is the call
for swimming; do you want to go, Philip?”

“No; do you?”

“Not a bit; Tell me some more about your pipe organ lessons. Which
do you like best, organ or piano? I suppose piano is easier.”

“My old organ teacher and I quarrel every once in a while about
that. He began with piano, too, and likes it, of course, but says
that anybody who gives pipe organ study a fair trial likes it
better, so many more effects and so on, and so much power in the
organ. But I hold out for piano still, though I thoroughly enjoy the
pipe organ work and do not find it so hard because of having played
piano so long. One reads music, you know, and has the fingering of
keys and the idea of expression and all.”

“Have you had harmony and counterpoint?”

“Yes; have you?”

“No, but I must, because I try to make up little songs and do not
know whether the accompaniments are right or not. O, dear, I’ll
never catch up to you!”

Philip’s face showed how little he thought Lilian needed anything
more to make her perfect, as he replied, “You are way beyond me, I’m
afraid. Let me help you with accompaniment. I’d love to try it! Send
me the melody and words and what idea of accompaniment you have,
whatever you have written, and I will see if you have broken any of
the rules at least, and if you want me to, I’ll perhaps suggest some
chords that would be good.”

“O, that will be wonderful!” Lilian clasped her hands in delight.
“But wouldn’t it bother you too much? You will be so busy with your
own work.”

“I’d consider it a privilege.”

“Well, you are nice!” But something in Philip’s tone made Lilian
hurry on to say, “I have always wanted to be a singer, Philip, but
Mother says it’s an awful life. She says that I can have the lessons
and sing without being a concert singer. But still sometimes I think
I would like to try it.”

“I’m very fond of music, you know,” replied Philip, “but Father
needs me in the business, and I like his line, too. I want a regular
job. I think every man ought to have one, and as I don’t care to be
a public performer or a music teacher, I think I’ll just keep it for
recreation, boring my family with occasional practice and much
private enjoyment of my own.”

“From what Cathalina says, I judge that your family is never bored.”

“They do seem to stand it, but they are a long-suffering lot. And
lately,” Philip’s face sobered, and he twirled the sweet fern that
he held, “I’ve been planning for a musical wife, that is ... she’s
pretty young now ... if I get home from war to ask her.”

Lilian’s heart tried to turn over, but did not succeed, and as he
spoke of the war she looked at him quickly,—“O, Phil!”

“We are bound to get into it, Father thinks, and says that when we
do get in I may go, not before. Campbell and I and most of our
friends are making our plans accordingly.”

Silence for a few moments. Lilian played with a sprig of
blueberries, which Philip had picked for her, and Philip still
twirled the bit of sweet fern.

“Say Lilian, would you mind writing to me?”

“I’d love to, Philip.”

“Right along, I mean, not just once in a while. I’d like to tell you
things, and know what you are doing all the time and where you are.”

Philip spoke so earnestly that Lilian almost gasped. Matters were
moving rapidly in this new friendship.

“You see you’re,—well, you’re different. I never met a girl like
you. You’re so _sweet_, you know!” and Philip put his long brown
fingers for just a moment over the little tanned hand on the rock.

Lilian’s blue eyes met Phil’s dark ones and fell before them, while
Philip watched a sweet, serious face surrounded by a bright halo of
hair on which the afternoon sun was shining.

“Here come Cathalina and Eloise, Philip,” and Lilian waved a hand to
the approaching girls.

“It’s about time for the supper, Lilian,” said Cathalina, “and I
thought we’d better look up you folks. Supper is half an hour
earlier, you know, and I wasn’t sure that you knew it. Whoo-oo,
everybody!”

Cathalina raised her voice a little and repeated her announcement of
“almost supper-time”, that a group of boys and girls down on the
cove rocks might hear her. “Where are Hilary and Campbell, Lilian?”

“They started to walk down the lane to Sunset Rock, to see birds, I
guess.”

“Yes, to see birds,” laughed Cathalina, as she and Eloise ran back
along the winding path. “I feel as if I were an entertainment
committee, don’t you, Elo’?”

“Yes, indeed, with young councillors and boys and girls to meet and
introduce. I hope that everybody has been having a good time.”

“I know that Phil and Campbell are! And there aren’t any lonesome
looking youngsters hanging around anyhow. Everybody has had
something to do or somebody to talk to.”

For the cafeteria supper, the “bread line” was arranged with the
purpose of making it easy for the boys and girls to be grouped
together while eating their supper. First a girl, then a boy, they
filed into the dining-room, past the tables which had been arranged
cafeteria fashion, the girls’ young councillors serving. Then out by
the other door went the long line, carrying their suppers to be
eaten upon the green. “Seconds” were permitted, except for ice cream
and cake. The quick disappearance of supplies and the merry
conversation among the picnickers indicated a good time. After the
councillors had had their picnic lunch and the tables were moved
back, music and games occupied the company till time for
leave-taking.

“I shall be up tomorrow, if nothing happens,” said Philip to the
girls. “And if Campbell can get away I’ll try to drag him along.”

“Yes; ‘try to drag me along’ is good!” said Campbell. “If he does
not select a time when I can get away there will be trouble.”

“How soon must you leave, Philip?” asked Cathalina.

“Tomorrow evening. If you have anything to send home, have it ready
when I come up. Good-bye, everybody. We have had a wonderful time.”

With parting gestures and camp yells, the manly crew boarded their
boats and took their departure.




                             CHAPTER XV

                           A SHORE DINNER


“What is this ‘shore dinner’, Marion, that I hear the girls talking
about?”

“I don’t know, Betty; ask Frances.”

“O, Frances!”

“Whoo-hoo,—in a minute.” Frances presently came in from hanging her
bathing suit on the line outside the klondike.

“What is it, Betty?”

“The ‘shore dinner’, Frances; what is it, and where is it? I have
been hearing the girls ask, ‘O, are you going to the shore dinner?’
but someway neglected to inquire. Do we go to some place on the
shore and have a clam chowder or something?”

“No. The shore dinner is of sea foods, to be sure, but we have it at
New Meadows Inn. They take us down to Bath and from there we take
the trolley car to the Inn. I went last year and want to go again. I
just love their lobster stew!”

“‘Love’ food, Frances?”

“I’m afraid I do, Miss Patty.”

“Can we stop in Bath, too?” continued Betty.

“Yes,—at least they always do let us shop a while.”

“Good! I’m going. How about you, Lilian?”

“O, I’m in for everything,” laughed Lilian, who was very happy these
days. “Will you go, Hilary?”

“Indeed I shall. Do you suppose I’d miss a trip like that? Besides,
I’m interested in this Maine country. I never was in New England
before. I hope we’ll have the trip to Augusta soon.”

“Is Augusta the capitol of Maine?”

“Listen to her! Go and ask Virgie. She studied geography last year.
Are you going, Cathalina?”

“Of course I am. I am particularly fond of clams and lobster.”

“Ugh! clams!” said Betty. “But if you all eat ’em, I will or perish
in the attempt.”

“Mercy, Betty! Taste ’em and go slow is my motto,” said Hilary.

“It is always just as well to have decided whether or not you want
to take a trip,” suggested Frances. “We’ll be asked and have to make
a quick decision perhaps. They have to know about the numbers going,
of course, both to order the dinner at the Inn and to plan about
boats. Will June go, Hilary?”

“She will hate to miss anything, but I’m a little afraid to have her
go. It might upset her to eat that stuff when she isn’t used to it,
and the trolley sometimes makes her sick. I’ll talk to her about it.
June has lots of sense, but once in a while she takes a spell and
will or won’t do something. The worm turns, you know.”

“Yes, I know the feeling,” said Lilian.

“Why, Hilary, at times you have a touch of almost human
intelligence,” said Frances, grinning broadly. “Get little sister to
decide for herself?”

“That is the idea.”

As in odd coincidence it often happens, the shore dinner trip was
announced at breakfast. The younger girls were advised not to go, as
the only attraction was the shore dinner, and that a doubtful
pleasure, unless they liked sea foods. All who so desired, however,
were permitted to go and were to leave their names at the office at
once or within a reasonable time. The dinner would be ordered by
telephone and the boats would start in time to catch the twelve
o’clock trolley car at Bath.

Hilary had not had time to prepare June’s mind to stay at home, but
to her relief June came running to her soon after breakfast.

“I’m not going, Hilary. The girls say that they just have old clams
and lobster and things like that, and I can’t eat any ice cream
afterwards at Bath because it wouldn’t go with the shore dinner, and
you know that I can’t even eat oysters. Are you going?”

“Yes; is there anything you’d like me to get for you at Bath?”

“We need some more films for the camera, and I need a bathing cap.
Mine’s all busted up.”

“‘Torn,’ little sister.”

“O, Hilary, I heard you say ‘bust’ the other day.”

Hilary laughed, and to change the subject, said, “I suppose you will
not object if I bring you something good.”

“You can’t. Don’t you remember what was said at breakfast? Nobody
can buy candy or anything to eat this trip, because they couldn’t
keep from eating it and so it’s safer not to buy ’em. See?”

“Sure enough. All right. Have a good time, Junie, and don’t try too
many wild stunts.” This last because it was so astounding to note
how June had ‘come out’ since coming to camp. Timid at first, afraid
to get out of her depth in the water, used to considering what would
be proper for the minister’s little girl to do, conscientious June
had now thrown all timidity to the winds, frolicked in the water
like a water-sprite since she had learned to swim under instruction,
and was daily getting so much of the group spirit that Hilary was
sometimes afraid of her going to the other extreme. But the daily
exercise and happy times outdoors were giving her much color and the
scales were marking greater gain every time that June was weighed
with the rest.

“Think what a dress-up occasion this is, girls,” said Lilian, as she
dived into her trunk for “real clothes”. “Doesn’t it seem funny to
wear a suit and gloves?”

“Gloves!” exclaimed Cathalina. “_I’m_ not going to wear gloves!”

“My, Cathalina, how you’ve changed!”

“Yes, isn’t it funny? But I just love to dress like a camper. I
think our costume is fine, too, and very becoming.”

“Going to wear your sport hat?”

“Yes.”

All the way down to Bath the girls in the Aeolus, for the numbers
were too many for the Truant, chatted, sang, or tried to compose
verses worthy of the annual prize song. And never did the girls tire
of the beautiful river, its eddies through the Burnt Jackets, its
rocky banks, its breezes and flying or floating gulls. The trolley
ride carried them over a winding way again, up hill and down dell,
past typical New England homes in town or country. Presently they
found themselves at New Meadows Inn and were ushered into its
dining-room.

“O, Cathalina, thank fortune you are with us,” whispered Isabel, as
she sat down next to Cathalina. “You will tell us how to eat the sea
food, won’t you?”

“If there is anything you do not know about,” replied Cathalina
smiling. “You’ve eaten soup?” noticing that the lobster stew was
coming.

“Mean thing! Yes we’ve had soup before!”

The lobster stew proved most popular. “We don’t have lobster stew in
Dakota,” explained Virgie, as she accepted the offer of a second
helping.

“It is always offered here,” said Frances, “and all right to take
it, and some only care for the stew.”

In came the clam course. The Western girls looked at each other and
Isabel whispered to Virginia, “Shades of clams and ‘craw-daddles’ in
our old creek at home! Now tell us, Cathalina.”

In a low tone Cathalina replied, “Open the shell, take the clam off
where it is fastened to the shell and hold it by that end with your
fingers, dip it in the little cup of broth, then in the melted
butter, and eat it.”

“Why, they’re _good_,” said Isabel in surprise, “taste like
oysters.”

Fried clams, lobsters on a little platter, New England doughnuts and
a plate of crisp cookies, pickles, and hot cups of tea or coffee,
all came in for a share of praise from these hungry campers. Coffee
was not served at camp, but permitted on these special occasions.

At Bath they divided into parties, a councillor in charge of each,
and scattered to the bookstores, the shoe stores, the jeweller’s,
the drug store, the dry goods stores or the ten cent store on their
different errands, till the time agreed upon to meet at the boat.
Then again the curving Aeolus took them up the river.

“Swimming meet tomorrow, girls,” reminded Hilary, “you going to try,
Cathalina?”

“No; I’m not speedy enough to race, though I’ve learned to swim so
much better already. It’s a shame that I can’t with all the summers
I’ve been at the shore. I’m going to do more of it at school next
year. Are you going to enter, Hilary?”

“Yes, you know that I always have to try everything. I’ll not win,
though. How about you, Virgie?”

“Not I. I never saw water I wanted to swim in till I came to school
last year. I love to swim now, but I’m no fish like Izzy.”

“There it is again! She calls me a fish now!” Isabel pretended to be
offended.

“Which is it, Isabel, the ‘crawl’ or the ‘overhand’?”

“The ‘crawl’ this time.”

Arrived at camp, the girls saw the Dixie from Boothbay Camp tied up
at the dock, and half way up the hill they met Campbell, who greeted
them and walked back to the club house with them.

“Is this the way you reward me for calling upon you?—coming home
just as I have to leave!”

“It is not quite that bad, I hope,” said Cathalina. “Do you have to
hurry off?”

“Before long, I’m afraid, whenever the ‘captain’ says the word. We
brought up some mail and other things.”

“Come up on the porch,” invited Cathalina.

One of the swings and a few chairs held the party, which included
Hilary, Eloise, Cathalina, Betty and Lilian, besides their guests.
Then Jo and June came running around, their heads scarcely to the
level of the porch floor.

“O, here are the girls. I wonder if they stood the sea food all
right. How’s the lobster?” inquired June, waving at Hilary and not
seeing the young man in the swing.

“Now what do you mean, young lady,—addressing your sister as a
lobster? Come right up and apologize!”

“O, Campbell, you’re so funny!” The little girls ran up the steps,
crossed the porch and June squeezed herself into the swing by
Campbell, Hilary moving over.

“Do you like the little boys, Campbell?”

“Yes, Junie, we have great times. I’ll tell you about them one of
these days. You are coming down to Boothbay on the picnic, aren’t
you?”

“O, I should say I am!”

“Careful, June,” warned Hilary. “Watch your speech.”

“Did you ever hear the story of the hunters’ cabin?”

“Our little cabin, Campbell?”

“Yes, or thereabouts.”

“No; except that hunters often go there during the hunting season.
We found the skeleton of a fox up there the other day. Tell us what
the story is.”

“The story I heard is that there was an old smuggler who had his
cabin up here, buried his treasure and was lost in a storm in the
harbor. The treasure is still buried here, ah-ha!”

“O, really?”

“Nonsense, Campbell; you’re making it up. Somebody would have found
it long ago.”

“I’m no authority myself, but that is one of the stories that they
were telling in camp last night.”

“Come up some day, Mr. Stuart, and we’ll go up there and dig!” said
Jo.

“Where is the place?”

“O, just a little way—up Merrymeeting Bay,” sang Lilian. “It’s in
the pine grove.”

“Well, I’m a busy man these days, with a lot of lively kids to look
after. Save some of the treasure for me.”

“Yes; you may have all we find,” generously offered Hilary.

“Don’t make such a rash offer, Hilary,” said Eloise, “we might
really find something. Can’t you stay to supper, Mr. Stuart?”

“No, thank you; it’s after five o’clock now, the next meal at six,
and we must get back to keep our especial division of boys from
running off with the place.”




                            CHAPTER XVI

                       THE PICNIC TO BOOTHBAY


“This is certainly one wonderful time to me,” remarked Virgie to
Isabel. “Lobster and clams on Tuesday, either a trip or something
going on every minute since, and now this picnic to the boys’
island. I have to shake myself sometimes and say ‘remember the
Maine’ or something for fear I’ll get spoiled. And G. G. G. G. again
next year!”

“Explain your abbreviations; something to do with Greycliff, I
suppose.”

“Yes; Greycliff Gay, Grand and Glorious. Won’t we be in fine trim
for the sports there? We girls never half appreciated our privileges
there.”

“It takes camp life to wake us up, doesn’t it?”

“Yes. Then, of course, there are so many other things that you have
to do at school.”

“A few lessons, for instance.”

“And I have too much sense to tire myself out on athletics and not
get those lessons. I say to myself every so often ‘Virginia Hope,
here is your chance to learn something; don’t miss it!’”

“Miss Randolph has the right idea. Do you remember how she says to
us once in a while ‘Take the hard courses, girls. Make your minds
work and you will never regret it’?”

“I’m going to have school and a little athletics during the year,
and camp in the summer, with lots of it, if I can, after this.”

About ten o’clock the girls started for Boothbay. As this was a very
popular picnic, held annually, nobody but a few councillors remained
at home. The boats went down the river with the girls singing as
usual, the weather propitious, young hearts gay.

“Shall we have a visit with Campbell, Hilary?” asked June, who had
been quite taken with the young man.

Lilian glanced roguishly at Hilary, who had replied soberly to June.
“Yes, perhaps so, but I think that he will be quite busy with the
entertaining and all.”

“Probably he will have a few minutes for you and Hilary, June,” said
Lilian. June perceived that there was some undercurrent of mischief,
but not understanding just what, subsided.

“I wish Philip were here,” said Hilary, “don’t you, Lilian?”

“Cathalina’s the one who would wish so the most,” said June,
“because he’s her brother.”

“Can’t the rest of us like him too?” asked Hilary, who was rather
regretting her blunt retort to Lilian’s teasing.

“O, yes; we all couldn’t help liking Philip, but sisters, of course,
are nearest.”

At this the girls smiled and Cathalina said, “I forgot to tell you
all about my letter from Philip. I read it in a hurry just before we
left. Somebody must have brought up some mail late last night,
because I looked just before we went to our klondike and there was
nothing for any of us in the box. He wrote that he met Lilian’s
brother in New York the other day. They just happened to be at lunch
at the same place and were eating away without knowing each other,
when in walked Judge North, and sat down by Dick, saying that he
found he could get away from somewhere after all. Then he spied
Philip and Philip saw him. They had met at Rochester, you know. Dick
is reading law with his father, isn’t he, Lilian?”

“Yes. Our families seem to meet by chance, don’t they?”

“Philip said that he is a fine fellow. He took Dick and the Judge
out home later for dinner, and Father and the Judge had a great talk
over the war, politics, business and everything. I say ‘Dick’ as if
I knew your brother, Lilian, but Philip called him that in the
letter and I have heard you speak of him so for so long. I wouldn’t
think of addressing him so familiarly.”

“We have been trying to call him ‘Richard’ lately, since he is so
grown up, but can’t remember to do it.”

“‘Richard’ is prettier,—‘Richard North’,” commented Cathalina.

“Dick wrote me a little scribble, too,” said Lilian. “I was so
surprised, because I rarely hear from him. We get news of each other
through Mother, of course. He said that next to Mother, Mrs. Van
Buskirk was the most lovely woman he ever met.”

Cathalina looked pleased at this. “O, isn’t that nice? and that he
is so loyal to his own mother, too.”

“You must meet our mother, Cathalina, and it would be nice if they
knew each other.” Lilian did not mention that she, too, had heard
from Philip. She intended to tell both Cathalina and Hilary, who was
now her closest friend, but the conversation in the pine grove, and
the letters, were just her own now.

“Here we are at Boothbay. I believe that Thorn Island is the name of
the boys’ island. We are going around to the other dock, aren’t we?
These are certainly high rocks. What a great old river the Kennebec
is! Where’s our little Canadian warbler?—O, Betty!”

Betty had been sitting up in front with Marion and Frances, but
joined Cathalina as soon as they landed.

The boys and their councillors had made great plans for the
entertainment of the girls. The picnic meal was at noon, instead of
the later time when it was celebrated at Merrymeeting. With great
gallantry the boys waited upon the girls, who enjoyed every minute.
The girls had been reminded by their head councillor that morning at
breakfast that they should show their appreciation of the courtesies
offered at Boothbay, and that they should consider how much easier
it always was for the girls to accept attentions than it was for the
younger and shy boys to offer them.

In the afternoon the boys played a “left-hand” game of baseball with
the girls, then staged a regular game, at which the girls rooted
impartially for both teams. There were also some singles and doubles
in tennis, which showed the boys’ skill. It must be admitted that in
athletics the boys are usually ahead. But the girls did not mind
being beaten, even when the boys were compelled to use their left
hands to throw and catch, and the boys admitted that the girls
played well, “for girls”.

Not until after the cafeteria dinner did Campbell have time to visit
with Hilary, on whom, however, he quite often kept an eye. But when
the games were in progress, he came up and asked her to take a
stroll around with him. This singling out of Hilary did not pass
unnoticed by the other girls, and Hilary knew that she might come in
for a good share of teasing from the Merrymeeting company. But so
far there was only good comradeship between Hilary and Campbell, at
least, so far as any expression of feeling was concerned. Both were
quite young, with some school years before them and life purposes to
be worked out.

“O, Campbell,” called June as Hilary and Campbell passed a group of
the younger boys and girls who were playing a game. “Tell me more
about the hunters’ cabin before we go, will you?”

“All I know is what I told you the other day. Ask Jack here. She
wants to hear those smuggler and pirate stories, Jack, that the boys
were telling.”

“O, could you tell me, Jack?”

Jack was a bright-eyed youngster of about fourteen years, who was
usually ashamed to be seen talking to a girl. But in his enforced
position as host it was different. Several of the boys and girls
immediately sat down upon the big rock near to hear or help tell the
story.

“Who told it in the first place, Jack?” asked one of the boys, a
little fellow of some nine years.

“A boy last year was telling the first I ever heard about this
country. I think he made it up, because he told us the awfullest
yarns all the time about ghosts and pirates and everything; but it
was fun to listen, and we all added to it.”

“Come on and tell, Jack.” June was sitting with her elbows on her
knees, her face in her hands, ready to listen in breathless
interest.

“All right. You know that cabin up at Merrymeeting doesn’t look very
old, does it?”

“No. It’s made of shingles, isn’t it? Seems so silly to try to have
a story like that one about it.”

“Well, that wasn’t the original cabin, according to Tom’s story, but
built on the same place where the old smuggler’s cabin stood. And
somewhere around there his treasure is buried, under the cabin, in
the cracks of some of the rocks and ledges, or maybe some tree has
grown over the place. He was a terrible old fellow, a sort of
retired pirate, I guess, and Tom said that the smuggler used to live
along the Kennebec and knew that it would be a good place to hide
his stores and treasures. So he built this cabin, the old one, I
mean. He would be gone for months and then his old boat would come
up the Kennebec in the night when the tide was coming this way from
the sea. And he’d drag old sacks full of something from the boat to
the cabin. He was so fierce looking that everybody was afraid of him
and if any boat was on the river when he came along they’d get out
of the way or hide somewhere till he had passed. Once somebody heard
horrible groaning from his boat,—”

“O, Jack!” It was getting too vivid for June.

“One time some people with some officers went to see what there was
in the cabin, while the old man was away. But they only found the
bunks and some food and an old chest with clothes in it.”

“Perhaps he just had food in the sacks and ate it up while he stayed
at the cabin,” suggested practical June.

“Yes. Perhaps he wasn’t a pirate. And perhaps he was,” said Jack.
“You just listen now. This is what Tom told. One night in a
rainstorm a boy that lived on a farm near the river came to shore in
a canoe, because he couldn’t get home in the wind and bucking the
tide. The waves were just _dashing_ every way by the time he got
into the Merrymeeting Bay, and pretty soon the canoe went plump,
crash, bang, smash, right on the rocks near the cove. But of course
the boy could swim and he kept up a minute or two, when he was
carried back from the rocks by the water, and finally he crawled up
on shore. It was in the days of Indians, and he was afraid of being
found by some of them that were not friendly or had had too much
fire-water, so he got among the bushes first. Then he saw a light in
the cabin, shining through cracks, and crept up, real still, to see
if he dared go in. There he saw the old pirate, or smuggler,
whatever he was, taking jewelry out of the chest. It flashed and
sparkled and the old man chuckled and chortled, as he ran the jewels
through his fingers. They always do that in stories, you know,” and
Jack laughed.

“This is a fine story,” said Jo, while Dot said, “O, I hope he
didn’t kill the boy!” and snuggled closer to June.

“Then the boy made a little noise, accidentally, stepped on a stick
or something, and the old man whisked the things into the chest,
caught up his gun, looked to see if his long knife was at his belt
and ran out. The boy was so scared that he scrambled up on a ledge
and climbed a tree, while the wicked old pirate hunted around, and
growled to himself, and said, ‘Nobuddy’d better come a-spyin’ on me!
Nobuddy’d better come a-spyin’ on me! I’ll give his bones to the
fishes!’”

Jack told this part of the story with relish, while June, Jo and
Dot, with the rest of the little girls, kept big eyes on him and in
imagination sat in the tree with the boy of long ago.

“Did he catch the boy?”

“No; I guess he thought it must have been a bear or some other
animal. He went back into his cabin and barred up the door, and
after a while the boy saw the light go out. It had been shining
through the chinks, you know.”

“What else?”

“Nothin’, except that the boy waited a while and slipped down from
the tree and got away from there as soon as he could. He had an
awful time getting home through the wood, afraid of meeting a bear,
and he didn’t have his gun, of course, had lost his canoe and
everything in it. By good luck he was on the mainland, and walked
home. They used to tramp around so much and so far that I imagine
that wasn’t much to him. We can hike a good distance ourselves, you
know.”

“The Indians really used to come to Merrymeeting, you know,” said
Dot.

“O, yes, and maybe this old smuggler or pirate traded with ’em. But
they say that he buried a lot of treasure up there and that his
ghost was seen hunting around and whispering in a hollow voice,
‘Four from the pine tree, Ten from the ledge, Six grey stones at the
water’s edge!’”

“Whoever made that up,” laughed one of the boys, “got up a good one,
for there are about a million pine trees more or less, and all the
stones along the bay are grey ones, I guess, to say nothing of all
the ledges of rock and stone along there!”

                     “Four from the pine tree,
                       Ten from the ledge,
                     Six grey stones
                       At the water’s edge.”

“I’ll remember that,” said Dot, “when we start digging!”

“It’s a great yarn,” said Jack.




                            CHAPTER XVII

                   A RAINY DAY AND “GOOD SPORTS”


“It’s been pouring all night and look at it now!” exclaimed Isabel
in disgust. “Goodbye our hike to Wiscasset! I had to help get the
shutters down in the night, I mean I insisted on helping, because I
was awake when the storm came up. The ground will be soaked and we
can’t have games either, can’t go out or swim or anything, I
suppose.”

“Why can’t we swim?—’cause we’d get wet?’”

Isabel laughed. “That seems to be a good one on me. Yes, thank
fortune, we can swim if it does rain, though I suppose if there were
a real big storm we wouldn’t.”

“No, because water is a great conductor of electricity. I heard
Lilian and Hilary talking about their trip and Lilian was wondering
if ‘all those dead fish’ they saw somewhere when they were on the
boat had been killed by lightning or what had killed them, and then
I remember what Father said one time, that fishes always go to the
bottom or hide away in a storm. I couldn’t be sure, though, let’s
look it up some time. We haven’t had but one thunderstorm and that
wasn’t worth mentioning.”

“It’s too cool and nice up here for thunderstorm weather, I guess.”

“This looks to me like a steady, all day pour. But they’ll have
something for us to do, or we can write or read or have fun in the
club house.”

“We can put on our ponchos and rubbers and go out when we feel like
it. I love to be out in the rain.”

“Good for you, Isabel. That’s the camp spirit. Hurrah, nice old
rainy day,—going to have lots of fun.”

“The girls can work on the prize songs for one thing. That will come
soon. I wonder who will make the best Merrymeeting song.”

“Time will tell. Of course Lilian will try her hand at it, and maybe
Cathalina.”

An indoor field meet was announced for the usual time of games and
duly the girls arrived at the dining hall, disposing of ponchos,
rain coats and rubbers as best they could. The chairs had been moved
back to leave a large space free for the play. The megaphone
announced “This is the annual indoor field meet. Prizes are to be
given to the winners in the different contests. These contests will
now begin. Will the following girls take their places up on the
floor?” Then more fun began than the girls themselves could ever
have thought up, so Isabel and Virgie concluded. For it seemed that
all the funny contests ever staged in parlors or at picnics were
presented in some amusing way. From marshmallow to hurdle races the
selections were entertaining to both contestants and audience. The
girls who were to take part had been selected beforehand by the
athletic director, that little matters like age and size might seem
appropriate to the part taken. No one refused to try the feat
demanded, and when the councillors were ordered to perform, the
merriment grew.

One easy-going, plump little camper created some amusement in the
“bean race”. “Hurry up,” called one of the older girls, “you haven’t
a single one of your beans carried over yet and everybody else has!”

“I can’t help it,” returned the little girl placidly, working away
quietly at the pile of beans on the floor, “they won’t get on my
knife.”

But patience and perserverance won. Not nervous about anything, when
the beans did “get on her knife”, she carried them without spilling
to their destined place and was the first to have her bean supply
all accounted for.

The “shot-put” was contested by girls and councillors with big
balloons, the line men soberly measuring the distances. Grins were
measured. A one hundred-yard dash proved to be walking on a string
(stretched from one point to another) with stepping off, and
watching the string and one’s footsteps through a field glass held
reversed. But the contest which aroused the most enthusiasm and the
wildest excitement was one called a relay race, in which the choice
of girls had much to do with the amusement. Four on a side, they
stood at opposite walls of the dining hall, and were numbered in
order. The plan was simple enough, merely to open a suit-case, which
was placed by Number One of each side, don the dress, hat and coat
which were found inside, open an umbrella, and walk over to the
opposite side. There the clothing would be returned to the
suit-case, the umbrella closed, the quick return made and all handed
to Number Two, who continued the performance. Dimple Dot, the quiet,
dignified Cathalina, cultured Marion, fat May and determined Virgie
were of this company. The side through first would win, hence the
mad scramble which brought tears to the eyes of the laughing girls.
Isabel, through the megaphone, gave the same order which she had
given for the other races, though perhaps not entirely appropriate
here. “Ready,—on your mark—all set—go!”

Cathalina threw dignity to the winds and was especially deft in the
whole performance. Little Dot was almost swallowed up in the
bungalow apron which did duty as dress, and presented a comical
figure as she ran across the floor, stepping on her long draperies,
lost in the big hat and coat, and swallowed up in the umbrella. “I
guess Cathalina and Marion never hurried like that in their lives
before,” she gasped, as she sank on the floor after taking off her
garb and returning it to the suit-case. She had won the race for her
side, for May was not quite through.

The line up for prizes was made a matter of much dignity, as pieces
of candy, popcorn crisps or cookies were presented to the winners.
Then the girls helped place the tables and chairs in order for the
noon meal which was almost ready.

In the afternoon there came more rain and heavier. Puddles stood in
the grass. Little streams ran down the paths and joined in larger
ones. Water poured from the dining hall roof and beat a tattoo upon
the umbrellas of the returning girls, for again entertainment was
planned with the big hall as headquarters. This time the good
old-fashioned games were used. And there were some little city girls
that had not played “drop the handkerchief”! The “farmer in the
dell” was kept going for some time. Musical chairs was played
without chairs, girls in a line crooking right and left arms
alternately to be grasped when the music stopped by the girls who
marched around them. London Bridge was called for, and the question
asked by the leaders was, “Which would you rather be, the best
swimmer in camp, or the best tennis player?” Girls in the line
passing under the bridge wondered why Frances had so many behind
her, till their turn came to hear the question. Lilian, Cathalina
and some others took their places behind Marion in favor of tennis,
but most of the girls desired to excel in swimming, and their long
line easily won in the tug of war which followed.

“O, look, girls, the sun!”

While they were absorbed in the games it had stopped raining. The
bell by the club house rang and the athletic director announced
swimming. “Into your bathing suits,” she cried, “and don’t forget to
gather up your rain coats and other things to take with you!”

“We’ll not get wet after all, Izzy,” said Virgie, teasing, as they
paddled down from their klondikes to the shore through puddles, sand
and mud. “Do you dare me to do a somersault and dive from the high
board?”

“What is the use of daring? You’ll do it anyhow if you feel like it.
I am practicing on the ‘crawl’ stroke, but it is so easy to drop
into the one you are used to using. Doesn’t Cathalina look sweet
with that pretty cape or cloak to match her suit? Here’s for the
rolling deep!”—with which Isabel threw herself from the dock into
deep water, came up to breathe and shake the water from her rosy
face, and made for the float, from which she and Virginia expected
to dive. Even the girls who had not been swimmers were growing
accustomed to the watery element, gaining both in confidence and
ability.

“The bell will ring for a boat ride at four o’clock,” was the
announcement after the whistle blew for all to come out of the
water. “Come now, everybody out! Go up and get thoroughly dry and
take sweaters for the trip.”

By the time the Aeolus had started with its happy company, a fresh
breeze and bright sun were already drying off the walks and grass.
It seemed a different world. The blue water was dancing and the tide
favorable to their ride up Merrymeeting Bay. Past “Marshmallow
Point”, past the swimming cove, past gulls posing on fishing weirs,
the Aeolus glided.

“There’s the hunters’ cabin, Hilary. See how it looks from the bay.”

“Not very far from shore, June; suppose the old pirate sank his
treasure chest with chain and anchor?”

“What if he had!”

“Six grey stones at the water’s edge,” repeated Hilary in a
sepulchral tone.

“Now Hilary, don’t laugh! Honest, don’t you think he could have done
it?”

“How should I know?”

“O, Hilary, I think you’re mean.”

“Because I don’t add my imagination to yours?”

“Look, girls,” said Rhoda as they turned to come back. “There comes
the Virginian. We’ll get her waves. Don’t you just love to go up and
down?”

“That is nothing to what we shall do in the deep sea fishing next
week,” said Marjorie. “They say we go ’way out and anchor, and bob
up and down while we pull in the monsters of the deep!”

The Virginia saluted the Aeolus with three long blasts, and Aeolus
not to be outdone in courtesy returned the salute through a long tin
horn, while the girls called “Rah, rah, Virginian!”




                           CHAPTER XVIII

                       WHO’LL WIN THE PRIZE?


“O, Lil-i-an!”

“Lilian’s out on the point working on a song.”

“Words and tune too?”

“I don’t know, very likely. She has her guitar with her and told us
that she was not to be disturbed ‘on pain of death’. But she laughed
when she said it, and if you want to see her, go and hunt her up.”

“Imagine Lil’s going off alone!”

“First she and Cathalina were working on a Merrymeeting song, then
we all got at it and evolved one of a sort. O, it’s a rouser, _mihi
crede_!” and Betty waved both hands, as if directing some
Merrymeeting celebration.

“What’s ‘meehee craydeh’?” asked Virgie.

“‘Believe me’; you find it in Cicero, though he did not use it in a
slangy way, of course. At least I suppose not, in his famous
orations. You ought to take Latin, Virgie. It would be lots of fun
now, because you would have it to Patty. Dr. Carver wouldn’t have
the beginning Latin classes last year, so Patty took them. _We_ had
it to Dr. Carver, alas. Here comes Lilian now. Did you get ‘lonse’
all by yourself, Lil?”

“Yes, and the divine afflatus wouldn’t afflate. I guess it works
better when you’re all round. I thought if anything would bring the
Muse it would be the ashes of the camp fires and the thoughts of the
Indians that used to meet there. I just had a little idea, but not
of a regular Merrymeeting song.”

“Did you know that the people on some of the land here first got
their deed, or whatever it was, back in 1726?”

“My, they must be old!”

“O, you know what I mean, their ancestors, of course.”

“Yes, I’ve been inquiring about all the legends and stories of this
place. This used to be heavily wooded, all over the point, and they
used to come down and shoot bears, right where this camp is. Dear
me, when you get into New England you are where things have
happened!”

“Yes, and in the West, too,” reminded loyal Virginia. “We have wild
Injun stories there, too, if we haven’t any Captain Kidd.”

“That is what my verses are about, Captain Kidd, If I finish them I
may hand them in, though the prize will be for some regular
Merrymeeting song, in praise of Merrymeeting, you know, something
that will go with yells and celebrations. At least that is what I
should think would take the prize, what I would give it for if I
were on the committee of councillors. But when I get something into
my head I have to finish it, or try to.”

“I’ll help you, Lilian—I’ll make up all the first lines of the
couplets and you make the second lines, or whatever lines have to
have the rhyme.”

“Aren’t you generous, Virgie!”

“Who’s going to claim the prize if the song you all wrote together
wins it?” asked Virginia.

“We haven’t thought that up yet,” replied Betty.

Not long after this conversation the songs were called for and a
meeting appointed at the club house to try out the songs previous to
the awards by the committee. The songs were to be sung before the
assembled campers, preferably by the composer, if not, by the young
councillor in charge of the proceedings. Another councillor was at
the piano. This method was explained at the beginning.

“There was an unusually large number of songs handed in this year,
which is very gratifying to the committee, but will make the choice
more difficult. As far as possible the author of the verses, or the
klondike, if part or all of the girls have learned them, will sing
them here tonight. First we shall have the Laugh-a-lot songs.”

Most of these were short efforts, but raised a great deal of
applause for the composers, though the term author is more
appropriate, since the songs were set to popular or familiar tunes.
One small author sat on a councillor’s lap and was so overcome when
her pretty little song was sung that she turned her face away; and
at the vociferous applause which followed, she quite hid her head on
the protecting shoulder.

One of the Intermediates in Piggly-Wiggly sang all alone, in a
gentle voice, two pretty verses about river, bay, island and clouds.
Helen, Eloise and the rest of the girls in that senior cabin gave
praise to Merrymeeting in a rousing chorus set to Yankee Doodle.
Lilian, Cathalina and Betty did the singing for Squirrels’ Inn.
Lilian had decided not to offer her Captain Kidd verses, declaring
that there were too many active things to do at camp to bother about
a “masterpiece”. Then, too, it would not turn out to be a real
Merrymeeting song.

After the singing of the list, a few which were easily recognized as
the best were asked for again, and the committee promised as quick a
decision as possible. As it turned out, several songs were adopted
as Merrymeeting songs, and several prizes were given, one to
Squirrels’ Inn included.

June, Jo and Dot came around to ask Lilian what had become of the
Captain Kidd song.

“Why, where did you ever hear that I was writing one?” she asked.

“I heard you and Hilary talking about it one time,” replied June.

“It isn’t much,”

“We want to hear it any way.”

“I’ll send it to the _Moon_ and if they accept it you shall hear it
read there.”

“All right. Did you hear any more facts about Captain Kidd?”

Lilian laughed. “I don’t know that I have any ‘facts’ about him, but
I find that there is a story about the real Captain Kidd and the
Kennebec. It is said that he used to attack boats that came to this
trading center, kill off everybody but one, whom he left to help him
carry the goods to his hiding place, and then kill him too. Nice old
pirate! And they say that the name ‘Merrymeeting’ applied not only
to the five rivers beside the Kennebec that come into Merrymeeting
Bay, but to the meeting of the tribes here.”

“Then the boys’ stories were true, or at least some of them!” said
June with satisfaction.

“How can you be glad that such terrible things happened,” teased
Lilian.

“O, I wouldn’t have had ’em happen,” explained June carefully, “but
if they did happen I want to know about it, and it would be great if
we could find some treasure. Miss Patty, do you know where we could
get something to dig with?”

“No, June, and remember, kiddies, that you can’t dig up the
place,—it isn’t yours. And if you ever go to the hunters’ cabin,
Hilary and some of the big girls must go with you.”

“O, dear, then we can’t have any fun, I suppose, and if we did find
anything it wouldn’t belong to us anyway!”

“Finders keepers,” suggested Dot.

“That wouldn’t be honest, I’m afraid,” said June.

“That ethical point can be decided if you ever come across any
treasure. I’m sure that you would be amply rewarded! Have fun
thinking about it anyhow.”

“S’pose we’d find some big red rubies,” suggested Jo.

“And di’monds,” added Dot.

“And pearls,” said June. “Haven’t we got the imaginations though?
Say, Lilian, please read us the verses!”

“O, all right, I had fun, too, writing out the story.”

                      The Merrymeeting Pirate.

              In the early days when Captain Kidd
                Sailed up the Kennebec,
              He had his gold in his vessel’s hold
                And prize from many a wreck.

              When on to Merrymeeting Bay
                The river boats would glide
              In rippling cove or piney grove
                This pirate dark would hide.
                    _Refrain_:
                  O, Captain Kidd, we’re glad
                  We’re glad you’re not here now!

              The goods that they had brought to trade
                With early pioneer,
              For Indian wild or settler child,
                Was soon to disappear.
              Alone he’d board the wave-washed deck,
                The crew could not resist;
              The pirate’s glare, their deep despair,
                Could feel through rain or mist!
                  O, Captain Kidd, we’re glad
                  We’re glad you’re not here now!

              With knife and gun and cutlass sharp,
                He’d cut and hack and shoot,
              Just saving one till set of sun,
                To help him carry loot.
              But on Brick Island, in the Bay,
                He met his well-earned fate;
              For on his track, when he came back,
                Were men that pirates hate.
                  O, Captain Kidd, we’re glad;
                  We’re glad you’re not here now!

              They captured him, and no one knows
                Just what those sailors did.
              With empty threat the end he met,—
                And _exit_ Captain Kidd!
              His treasure lies somewhere about
                Beneath the wrinkled rock,
              Or in some cave where wild winds rave
                Or screaming sea-birds flock.
                  O, Captain Kidd, we’ll find,
                  We’ll find your treasure-trove!

              Of coins a little box or two,
                The legend says they found,
              But would you wear his jewels rare,
                You still must search this ground.
              At if at eve his ghost you meet,
                Just follow if you dare;
              Get spade and pick, or knife and stick,
                And dig for treasure there!
                  O, Captain Kid, we’ll find,
                  We’ll find your treasure-trove!

The little girls clapped their hands. “O, Lilian, I think that’s
great! Did he really ‘meet his fate’ on Brick Island?”

“That is what the story says, that he was captured there, and that
they really did find some coins around here somewhere.”




                            CHAPTER XIX

                       AT THE HUNTER’S CABIN


“Hurry! Don’t let the youngsters see you Campbell. They went out the
lane a while ago with ‘Mother Nature’ and may be back at any time. I
think they went after flowers and will not go through the woods to
the shore, I’m pretty sure.”

“We’ll just go right down to the pine grove, and if they see us we
can’t do it, that’s all.”

Campbell had come up before supper with several parents and some
boys from Boothbay, and had just come in from canoeing with Hilary.
They were laughing, as they walked up from the shore and beckoned to
Cathalina, Betty and Eloise, who happened to appear. While Campbell
unfolded a little plan, they stood in a smiling group, approving the
scheme, which developed further under the ideas of more
conspirators. Campbell fished in his pocket for something which they
all examined with interest. Cathalina thought a moment, and with one
word, “wait”, sped away toward her cabin. There she searched her
trunk for a few minutes and flew back to her companions.

“Just the thing! Don’t you want them, Cathalina?”

“No, I happened to bring them because they were in with the rest.”

As if strolling, the party moved toward the pine grove, but when
they had reached its shelter their demeanor changed and they
scurried along the trail, through the trees and over the rocks that
lined the shore of Merrymeeting Bay.

“We’ll have to be quick,” said Campbell, “before my party has to
leave.”

“Where shall we put it?”

“Look; just the place!”

“I’m afraid they’ll think it’s fishy.”

“Let ’em; they’ll soon find out, anyhow.”

“O, Campbell, have more imagination.”

“They will like it in the end. Let me know how it comes out, girls.”

“Indeed we will.”

“Be sure to have them start out early tomorrow morning before
anybody else does.”

As they came back toward the club house, they saw June, Dot and Jo
sitting on the steps, talking earnestly and mysteriously, as
gestures and looks indicated.

“Hello, June,” called Campbell, holding out a hand. “And how are Dot
and Jo by this time?” June sprang to meet him, Dot took his other
hand and Jo stood smiling by.

“Where’ve you been, Mr. Stuart?” asked Dot. “We looked for you after
supper.”

“Just now we’ve come from the pine grove and around the rocks,”
replied Campbell, promptly and truthfully. “Big storm last night,
girls, must have beat upon the rocks something fierce! I wonder if
it opened up any of the caves where Captain Kidd’s treasure is!”

“Campbell!” exclaimed Hilary, laughing.

“We’ll go up tomorrow and see,” said Jo, entering into the spirit of
Campbell’s joking. “But we children are not allowed to play around
there alone. I don’t see why, because there’s nobody ever there but
camp folks.”

“Could the big girls take you? They could get up early for once,
couldn’t they?”

“Why, Mr. Stuart! You know we get up as early as the boys do, and
have a dip and everything, early bird hikes,—”

“Of course you do, Jo, excuse me!”

“We’ll prove it,” said Cathalina. “We will take you tomorrow
morning. Be ready and we’ll stop for you,—we’ll whistle Campbell’s
fraternity whistle.”

“All right! Goody!” The little girls jumped up and down as small
girls sometimes do.

“Hunting treasure!” exclaimed Campbell. “What could be more
thrilling?”

“Wear your sweaters, kiddies,” Hilary admonished, “it will be cool.”

“What time shall we get up?”

“About six o’clock?”

“O, that isn’t early enough. That would only give us an hour or so
before dip.”

“Mercy,” said Eloise, “how long do you want?”

“Could you come for us at five or five-thirty, before _anybody_ is
up, you know?”

“I guess so,” said Hilary.

Bright and early the next morning, Cathalina and Hilary whistled
softly outside of Laugh-a-lot and were joined by three stealthily
moving figures which slipped out of the klondike, permission having
been asked the night before.

“Isn’t this fun?” said Betty. “What if we really should find
something?”

Little birds disturbed in their slumbers twittered a little from the
trees as the girls passed. Jo had a spade, which she had secured
soon after the conversation with Campbell. June had a trowel, and
Dot carried a stout stick, which she had sharpened.

“We had the awfullest time doing anything to get ready last night,
because the girls asked what we were doing.”

Arrived at the cabin, the little girls peered eagerly around and the
big girls pretended to do so. The hunter’s cabin itself was of no
particular interest, because of having been explored before. They
did not consider taking up the floor to dig or doing anything to
injure property that belonged to other people. “O, don’t I wish I
owned this place,” sighed Dot. “I’d dig and dig whenever I needed
exercise!”

“There’s an awfully old looking pine tree, Dot,” said Jo, “and not
far from that ledge either.” To the older girls’ great amusement,
Dot brought forth a ruler, which they had not noticed before.

“They are actually going to measure according to that silly verse,”
whispered Cathalina.

As if to explain the performance to more critical judgment, June
said, “Now I don’t suppose that there is anything in that verse, but
if we are going to dig at all we may as well have some plan.”

“O, what’s this?” cried Jo, turning up something near the pine tree
from which they were about to measure. The three little girls
dropped on their knees as Jo pried up from the ground an
old-fashioned brooch set with a small garnet. It was well packed
with dirt and took some cleaning and blowing on Jo’s part to make it
apparent what jewel it contained. It was, however, remarkable,
considering how long the pin must have been there if dropped by
Captain Kidd, how little spoiled it was by wind and weather. The
little girls looked soberly at each other and began to examine the
place.

The next find was made by Dot and was a little silver coin, too worn
for any marks of identification to be distinguished. This time the
older girls sat down on the ground to examine it. “See how crusty it
is with dirt!” exclaimed June excitedly. She was sitting at the foot
of one of the larger trees and lifted a little mat of pine needles
where the curving root showed a little hollow.

“O, look here, I feel something hard!” Slipping her hand down
further, she fished out a queer-looking metal case of some sort, all
battered and dingy, encrusted with dirt and rattling with its
contents as June held it up. “H’m,” said she, “I guess it looks old
enough for Captain Kidd’s time, or maybe the Indians put it there,
or some hunter. Beads or pearls, which?”

The girls had quite a time in getting off the cover, which was at
one end, but finally it flew off.

“Just beads.”

“Probably for Indians.”

“Take ’em out and see what’s underneath.”

“Empty the whole thing out into your lap!”

The last bit of advice was followed, and there came tumbling out of
the funny old long case a stringy little mass of beads and jewelry.
This they began to disentangle at once.

“Here’s a coral necklace.”

“Look at this little gold cross with a weeny ruby, but one arm is
broken off! Too bad.”

A silver buckle of old style, a plain gold pin, a pair of long jet
earrings, a delicate gold chain with a tiny heart on it, a small
ring set with a real turquoise and another set with a garnet and
pearls completed the list. June looked quizzically at Cathalina.
“Seems to me I’ve seen that gold chain and heart before. I bet you
and Campbell put this box here last night!”

“What makes you think so?” parried Cathalina.

“I just do. Didn’t you wear that chain at our first party?”

“How could I if it were here?”

“O, but it wasn’t here. You dear old Cathalina, you didn’t want us
to be disappointed, did you?” It was like June to take it so,
instead of feeling that the girls and Campbell wanted to make fun of
the little girls.

Dot and Jo were looking a bit rueful and Dot remarked dolefully, “Of
course we can’t keep ’em, then,” and turned the turquoise ring about
on her finger.

“Of course you can keep them if you like them. We thought that you’d
like to find something, and of course you can’t dig around much to
spoil the looks of things here.”

“Well,” said philosophical June, “of course we’d like to find some
real Captain Kidd stuff, but after all, Dot, it’s better to have
these pretty things than to dig around and not find a thing.”

“That’s so,” replied Dot, looking more cheerful. “Let’s divide them,
if Cathalina really meant them for us. Why don’t you want them,
Cathalina?”

“I never wear them. O, I did put on that necklace once lately. I had
forgotten it. Mother gave me quite a lot of old jewelry one day,
saying that no one ever wore the pieces and that I might keep them
or give them away, as I liked. I happened to have it with me and
thought of it when Campbell said ‘let’s fix up something for the
girls to find.’ The turquoise ring I had when I was about Dot’s age,
and I thought of that for her, of the garnet one for Jo, and of the
little chain for June. But divide them any way you like.”

“My, you’re good to us, Cathalina,” said Dot.

The children had quite a lively time while dividing the “treasure”.
They decided to keep it a secret about the digging, and asked the
older girls not to tell. “We didn’t put that coin there, though,”
said Hilary.

“That’s so!” exclaimed Dot. “We did find something, then!”




                             CHAPTER XX

                          AS TOLD BY BETTY


Dearest Polly and Juliet:

You can’t imagine how we girls enjoyed your combination letter in
reply to the little card we sent,—just to tell you where we were and
to let you know that we are thinking of you. It is fine, Polly, that
Juliet is with you on the ranch this summer. Maybe she will look
like more than your “shadow” by the time she leaves the ranch. In my
“mind’s eye” I see you both tearing around on horseback,—or is it
bronco-back?

We appreciate all the more your writing to us because you have been
so busy with the summer’s work. We all went out on the rocks, Patty,
too, and sat there eating blueberries while Cathalina read the
letter to us. You have already received her letter, of course. She
said that she tried to give you a general idea of the camp and told
you about some of the good times we’ve had, and they have been going
on steadily since. It would take pages and pages to tell about them.

The August tournaments are on now. We have been playing off tennis
and trying hard to have our team win in the other games. Since
Cathalina wrote, we have had some fine trips, too. One was our
second trip to Popham Beach for surf bathing. That was the real salt
water, you know, sandy beach and everything. The water was cold, but
you feel so fine, all in a glow afterwards. Those big waves,—I just
love them. There is a place to buy ice-cream and other things, and
we are always hungry, you know. We go to a house not far from the
beach to change to bathing suits, and after the swim we have a hot
lunch on the shore, hot beans and bacon or “wieners” and sandwiches,
pickles, cake, different good things, and my, how we eat! This last
time it took a good while to eat our lunch and then we shopped a
little in Bay Point, which is the name of the little town, and all
this made us late starting home. It is a three hours’ ride, anyway,
and you may imagine that we were late getting home, and hungry
again. We had to stop at Bath for errands and to pick up a visitor
who was coming up to camp, then had to “buck tide” all the way up.
The smaller boat got in while the folks were eating supper, but our
big boat was heavier, with more passengers, couldn’t get through the
Burnt Jackets and went around the longer way. The folks saw us turn
around and go back and were worried, I guess, for one of the other
boats came to meet us, but developed engine trouble and we beat it
home! The girls pretended to be starving, and went up the rise to
the dining-room saying, “We want food! We want food!” and two or
three of the councillors who came out to meet us answered, “We want
our children! We want our children!”

As we have been having good weather right along, it was decided to
have the deep sea fishing trip this week, too. We go to the same
beach, but go out to sea and fish. Last year they had rough weather
and some of the girls had a hard time to stand it, after they
anchored and were tossed around and up and down and back and forth!
But this time it wasn’t rough at all. O, we rode some nice big
waves, but that was fun. Our two boats caught forty fish. We had so
much fun through it all. Evelyn Calvert caught the biggest fish of
all and was so excited and even scared over it. Eloise and Helen are
a “perfect scream” when they are together, say the funniest things
with the most sober faces, and keep us laughing half the time. We
have met so many interesting girls up here, too, besides the
Greycliffers. Frances Anderson is a peach and Marion Thurman is a
dear,—but Cathalina said that she told you all about Squirrels’ Inn.
Virgie is having a great time with Isabel, who keeps her down
somewhat. Can you imagine Isabel’s keeping anybody down? Virginia is
all right, but after being bottled up so long she sometimes wants to
try all sorts of things. I heard Isabel telling her the other day
that she wanted to get back to school alive anyhow.

O, I must tell you about the scare we had. You know how noises do
sound in the night. At first whenever a squirrel would run over the
roof somebody would squeal, but we are used to that now. Once a
mouse ran around the big room, and must have been scared to death, I
judge, when we all jumped up on our cots and shrieked. Anyway we did
not see him again.

This time it was moonlight and we were all asleep, our shutters
opened as usual, the big doors “bolted and barred”. The windows are
all screened and rather high from the ground. Cathalina sleeps just
across from me, and when I suddenly woke up that night I saw her
sitting up in bed, rubbing her eyes and looking startled. “What was
that?” she whispered over to me. We listened and heard the bushes
rustle and crackle and it seemed as if a stone rolled down the bank.
Then we imagined that some one was coming up the steps in front. By
this time nearly all the girls were sitting up to listen, and Patty
woke up too.

“What are you all awake for, girls?” she asked.

“Just listen,” several of us whispered, and put our fingers on our
lips to warn her. Just then came a terrible bump on the door. Marion
screamed and ducked down in bed. Cathalina flew over to Lilian,
whose cot is not far from hers. Patty jumped up as if she were shot,
and went toward the door, putting on her bath robe, while Hilary
picked up a baseball bat that was standing in a corner and joined
Patty. She tried to laugh, and said, “I will protect you or perish,
Miss West,” but I’m sure her teeth were chattering.

“Sh-sh,” said Patty.

Next we all flew to our windows and looked out. They’re screened
tight, so we couldn’t lean out. Not a thing could we see but
moonlight on the bushes and trees.

“Open the back door and look, girls,” said somebody. “Not on your
life,” said Nora.

“Nobody could get up there.”

“Yes they could; they could climb!”

“Somebody go to the club house!”

“Yes, and get murdered on the way!”

“I wonder if it could be a bear.”

“No bears here now.”

“Get your revolver, Hilary.”

“Haven’t got any.”

“Sh-sh. I just said that for the benefit of the burglar.”

“Could it be the boys trying to scare us?”

“They wouldn’t do such a thing, besides they couldn’t get up here
without being found out.”

By this time it began to be a lark to some of us, and we got over
being so frightened. Then there was a rubbing sound against the
klondike. Patty was puzzled, we could see, but she said, “I think
that it must be some animal, probably a loose horse.” Then she told
us to keep still so she could listen, and we all got scared again.
Lilian whispered that she heard breathing, and when Nora said,
“Course you do, it’s me,” everybody laughed.

Patty began to get tired of our nonsense and said, “Girls! No
burglar would try to get in here after all that shrieking! It is a
wonder that the people at the club house haven’t been roused before
this!”

Just then somebody did run up the steps and knocked on the door. A
most welcome voice called, “What’s the matter, girls?” Patty
unfastened the door in a jiffy and there were the councillor and one
of the girls from the nearest cabin. They had heard the commotion
and finally decided to come over. Patty told them, and the girls
just stood aside and pointed at two stray cows that by this time
were some little distance away, over where the bushes grow thickly
at the top of the bank.

We all settled down then and went to sleep after a while, but we
nearly collapsed with merriment the next morning going over it
again,—the way the girls looked and what they said and how
ridiculous it all was! One would remember one thing that was said
and another something else, till Patty said that we might “use the
occurrence” in a “stunt” if we chose. Maybe we shall, but there was
another cow episode that was a little more wildly exciting, perhaps,
when we were on a six point hike from North Bath, through the woods
on the mainland opposite. One of the girls threw some sticks as they
passed some cows, and the cows chased them. They were not “dumb
driven cattle,” by any means! Even Virgie, who is used to cows,
climbed a tree, and we have teased Isabel nearly to death for
getting on a big rock and asking Virgie in anguished tones if cows
could climb rocks. Virgie said, “Yes,” as she was climbing the tree,
and Isabel did not know what to do; but the cows went past. They
were fierce looking things, had long horns. Now you would have
lassoed a few, wouldn’t you?

There is so much to tell that it would take volumes if I tried to
write it. But when we get back to school we can have a good old
visit and tell all we know and some that we don’t know, as usual. I
do hope that you both will be there. You did not say a word about
school in your letter. However, the ranch doings were of more
interest to us all just now. All the girls send heaps of love to you
both. We hope to see you at the opening of school.

                                                Lovingly,
                                                            Betty




                            CHAPTER XXI

                         A FIVE-POINT HIKE


“There goes the bell. Are you going, Hilary?”

“I don’t know, Frances. I’m awfully sleepy, and it is hot this
afternoon.”

“Good breeze, though.”

“Do we get points for this hike?”

“Five miles, five points.”

“All right, Frances, I’ll try to get up a little energy and go! How
about you, Lilian?”

“Why you know I twisted my ankle a little this morning in games and
it doesn’t feel right yet. I’ve been rubbing it, but I do not
believe that a five-mile walk would help it any.”

“O, no; you ought to rest it today. Did you see the nurse?”

“No, it did not swell or anything. I just gave it a wrench, I guess.
It will be all right.”

“I’m not going either,” said Cathalina. “I will go down to the house
and get you some liniment, if you like.”

Marion, Frances and Hilary proved to be the only Squirrels’ Inn
representatives on this hike, for Betty decided to stay with Lilian
and Cathalina, and Nora had other plans. The three hikers donned
their elkskin hiking shoes, took their smallest purses and started
with the rest out the road toward First Trott’s. It was too early in
the afternoon for much shade, though the narrow road wound between
ferns and woods as ever. The sun had baked the ruts hard, too, and
came down hot upon youthful shoulders. But why get points if one
does not earn them by effort?

“I’m going to see how soon I can walk it,” said one girl, striding
past, though for the most part the girls were going in groups, some
strolling, some walking briskly or sturdily along.

“Goodbye, then,” said Frances, “there isn’t any hurry this time,
with such a short hike and time to rest there. I’d rather take it
more slowly and eat a few blueberries or stop in the shade
occasionally, wouldn’t you, Hilary?”

“Indeed I would. But I didn’t bring my field glasses. I thought that
there would be few birds flying while it is so hot, and we’ll be
coming home for supper before it cools off very much.”

“How far is it to Second Trott’s?” asked Marion.

“Opinions differ, but on our hikes it is always considered a
five-mile hike there and back, or to the school-house, which is not
far beyond. What sort of a performance, by the way, are they going
to have there? Do either of you know what we are going to do?”

“Why, yes, Frances,” replied Hilary. “They said it was a lawn fete,
or something of the sort, and that we could buy ice cream and candy
and lemonade, maybe other things.”

“I wonder if they will not let the boys come up, too,” said Marion.

“I wouldn’t be surprised to see them,” Frances assented.

Hilary had not thought of that, but her mind immediately visualized
a certain young councillor whom she would be very glad to see.

Soon they reached the turn in the road after Second Trott’s. With a
gentle rise it wound around some fine old rocks, on whose top grew
great pine trees. In these a little flock of chickadees was turning
somersaults. Further on was a bit of backwater, near which grew some
water plants, and a line of brilliant cardinal flowers. Climbing
along steep and dusty hill, the girls found themselves in sight of
the white school house, known as Chopp’s. There, indeed, was a group
of Boothbay boys, some just arriving as the Merrymeeting campers
came up. They had come by a different way, upstream from Boothbay
Camp, then docking at the mainland, on the opposite side of the back
water, which makes a peninsula out of Merrymeeting.

The first thing was to cool off a little and enjoy ice cream and
other goodies afforded by the ladies who served the refreshments.
Home-made cake, candy and nuts proved popular. The lemonade, alas,
was all gone before the Merrymeeting girls arrived, but there was
plenty of cool water. Campbell was looking for Hilary, afraid that
perhaps she was not coming, and walked to meet the girls, as they
approached. “Where’s Cathalina?” he asked.

“She and Betty stayed with Lilian. Lil twisted her ankle this
morning, not much, but enough to keep her from any long hike. I
promised to bring her some sweets.”

“Well, come on, girls, before everything is gone, and I’ll see that
you get some ice cream and cake.”

Campbell beckoned to another councillor and they waited upon the
girls, bringing the cooling water, which tasted so good after the
hot walk, and the more substantial refreshments, as they could be
waited upon.

“O, you don’t know how good this is!” exclaimed Hilary.

“Yes I do, for I thought I never was so thirsty in my life and we
did not have much of a walk. But Bob and I came up in a canoe and it
was hot on the water.”

“I always get sunburned till I peel off, on a canoe trip,” said
Frances.

“That remark is somewhat ambiguous, Frances.”

“All right, Marion, I’ll change it. On a canoe trip I always get
sunburned till I peel off later. My nose, arms and shoulders will
have an entirely different epidermis when I return from the wilds of
Maine. My, don’t I hate to think of it!”

“I would,” said Hilary, “if I were not going to such a wonderful
school. It is on the water, too, and while we do not have time for
the good times of a camp, not straight along, you know, we do some
very interesting things and I am going to try to get more of them in
the next year. My schedule will not be so full, and while I want to
get in all the studying that I can, and there are so many fine
courses to take, I suppose it is silly not to get some of the
_different_ things that you never can get anywhere out of school.”

“Are you going to keep on at Greycliff instead of going to a regular
college?” asked Campbell.

“I am for this year, but I am not sure about the next. When I
started to Greycliff I expected to finish two years there instead of
high school. But you know they have two years of college work, too,
and most of our little crowd decided last year to return another
year anyway.”

“It isn’t such a bad idea to miss the freshman year at college
anyhow,” said Campbell. “It is the hardest year.”

“Yes, and one will miss a lot of the hazing, but girls don’t make it
as bad as the boys do, and I suppose I’ll get to be as fond of
college or university life as I am of dear old Greycliff, though
that does not seem possible.”

“What sort of a school are you going to, one of the girls’ colleges
or a co-educational school?”

“That isn’t decided yet. It depends on what Father thinks about it.
He and Mother are still discussing it, and Mother says that Father
has to decide the matter. I have such wonderful parents that I am
sure what they decide will be just the thing.”

By this time the other councillor from Boothbay, with Frances and
Marion, had strolled out to where some games had been started,
leaving Campbell and Hilary still talking over their ice cream.

“I’m going West on a short trip with Uncle Mart at Christmas time,
Hilary. Would you mind if I stopped off to see you, or will you be
at home?”

“Would I _mind_!” exclaimed Hilary. “Why, Campbell, I’d love to have
you come. No, after having been away nearly all summer, I shall plan
to stay with the folks at Christmas time. And Father and Mother have
been just aching to have you and Philip and some of the rest come to
be entertained at our house,—ever since they have listened to my
description of the Stuarts and Van Buskirks, and all the sisters,
cousins and aunts that you have. We have so few near relatives.”

Campbell was wishing that Hilary would not be quite so general in
her expressions of interest in the Van Buskirks and Stuarts, but
could not but be satisfied with the heartiness of her response to
his suggestion of a visit at Christmas time. Hilary was no coquette,
but it was a source of her attraction, so far as Campbell was
concerned, that he could trust her sincerity. The fact that Hilary
was interested in real living more than many of the city girls whom
Campbell knew was another source of interest to him. “Hilary talks
sense,” Campbell had remarked to Philip. “She likes a good time as
well as anybody, but that isn’t the main thing in life, as she sees
it. It’s some fun to send candy or flowers to a girl who will really
appreciate it, and not pat herself on the back and think ‘How sweet
I must be to have the boys sending me flowers!’” And Philip had
thought of another girl of the same true sort to whose winning he
intended to devote himself.

“Well, I’ll have it to look forward to, then,” said Campbell, in
reply to Hilary’s cordiality. “I shall write to find out if it is
all right when the time comes. You don’t mind not playing the games
out there,” he continued, waving his hand toward the boys and girls.

“No; I much prefer this,” acknowledged Hilary demurely.

“I have a fine plan, at least it will be fine for me if you consent,
and I came up in a canoe on purpose. Do you suppose you can get
permission to go back with me?”

“Why I believe I can.” For what were points for hiking to Hilary
when an invitation from Campbell was in question?

Patty was not there, but Hilary asked the camp mother if Mr. Stuart
might paddle her home, and permission was granted. Smiling, Hilary
ran back to Campbell, stopping a moment to tell Frances of her
change of plan. “She asked me if you would upset the canoe,” Hilary
reported to Campbell, as they started off briskly, “and I told her
that you could do anything!”

“That was rather a doubtful reply,” remarked Campbell.

“She understood all right, but looked at me so soberly, just as if
she were going to refuse, asked me if you were Cathalina’s cousin
and all sorts of things that she knew perfectly well, just to make
me think that perhaps I could not go, but I knew that she was doing
it for fun.”

“Did the girls mind your going?”

“No. Frances was lovely, and said that she would tell Marion.”

Hatless and brown from the sun, a typical summer girl and boy,
Hilary and Campbell swung along the way to the shore where the canoe
waited. It was pleasant to be taken care of, Hilary thought, as
Campbell did the launching and most of the paddling, and told Hilary
to “fold her hands and look pretty”.

“How could I!” she exclaimed with a laugh.

“You don’t have to try,” returned Campbell with an approving glance.
But this was the nearest approach to sentiment that he made that
summer. “Where shall we go? Into the bay and up the Androscoggin a
little way?”

“That will be fine,” Hilary assented. “We still have an hour or so,
haven’t we? We were only there about half an hour, I think. I didn’t
wear my watch, though.”

“I’ll get you home in time,” declared Campbell. “Let’s forget the
time o’ day and just have a good old talk.” This they proceeded to
do, but after all managed to arrive at Merrymeeting dock in time for
Campbell to join the Boothbay flotilla, which started from the other
shore for Boothbay Camp.

“Goodbye, Campbell, I have had such a good time.”

“So have I, and I hope we can have a few more visits before camp
closes.”

The bell was ringing for swimming, for which there was just time
enough before supper. Hilary met the girls coming down to the shore
as she went up to get her bathing suit.

“Why from this direction?” asked Marjorie. “The last I saw of you,
you were eating ice cream at the school-house.”

“O, I came home in an aeroplane,” joked Hilary.

“She was paddled home,” explained Jean to Marjorie, as they ran past
Hilary.

Hilary found some of the girls of Squirrels’ Inn just getting ready
for the swim, and they all went in together. “This,” said Frances,
as they swam out to the float, “is the end of a perfect day for you,
isn’t it, Hilary?”

“I think I’ll have to acknowledge it,” said Hilary, turning over to
float a while, “but we are going to work a while on our canoe after
supper, aren’t we?”

“Yes, unless something else turns up.”

Much mystery was in the air relative to the decorating of canoes.
Each group of girls contesting had one in some sequestered spot and
was decking it for the annual canoe pageant. Prizes were to be given
for the prettiest and for the most original idea. Crepe paper had
been brought up in quantities and in all colors from Bath. Wire and
string were in great demand. Some of the girls were working hard on
designs and decorations. The little folks had great ambitions, but
depended more on their councillors to work out ideas. The older
girls could do their own decorating, with assistance at the last
from the long-suffering man power of the camp; for not a tack or
wire was to be hammered into these graceful and expensive canoes.

“I know what you’re going to have,” asserted Virgie to June.

“No you don’t; you just hope I’m going to tell you!”

“Yes I do, I guessed.”

“Who told you that you were right?”

“Nobody.”

“O, you just think that you can get me to tell you, Miss Virgie, but
we are going to have the funniest and best of all, I’m sure. Just
wait till tomorrow night!”




                            CHAPTER XXII

                         THE CANOE PAGEANT


Lilian was trying on Eloise’s bathing suit of red and black, and
wrapping the cloak of the same colors about her, she folded her arms
and repeated, “Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest!”

“Yo! ho! ho! and a bottle of rum! Wait till I get on my fierce beard
and mustache and you’ll see what a pirate can look like!”

“What do you think of this?” asked Hilary, as she tried on a fiery
looking turban made of silk middy ties. “And look at the flag Patty
has made for us. Isn’t that a scary skull and cross-bones?”

“Yes indeed! Patty’s a peach,—O, ‘fifteen men on a dead man’s chest.
Yo, ho, ho!—and a bottle of rum!’”

“Aren’t you a case, Lilian North!” exclaimed Cathalina, who was
resting from her recent labors on the canoe, and lay on her cot
watching the girls.

“O, Captain Kidd, we’re glad, we’re glad you aren’t here now!”
hummed Lilian.

“Are you going to sing that?” asked Cathalina.

“O, no; if I have time I’ll make up something like, ‘I’m Captain
Kidd, the pirate bold, who sails the Kennebec,—’”

“My right arm helps ’em walk the plank,” added Hilary.

“And little do I reck!” finished Cathalina.

“Hurrah!” cried Lilian. “Poetry made while you wait by Squirrels’
Inn and company. Give me another verse and I’ll take my guitar,
neatly concealed by evergreen, and make up a tune on two or three
notes as we go.”

“A verse is a line, Lilian.”

“Very well, a stanza, then. O bold and true, my pirate crew,—”

“And if they’re not, what then?” asked Frances.

“Thanks, Frances, that will make the next line. Ah, Davy Jones will
get their bones,—mm.”

“Goodbye, ye merry men! Tra-la, another poem for our collection of
masterpieces! Say it all, Hilary,” continued Cathalina.

Hilary, “struck an attitude” and with some prompting, repeated their
latest effort:

               “I’m Captain Kidd, the pirate bold,
                 Who sails the Kennebec;
               My right arm helps ’em walk the plank
                 And little do I reck!

               O, bold and true my pirate crew,
                 And if they’re not, what then?
               ’Tis Davy Jones will get their bones!
                 Goodbye, my merry men!”

Most of the day had been spent by the campers upon the canoes, and
in some cases upon their own costumes, when these were necessary to
carry out the idea. It had been planned to use that witching time
when the sky was still beautiful from the sunset and yet the blue
mist of evening with moon and stars was just appearing in the east.
It did not seem best to plan for lighting up the canoes. While there
was plenty of water, it is true, to put out any blaze that might
occur, the canoes might not be in the most favorable position for an
upset. The most beautiful light was offered by Nature herself.

The girls had worked hard. Not a canoe but was prettily dressed. As
each one was brought from its hidden retreat to be launched,
exclamations were heard on all sides. Admiration and surprise were
mingled. It was a matter of honor not to intrude upon the secrecy of
those engaged upon the work, but in some way the news about a few
had leaked out. However, only the sight of the canoes themselves
could give the full effect. The athletic director and the other
councillors knew the plans for the girls and arranged the order of
launching. With the heavier canoes, some of which had a light
framework wired and resting on top of the canoes, the girls had to
have some help. All those who were not needed to paddle or pose
stood upon the shore and dock as audience and judges.

In the graceful fleet which passed the “reviewing stand” there was
the canoe decked in ferns and evergreen, with a few paper birds
wired to poise in flight above; one in yellow and white, with yellow
roses and butterflies; another trimmed in white cotton, so put on as
to imitate snow and ice, a diamond dust covering all, two
long-bearded, white-garbed paddlers guiding the canoe, and a big
white polar bear, sitting in the center and carrying a banner marked
“The Northland.” The war canoe was given to some of the Juniors, who
wanted to represent the Old Woman who lived in a Shoe, and had to
have several children to overflow the big shoe of wired paper. One
of the councillors in white cap and kerchief took the part of the
Old Woman, and the children in quaint costumes, with ruffles of
crepe paper, roused much enthusiasm among the spectators.

This canoe won the prize for being the prettiest, and some of the
judges wanted to award it the prize for the most clever idea. But
that finally went to the three girls of Squirrels’ Inn, whose canoe
was decked to represent a pirate ship. A furled sail was put up in
the bow, to which the pirate flag was attached. Frances as Captain
Kidd, with Lilian and Hilary in costume, repeated in hoarse voices,
as they passed the judges, the couplet which Lilian had been
chanting, with “Yo, ho, ho!—and a bottle of rum!” Then all in deep
voices sang the new Captain Kidd stanzas to the tune of _Yankee
Doodle_, rendered slowly, while Lilian twanged an accompaniment on
the guitar. Burnt cork mustaches of fierce upward curve, made all
this more impressive.

As the light grew more dim, the girls in the canoe marked the
Northland, turned on several flashlights, which lit up effectively
the diamond dust, and those in the pirate ship turned on several
large ones, which they had covered with their red paper. A few other
lights flashed out in different canoes as they all circled prettily
in the water and came into port once more.

“There, that’s over,” said Hilary, as with the pirate flag over one
shoulder and Lilian’s guitar over the other, she entered the
klondike. “Patty will certainly have to get up our entertainment for
stunt night. We have only about a week to get ready now, and with
the Wiscasset hike, the canoe trip to Brunswick, and the White
Mountain trip, I can’t see where we get up anything, do you
Frances?”

“No, I don’t. However, not all the girls will go on the White
Mountain trip, you know. Perhaps we can have some little easy part
to do that we can get quickly, or if we can think it up before we
go, we can have it in mind, you know.”

“There come Patty and the girls now; let’s ask them.”

“O, Miss Patty, how about our having stunt night next week?”

“I have been thinking about that, girls. Who has an idea?”

Nobody seemed to have one.

“They have had everything there is to have, I’m afraid,” said
Lilian.

“Well, let me relieve your minds, then,” said Patricia. “I had an
idea several days ago and have been trying to get it a little more
clearly outlined.” At this point Cathalina gave a meaning nod to
Lilian which Patty caught. “Yes, you think ‘the poor English
teacher,’ don’t you?”

“It reminded me of outlines,” Cathalina acknowledged.

“We must have a meeting tomorrow and I will tell you just what I
think we can do.”

At the morrow’s meeting the girls enthusiastically approved Miss
West’s idea, applauded the productions already in hand and thanked
her warmly for taking the responsibility. It was, to be sure, hers
as councillor to see that the girls had some sort of entertainment
ready for their turn at stunt night, but these girls, as good
campers, were always willing to do their share and had no desire to
take advantage of their young councillor. Some of the parts were
given out and the girls began to learn them. They considered it pure
fun, for there was required no serious preparation.

The canoe trip to Brunswick was next on the list of trips. The
canoes, stripped of their decorations, bore the jolly campers away,
around Marshmallow Point into Merrymeeting Bay, to the left, past
Brick Island of Captain Kidd fame, and on up the Androscoggin river,
the war canoe in the lead. So many wanted to go that each of the
smaller canoes bore three. Some of the little girls who could not
paddle were among those who sat more or less comfortably on life
preservers in the middle. Or it would be one of the older girls who
took the middle position, to change places with some tired paddler
in bow or stern as need might be. The girls were reminded of the
rules that no one was to change places in midstream. They must
paddle to shore and make the adjustment. Lunch was distributed among
the canoes, for the launches could not go up the shallow
Androscoggin.

Hilary and Lilian took June with them. Frances, Betty and Cathalina
were together. Neither Betty nor Cathalina had as much endurance as
Frances, but they thought that by changing occasionally, all would
be able to make the eight or ten-mile paddle with ease. Eloise,
Helen and Isabel were together and rather evenly matched in paddling
ability, as were Marion, Jean and Nora. Patty, with another
councillor, carried some of the heavier packages or cans of lunch in
their canoe.

“Hard luck, Miss West,” called Isabel; “what you have in the middle
of your canoe can’t change places and help you paddle.”

“Some of it will help me paddle coming back,” answered Patty,
pointing to the milk can and package of sandwiches. “And Mr. Clark
has gone on ahead to see about getting corn for us to roast.”

“O, joy!” exclaimed Isabel, “corn and bacon! I saw them putting in
the bacon.”

“Do we wait till we get to Brunswick before we have lunch?” asked
Eloise. “Patty spoke as if we would.”

“No, I don’t think so,” said Isabel. “We build a fire somewhere
along the river, I think.”

“I don’t see the war canoe. I wonder which side of this big island
we take.”

“I believe the one to the left is the way,” and Isabel pointed out a
few imaginary indications that the war canoe had taken that course.
But it turned out that while their canoe had no trouble in getting
through, this channel would have been too shallow for the war canoe.
It had gone to the right. There were many sand bars in the river,
but the paddling was easy. There was no wind and the water was calm,
like a mirror reflecting the rocks and dark green trees of the
shore, while the dark blue canoes came stealing up on the grassy
surface to add to the beauty of the scene. Not even the most
practical girl, her mind chiefly upon getting to the destination,
eating lunch and getting points for paddling, could fail to be
impressed by it.

“Shall we go to see Bowdoin College?” inquired Helen.

“In this rig?”

“Excuse the question, Eloise; I forgot our picnic garb. I remember
the girls said that they usually go by trolley from Bath.”

It must be admitted that a substantial lunch adds much to the joy of
such picnics. This one was especially good. The corn was boiled in a
big kettle, which was borrowed or hired for the occasion. Such
perfect and tender ears they were. Boiling was substituted for
roasting and saved much time, a second lot of ears going in the pot
as soon as the first came out. Potato salad and pickles, all the
sandwiches one could eat, cake, ripe pears and all the milk one
could drink,—what more could they ask? Yet still came marshmallows,
passed around to be toasted over the embers.

“We’ll start home early, girls,” announced the young director of
athletics. “Then we can take our time, change often if we get tired,
and everything will be in our favor, no wind, and tide and current
in the right direction. I believe we could almost float home!”

It was not quite like floating, however, and the girls earned their
points for paddling. But without trouble they all reached camp in
good season, and in good humor to think that they had carried
through a twenty-mile paddle.

“How much do you think I paddled, Frances?” asked Cathalina, as they
put away their paddles.

“O, you must have paddled half the way, in resting either Betty or
me.”

“Scarcely that, I’m afraid. You paddled too long several times and
wouldn’t let me take it, you know. You were afraid I’d get too
tired.”

“Not at all. Wanted the points.”

“Never mind, I know you. You would take stern most of the way, too.”

“I wish you were coming to Greycliff next year, Frances,” said
Betty. “How you would fit in with our crowd. You would love Polly
and Juliet, and how proud we’d be of you!”

“That is awfully dear of you, Betty. For ‘half a cent’ I’d come. But
I don’t think I can.”

“Think about it, anyhow,” Betty insisted.




                           CHAPTER XXIII

                 “STUNT NIGHT” WITH SQUIRRELS’ INN


Several things had conspired to put off the White Mountain and
Wiscasset trips, till within about ten days of the close of camp.
The first was a three days’ jaunt, when the girls were taken first
by boat, then by truck, with their packs, to the foot of Mt.
Washington, which they were to climb. The second led to historic
little Wiscasset, part of the way by boat, the rest a hike, except
for the little girls who were taken all the way by launch. The night
was spent under the stars near the old block house, meals were
carried in the launches, and the return the next day was on the same
plan, partly by boat, partly on foot.

Patty despaired of having any practice for the Squirrels’ Inn
“stunt”, but concluded that inasmuch as they were not attempting any
formal performance before a critical audience, one or two hasty
rehearsals of the program as a whole in the club room would do. Only
Frances and Hilary were going to Mt. Washington, but the other girls
all went to Wiscasset.

At last the fateful night arrived, stage property was quickly
collected, each girl having her own peculiar accoutrement to gather,
and Miss Patricia was on hand with the program in full, ready to
prompt or to take part with the performers. At the piano was a
musical councillor, who was to play the accompaniments, and Eloise,
who had been ill when her own klondike had their evening, had been
asked to help with the singing. That it was a musical program might
be taken for granted by any who knew Miss West’s tastes and her
chief avocation. But it is not to be supposed that she would
undertake any classical performance as a “stunt”. The music
consisted of the popular airs; the songs were little verses
illustrating Merrymeeting activities, all bound together by one
central idea.

That announcement of the numbers might be avoided, the girls had
prepared small programs written on ordinary yellow tablet paper, cut
and folded. The audience upon the floor of the club room read upon
the outside:

                           Squirrels’ Inn
                              Presents
                      The Merrymeeting Follies
                               of 19—
                     Monday Evening, August ——

Inside they found the program in order, and tongues were busy as
they looked it through.

“O, I wonder what that is. Do you suppose that the doctor will
really be in it?”

“Took at this: ‘Bird Hike.... Bird, Mother Nature and Chorus’.
Birdie, are you going to take part?”

“Of course not,” replied the nature lady, settling back in her
little rocking chair. “But I lent them my rubber boots and hat.”

“I wonder,” said Betty behind the curtain, “if they will take it in
about the head band.”

“Of course they will,” said Frances, who was just adjusting hers
across her forehead. “The headband—the connecting link which has a
symbol for all the things we do!” This with the explanatory gesture
of an orator.

“There will be some funny symbols put up tonight,” said Betty,
tossing up a volley ball.

“I guess so. Imagine a pickle jar on our head bands! Dear me, I hope
I don’t forget my songs.”

“You haven’t had much time to learn them. Have you gotten over the
effects of mountain climbing?”

“O, yes; there weren’t any, except my tired feet.”

“Everybody here and ready?” asked Miss Patricia, looking last to see
if Isabel and Virgie, who were to manage the curtains, were in
place.

At her signal, they drew aside the curtains, revealing the eight
girls—Frances, Marion, Nora, Hilary, Lilian, Betty, Cathalina and
Eloise, who were dressed in full camp costume, including head bands,
arm bands, and diamonds on the sweaters, and carried each some
emblem of Merrymeeting activities, from volley ball and paddle to
the silver cup marked Merrymeeting Trophy.

After a chord from the accompanist, the girls sang to a popular
ragtime tune the “Opening Chorus” of the program:

           “Just a head band,
             Golden and Blue;
           Athletic emblems
             Of what we can do—
         Swimming, baseball, tennis, paddling, basketball,
         Volley, hiking,—at our camp we do them all.

           But these symbols
             Don’t represent you;
           There are other things
             That you do,
         And if you will watch our little show tonight,
         We’ll give you a head band that’ll be right.”

The curtains were drawn together in the midst of the applause which
welcomed the first appearance, but in a few moments were again
parted and drawn aside. The audience for a second expected an encore
or a new number, then saw the point as June shouted, “O, there’s the
head band!” For across the stage at a convenient height and pinned
upon the wall was an immense dark-blue “head band”, upon which had
just been placed the customary M C with a small pine tree on each
side. The golden symbols, like the program, were cut from yellow
tablet paper.

“I get it,” said Jo. “They’re making a head band with our
‘Follies’.”

The first activity to be perpetuated in song was the “Marshmallow
Roast” of the program. When the curtains were drawn, they disclosed
in the foreground a camp fire made of sticks, in the center of which
glowed a lighted lantern covered with red paper. Close to this sat
the “marshmallow”, covered with white and occasionally shaking a
white powder from the drapery, by which she was concealed. Frances
stood back of her holding the stick on which she was supposed to be
impaled. The tune was “Old Black Joe”.

                   “Marshmallow plump,
                 With sugar powdered o’er;
                   Marshmallow white,
                 They wish they had some more;

                   Marshmallow brown,
                 As down their throats I go,—
                   I hear Camp Merrymeeting calling
                 ‘Marshmallow!’

                 CHORUS:

                 Marshmallow, marshmallow,
                   I’m used for every roast;
                 I hear Camp Merrymeeting calling,
                   ‘Toast! Toast! Toast!’”

Curtain. Curtains apart again. A fat marshmallow on the head band,
next to one of the pine trees.

“This next ought to be funny,” said Dot, who was in the front row.
“‘Deep Sea Fishing, (a) Fish Chorus, (b) Fishermen’s Chorus.’ How
can they fix up fish?”

“They don’t have to much,” answered June. “We are supposed to use
our imagination. Hilary says that they didn’t use to have all the
stage fixings that they think they have to now.”

“Sh-sh, here they are!”

Four girls in Merrymeeting costume sat upon the edge of the big
table under the head band. With sticks and lines they were fishing.
In front of them, facing the audience, but lying upon the floor in
swimming position, were four “fish”, just the girls, in customary
garb, without any attempt at a fish costume. To the lively tune of
Jingle Bells, and with the movements appropriate to swimming and
“flapping” of fins, they sang the following ditty:

                  “We are the fishes gay,
                  Swimming every day,
                  In the ocean blue,
                  Just see what we can do!
                  We dart and dance about,
                  Each minnow and each trout;
                  We glisten and we gleam,
                  As we sidestroke down stream.

                  CHORUS:

                  Flap your fins! Flap your fins,
                  Fishies in the sea,
                  Oh what fun to splash and dive
                  And swim so gay and free!
                  Flap your fins! Flap your fins,
                  Fishies in the sea,
                  O, who would not a fishie be
                  In the bottom of the sea!”

At this, the fishers started a rollicking chorus with waving lines:

          “We’re deep-sea fishers,
            Watch us fish!
          We ride out over the ocean
            Where-e’er we wish.

          We don’t have to wait for the fish to bite,
          They jump on the hooks when we heave in sight,—
                  We’re deep-sea fishers,
                    Watch us fish!”

At the appropriate time the fishes turned and caught the lines, then
rose as the fishers jumped down from the table, and all danced
around in a circle, while the accompanist played the tune through
once, finishing it as the last fish or fisher disappeared through
the door in the midst of most enthusiastic applause, especially from
those who had memories of the deep-sea fishing trip.

The Bird Hike was introduced by a solo from the bird, the burden of
whose refrain was:

         “Come along, there’s a bird hike here today;
         Get you ready, there’s a bird hike here today;
         I know them by their graceful walk,
         There’s a bird hike here today.
         I’m a poor old fowl, but I’ll fool ’em yet,” etc.

Hilary was the “bird”, and sat on the corner of that most convenient
table, when—enter Mother Nature and Girls. “Clementine” was the tune
in which the following musical conversation occurred:

    GIRLS—

        Mother Nature, Mother Nature,
        Shall we see some birds today?

    MOTHER NATURE (ELOISE)—

        Very likely, very likely,
        If only quiet you will stay.

    GIRLS—

        Mother Nature, Mother Nature,
        Here’s a rock where we may sit.

    MOTHER NATURE—

        Yes, sit down and all be quiet,
        While we wait for birds to flit.

    GIRLS—

        Mother Nature, Mother Nature,
        What’s that bird upon the limb?

    MOTHER NATURE—

        Steady now, give me the glasses,
        While I take a look at him.

Eloise as Mother Nature, in the well known hat pulled down over her
face, the scarlet blouse of the nature lady and the rubber boots
which had given her the title of Puss in Boots, was hailed with wild
applause and shrieks of delight from the audience. The nature lady
herself leaned back in her chair to laugh at this clever
representation. In a sweet contralto, Eloise sang her comments on
the bird while she gazed through the glasses:

               “Dear little bird in the bushes,
               Under the old pine tree,
               Singing alone,
               In a sweetly cheerful tone,
               Perching in the air(!)
               Flying everywhere!
               Notice the marks on his wings, girls;
               Look at the stripe on his knee;
               I’m sure this pretty bird
               Will be the rarest thing we’ve heard
               What kind of a bird, girls,
               Can that bird be?”

The girls now took up the air, repeating the same song with Eloise,
and assuming attitudes of delight when the Bird began to sing. But
how their expressions changed as he announced that as only a
Plymouth Rock rooster “cock-a-doodle-doo” was all that he could
sing, “when I flap my wing, scaring everything”. And while he would
like to be an “eagle” or a “flycatcher”, it was merely as a
“scratcher” that he could claim their interest. Curtain.

The “Merrymeeting Moon”, which came next, was entirely different
from anything which had been given. Lilian, who represented the
chief editor, Maribelle Hartley, was prettily dressed in a real
party frock, filmy and beautiful, wore silver slippers and carried a
round “moon.” This was a round circle of cardboard, cut out in the
center to leave only a wide rim and covered with silvered paper.
Grace and gestures with this moon and a few steps here and there to
show the silver slippers accompanied a very pretty song written to
one of the more elaborate ragtime tunes.

“Merrymeeting needs your gleaming, just to keep us all a-beaming,”
sang Lilian, addressing the silver moon which she was holding above
her head; and at the close of the song she stood with her face
framed within the rim while singing:

                     “Can’t you all tell
                     That I’m Maribelle,
                 I’m the Man in the Moon, you see.”

The audience was scarcely satisfied with one repetition of this, but
time was pressing and the program had to go on. By this time a fish,
a bird and a moon had been added to the symbols on the head band.

The girls enjoyed taking off the camp doctor in the next act, called
on the program, The Infirmary, Doctor—and Gargling Girls. There had
been some mild cases of tonsilitis, immediately isolated in the
“Infirmary”, where, with skull and cross-bones, the girls had
announced the “Leper Colony” on a clever sign, and bewailed their
isolation. This was all portrayed in the sketch. First the girls
appeared, wrapped in long bath robes and singing pathetically about
the “tonsils’ retreat” and the “little cots, whose owners have
spots,—

                       And the doctor’s job,
                       Their throats to swab,
                         Can’t be beat!”

Their temperature was “torrid” and the gargle “horrid”. Then came
the doctor, who looked at their throats with the aid of an immense
kitchen spoon, and sang with great enjoyment a solo to the effect
that he had waited long to catch them, but had them fast quarantined
now. Giving each a spoonful from a large bottle, he stood before
them like an orchestra leader, and beat time with the spoon, while
in throaty tones to the tune of John Brown’s Body the girls sang,
“Gargle, gargle, gargle, gargle,” etc., and falling into a
procession behind the doctor, filed out. This proved so popular that
the “doctor” was forced to repeat his solo and lead again the chorus
of gargling girls. Frances, of course, as the tallest of the girls,
impersonated the doctor and tried to imitate his step and movements.
This time the curtains parted to show a spoon on the head band.

“What do you suppose the next will be?” asked Jean in the audience.

“It says ‘Pickles’,” replied Rhoda, “but who knows how they’ll do
it?”

            “Pickles
                (a) Onion
                (b) Cauliflower
                (c) Quartered pickle,” read the program.

When Isabel and Virgie drew the curtains, Betty, Cathalina and Nora
stood there decked in green crepe paper, Betty’s costume having
yellow trimmings. At once Betty, to the tune of “Reuben, Reuben”
began the song of the pickled onion:

               “Picnic pickles you’ve been eating,
                   All the pickles you could get,
               I should think you’d hate to think of
                   All the pickles you have ‘et’,—
                       H’m-te-dum-tum,
                       H’m-tum-dum!”
                       (Turning around quickly)

               “Here behold the pickled onion
                   Round and sweet as I can be,
               Where’ll you find another onion
                   Anywhere to equal me?
                       H’m-te-dum-tum,” etc.

Nora now took up the song:

               “My name’s pickled cauliflower,
                   I’m as crisp as I can be;
               Where’ll you find another cauliflower
                   Anywhere to equal me?” Refr.

Cathalina’s inquiry was similar:

                “Once I was a full-sized pickle,
                    But they came and quartered me;
                Where’ll you find a quartered pickle
                    Anywhere to equal me?” Refr.

At this point the Picnic Pickles joined hands above their heads and
circled the stage singing:

               “Three sweet pickles in the barrel,
                   Picnic pickles can’t be beat;
               Merrymeeting girls all love us,
                   Eat and smile and smile and eat!”

“Merrymeeting Music” not unkindly took off several of the girls in
camp, among them one of the chief “yell-leaders”, and Rhoda, whose
really beautiful piano playing the girls had so much enjoyed all
through the weeks of camp. Marion represented her and sang; to
“Boola, Boola”:

                         “I am Rhoda
                         I can play
                         Brahms and Chopin
                         Any day.

                         If you listen
                         I’ll start you off
                         On the Prelude
                         Of Rachmaninoff.”

Lilian, with her guitar, and Eloise with ukulele, sat upon the floor
to sing two or three of the camp favorites and represented the
“Jazz” of the program.

Musical notes now appeared upon the head band next to the pickle
jar, and the audience again consulted their programs. “Whiskaway”
was to appear.

Betty was slim and had made a remarkable though simple costume of
black, covering her arms with long black stockings and padding out
with cotton a muslin mask to imitate the muzzle of a dog. The rest
of the face had a comical expression, and the corners of the big
square of muslin had been tied into ears. A gentle old dog sometimes
wandered into camp from a neighboring farm, although dogs were
forbidden, and had been dubbed “Whiskaway” by the girls.

Down on her knees Betty moved about, causing much amusement among
the little girls in front by the waving of her paws and the swinging
of the doggy nose, which was not very well fastened at the lower
part. At the last Betty assumed a begging attitude, her
stocking-covered hands hanging limply over, with such effect that
this tableau and chorus had to be repeated:

              “When a cold nose gives you a fright,
                That’s dear Whiskaway;
              When a footstep sounds in the night
                That’s poor Whiskaway!
          I love to sleep in the softest bed,—
          I don’t care whether it’s the foot or the head.
              I don’t mean to scare you,
                But only prepare you
              For poor, dear Whiskaway!”

The ensemble chorus gave the new Merrymeeting song which had won the
prize. In this and the camp yell with which the performance closed
the audience could not help joining, and went away to sing these
masterpieces of poesy and song for the rest of the week.




                            CHAPTER XXIV

                         THOSE CAMPING DAYS


“Isn’t this the most exciting week?” queried Isabel.

“It is indeed,” replied Cathalina, who was feeling disappointed over
tennis results in the August tournament, provoked at herself for one
or two bad plays she had made, yet glad for Lilian that she had won
the tournament again. The girls had just finished the final baseball
game and both teams, with a few spectators, had strolled off to rest
under the trees. A cool breeze blew from the water which sparkled
and foamed over the rocks.

“Tournaments to be finished, the last points you can possibly get in
anything to be made, swimming match tomorrow, boys’ minstrel show
next day, then the last hike, the big banquet and prizes and
everything on Friday, and on Saturday the last senior lodge play!
This hectic life of pleasure has spoiled me for school!”

“Nonsense, Isabel. We’ll feel all the more like it,” said Lilian.

“There _are_ those who love to study, I’m told,” said Isabel, who
was feeling anything but intellectual that morning, “but the only
reason that _I_ do it is that I’m ashamed to be ignorant!”

“You are certainly frank about it,” Eloise remarked with a quizzical
smile.

“Then if you don’t study,” continued Isabel, saucily addressing
Eloise, “you can’t enjoy the real fun, because of what hangs over
your head in the way of cuts, lessons to be made up, letters home
from the faculty, and term work to be repeated because of failures.”

“To hear you talk, anybody would think that you are one of those who
are always on the ragged edge,” reproved Betty. “Frances, Isabel is
one of the best in her classes at Greycliff.”

“Thanks, Betty, for your kind tribute, but I have learned by
observation,” said Isabel loftily, “and profited by seeing the awful
times the idlers have. They have to pay the bill some time, and
that’s the only reason I work.”

“Isabel is just thinking with her tongue about her reasons for
work,” said Virginia.

“Lots of people do that,” acknowledged Isabel, laughing.

“Unfortunately true,”—and Eloise gave Isabel a gentle push till she
fell over on the grass by Cathalina, who was lying at full length.

“Don’t you wish you knew,” continued Eloise, “what they’re going to
do at the banquet—and how the dining-room will be decorated,—and
what the eats will be,—and how the councillors will dress up,—and
who will get the prizes?”

“I wouldn’t miss the banquet for worlds!” cried Betty. “The girls
all say that it is always _wonderful_, and so exciting and thrilling
about the prizes. Why, sometimes the girls have the tears just
streaming down their cheeks, but root nobly for the one who took the
prize away from them!”

“I don’t believe that I could do that,” said Virginia.

“O, you’d be ashamed not to be glad for the other girl, wouldn’t
you?”

“It would just depend on who she was and how she took it,” said
Virgie with decision. “If she were airy and smarty, I wouldn’t like
it.”

“N-no, but anybody’d be ashamed to be that way up here, or at least
to show it. There is too much camp spirit among us.”

Cathalina slipped her hand into Lilian’s and they exchanged an
affectionate look, which Hilary did not miss, and she patted
Cathalina’s shoulder approvingly.

“I’m sorry for the girls that are leaving early,” Virgie continued.
“Two or three are going tomorrow. It’s a good thing that the games
are about over,—we’d have so few on our team.”

“What do we do next week, Frances?” asked Helen.

“Chiefly get ready to leave. It will take us all day Monday to
pack.”

“How could it?”

“I don’t mean every minute, but there will be things to fix and hunt
up. We can have some good times in between at the club house, and
play tennis or anything we want to, you know, but we leave Tuesday
afternoon, and by Wednesday hardly anybody will be at camp.”

“Doesn’t it make you sick to think about it? Maybe I’ll never be
able to come back here!” Helen’s eyes looked misty.

“We mustn’t think about it,” said Isabel. “Cheer up. Suppose you
could never go home and see your folks.”

“Listen to the practical Isabel,” laughed Lilian. “That’s right,
Isabel; always look forward to the next nice thing that you’re going
to do!”

“By the way, girls,” said Isabel, “the last _Moon_ will be read
Sunday, and I promised to see everybody and ask for a contribution.
Every one of you can hand in a personal or some little paragraph
about something that has happened in your klondike. I’m coming
around Saturday and if you haven’t written anything I’m going to sit
down and wait till you do. No promises go!”

“Might as well do it, girls,” said Eloise. “When the energetic
Isabel has a duty to perform, it is a case of ‘do it _now_’. O,
dear, what fun we have had!”

“_Are_ having, _going_ to have,” insisted Isabel. “Don’t start any
mourning, anybody. We’ll probably have enough of waterworks at the
end, and I, for one, don’t want to begin now.”

“You funny, nice, dear old Isabel,” said Cathalina, reaching a hand
over to rumple Isabel’s curly head.

Rapidly passed these last day of camp. The last games of the August
tournament were played. Reports of attainment and points earned were
handed in by the director of athletics, the swimming instructor and
other councillors. Excitement more or less suppressed spread among
the girls as they consulted with each other about whom to choose and
vote for in regard to the prize cups. From so many bright, helpful
and popular girls, who should be chosen as the best camper among the
seniors, the intermediates and the juniors? The girls were warned
against “campaigning” for their favorites. In this, points did not
count, except as indicating an interest in the activities. The best
“all-around camper” would not necessarily be the one who was first
in any particular activity. Former years in camp, giving what we
might call “cumulative” helpfulness and loyalty, counted also.

The annual “minstrels” at the boys’ camp was one of the great
events. Gay boat-loads of girls on that happy night went down to
Boothbay Camp, gave enthusiastic support and applause to the
entertainment furnished by the boys, enjoyed every feature, and
joined heartily in the singing of popular or camp songs while the
curtains were drawn between “acts.” By lantern and flashlight they
again filled the boats for the unusual experience of a ride home on
the river after dark. A big flashlight served occasionally as search
light, but the pilot knew his river even without a moon.

Mysterious indeed were the doings of councillors on the fateful
Friday. All girls were forbidden the dining-room after breakfast,
except a few who were asked to help bring down the “greenery” from
the woods. These had a peep at the unfinished decorations. There was
to be a picnic lunch at noon, to leave the dining-room free for the
elaborate decorating, and it was even a mystery where the lunch was
to be. In the arts and crafts room councillors were working on the
last menu cards, which were being painted and lettered, and
occasionally a few girls would invent some “necessary” errands,
which would take them through the room into Laugh-a-lot. But furtive
glances only increased interest.

“I saw the cap the camp mother was making,” said one. “My, it was
pretty. There was a little crinkled yellow ruffle on the edge of
black crepe paper.”

“Then that’s the color scheme! I suppose they’ll wear caps and
aprons,—they did last year.”

“Yes, but it’s _never_ the same, so you can’t tell.”

When the bell rang for lunch, all who had to go to the club house
for information were directed to the pine grove. But before this,
many of the girls had noticed the people who were trailing in that
direction with utensils and eatables. The big kettle of hot beans
and some other supplies were taken in the convenient and familiar
wheelbarrow.

On the rocks at the right of the cove the fire was made and long,
fat “wienies” were being cooked in a big pan, which was supported on
the edge of the fire by two large chunks of wood.

“O, the beautiful, _beautiful_ pine-grove!” exclaimed Cathalina, as
she took her place behind Hilary in the line, which had been halted
by the smiling head councillor some little distance from the fire
till the signal should be given that all was ready.

“If I come back next summer, I’m going to bring my paints and
everything,” she continued. “I’ve made some sketches, but I want to
get the blue of the blueberries with the dew on them, and some of
the sunsets are so gorgeous,—or so delicate. I saw the most peculiar
effect one night when we were starting a camp fire on Marshmallow
Point for a marshmallow roast. There were heavy brown-gray clouds
and just one streak where the sun was trying to shine through, and
the queerest color to the water. I thought of the old poem where
‘the dark Plutonian shadows gather on the evening blast.’”

“Look at this little vine with the scarlet berries,” said Hilary,
stooping to gather a bit that was trailing along the ground. “Has
this been taken in to Mother Nature yet?”

“I think so, and there is another kind on the ground not far from
where the fire is. Yesterday I found the oddest little flower
growing right out of the rock in the cove. The flower was almost
exactly like the common little fall aster, purple of a sort, but the
plant was a single stalk and looked like an evergreen, made you
think of balsam. I’m going to ask Mother Nature what it is. I picked
it.”

“Hurrah, here we go!” said Hilary, weaving the bit of vine in one of
her braids as the line started.

A pasteboard plate received the necessary silver, hot beans spooned
out of the kettle by one councillor, two or three “wieners” forked
out by the presiding masculine genius of the fire, the bread and
butter for the sandwiches, mustard if one wanted it, the good
“picnic pickles” and a sanitary cup for either water or milk.
Dessert was to come later, delicious watermelons, not brought down
the hill, but served nearer the entrance to the pine grove.

Evening came at last. Camp garb was laid aside for the pretty summer
dresses appropriate to the occasion. The girls thought that the bell
would never ring. The finishing touches seemed to take the
councillors forever! But at last the big bell clanged out its
invitation, and the girls came hurrying down the hill.

The dining-room looked almost like a bit of the pine grove, for the
rafters were covered by the green branches of the whole trees that
had been brought to deck the place, and stood around the supporting
pillars and at the sides of the room. White pine, balsam and
arborvitæ filled the dining hall with spicy odor. And if any were
shocked at the cutting of these big “Christmas trees”, they might
have been told that they were carefully selected where thinning was
necessary and where the trees would never have reached a perfect
maturity when all had grown larger.

“O, isn’t it a dream!” exclaimed Lilian, as she found the place card
with her name on it at the same table with Cathalina, Hilary, Betty
and Eloise. “Look at these darling menu cards!”

“And read it,” said Hilary. “They’re too funny. Let’s see if we can
make out what the different things really are.”

“What do you suppose ‘Brunswick Special’ is?” wondered Cathalina.

“Maybe our pickles,” said Eloise. “No, it isn’t in the right
place,—O, I know, corn!”

“And the ‘Young Fried Flappers’ are the fried chickens, of course,
and Charlotte Young’s name.”

“Here’s ‘Piggly Wiggly’, now what can that be?”

“Look at the place on the menu; O, that’s the jelly, to be sure.”

“‘Truant’s Delight’ must be the ice-cream, and Virginia sauce must
be something we have over it and called in honor of Virgie!”

Just before the courses were served, the councillors in a long line,
with their giddy postage stamp caps and ruffled aprons, sang a brief
song beginning, “O, we are the councillors gay, tra-la,” and were
greeted with the hearty applause of appreciation and given, both
collectively and individually, the “rah-rahs” of Merrymeeting. But
ah, those plates of fried chicken, mashed potato and hot rolls! And
the platters of steaming corn, served because of its popularity.
From bouillon to salted almonds and candy, the refreshments seemed
to be a success and the councillors saw to it that each girl had all
she wanted. The hour was early, even if dinner was a trifle late.

More than one heart beat a little faster when the table which held
the three cups and little packages marked with different names was
moved to the center. Chairs were moved back and turned to face in
the right direction. The head councillors, in a brief speech full of
charm and sincerity, spoke of the camp ideals and of what these
prizes would represent, then began to call the names and present to
each the prize which she had worked for and won. Not all could win
distinction. Some girlish hopes were bound to be disappointed,
either when expectation was greater than the facts warranted, or
when the contest was so close that no one could tell how the vote
would turn.

Hilary won the ring; Lilian, Cathalina, Eloise and Isabel, pins.
Hilary’s record was unblemished by any tardiness or absence. She had
identified birds and flowers, taken the hikes, climbed Mt.
Washington, and had been so generally helpful and well liked that
some of the girls had voted for her to have the senior cup. Lilian
had won the tennis tournament, and Cathalina had won second place,
having vanquished all her opponents but Lilian. Isabel, in addition
to a long list of activities, had won the swimming meet. Eloise,
like Lilian, had been especially good with the musical affairs, and
had made points in all lines. Both musical notes and a paddle for
canoeing were on her headband, with the usual symbols. Betty had not
quite enough points for a pin, but received arm band and diamond.

The suspense was great when it came to awarding the honor cups to
the girls who had been considered and voted the best campers.
Frances of the seniors, Charlotte Young of the intermediates, a
sweet girl, whose election was practically unanimous, and little
June Lancaster of the juniors, were announced. June was quite
overcome and went forward for her trophy in great trepidation, while
Hilary beamed with pride in her little sister. The girls in excited
groups gathered to see the prizes of those who had won them, and
then gradually left the dining hall, looking back to see the
prettily decorated tables and the tired, but happy councillors who
were about to consume the rest of the chicken!

The great event was over. Packing and leave-taking were close at
hand. A few days more saw the girls on the eve of their final
departure. Many times had they floated away from the little dock,
but always to return.

The house party planned by Cathalina was really to be carried out.
The girls’ trunks were to go by train to New York, but Mrs. Van
Buskirk and Philip were to meet them with the big car in Bath,
whence by easy stages they would travel to the Van Buskirk home.
Cathalina, Lilian, Hilary, Betty, Campbell and Philip were the young
people of the party. Philip and Campbell would drive the car by
turns.

At last all were ready. The boats were waiting. A bright sun had
shone out, after a dark morning, to render the last pictures of
Merrymeeting things of beauty and a joy forever. As the boats moved
off, there was waving of many hands to the few campers left standing
upon the dock.

An unexpected hush fell upon the girls in the Aeolus, and to
Isabel’s great surprise she felt a lump in her throat and several
tears trickling down her cheeks. Two or three of the girls were
openly crying.

“Mercy, girls,” said Isabel, “this will never do! Come on and sing!
Lilian and Eloise, start something!”

“Camping Days,” suggested Eloise, and in a moment, to the old tune
of “College Days”, the cheerful voices of contented campers, looking
forward to their trip and home, mingled with the chugging of the
engine and the splashing of waters.

             Don’t you remember those camping days?—
             Peppy girls and their peppy ways,
             Swims and hikes to beat the band,
             H’m—m’m, and wasn’t it grand?
             Plenty of things for you to do,
             Volley, basketball, tennis, too;
             Time went so fast, it couldn’t last,—
             Back in those camping days!

             Don’t you remember those camp fire nights,
             After the sunset’s glowing lights?
             Songs we sang and cheers so loud,
             H’m—m’m, and the great old crowd
             Starts to Brunswick, city of dreams,
             Never will get there, so it seems,
             Time went so fast, it couldn’t last,
             Back in those camping days.

             When you’re home, you’ll think of the fun
             In days of rain or days of sun,
             One point off if you were late,
             H’m—m’m, and wasn’t it great?
             Don’t you remember the Sunday _Moon_?
             Hope next summer will come real soon!
             Time went so fast, it couldn’t last,—
             Back in those camping days!