^ LONG 
 
 tIANE L. STEWART 
 

 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 
Camp Fire Girls Series, Volume III 
 
 « 
 
 The Camp Fire Girls 
 at Long Lake 
 
 or 
 
 Bessie King in Summer C^mp 
 
 by 
 
 JANE L. STEWART 
 
 □ 
 
 The Saalfield Publishing Company 
 Chicago Akron, Ohio New Yoik 
 
Copyright, 1914 
 
 The Saalfield Publishing- Company 
 
The Camp Fire Girls 
 
 / 
 
 at Long Lake 
 
 CHAPTEE I 
 
 A GEOUNDLESS JEALOUSY 
 
 “I told you we were going to be bappy berCj 
 didn’t I, Zara?” 
 
 Tbe speaker was Dolly Eansom, a black-haired, 
 mischievous Wood Gatherer of the Camp Fire 
 Girls, and a member of the Manasquan Camp 
 Fire, the Guardian of which was Miss Eleanor 
 Mercer, or Wanaka, as she was known in the 
 ceremonial camp fires that were held each month. 
 The girls were staying with her at her father’s 
 farm, and only a fevv days before Zara, who had 
 enemies determined to keep her from her friends 
 of the Camp Fire, had been restored to them, 
 through the shrewd suspicions that a faithless 
 friend had aroused in Bessie King, Zara’s best 
 chum. 
 
 Zara and Dolly were on top of a big wagon, 
 half filled with new mown hay, the sweet smell 
 of which delighted Dolly, although Zara who had 
 lived in the country, knew it too well to become 
 
4 
 
 THE CAMP PIPE GIELS 
 
 wildly entlniaiastie over an3H;liing tliat was so 
 coimnonplace to her. Below them, on the ground, 
 two other Camp Fire Girls in the regular work- 
 ing costume of the Camp Fire— middy blouses 
 and wide blue bloomers— were tossing up the hay, 
 tinder the amused direction of Walter Stuhhs, 
 one of the hoys who worked on the farm. 
 
 “I’m awfully glad to he here with the girls 
 again, Dolly,” said Zara. “No, that’s not the 
 way! Here, use your rake like this. The way 
 you’re doing it the wagon w’on’t hold half as 
 much hay as it should.” 
 
 “Is Bessie acting as if she was your teachei’, 
 Margery!” Dolly called down laughingly to Mar- 
 gery Burton, who, because she was always laugh- 
 ing, was called Minnehaha hy the Camp Fire 
 Girls. “Zara acts just as if we were in school, 
 and she’s as superior and tiresome as she 
 can he.” 
 
 “She’s a regular farm girl, that Zara,” said 
 Walt, with a grin. “Knows as much about 
 packin’ hay as I do— ’most. Bessie, thought 
 you’d lived on a farm all yer life! Zara there 
 can heat yer all hollow at this. You’re only 
 gettin’ half a pickful every time yon toss the 
 hay up. Here— let me show you!” 
 
 “I’d be a pretty poor teacher if I tried to show 
 Margery, Dolly,” laughed Bessie King. . “You 
 hear how Walter is scolding me!” 
 
 “He’s quite right, too,” said Dolly, with a little 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 &■ 
 
 pent. “You know too inueh, Bessie— I ‘m glad to- 
 find there’s something yon don’t do right. Yon 
 ninst be stupid about some things, just like the 
 rest of us, if you lived on a' farm and don’t know 
 how to pitch hay properly after all these years ! ’ ’ 
 
 Bessie laughed, Dolly’s smile was ample proof 
 that there was nothing ill natured about her 
 little gibe. 
 
 “Girls on farms in this country don’t work in 
 the fields— the men wouldn’t let thein,” said 
 Bessie. ‘They’d rather have them stay in a hot 
 kitchen all day, cooking, and washing dishes. 
 And when they want a change, the men let them 
 chop wood, and fetch water, and run around t» 
 collect the eggs, and milk the cows, and churn 
 butter and fix the garden truck! Oh, it’s easy for 
 girls and women on a farm — all they have to do 
 is a few little things like that. The men do all 
 the h^rd work. You wouldn’t let your wife do 
 more than that, would you, Walter?” 
 
 The boy flushed. 
 
 “When I get married, I’m aimin’ to have a 
 hired gal to do all them chores,” he said. “They’s 
 some farmers seem to think when they marry 
 they’re just gettin’ an extra lot of hired help 
 they don’t have to pay fer, but we don’t figger 
 that way in these parts. 'No, ma’am.” 
 
 He looked shyly at Dolly as he spoke, and 
 Dolly, who was an accomplished little flirt, saw 
 
6 
 
 THE CAMP FIKE GIELS 
 
 the look and understood it very well. She tossed 
 her pretty head. 
 
 “You needn’t look at me that way, "Walt 
 Stubbs,” she said. “I’m never going to marry 
 any farmer— so there! I’m going to marry a rich 
 man, and live in the city, and have my own auto- 
 mobile and all the servants I want, and never do 
 anything at all unless I like. So you needn’t 
 waste your breath telling me what a good time 
 your wife is going to have.” 
 
 Walter, already as brown as a berry from the 
 hot sun under which he worked every day, turned 
 redder than he had been before, if that was 
 possible. But, wisely, he made no attempt to an-, 
 swer Dolly. He had already been inveigled into 
 two or three arguments with the sharp witted girl 
 from the city, and he had no mind for any more 
 of the cutting sarcasm with which she had with- 
 ered him up each time just as he thought he had 
 got the best of her. 
 
 Still, in spite of her sharp tongue and her fond- 
 ness for teasing him, Walt liked Dolly better than 
 any of the girls from the city who were staying 
 on the farm, and he was always glad to welcome 
 her when she appeared where he was working, 
 even though she interrupted his work, and made 
 .it necessary for him to stick to his job after the 
 others were through in order to make up for lost 
 time. But Dolly had little use for him, in spite 
 of his obvious devotion, which all the other girls 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 7 
 
 had noticed. And this time his silence didn’t 
 save him from another sharp thrust. 
 
 “Goin’ to that ice cream festival over to the 
 Methodist Church at Deer Crossin’ to-night?” 
 she asked him, trying to imitate his peculiar 
 country accent. 
 
 “I’m aimin’ to,” he said uncomfortably. 
 “You said you was goin’ to let me take you. 
 Isn’t that so?” 
 
 “Oh, yes— I suppose so,” she said, tossing her 
 head again. “But I never said I’d let you bring 
 me home, did I? Maybe I’ll find some one over 
 there I like better to come home with,’-’ 
 
 Walter didn’t answer, which proved that, 
 young as he was, and inexperienced in the way» 
 of city girls like Dolly, he was learning fast. But 
 just then a bell sounded from the farm, and the 
 girls dropped their pitchforks quickly, 
 
 “Dinner time!” cried Margery Burton, hap- 
 pily. “Come on down, you two, and we’ll go 
 over to that big tree and eat our dinner in the 
 shade. Walter, if you’ll go and fetch us a pail 
 of water from the spring, we ’ll have dinner ready 
 when you get back. And I bet you’ll be surprised 
 when you see what we’ve got, too— something 
 awfully good. We got Mrs. Farnham to let us 
 put up the best lunch you ever saw!” 
 
 “Yes you did!” gibed Walter. He wasn’t half 
 as much afraid of Margery and the other girls, 
 who never teased him, as he was of Dolly Ran- 
 
8 
 
 THE CAMP PIEE GIELS 
 
 som, and he didn’t like them as well, either. Per- 
 haps it was jnst because Doily made a point of 
 teasing him that he was so fond of hei*. But he 
 picked up the pail, obediently enough, and went 
 otf. When he was out of hearing Bessie shook 
 her finger reproachfully at Dolly. 
 
 “I thought you w’ere going to be good and not 
 tease Walter any more!” she said, half smiling. 
 
 '“Oh, he’s so stupid— it’s just fun to tease him, 
 and he’s so easy that I just can’t help it!” said 
 Dolly. 
 
 “1 don’t think he’s stupid— I think he^'s a very 
 nice' boy,” said Bessie. “Don’t you, Margery?” 
 
 “I certainly do, Bessie— much too nice for a 
 little flirt like Dolly to torment him the way she 
 does.” 
 
 “Well, if you two like him so much you can 
 have him, and welcome!” cried Dolly, tossing her 
 head. “I’m sure I don’t want him tagging 
 around after me all the time tlie way he does. ’ ’ 
 
 “Better be careful, Dolly,” advised Margery, 
 who knew her of old. “They say pride goes be- 
 fore a fall, and if you’re not nice to him you may 
 have to come home from the festival to-night with- 
 out a beau— and you know you wouldn’t like 
 that. ” 
 
 “I’d just as soon not have a beau at all as have 
 some of these boys around here,” declared Dolly, 
 pugnaciously. “I like the country, but I don’t 
 see why the people have to be so stupid. They’re 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 9 
 
 not half as bright as the ones we know in the 
 city.” 
 
 ‘‘I don’t know about that, Dolly. Bessie’s from 
 the country, but I think she’s as bright as most 
 of the people in the city. They haven’t been able 
 to fool her very much since she left Hedgeville, 
 you know.” 
 
 ‘‘Oh, I didn’t mean Bessie!” cried Dolly, 
 throwing her arms aroimd Bessie’s neck affec- 
 tionately. “You know I didn’t, don’t you, dear? 
 And I’m only joking about half the time anyhow, 
 when I say things like that.” 
 
 “Here comes Walter now— we’ll see whether 
 he doesn’t admit that this is the best dinner he 
 over ate in the fields!” said Margery. 
 
 It was, too. There was no doubt at all about 
 that. There were cold chicken, and rolls, and 
 plenty of fresh butter, an(i new milk, and hard 
 boiled eggs, that the girls had stuffed, and a lus-< 
 ciousi blueberry pie that Bessie herself had been 
 allowed to bake in the big farm kitchen. They 
 made a great dinner of it, and Walter was loud in 
 his praises. 
 
 “That certainly beats what we have out here 
 most days!” he said. “We have plenty— but it’s 
 just bread and cold meat and water, as a rule, 
 and no dessert. It’s better than they get at most 
 farms, though,- at that. ’ ’ 
 
 When the meal was finished the girls quickly 
 made neat parcels of the dishes that were to be 
 
10 
 
 THE CAMP PIPE GIELS 
 
 taken back, and all the litter tbat remained under 
 the tree was gathered up" in to a neat heap and 
 burned. 
 
 ‘‘My, but you’re neat!” exclaimed Walter, as 
 he watched them. 
 
 “It’s one of our Camp Fire rules,” explained 
 Margery. “We’re used to camping out and eat- 
 ing in the open air, you know, and it isn’t fair to 
 leave a place so that the next people who camp 
 out there have to do a lot of work to clean up 
 after you before they can begin having a good 
 time themselves. We wouldn’t like it if we had 
 to do it after others, so we try always to leave 
 things just as we’d like to find them ourselves. 
 And it wouldn’t be good for the Camp Fire Girls 
 if people thought we were careless and untidy.” 
 
 Then they got back to work again, and the long 
 summer afternoon passed happily, with all four 
 of the girls doing their share of the work. The 
 ,sun was "still high when they had finished their 
 work, and Walter gave the word to stop happily, 
 since he wanted time to put on his best clothes for 
 the trip to Deer Crossing, where the ice cream fes- 
 tival was to be held. Such festivities were rare 
 enough in the country to be made mightily wel- 
 come when they came, especially when the date 
 chosen was a Saturday, since on Sunday those 
 who worked in the fields every other day of the 
 week could take things easily and lie abed late. 
 
 “Well, I’ll see all you girls again to-night,” he 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 11 
 
 said. “I’ll be along after supper, Dolly— don’t 
 forget. We’re goin’ to ride over together in the 
 first wagon.” 
 
 “All right,” said Dolly, smiling at him, and 
 winking shamelessly’ at Bessie. “Don’t forget 
 to put on that new blue necktie and to wear those 
 pink socks, Walter.” 
 
 “I sure won’t,” he said, not having Seen her 
 wink, and, as he turned away, Dolly looked at 
 Bessie with a gesture of comic despair. 
 
 “I think it’s very mean to laugh at Walter’s 
 clothes, Dolly,” said Bessie. “They’re not a bit 
 sillier than some of the things the boys in the 
 city wear, are they, Margery?” 
 
 “I should say not— not half as foolish. I’ve 
 seen some of your pet boys wearing the sort of 
 clothes one would expect men at the racetrack to 
 wear, and nobody else, Dolly. You w^ant to get 
 over thinking you’re so much better than every- 
 one else— if you don’t, it’s going to make you 
 unhappy. ’ ’ 
 
 Once they were at the ice cream festival, where 
 all the girls and young fellows from miles around 
 seemed to have gathered, Dolly seamed prepared 
 to have a very good time, however. She entered 
 into the spirit of the occasion, and, though she, 
 like Bessie and most of the Camp Fire Girls, 
 would not take part in the kissing games that 
 were popular, she wasn’t a bit stitf or superior. 
 
 “I wonder where that nice boy that thrashed 
 
12 
 
 THE CAMP FIEB GIELS 
 
 Jake Hoover is?” slie asked Bessie, after they;' 
 had been there for a while. 
 
 “Oh, that’s whom you’re looking for!” ex- 
 claimed Bessie, with a laugh. “Will Burns, you 
 mean? That’s so, Dolly— he said he was coming- 
 here, didn’t he?” 
 
 “He certainly did. I’d like to see him again, 
 Bessie. He wasn’t as stupid as most of these 
 country boys.” 
 
 “Tie was splendid,” said Bessie, w-armly. “If 
 it hadn’t been for him, I might net be here now'', 
 Dolly. .Jake would have got me back into the 
 other state— he was strong enough to make me go 
 wEere he wanted. And if I’d been caught there, 
 they’d have made me stay.” 
 
 “There he is now!” exclaimed Dolly, as a tall, 
 sunburned boj'' appeared in the doorway. “I 
 was beginning to be afraid he wasn’t coming at 
 all.” 
 
 Will Burns, who was a cousin of Walter 
 Stubbs, seemed to be well known to the young 
 people of the neighborhood, though his home was 
 near Jericho, some twmnty miles away. He was 
 greeted on all sides as he made his way through 
 the Sunday School room, wdiere the festival was 
 being held, and it was some minutes before the 
 girls from the farm saw that he was nearing 
 them. 
 
 “Well— well, so you got home all right?” he 
 said, smiling at Bessie. “I thought you wouldn’t 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 13 
 
 \ have any more trouble, once yon got on the train, 
 pm glad to see yon again.” 
 
 ( And then Dolly’s vanity got a rnde shock. For 
 "will Burns began to devote himself at once, after 
 lie had greeted Dolly and been introduced to Zara 
 and some of the other girls, to Bessie. Everyone 
 in the room soon noticed this, and since most of 
 the girls there had tried to make him pay atten- 
 tion to them, at one time or another, his evident 
 fondness for Bessie caused a little sensation. 
 Dolly, so surprised to find a boy she fancied will- 
 ing to talk to anyone else that she didn’t know 
 what to do, stood it as long as she could, and then 
 went in search of Walter Stubbs, whom she had 
 snubbed unmercifully all evening. 
 
 But Walter had at last plucked up courage 
 enough to resent the way she treated him, and she 
 found that he had bought two plates of ice cream 
 for Margery Burton and himself, and that they 
 were sitting in a corner, eating their ice cream, 
 and talking away as merrily as if they had known 
 one another all their lives ! 
 
 Eleanor Mercer, who had come over to have an 
 eye on the girls, saw the little comedy. She waa 
 sorry for Dolly, who was sensitive, but she knew 
 that the lesson would be a wholesome one for the 
 little flirt, who had been flattered so much by 
 the boys in the city that she had come to believe 
 that she could make any boy do just what she de- 
 sired. So she said nothing, even when Dolly, with- 
 
14 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 out a single boy to keep her in countenance, was 
 redueed to sitting with one or two other girls who 
 were in the same predicament, since there were 
 more girls there than boys. 
 
 Walter did not even come to get her to ride 
 home with him. Instead, he found a place with 
 Margery Burton, and Dolly had to climb into her 
 wagon alone. There she found Bessie. 
 
 “You’re a mean old thing, Bessie King!” she 
 said, half crying. 
 
CHAPTEE II 
 
 GOOD-BYE TO THE FARM 
 
 Dolly had spoken in a low tone, her sobs seem- 
 ing to strangle her speech, and only Bessie, who 
 was amazed by this outburst, heard her. Grieved 
 and astonished, she put her arin about Dolly, but 
 the other girl threw it off, roughly. 
 
 “Don’t you pretend you love me — I know the 
 mean sort of a cat you are now!” she said, bit- 
 terly. 
 
 “Why, Dolly! Whatever is the matter with 
 you! What have I done to make you angry!” 
 
 “If you were so mad at me the other day for 
 getting you into that automobile ride with Mr. 
 Holmes you might have said so — instead of pre- 
 tending that you’d forgiven me, and then turning 
 around and making everyone laugh at me to-night ! 
 You’re prettier than I am— and cleverer— but I 
 think it’s pretty mean to make that Burns boy 
 spend the whole evening with you!” 
 
 Gradually, and very faintly, Bessie began to 
 have a glimmering of what was wrong with her 
 friend. She found it hard work not to smile, or 
 even to laugh outright, but she resisted the temp- 
 tation nobly, for she Imew only too well that to 
 Dolly, sensitive and nervous, laughter would be 
 
 15 
 
16 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 just tlie one thing needed to make it harder than 
 ever to patch up this senseless and silly quarrel, 
 ■which, so far, was only one sided. 
 
 To Bessie, who thought little of boys, and to 
 whom jealousy was alien, the idea that Dolly was 
 really jealous of her seemed absurd, since she 
 knew how little cause there was for such a feel- 
 ing, But, very wisely, she determined to proceed 
 slowly, and not to do anything that could possibly 
 give Dolly any fresh cause of offence. 
 
 “Dolly,” she said, “you mustn’t feel that. way. 
 Eeally, dear, I didn’t do that at all. I talked 
 to him when he came to sit down by me, but that 
 was all. I couldn’t very well tell him to go away, 
 or not answer him when he spoke to me, could I?” 
 
 “Oh, I know what you’re going to say— that it 
 was all his fault. But if you hadn’t tried to make 
 him come he wouldn’t have done it.” 
 
 “I didn’t try to make him come, Dolly. Did 
 you?” 
 
 Dolly stared at her a moment. Thq question 
 seemed to force her to give attention to a new 
 idea, to something she had not thought of before. 
 But when she spoke her voice was still defiant. 
 
 “Suppose I did!” she said, angrily. “I wanted 
 to have a good time— and he was the nicest boy 
 there — ” 
 
 ‘ ‘ Maybe he saw that you were waiting for him 
 too plainly, Dolly, Maybe he wanted to pick out 
 someone for himself— and if you’d pretended that 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 17 
 
 you didn’t 'care whether he talked to you or not 
 he would have been more anxious to be with 
 you. ” 
 
 Dolly blushed slightly at that, though it was 
 too dark for Bessie to see the color in her cheeks. 
 She knew very well that Bessie was right, but 
 she wondered how Bessie knew it. That feigned 
 indifference had brought her the attentions of more 
 than one boy who had boasted that he was not 
 going to pay any attention to her just because 
 everyone else did. 
 
 But the gradually dawning suspicion that she 
 might, after all, have only herself to blame for the 
 spoiling of her evening’s fun, and that she had 
 acted in rather a silly fashion, didn’t soften Dolly 
 particularly. Very few people are able to re- 
 cover a lost temper just because they find out, 
 at the height of their anger, that they are them- 
 selves to blame for what made them angry, and 
 Dolly was not yet one of them. 
 
 “I suppose you’ll tell all the other girls about 
 this,” she said. She wasn’t crying any more, but 
 her voice was as hard as ever. ‘‘I think you’re 
 horrid— and I thought I was going to like you 
 so much. I think I’ll ask Miss Eleanor to let me 
 share a room with someone else.” 
 
 Bessie didn’t answer, though Dolly waited while 
 the wagon drove on for quite a hundred yards. 
 Bessie was thinking hard. She liked Dolly; she 
 was sure that this was only a show of Dolly’s 
 
18 TPIE QAMP FIEE GIRLS' 
 
 temper, ■vvliieli, despite tlie restrictions tliat sur- 
 rounded her in her home, and had a good deal to 
 do with her mischievous ways, had never been 
 properly curbed. 
 
 But, though Bessie was not angry in her turn, 
 she understood thoroughly that if she and Dolly 
 were to continue the friendship that had begun so 
 promisingly, this trouble between them must he 
 settled, and settled in the proper fashion. If 
 Dolly were allowed to sleep on her anger, it vrould 
 he infinitely harder to restore their relations to 
 a friendly basis. 
 
 “I suppose you don’t care!” said Dolly, fin- 
 ally, when she decided fhat Bessie was not going 
 to answ’er her. 
 
 And now Bessie decided on a change of tactics. 
 She had tried arguing with Dolly, and it had 
 seemed to do no good at all. Itxwas time to see 
 if a little ridicule would not he more useful. 
 
 “I didn’t say so, Dolly,” she answered, very 
 quietly. And she smiled at her friend. “What’s 
 the use of my saying anything? I told you the 
 truth about what happened this evening, and you 
 didn’t believe me. So there’s not much use talk- 
 ing, is there?” 
 
 “You know I’m right, or you’d have plenty to 
 talk about,” said Dolly, unhappily. “Oh, I wish 
 we’d never seen Will Burns!” 
 
 “I wish we hadn’t seen him until to-night, 
 Dolly,” said Bessie, gravely. “You know, that 
 
AT LONO LAKE 
 
 19 
 
 trip in the automobile with Mr. Holmes the o&ar 
 day waisn’t very nice for me, Dolly. If they had 
 caught me, as Mr. Holmee had planned to do, I’d 
 have been taken back to Hedgeville, and bound 
 pver to Farmer Weeks— and he’s a miser, who 
 hates me, and would have been as mean to me as 
 he could possibly be. That’s how we met Will 
 Burns, you know— because you insisted on going 
 with Mr. Holmes in his car to get an ice cream 
 soda.” 
 
 “That’s just what I said— you pretended to for- 
 give me for that, and you haven’t at all— you’re 
 still angry, and you humiliated me before all those 
 people just to get even! I didn’t think you were 
 like that, Bessie— I thought you were nicer than 
 I. But-” 
 
 “Dolly, stop talking a little, and just think it 
 over. You say you didn’t have a good time, and 
 you mean that you didn’t have a boy waiting 
 around to do what you told him all evening. Isn’t 
 that so?” 
 
 “All the other girls had boys around them all 
 the time—’? I 
 
 “You went with Walter Stubbs, didn’t you? 
 And you told him that maybe you’d come home 
 with him and maybe you wouldn’t— and that if 
 anyone you liked better came along you were go- 
 ing to stay with them. You didn’t know Will 
 Burns was coming, did you?” 
 
 “No, but— I thought if he did come—” 
 
20 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “That’s just it. You didn’t think about Walter 
 nt all, did you? You wanted to have a good time 
 yourself— and you didn’t care what sort of a time 
 he had? You just thought that if Will Burns 
 did come he was sure to want to be with you, and 
 so, as soon as you saw him come in you sent 
 Walter off. Oh, you were silly, Dolly— and it was 
 nil your own fault. Don’t you think it’s rather 
 mean to blame me? We were together when Will 
 Burns was coming toward us, and I wanted to go 
 away and let you stay there— but you said I must 
 stay. Don’t you remember that?” 
 
 Dolly, as a matter of fact, had quite forgotten 
 it. But she remembered well enough, now that 
 Bessie had reminded her of it. And, though she 
 had a hot temper, and was fond of mischief, Dolly 
 was not sly. She admitted it at once. 
 
 “I do remember it now, Bessie.” 
 
 “Well, don’t you see how absurd it is to say 
 that I took Will away from you? We were both 
 there together— I couldn’t tell when we saw him 
 coming that he was going to talk to me, could 11 
 And listen, Dolly— he asked me to go home with 
 him in his buggy, and I said I wouldn’t.’’ 
 
 With some girls that would have made the 
 chance of mending things very remote. But Dolly, 
 although her jealousy had been so quickly aroused, 
 was not the sort to get still angrier at this fresh 
 proof that she had been mistaken in thinking that 
 Will Burns had liked her better than Bessie. 
 
A.T LONG LAKE 
 
 21 
 
 “'Why, Bessie— why did you do that?” 
 
 Bessie laughed. 
 
 “We’re not going to be here very much longer, , 
 are we, Dolly?” she said. “Well— if we’re not 
 going to be here, we’re not going to see much of 
 Will Burns. You’re not the only giid who— was 
 —who thought that he ought to be j)aying' more 
 attention to her than to me. There was a pretty 
 girl from Jericho, and he’s known her a long 
 time. "Walter told me about them.. 
 
 “And I oould see that she wanted him to drive 
 her home, so I asked him why he didn’t do it. 
 And he got very much confuted, but he went over 
 to her, finally, and she looked just as happy as 
 she could he when he handed her up into his 
 buggy, and they all went off along. the road to- 
 gether, "Will and she and two or three other fel- 
 lows who had driven over together from Jericho.” 
 
 Dolly’s expression had changed two or three 
 times, very swiftly, as she listened. Now she 
 sighed, and her hand crept out to find Bes.sie’s. 
 
 “Oh, Bessie,” she said, softly, “vv-on’t you for- 
 give me, dear? I’ve made a fool of myself again 
 -^I’m always doing that, it seems to me. And 
 every time I promise myself or you or someone 
 not to do it again. But the trouble is there are 
 so many different ways of being foolish. I seem 
 to find new ones all the time, and every one is so 
 different from the others that I never know about 
 it until it’s too late.” 
 
22 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 never too late to find out one’s been in 
 tbe wrong, Doily, if one admits it. There aren’t 
 many girls like you, who are ready to say they’ve 
 been wrong, no matter how well they know it. I 
 haven’t anything, to forgive you for— so don’t 
 let’s talk any more about that. Everyone makes 
 mistakes. If I thought anyone had treated me as 
 you thought I had treated you to-night I’d have 
 been angry.^ too.” 
 
 Poor Dolly sighed disconsolately. 
 
 “ You’re the best friend I ever had, Bessie,” 
 she said. “I make everyone angry with me, and 
 when I say I’m sorry, they pretend that they’ve 
 forgiven me, but they haven’t, really, at all. 
 That’s why I said that about your still being 
 angry with me. I thought you must be. I really 
 am going to try to be more sensible.” 
 
 And so the little misunderstanding, which might 
 easily, had Bessie been less patient and tactful, 
 have grown into a quarrel that would have ended 
 their friendship before it was well begun, was 
 smoothed over, and Dolly and Bessie, tired but 
 happy, went upstairs to their room together, and 
 were asleep so quickly that they didn’t even take 
 the time to talk matters over. 
 
 Eleanor Mercer, standing in the big hall of 
 the farm house as the girls went upstairs, smiled 
 after Dolly and Bessie. 
 
 “I think you thought I was foolish to put those 
 two in a room together,” she said to Mrs. Earn- 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 33 
 
 ham, the motherly housekeeper, whom Eleanor 
 'had known since, as a little girl, she had played 
 about the farm. 
 
 “I wouldn’t say that. Miss Eleanor,” said Mrs. 
 Farnham. ‘‘I didn’t see how they were going tc 
 get along together, because they were so differ* 
 ent. But it’s not for me to say that you’re fool** 
 ish, no matter what you do.” 
 
 “Oh, yes, it is,” laughed Eleanor. “You used 
 to have to tell me I was foolish in the old days, 
 when I wanted to eat green apples, and all sorts 
 of other things that would have made me sick, 
 and just because I’m grown up doesn’t keep me 
 from wanting to do lots of things that are just 
 as foolish now. But I do think I was right in 
 that.” 
 
 “They do seem to get on well,” agreed Mrs. 
 Farnham. 
 
 “It’s just because they are so different,” said 
 Eleanor. “Dolly does everything on impulse— 
 she doesn’t stop to think. ’With Bessie it’s just 
 the opposite. She’s almost too old— she isn’t im- 
 pulsive enough. And I think each of them will 
 work a little on the other, so that they’ll both bene- 
 fit by being together. Bessie likes looking after 
 people, and she may make Dolly think a little 
 more. 
 
 “There isn’t a nicer, sweeter girl in the whole 
 Camp Fire than Dolly, but lots of people don’t 
 like her, because they don’t unders-?-nd her. Oh, 
 
pfiTT-'iT' 
 _L ,i.X 
 
 C- 
 
 FIEE GISL 
 
 
 I’m sure it’s going to be splendid for both of them. 
 Dolly was awfully angrj’ at Bessie before they 
 started from the church — but you saw how they' 
 were wdien they got here to-night?” 
 
 ^‘1 did, indeed, Miss Eleanor. And I’d say 
 Dolly has a high temper, too, just to look at her.” 
 
 “Oh, she has— and Bessie never seems to get 
 angry. I don’t understand that— it’s my worst 
 fault, I think. Losing my temper, I mean. 
 Though I’m better than I used to be. Well- 
 good-night. ’ ’ 
 
 The next day was Sunday, and, of course, there 
 was none of the work about the farm that the 
 girls of the Camp Fire had enjoyed so much. They 
 weut to church in the morning, and when they re- 
 turned Bessie was surprised to see Charlie Jamie- 
 son, the lawyer, Eleanor Mercer’s cousin, sitting 
 on the front piazza. Eleanor took Bessie with her 
 wEen she went to greet him. 
 
 “No had news, Charlie?” she said, anxiously. 
 He was looking after the interests of Bessie and 
 of Zara, whose father, unjustly accused as Charlie 
 and the girls believed, of counterfeiting, was in 
 prison in the city from which the Camp Eire 
 Girls came. Charlie Jamieson had about decided 
 that his imprisonment was the result of a con- 
 spiracy in which Parmer Weeks, from. Bessie’s 
 home town, Hedgeville, was mixed up with a Mr. 
 Holmes, a rich merchant of the city. The reason 
 for the persecution of the two girls and of Zara’s 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 .25 
 
 fatlier was a mystery, bat Jamieson had made up 
 his mind to solve it. 
 
 ‘E'To— not bad news, exactly,” he said. ‘‘Bat 
 I’ve had a talk with Holmes, and I’m worried, 
 Eleanor. You know'^, that wans a pretty bold thing 
 he did the other day, when he trapped Bessie into 
 going v/ith him for an auto^niobile ride and tried 
 to kidnap her. That ’s a serious offence, and a 
 man in Holmes’s position in the city wmaldn’t be 
 mixed up in it unless there was a very important 
 reason. And from the way he talked to me' I ’m 
 more convinced than ever that he will just be wait- 
 ing for a chance to try it again.” 
 
 “What did he say to you, Charlie!” 
 
 “Oh, nothing very definite. He advised me to 
 drop this case. He reminded me that he had a 
 good deal of influence— and that he could bring 
 me a lot of business, or keep it away. And he said 
 that if I didn’t quit meddling with this business 
 I’d have reason to feel sorry.” 
 
 “What did you tell him!” 
 
 “To get out of my office before I kicked bim 
 out! He didn’t like that, I can tell you. But I 
 noticed that he got out. But here’s the point. 
 Are you still planning that camping trip to Long 
 Lake!” 
 
 “Yes— I think it would be splendid there.” 
 
 “Well, why don’t yoii start pretty soon! Holmes 
 knows this country very well, and he ’s got so 
 much money that, if he spends it, he can probably 
 
26 THE CAMP FIKE GIELS ! 
 
 find people to do what lie wants. Up there it’s 
 lonely country, and pretty wild, and you could 
 keep an eye on Bessie and Zara even better than 
 you can here. I don’t know why he wants to 
 have them in his power, but it’s quite evident that 
 their plans depend on that for success, and our 
 best plan, as long as we’re in the dark this way, 
 and don’t know the answer to all these puzzling 
 things, is to keep things as they are. I’m con- 
 vinced that they can’t do anything that need worry 
 us much as long as we have Bessie and Zara safe 
 and sound.” 
 
 ‘AVe can start to-morrow,” said Eleanor. 
 “Bessie— will you tell the girls to get ready? I’ll 
 go and make arrangements, Charlie.” 
 
 And so, the next day, after lunch, the Camp 
 Fire Girls, waving their hands to kindly Mrs. 
 Farnham, and making a great fuss over Walter, 
 who drove them to the station, said good-bye, for 
 the time, at least, to the farm. And Dolly Ran- 
 som, Bessie noticed, took pains to be particularly 
 nice to Walter Stubbs, 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 LONG LAKE 
 
 “I love travelling,” said Dolly, when they were 
 settled in their places in the train that was to take 
 them up into the hills and on the first stage of 
 the journey to Long Lake. “I like to see new 
 places and new neople.” 
 
 “Dolly’s never content for very long in one 
 place,” said Eleanor Mercer, who overheard her 
 remark, smiling. “If she had her way she’d be 
 flying aU over the country all the time. Wouldn’t 
 you, Dolly?” 
 
 “I don’t like to know w^hat’s going to happen 
 next all the time,” said Dolly. 
 
 “I know just how" you feel,” Bessie surprised 
 her by saying. ‘ ‘ I used to think, sometimes, when 
 I was on Paw Hoover’s farm in Hedgeville, that- 
 if only I could go to sleep some nig*ht without 
 knowing just what was going to happen the next 
 day I’d be happy. It was always the same, too— 
 just the same things to do, and the same places 
 to see—” 
 
 “I should think Jake Hoover would have kept 
 you guessing what he was going to do next,” said 
 Doily, spitefully. ‘ ‘ The great big bully ! Oh, how 
 glad I was when Will Burns knocked him down 
 the other day ! ’ ’ 
 
 27 
 
28 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 ‘‘Yes/’ admitted Bessie^ “I didn’t know jnsti 
 what Jake was going to tell Maw ^oover ahont \ 
 me next— hut then, you see, I always knew it was t 
 something that vrould get me into trouble, and I 
 that I’d either get beaten or get a scolding and! 
 have to do without my supper. So even about I 
 that it wasn ’t very difficult to Imow what was 1 
 going to happen,” j 
 
 “Heavens— I’d have run away long'before. you 
 did,” said Dolly, with a shudder, “I don’t see 
 how you ever stood it as long as you did, Bessie. 1 
 It must have been awful. ” , i' 
 
 “It was, Dolly,” said Eleanor, gravely. “I was| 
 there, and I made a point of looking into things,' 
 so that if anyone ever blamed me for helping; 
 Bessie and Zara to get away, I could explain that: 
 I hadn’t just taken Bessie’s word for things. But' 
 running away was a pretty hard thing to do. It’s 
 easy to talk about— but where was Bessie to go? 
 She isn’t like you— or she wmsn’t. 
 
 “She didn’t have a lot of friends, who would 
 have thought it was just a fine joke for her to 
 have run off that way. If you did it, you’d have a 
 good time, and when you got tired of it, you’d go 
 back to your Aunt Mabel, and she’d scold you a 
 little, and that would be the end of it. You must 
 have thought of trying to get away, Bessie, didn’t 
 you?” 
 
 “Oh, I did. Miss Eleanor, often and often. 
 "When Jake was very bad, or Maw Hoover was 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 29 
 
 meaner tlian usual. But it’s just as you say. I 
 was afraid that wherever I went it would he worse 
 than it was there. I didn’t know where to go or 
 what to do. ’ ’ 
 
 “ Well--that’s so,” ‘said Dolly. “It must have 
 been awfully hard. But then, how did you ever 
 get the nen^e to do it at ail, Bessie? That’s what 
 I don’t understand. The way you act now^, it 
 seems as if you always w'-anted to do just as you 
 are told.” 
 
 “I thought you’d heard all about that, Dolly. 
 You see, when we really did run aivay, we couldn’t 
 help it, Zara and I. And I don’t believe v/e really 
 meant to go quite away, the way we did— not at 
 first. You remember when we saw you girls 
 first— when you were in cam^p in the woods?” 
 
 “Oh, yes; I remember seeing you, with your 
 head just poking out of the door of that funny 
 old hut by the lake. I thought it was awfully 
 funny, but I didn’t know you then, of course.” 
 
 “I expect you’d have thought it was funny 
 wLether you knew us or not, Dolly. Well, you see, 
 Zara had come over to see me the day it all hap- 
 pened, and Jake caught her talking v/ith me, and 
 locked her in the ■woodshed. Maw Hoover didn’t 
 like Zara, because she was a foreigner, and Maw 
 thought she stole eggs and chickens- but Zara 
 never did such a thing in her life. So Jake locked 
 her in the woodshed, and said that he was going 
 to keep her there till Maw Hoover came home. 
 She’d gone to town.” 
 
THE CAMP EIRE GIRLS 
 
 ^^0 
 
 ‘‘MHay did lie want to do that?” 
 
 ^‘Because Maw had said that if she ever caught 
 Zara around their place again she was going to 
 take a stick to her and heat her until she was 
 hlack and blue^and I ghess she meant it, too. 
 She liked to give people heatings— me, I mean. 
 She never touched Jake, though, and she never 
 helieved he did anything wrong.” 
 
 Dolly whistled. 
 
 ”If she k?iew him the way I do, she would,” she 
 said. ”And I’ve only seen him twice — hut that’s 
 two times too many!” 
 
 “Well, after he’d locked her in, Jake went off, 
 and I tried to let her out. I couldn’t find the key, 
 and I was trying to break the lock on the door 
 with a stone. I’d nearly got it done, when Jake 
 came along and found me doing it. So he stood 
 off and threw hits of burning wood from the fire 
 near me, to frighten me. That was an old trick 
 of his. 
 
 ‘ ' But that time the woodshed caught fire, and 
 he was scared. He got the key, and we let Zara 
 out, and then he said he was going to tell Maw 
 Hoover that we’d set the place on fire on pur- 
 pose. I knew she’d believe him, and we were 
 frightened, and ran off.” 
 
 “Well, I should say so! Who wouldn’t? Why, 
 he’s worse than I thought he was, even, and I 
 knew he was pretty had.” 
 
 “We were going to Zara’s place first, but that 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 31 
 
 was tlie day they arrested Zara’s father. They 
 said he’d been making bad money, but I don’t 
 believe it. But anyhow, we heard them talking 
 in their place— Zara’s and her father’s— and they 
 said that I’d set the barn on fire, and they were 
 going to have me arrested, and that Zara would 
 have to go and live with old Farmer Weeks, who’s 
 the meanest man in that state. And so we kept 
 on running away, because we knew that it couldn’t 
 be any worse for us if we went than if we stayed. 
 So that’s how we finally came away.” 
 
 “Oh, how exciting! I wish I ever had adven- 
 tures like that!” 
 
 “Don’t be silly, Dolly,” said Eleanor, severely. 
 “Bessie and Zara were very lucky— they might 
 have had a very hard time. And you had all the 
 adventure you need the other day when you made 
 Bessie go off looking for ice-cream sodas with 
 you. You be content to go along the way you 
 ought to and you’ll have plenty of fun without 
 the danger of adventures. They sound very nice, 
 after they’re all over, but when, they’re happen- 
 ing they’re not very pleasant” 
 
 “That’s so,” admitted Dolly, becoming grave. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon before they reached 
 the station at which they had to change from the 
 main line. There they waited for a time before 
 the little two-car train on the branch line was 
 ready to start. Short and light as it was, that 
 train had to be drawn by two puffing, snorting en- 
 
32 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 gines, for the rest o'f the trip was a climlb, and a 
 stilf cue, since Long Lake was fairly high up, 
 though the train, after it passed the station near- 
 est to the lake, would climh a good deal higher. 
 
 Even after they left the train finally, they w^ere 
 still some distance from their destination. 
 
 “Yon needn’t look at that hnckboard as if yon 
 were going to ride in it, girls,” said Eleanor, 
 laughing, as they surveyed the single vehicle that 
 v/as vfaiting near the track. “That’s just for the 
 baggage. Now you can see, maybe, why you were 
 told yon couldn’t bring" many things with you. 
 And if that isn’t enough, wait until yon see the 
 trail ! ” 
 
 Soon all the baggage vvas stowed away on th^ 
 back pf the backboard and securely tied on, and 
 then the driver whipped up the stocky horses, and 
 drove off, while the girls gave him the Wohelo 
 cheer.. 
 
 “But hov7 are we going to get to Long Lake?” 
 asked Dolly, apprehensively. 
 
 “We’re going to walk!” langhed Eleanor. 
 “Come on nova or we won’t get there in time 
 for snpper— and I’ll bet we’lj all have a fine appe- 
 tite for su|)per to-night!” 
 
 Then she took the van, and led the way across 
 a field and into the woods that grew thickly near 
 the track. 
 
 “This isn’t the way the backboard vfent!” 
 said Dolly. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 33 
 
 “No— we’il strike tlie road pretty soon, 
 tlio'iigii,” said Eleanor. “Yv^e save a little time by 
 taking tiiis trail. In the old days tbere wasn’t any 
 way to get to tbo lake, or to. carry anything there, 
 except by walking. And when they built the cordti- 
 I'oy road they couldn’t make it as short as the trail, 
 although, wherever they could, they followed the 
 old trail. So this is a sort of short cut.” 
 
 ^‘Wl-iat’s a corduroy road?” asked Lolly. 
 
 “Don’t yon know that? I thought you knew 
 something about the woods, Dolly. My, what a 
 lot you’ve got to learn. It’s, made of logs and 
 they’re built in woods and places where it’s hard 
 to make a regular road, or would cost too much. 
 All that’s needed, you see, is to chop dovni trees 
 enough to make a clear path, and then to put 
 down the logs, close together. It’s rough going, 
 and no wagon with spinngs can be driven over it, 
 but it’s all right for a hnckboard.” 
 
 “Ugh!” said Dolly. “I should think it would 
 shake you to pieces.” 
 
 “It does, pretty nearly,” said Eleahor, with a 
 smile. “One usuallj^ only rides' over one ^once — 
 after &at one walks, and is glad of the chance.” 
 
 When, after a three-mile tramp, Eleanor, 
 who was in front, stopped suddenly at a point 
 where the trees thinned out, on top of a ridge, 
 and called out, “Here’s the lake, girls!” there 
 was a wild rush to reach her side. And the view. 
 
34 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIKLS 
 
 wlien they got the first glimpse of it^ was cer- 
 tainly worth all the trouble it had caused them. 
 
 Before them stretched a long body of water, 
 sapphire blue in the twilight, with pink shadows 
 where the setting sun was reflected. Perhaps two 
 miles longj the lake was, at its widest point, not 
 more than a quarter of a mile across, whence, of 
 course, came its name. About it the land sloped 
 do\vn on all sides, into a cup-like depression that 
 formed the lake, so that there was, on all four 
 sides, a tree crowned ridge. From a point about 
 half way to the far end of the lake smoke rose in 
 the calm evening air. 
 
 “Oh, how beautiful!” cried Bessie. “It’s the 
 loveliest place I ever saw. And how wonderful 
 the smell is.” 
 
 “That’s from the pine trees,” said Eleanor. 
 She sighed, as if overcome by the calm beauty of 
 ■ the scene, as, indeed, she was. “It’s always beau- 
 tiful here— but sometimes I think it’s most beau- 
 tiful in winter, when, the lake is covered with 
 ice, and the trees are all weighed down with snow. 
 Then, of course, you can walk or skate all over 
 the lake— it’s frozen four and five feet deep, as a 
 rule, by January.” 
 
 Dolly shivered. 
 
 “But isn’t it awfully cold here?” she inquired. 
 
 “Oh, yes; but it’s so dry that one doesn’t mind 
 the cold half as much as we do at home when it’s- 
 really ten or fifteen degrees warmer, Dolly. One- 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 35 
 
 dresses for it, too, you see, in thick, woolen things, . 
 and furs, and there’s such glorious sport. You 
 can break holes through the ice and fish, and then 
 there are ice boats, and skating races, and all sorts 
 of things. Oh, it’s glorious. I’ve been up here 
 in winter a lot, and I really do think that’s best 
 of all.” 
 
 Then she looked at the rising smoke. 
 
 “Well, we mustn’t stay here and talk any 
 more,” she said. “Come along, girls, it’s getting 
 near to supper time.” 
 
 “Have we got to cook supper?” asked' Dolly, 
 anxiously. 
 
 “No, not tomight,” said Eleanor, with a laugh* 
 “The guides have done it for us, because I knew” 
 we’d all be tired and ready for a good rest, with- 
 out any work to do. But with breakfast to- 
 morrow we’ll start in and do all our own work,, 
 just as we’ve done when we’ve been in camp 
 before. ’ ’ 
 
 Half an hour’s brisk walk took them to the site 
 of the camp. There there was a little sandy beach, 
 and the tents had been pitched on ground that was 
 slightly higher. Behind each tent a trench had 
 been dug, so that, in case of rain, the water flow- 
 ing down from the high ground in the rear would 
 be diverted and carried down into the lake. 
 
 Before the tents a great fire was burning, and 
 the girls cried out happily at the sight of plates, 
 with knives and forks and tin pannikins set by 
 
3G THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 Eiem, all spread out in a great circle near the fire. 
 At the fire itself two or three men were busy with 
 frying pans and great coffee pots, and the savory 
 smell of frying bacon, that never tastes half as 
 good as when it is eaten in the woods, rose and 
 mingled with the sweet, spicy smell of the balsams 
 and the firs, the pines and the spruces. 
 
 “Oh, but I’m glad we’re here!” cried Dolly, 
 with a huge sigh of content. “And I’m glad toi 
 see supper— and smell it!” 
 
 And what a supper that was ! For many of the 
 girls, like Bessie, and Zara, and Dolly, it was the 
 first woods meal. How good the bacon was, and 
 the raised biscuit, as light and flaky as snow- 
 flakes, cooked as only woods guides know how to 
 cook them ! And then, afterward, the great plates 
 heaped high with flapjacks, that were to be eaten 
 with butter and maple syrup that came from the 
 trees all about them. Not the adulterated, wishy- 
 washy maple syrup that is sold, as a rule, even 
 in the best grocery stores of the cities, but the real, 
 luscious maple syrup that is taken from the run- 
 ning sap in the first warm days of February, and 
 refined in great kettles, right under the trees that 
 yielded the sap. 
 
 And then, when it was time to turn in, how they 
 did sleep! The air seemed to have some myster- 
 ious qualities of making one v/ant to sleep. And 
 the peape of the great out-of-doors brooded over 
 the camp that night. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 A EECKLESS ErCUESIOir 
 
 In the morning, when the girls awoke, there was 
 no sign of the guides who had cooked that tempt- 
 ing and delicious supper the night before. 
 
 “V/’ell, we’re on our own resources now, girls,” 
 said the Guardian. “This may be a sort of Eden 
 —I hope we’ll find it so. But it’s goin?; to oe a 
 manless one. There’ll be no men wrc un. " we 
 get ready to go away, if I can help it— exce; as 
 visitors. ” 
 
 “Well, I guess we. can get along without them 
 all right, for a change,” said Dolly, blushing a 
 little. 
 
 “Some of the men I know who are interested 
 in the Boy Scouts think the Camp Eire Girls are 
 a good deal of a joke,” said Eleanor, with a light 
 in her eyes that might have made some of the 
 scoffers she referred to anxious to eat their 
 words. “They say we get along all right because 
 we ahvays have some man ready to help us out 
 if we get into any trouble. So I planned this camp 
 just to show them that we can do just as well as 
 any troop of Boy Scouts ever did.” 
 
 “I bet we can, too,” said Dolly, eagerly. “V/hy, 
 with such a lot of us to do the work, it won’t be 
 very hard for any one of us.” 
 
S3 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “Not if we all do our share, Dolly,” said 
 Eleanor, looking at her rather pointedly. “But 
 if some of us are always managing to disappear 
 just when there’s work to he done, someone will 
 have to do double duty— and that’s not fair.” 
 
 “I won’t— really I won’t. Miss Eleanor,” said 
 Dolly. “I know I’ve shirked sometimes, hut I’m 
 not going to this time. I’m going to work hard 
 now to be a Eire Maker. I think I’ve been a 
 Wood Gatherer long enough, don’t you!” 
 
 “You’ve served more time than is needed for 
 promotion, Dolly. It’s all up to you, as the boys 
 say. As soon as you win the honors you need you 
 can be a Eire Maker. You can have your new 
 rank just as soon as you earn it. ” 
 
 “Bessie and I are going to be made Eire Mak- 
 ers together, if we can. Miss Eleanor. We talked 
 that over the other day, at the farm, and I think 
 we’ll be ready at the first camp fire we have after 
 We get home. ’ ’ 
 
 “Well, you’ll please me very much if you do. 
 It’s time the other girls were getting up now — 
 we’ve got to cook breakfast now. I’ll call them 
 while you two build a fire— there’s plenty of wood 
 for to-day, piled up over there.” 
 
 As Dolly had said, with each girl doing her 
 share, the work of the camp was light. While 
 some of the girls did the cooking, others prepared 
 the “dining table”— a smooth place on the 
 ground— and others pinned up the bottom flaps of 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 39 
 
 tlie tents, after turning out the bedding, so that 
 the floors of the tents might be well aired. And 
 then they all sat down, happily and hungrily, to 
 a breakfast that tasted just as good as had supper 
 the night before. 
 
 “Can we swim in the lake. Miss Eleanor?’’ 
 asked Margery Burton. 
 
 “If you want to,” said Eleanor, with a smile. 
 “It’s pretty cold water, though; a good deal 
 colder than it was at the sea shore last year. You 
 see, this lake is fed by springs, and in the spring 
 the ice melts, and the water in April and May is 
 just like ice water. But you’ll get used to it, if 
 you only stay in a couple of minutes at first, and 
 get accustomed to the chill gradually. But re- 
 member the rule: no one is ever to go in unless 
 I’m right at hand, and there must always be some- 
 one in a boat, ready to help if a girl gets a cramp 
 or any other sort of trouble.” 
 
 “Oh, are there boats?” cried Dolly. “That’s 
 fine! Where are they. Miss Eleanor?” 
 
 “You shall see them after we’ve cleared away 
 the breakfast things and washed up. But there’s 
 a rule about the boats, too: no one is to go out 
 in them except in bathing suits. And remember 
 this, when you’re out on the lake. It’s very nar- 
 row, and it looks very calm and safe, now. 
 
 “But at this time of the year there are often 
 severe squalls up here, and they come over the 
 hills so quickly that it’s easy to get caught unless 
 
40 
 
 '■THE CAMP FIEE'GlIii.3 
 
 you’re very careful. I think there had better al- 
 ways be two girls in each boat. We don’t want 
 any accidents.” .1 
 
 “Can we go for walks through the woods, Miss 
 Eleanor!” 
 
 “Oh, yes; that’s the most beautiful x)art cf ’oe- 
 ing up here. But it’s easy to get lost. When 
 you start on a trail alvrays stick to it. Don’t be, 
 tempted, to go off e:q)loring. I ’in going to give 
 you all some lessons in finding your way in the 
 woods. You know, the moss is always on the 
 south side of a tree, and there are other ways of 
 telling direction, by the leaves. I expect you all 
 to he regular woodsmen v»dien we go away from 
 here, and I’m sure you’ll learn things about the 
 woods that will give you a good many pleasant 
 times in the future.” 
 
 “Isn’t there anyone else at all up here, Miss 
 Eleanor? I should think there ’d be a hotel or 
 something like that here. ’ ’ 
 
 “No, not yet; not right near here. This lake is 
 part of a big preserve that is owned by a lot of 
 men in the city. My father is one of them, and 
 they have tried to keep all this part of the woods 
 just as nature left it. There are a lot of deer 
 here, and in the fall, when hunters come into the 
 woods, they have to keep out of this part of them. 
 A few deer are shot here, because if only a few 
 are taken each year, it’s all right. But there will 
 be no hotels in this tract. Hotels mean the end 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 41 
 
 of the real woods life. There are half a dozen 
 lakes in the preserve, and each of the families 
 that owns a share in it has a camp at one of the 
 lakes. I mean a regular camp, with wooden build- 
 ings, where one can stay in the winter, even. But 
 this lake was set apart for trips like this, where 
 people can gfet right back to nature, and sleep in 
 tents. ’ ’ 
 
 ‘ ‘ Then we can go over and see some of the 
 other lakes?” 
 
 “Yes; I don’t know whether we’ll find anyone 
 at home in any of the camps or not, but they’ll 
 be glad to see us if they are there. A lot of people 
 wait until later in the year to come up here— 
 until the hunting season l?egins. But we can do 
 some hunting even now, though it’s against the 
 law to do any shooting. ” 
 
 “Oh, I know^ what you mean. Miss Eleanor— 
 with a camera?” 
 
 It was Margery Burton who thought of that. 
 
 “Yes. And that’s really the best sort of hunt- 
 ing, I think. If you’ve ever seen a deer, and had 
 it look at you with (its big, soft eyes I cton’t see 
 how you can kill it. It’s almost as hard to get 
 a good picture of a deer as it is to kill it — in fact, 
 I think it’s harder, because you have to get so 
 much closer to it. And it’s awfully good fun at 
 night. 
 
 “Yon go to one of their runways, and settle 
 down, with your camera and a flashlight powder, 
 
42 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 and then when the deer comes, if you’re very 
 quick, you can get a really beautiful picture. The 
 deer may be a little frightened, but he isn’t hurt, 
 and you have a picture that you can keep for 
 years and show to people. And an experienced 
 hunter will tell you that any time you can get 
 close enough to a deer to get a good flashlight pic- 
 ture of him you could easily have killed him.” 
 
 “Why is it so very hard to do that?” 
 
 “Well, for lots of reasons. You have to figure 
 on the wind— because if the wind is blowing away 
 from you and toward the deer he can smell you 
 long before he’s in sight, and off he goes, afraid 
 to come any nearer.” 
 
 “But how can you tell where a deer will be?” 
 
 “They have regular runways— just as we have 
 trails. And at night they come down to the lake 
 to drink. So you can station yourself on one of 
 those runways, and be pretty sure that sooner or 
 later a deer vdll come along.” 
 
 The morning passed quickly and happily. To 
 the girls who had never before been in that coun- 
 try, there seemed to ‘be an unending number of 
 new discoveries. Timid as the deer might be, 
 there was nothing nervous about the squirrels and 
 chipmunks which abounded in the woods near the 
 lake, and as soon as they saw the girls they came 
 running about, so that there were often half a 
 dozen or more begging noisily for dainties to af- 
 ford them a change from their diet of nuts, sitting 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 43 
 
 up, and chattering prettily as they got the mor- 
 sels that were tossed to them. 
 
 “I never saw them so tame, even at home,” 
 said Bessie, surprised. “We had plenty of them 
 there, but I suppose they were wilder because 
 the boys used to shoot them. They don’t do that 
 here, I suppose?” 
 
 “No; the people who hunt around here go in 
 for bigger game. They would think they were 
 wasting their time if they bothered to shoot chip- 
 munks and squirrels.” 
 
 “I’ve seen them tame before, but that was in 
 the park, at home, and it isn’t the same thing at 
 all,” said Dolly. 
 
 “No; though they’re very cute, and I’m glad 
 there afe so many of them there. But here, of 
 course, they’re in their real home, and it’s differ- 
 ent, and much nicer, I think.” 
 
 Then, after luncheon. Miss Eleanor divided the 
 girls into watches. 
 
 “I think we’ll have more fun if a certain num- 
 ber stay home every afternoon to prepare dinner 
 and cook it,” she said. “Then the rest of you can 
 go for walks, or do anything you like, so long 
 as you are back in time for dinner. In that way, 
 some of you will be free every afternoon, and 
 those who have to work won’t mind, because they 
 will know that the next day they will be free, and 
 so on.” 
 
 Zara was one of those who drew a piece of 
 
44 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 paper marked “work” from the big hat in which 
 Miss Eleanor put a slip of paper for every girl, 
 while Bessie and Dolly each drew a slip marked 
 “play.” 
 
 “To-morrow the girls who work to-day will 
 play,” said Miss Eleanor, “and those who play 
 to-day will draw again. Fonr of them will play 
 again to-morrow, and the other four will work, 
 and then, on the third day, those who play to- 
 morrow will work, and on the fourth day to-day’s 
 four will work again. That will give everyone 
 two days off and one day to work while we’re in 
 camp. And I think that’s fair.” 
 
 So did everyone else, and Dolly, always willing 
 to put off work as long as she could, was delighted. 
 
 “Let’s take a long walk this afternoon, Bessie,” 
 she said. “The air up here makes me feel more 
 like walking than I ever do when I’m at home. 
 There I usually take a car whenever I can, though 
 I’ve been trying to walk more lately, so as to get 
 an honor bead.” 
 
 “I’ll be glad to take a walk, Dolly,” said Bessie, 
 laughing. “I think you ought to be encouraged 
 any time you really want to do something that’s 
 good for you.” 
 
 “Oh, if I stay with you long enough I’ll be 
 too good to keep on living,” said Dolly. “Don’t 
 you see the difference between us, Bessie? You’re 
 good because you like to do the things you ought 
 to do. And when anyone tells me something’s 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 45 
 
 good for me, I always get so tliat I don ’I w^ast 
 to do it. We’ll start riglit after I'aneL, shall wre?*’ 
 “All riglit,” said Bessie. 
 
 But before it was tipae to maLe a start sLe 
 sought out Miss Eleanoi'. 
 
 “I’m not really afraid, Yfanaka,” she sahl, 
 using the Indian name, Lince, here in the Woods,, 
 it Seemed natural to do it. ‘ ‘ But I thought I ViigM 
 to ask you if you think it’s all yight for me m go- 
 off with Dolly? I suppose none of those pe^le 
 who were trying to get hold of me wmuld do a^- 
 thing up here, would they?” ' l 
 
 “Oh, I don’t think so, Bessie. No, I thiii^ 
 you’re just as safe anywhere in these w'oods as 
 you would be right here in the camp. There are 
 a few guides around— they have to be kept here 
 to warn people who make camt) and don’t put. 
 out their fires properly. You see, my father and 
 the rest of the people don’t mind letting nice peo- 
 ple come here into their preserve to camp, but 
 they’ve got to be careful about fire. 
 
 “You can imagine what rvould happen here if 
 the woods caught fire ; it would be dreadful. Fur- 
 ther on, the woods are only just beginning to grow' 
 up again. They were all burned out a year or so 
 ago, and they look horrid. This preserve is so 
 beautiful that we all want to keep it looking just 
 as nice as possible. But the guides would look 
 after you: there’s nothing to be afraid of witk 
 them. 
 
46 
 
 THl? CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 “And I djn't believe that you’d be at all likely 
 to meet an/one else. Suppose you take the trail 
 that start^ at the far end of the lake, and follow 
 it straigOT over until you come to Little Bear 
 Lake, ^at’s a very pretty walk. But don’t go 
 off the /preserve. There’s a trail that leads over 
 to Loon Pond, but you’d better not try that until 
 we all go as a party.” 
 
 So, when the midday meal had been eaten, 
 Bessie and Dolly started off, skirting the edge of 
 the lake until they came to the beginning of the 
 trail Miss Mercer had spoken of, which was 
 marked by a birch bark sign on a tree. There 
 they left the lake, and plunged so quickly into 
 thick woods that the water was soon out of sight. 
 
 “Isn’t this lovely? Oh, I could walk miles and 
 miles here and never get tired at all, I believe!” 
 said Dolly. “But I do sort of wish there was a 
 hotel somevirhere around. They have dances, and 
 parties, and all sorts of fun at those hotels. And, 
 Bessie, do you know I heard there was one near 
 here, at a place called Loon Pond?” 
 
 “Is there?” 
 
 “Yes; I think it would be fun to go there some 
 time.” 
 
 “Well, maybe we can, some time, Dolly. When 
 Miss Eleanor is along. But we’d better not do it 
 to-day. You Imow she said we were to stick to 
 the preserve. ’ ’ 
 
 “Oh, bother; as if we could get into any mis- 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 47 
 
 chief up here! But I suppose there wouldn’t be 
 any use in trying to persuade you ; you always do 
 just us you’re told.” 
 
 “Oh, I’d like to see the hotel, too, Dolly, but 
 not to-day. The woods are enough for me now. 
 And we can go there some other time, I’m sure.” 
 
 Dolly said nothing more just then, and for a 
 time they walked along quietly. 
 
 “We’re about half way to Little Bear Lake 
 now,” announced Dolly, after a spell of silence. 
 
 “IVliy, how do you know!” 
 
 “Because I saw a map, and this ridge we’ve 
 just come to is half way between the two lakes.” 
 
 “Oh,” said Bessie. 
 
 “Yes. WY’ve been coming up hill so far now, 
 the rest of the way is down hill, so it will be 
 easier walking. ’ ’ 
 
 “That’s good; it means that when we’re going' 
 home Ave’ll be going down for the last half of 
 the trip, v/hen we’re tired. That’s much easier 
 than if it was the other way, I think.” 
 
 “You look tired, Bessie; why don’t you sit 
 down and rest?” 
 
 “Well, that’s not a bad idea, Dolly. I’m not 
 used to so much walking lately.” 
 
 “All right, sit down. I’m thirsty. I th,ink I’ll 
 just run ahead and see if I can find a spring 
 while you rest.” 
 
 So Dolly ran ahead, and disappeared after a 
 moment. Presently, when Bessie was rested, she 
 
48 
 
 THWCAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 started again/jand soon overtook Dolly. 
 
 “We turn here,” said Dolly. “See, here’s 
 another trail, and the signs sho;\v which one we ’re 
 to take.” , 
 
 “That’s funny,” said Bessie, puzzled. “I 
 thought we went to Little Bear in a perfectly 
 straight line. Miss Eleanor didn’t say anything 
 about changing direction. ’ ’ 
 
 “Weil, there’s the sign, Bessie. If we keep 
 straight on it says that we’ll come to Loon Pond. 
 We turn off to the right here to get to Little 
 Bear. ’ ’ 
 
 “Weli, I guess the sign must he right. But it 
 certainly seems funny. I hope there isn’t any 
 mistake.” 
 
 “Mistake! How can there he! Don’t he silly, 
 Bessie. There wouldn’t he any chanCe of that. 
 Come on.” 
 
 So they turned off, and, as they followed the 
 nev/ trail, the trees began to grow thinner, j^res- 
 ently. The whole character 6f the woods seemed 
 to change, too. They passed numerous places 
 where picnic parties had evidently eaten their 
 meals, and had left blackened spots, and the rem- 
 nants of their feasts. 
 
 “It seems to me some of the people who’ve been 
 here have been very careless, Dolly, ’ ’ said Bessie. 
 “Look, tliei'e’s a place where a fire started. It 
 didn’t get very far, hnt it burnt over quite a little 
 hit of ground before it was put out.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 49 
 
 The trail begaii to dip sharply, too, and before 
 long they were waiting in vfhat was almost open 
 Goniitr].'. Stamps of trees were all . about, c^nd 
 evidently wood-cutters had been at rvork. 
 
 “This isn’t half as pretty as Long Lake,” said 
 Bessie. “Oh, Dolly, look! What’s that!” 
 
 Dolly laughed in a peculiar fashion. For they 
 had come in sight of a sheet of water, and, in 
 plain view', not far from them, by the shore of 
 the lake, they saw a place that could not be mis- 
 taken. It proclaimed its nature at once— a reg- 
 ular summer hotel, with wide piazzas, full of peo- 
 ple. And on the water there were a score of 
 boats and canoes, and one or two launches. 
 
 “This isn’t Little Bear Lake!” said Bessie. 
 
 “Of course it isn’t, silly; it’s Loon Pond. I 
 changed the signs while you rested, becau.se I 
 meant to come here, and I knew you wouldn’t, if 
 you knew what you were doing!” 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE GYPSY CAMP 
 
 Bessie grew red witli indignation for a moment, 
 out before she spoke she was calm again. 
 
 “Don’t you think that’s a pretty mean trick, 
 Dolly?” she said, gently. “It seems to me it’s a 
 good deal like lying.” 
 
 “Why, Bessie King! Can’t you ever take a 
 joke? I didn’t say a single, solitary thing that, 
 wasn’t so. I said the signs said this was the way 
 to Little Bear Lake, and you never asked me if 
 I’d changed them, did you?” 
 
 Bessie laughed, helplessly. 
 
 “Oh, Dolly!” she said. “Of course I didn’t; 
 why should I? Who would ever think of doing 
 such a thing, except you? You don’t expect people 
 to guess what you’re going to do next, do you?” 
 
 “I suppose not,” said Dolly, impenitently, her 
 eyes still twinkling. “I do manage to surprise 
 people pretty often. My Aunt Mabel says that if 
 I spent half as much time studying as I do think- 
 ing up new sorts of mischief I’d be at the top of 
 every class I’m in at school.” 
 
 “She’s perfectly right. I thought at first you 
 had a hard time with your aunt, Dolly, but I’m 
 through being sorry for you. She needs all the 
 
 50 
 
A.T LONG LAKE 
 
 51 
 
 sympathy anyone has got for having to try to 
 look after you!” 
 
 '‘Oh, what’s the harm? We’re here now, and 
 it isn’t so very dreadful, is it? Come on, let’s 
 go over to the hotel.” 
 
 “Indeed we shan’t do anything of the soit 
 Dolly Eansom. We’ll turn around and go right 
 straight back to Long Lake, that’s what v/e’il do.” 
 
 “I guess not. You don’t think I’ve come this 
 far and that I’m going to turn around without 
 seeing what the place is like, do you?” 
 
 “Why, Dolly, you know we weren’t supposed 
 to come here alone. I don’t think much of it; it 
 isn’t half as pretty as Long Lake. What’s the 
 use of wasting our time here, anyhow?” 
 
 “Why— why— because there are people here! 
 I just love seemg people, Bessie, they’re so in- 
 teresting, because they’re all so different, and you 
 never know what they’re going to say or do. And 
 there may be someone we know here, too.” 
 
 “There can’t be anyone I know, Dolly.” 
 
 “Oh, bother! Well, there may be someone I 
 know, and that’s the same thing, isn’t it? Come 
 on, be a sport, Bessie.” 
 
 “That’s what you said about going in the ear 
 with Mr. Holmes the other day, too.” 
 
 “Oh, but this isn’t a bit like that, Bessie.” 
 
 “It might get us into just as much mischief, 
 Dolly. No, I’m not going over there. It’s silly, 
 and it’s wrong.” 
 
THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 S2 
 
 And this time Bessie stood firm. Despite 
 Doily’s pleading, which turned, presently, to 
 angry threats, she refused afesolutely to go any 
 nearer the hotel, and Dolly was afraid to venture 
 there alone, thougli there was very little she was 
 afraid to do. In her inmost heart, of course, 
 Doily knew that Bessie was right, and that sh§ 
 had had no business to trick her chum into seem- 
 ing to break her promise to Miss Eleanor. 
 
 “Oh, well,” she said, “I might have known that 
 1 couldn’t always make you do what you don’t 
 want to do, Bessie. You’re not mad at me, are 
 you?” 
 
 Bessie, pleased by this sign of surrender, re- 
 turned the smile. 
 
 “I ought to be, hut I’m not, Dolly,” she an- 
 swered. “I think that is one of the reasons you 
 keep on doing these things— that no one ever 
 really does get angry with you, as they should. If 
 ■someone you really cared for got properly angry 
 at you just once for one of your little tricks, I 
 tldnlc it would teach you not to do anything of 
 the sort for a long time.” 
 
 “Oh, I don’t mean any harm, Bessie, and you 
 know it, and when people really like you they 
 don’t get angry unless they think you’re really 
 trying to be mean. I say, Bessie, if you won’t go 
 over to the hotel, will you walk just a little way 
 over to the other side, and see what that funny 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 53 
 
 looking place is where those big wagons are all 
 spread out?” 
 
 Bessie followed Dolly’s pointing finger, and 
 saw, on the side of Loon Pond opposite the hotel, 
 several wagons, among which smoke vms rising. 
 
 “It looks like a circus,” said Doily. 
 
 “It isn’t, though. I know what they are,” said 
 Bessie, promptly. “It’s a gypsy encampment. 
 Do you mean you’ve never seen one, Dolly?” 
 
 “No; and oh dear, Bessie, I’ve always wanted 
 to. Surely we could go a little nearer, couldn’t 
 we ? As long as we ’re here ? ” 
 
 Bessie thought it over for a moment, and, as a 
 matter of fact, really could see no harm in spend- 
 ing ten minutes or so in walking over toward the 
 gypsy camp. She herself had seen a few gypsies 
 near Hedgeville in her time, but in that part of the 
 country those strange wanderers were not pop- 
 ular, 
 
 “All right,” she said. “But if I do that will 
 you promise to start for home as soon as we’ve 
 had a look at them, and never to play such a 
 trick on me again?” 
 
 “I certainly will. Bessie, you’re a darling. 
 And I’ll tell you something else, too; you were 
 so nice about the way I changed those signs that 
 I’m really sorry I did it. And I just thought it 
 would be a good joke. Usually I’m glad when 
 people get angry at my jokes, it shows they were 
 good ones.” 
 
54 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 Bessie smiled wisely to herself. Gradually she 
 was learning that the way to rob Dolly’s jokes 
 and teasing tricks of their sting, and the best 
 way, at the same time, to cure Dolly herself of 
 her fondness for them, was never to let the joker 
 know that they had had the effect she planned. 
 
 Dolly, considerably relieved, as a matter of 
 fact, when she found that Bessie was really not 
 angry at her for the trick she had played with the 
 sign post, chattered volubly as they turned to walk 
 over toward the gypsy camp. 
 
 “I don’t see why they call this a pond and the 
 one we’re on a lake,” she said. “This is ever so 
 much bigger than Long Lake. Why, it must be 
 four or five miles long, don’t you think, Bessie!” 
 
 “Yes. I guess they call it a pond because it 
 looks just like a big, overgrown ice pond. See, 
 it’s round. I think Long Lake is ever so much 
 prettier, don’t you, even though it’s smaller?” 
 
 “I certainly do. This place isn’t like the woods 
 at all, it’s more like regular country, that you 
 can find by just taking a trolley car and riding 
 a few miles out from the city.” 
 
 “It used to be just as it is now around Long 
 Lake, I suppose,” said Bessie. “But they’ve cut 
 the trees down, and made room for tennis courts 
 and all sorts of things like that, and then, I sup- 
 pose, they needed wood to build the hotel, too. 
 It’s quite a big place, isn’t it, Dolly?” 
 
 “Yes, and I’ve heard of it before, too,” said 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 55 
 
 Ddfly. “A frim4 of mae stefied up here for a 
 monlii tw© or years go. ®te says they ad- 
 vertise &at it’s wild aud jr^t like Bving right ia 
 the woods, but it isn’t, at ail. I it’s for peo- 
 ple who like to feiak feey’re rm^hing it when 
 they’re really just as oemfortafele as they would 
 be if tliey stayed at home. Comfortable the same 
 way, I mean.” 
 
 “Yes, that’s better, Dolly. Because I think 
 we’re comfortable, though it’s very different from 
 the way we would live in the city, or even from 
 the way we lived at the farm. But we’re really 
 roughing it, I guess.” 
 
 “Yes, and it’s fine, too! Tell me, Bessie, did 
 you ever see any gypsies like these when you lived 
 in the country?” 
 
 ‘ ‘ There were gypsies around Hedgeville two or 
 three times, but the farmers all hated them, and 
 used to try to drive them away, and Maw Hoover 
 told me not to go near them when they were 
 around. She usually gave me so many things to 
 do that I couldn’t, anyhow. You know, the farm- 
 ers say that they’ll steal anything, but I think 
 one reason for that is that the farmers drove them 
 into doing it, in the beginning, I mean. They, 
 wouldn’t let them act like other people, and they 
 didn’t like to sell them things. So I Ijiink the 
 poor gypsies wanted to get even, and that’s how 
 they began to steal.” 
 
56 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “MTiat do you suppose they’re doing up here, 
 Bessie ? ’ ’ 
 
 ‘‘They always go around to the summer places, 
 and in the winter they go south, to where the 
 people from the north go to get warm when it’s 
 winter at home. They tell fortunes, and they 
 make all sorts of queer things that people like to 
 buy; lace, and bead things. And I suppose up 
 here they sell all sorts of souvenirs, too; baskets, 
 and things like that.” 
 
 “Don’t they have any real homes, Bessie?” 
 
 “No; except in their wagons. They live in 
 them all the time, and they always manage to be 
 where it’s warm in the winter. They don’t care 
 where they go, you see. One place is just like 
 another to them. They never have settled in 
 towns. They’ve been wanderers for ages and 
 ages, and they have their own language. They 
 know all sorts of things about the weather, and 
 they can find their way anywhere.” 
 
 “How do you know so much about thfem, Bessie, 
 if you never saw anything of them when you were 
 in Hedgeville?” 
 
 “I read a book about them once. It’s called 
 ‘Lavengro,’ and it’s by a man who’s been dead 
 a long time now ; his name was Borrow. ’ ’ 
 
 “IVliat a funny name! I never heard of that 
 book, but I’ll get it and read it when I get home. 
 It tells about the gypsies, you say?” 
 
 “Yes. But I guess not about the gypsies as 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 57 
 
 they are now, hut more as they used to be. We’re 
 getting close, now. See all the babies! Aren’t 
 they cute and brown?” 
 
 Two or three parties, evidently from the hotel, 
 were looking about the camp, but they paid little 
 attention to the two Camp Fire Girls, evidently 
 recognizing that they did not come from the hotel. 
 The gypsies, however, always on the alert when 
 they see a chance to make money by selling their 
 wares or by telling fortunes, flocked about them, 
 particularly the women. Bessie, fair haired and 
 blond, they seemed disposed to neglect, but Bessie 
 noticed that several of the men looked admiringly 
 at Dolly, whose dark hair and eyes, though she 
 was, of course, much fairer than their own women, 
 seemed to appeal to them. 
 
 “I’d like to have my fortune told!” Dolly 
 whispered. 
 
 “I think we’d better not do that, Dolly, really; 
 and you remember you said you’d stay just for 
 a minute.” 
 
 “I don’t see what harm it would do,” Dolly 
 pouted. But she gave in, nevertheless. They 
 passed the door of the strangely decorated tent 
 inside of which the secrets of the future were sup- 
 posed to be revealed, and, followed by a curious 
 pack of children, walked on to a wagon where a 
 pretty girl, who seemed no older than themselves 
 but was probably, because the gypsy women grow 
 old so much more quickly than American girls. 
 
58 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 actually younger, was sitting. She was sewing 
 beads to a jacket, and she looked up with a bright ^ 
 smile as they approached. 
 
 “You come from the hotel?” she said. “You 
 live there?” 
 
 “No,” said Dolly. “We come from a long way 
 off. Are you going to wear that jacket?” 
 
 The gypsy girl laughed. 
 
 “No. I’m making that for my man, him over 
 there by the tree, smoking, see? He’s my man; 
 he’s goin’ marry me when I get it done.” 
 
 Bessie laughed. 
 
 “Marry you? Why, you’re only a girl like 
 me!” she exclaimed. 
 
 “No, no; me woman,” protested the gypsy, 
 eagerly. “See, I’m so tall already!” 
 
 And she sprang up to show them how tall she 
 was. But Bessie and Dolly only laughed the 
 more, until Bessie saw that something like anger 
 was coming into her black eyes, and checked 
 Dolly’s laugh. 
 
 “I hope you’ll be very happy,” she said. 
 “Come on, Dolly, we really must be going.” 
 
 Dolly was inclined to resist once more. She 
 hadn’t seen half as much as she wanted to of the 
 strange, exotie life of the gypsy caravan, so differ- 
 ent from the things she was used to, but Bessie 
 was firm, and they began to make their way 
 back toward the trail. And, as they neared the 
 spot from which they had had their first view of 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 59 
 
 Loon Pond and the gypsy camp, Bessie was 
 startled and frightened by the sudden appearance 
 in their path of the good looking yming gypsy for 
 whom th« girl they had been talking to was deco- 
 rating the jacket. 
 
 His keen eyes devoured Dolly as he stood be- 
 fore her, and he put out his hand, gently enough, 
 to bar their way. 
 
 “Will you mai’ry me?” he said, in English 
 much better than that of most of his tribe. 
 
 Dolly laughed, although Bessie looked serious. 
 
 “Oh, yes, of course,” said Dolly. “I always 
 marry the first man who asks me, every day; 
 especially if he’s a gypsy and I’ve never seen 
 him before.” 
 
 “You’re too young now; you think you are, I 
 suppose, ’ ’ said the gypsy, showing his white 
 teeth. “You come back with me and wait; by 
 and by we will get married.” 
 
 “Nonsense,” said Bessie, decisively. “He 
 means it, Dolly, he’s not joldng. Come, we must 
 hurry.” 
 
 “Wait, stay,” said the gypsy, eagerly. And 
 he put out his hand as if to hold Dolly. But she 
 screamed before he could touch her, and darted 
 past him. And in a moment both girls, running 
 hard, were out of sight. 
 
! ( 
 
 1 ; * ' . 
 
 V 
 
 CHAPTER Vr 
 
 A SEKIOUS JOKE 
 
 Bessie, seriously alarmed, led ttie race through 
 the woods and they had gone for nearly a quarter 
 of a mile before she would even stop to listen. 
 When she felt that if the gypsy were going to over- 
 take them he ■would have done it, she stopped, 
 and, breathing hard, listened eagerly for some 
 sign that he was still behind them. But only the 
 noises of the forest came to their ears, the rustling 
 of the leaves in the trees, the call of a bird, the 
 sudden sharp chattering of a squirrel or a chip- 
 munk, and, of course, their own breathing. 
 
 “I guess we got away from him all right,” she 
 said. ”Oh, Dolly, I was frightened!” 
 
 “"V^Tiat?” cried Dolly, amazed. “Do you mean 
 to say that you let that silly gypsy frighten you? 
 I thought you were braver than that, Bessie!” 
 
 “You don’t know anything about it, Dolly,” 
 said Bessie, a little irritated. “It really wasn’t 
 your fault, but those people aren’t like our men. 
 He probably meant just what he said, and if he 
 thought you were laughing at him, it ■would have 
 made hiin furious. V/hen you said you would 
 marry him, . of course I knew you were joking, 
 and so would anyone like us, but I think he took 
 you seriously, Ea thought you meant it!” 
 
 60 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 61 
 
 ‘‘Bessie! How absurd! He couldn’t! Wby, I 
 won’t marry anyone for ever so long, and be surely 
 doesn’t tbink an American girl would ever marry 
 one of bis nasty tribe! You’re joking, aren’t 
 you? He couldn’t ever have really thought any- 
 thing so perfectly absurd!” 
 
 “I only hope we won’t find out that he was 
 serious, Dolly. You couldn’t be expected to under- 
 stand, but people like that are very different from 
 ourselves. They haven’t got a lot' of civilized 
 ideas to hold them in check, the way we have, 
 and when they want something they come right 
 out and say so, and if they can’t get what they 
 want by asking for it, they’re apt to take it.” 
 
 “But I didn’t think anyone ever acted like that! 
 And he is going to marry that pretty gypsy girl 
 who is putting the beads and buttons on a jacket 
 for him, anyhow. She said so ; she said they were 
 engaged. ’ ’ 
 
 “Men have changed their minds about the 
 women they were going to marry, Dolly, even 
 American men. And that’s another thing that 
 bothers me. I think that girl’s very much in love 
 with him, and if she thought he was fond of you, 
 she ’d be furious. There ’s no telling what a gypsy 
 girl might do if she was jealous. You see, she’d 
 blame you, instead of him. She’d say you had 
 turned his head.” 
 
 “Oh, Bessie, what a dreadful mess. Oh, dear! 
 
62 
 
 THE GAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 I seem to be getting into trouble all the time! I 
 think I’m just going to have a little harmless fun 
 and then I find that I’ve started all sorts of 
 trouble that I couldn’t foresee at all.” 
 
 “Never mind, Doily. You didn’t mean to do it, 
 and, of course, I may be exaggerating it anyhow. 
 I’ll admit I’m frightened, but it’s because of what 
 I know about the gypsies. They’re strange people 
 and they carry a grudge a long time. If they 
 think anyone has hurt them, or otfended them, 
 they’re never satisfied until they have had their 
 revenge. But, after all, he may not do anything 
 at ail. He may have been joking. Perhaps he 
 just wanted to frighten you.” 
 
 “Oh, I really do think that must have been it, 
 Bessie. Don’t you remember that he was differ- 
 ent from die others? He spoke just as well as 
 we do, as if he’d been to school, and he must know 
 more about our (jastoms.” 
 
 Bessie shook her head. 
 
 “That doesn’t mean that he isn’t just as wild 
 and untamed as the others down at bottom, Dolly. 
 I’ve heard the same thing about Indians; that 
 some of those who make the most trouble are the 
 very ones who’ve been to Carlisle. It isn’t be- 
 cause they’re educated, because they would have 
 been wild and wicked anyhow, but the very fact 
 that they are educated seems to make them more 
 dangerous. I hope it isn’t the same with this 
 gypsy; but we’ve got to be oarefoJ ” 
 
63 
 
 .li’ LONG LAKE 
 
 “Oil, I’li be careful, Bessie,” said Dolly, with 
 a shudder. “I’ll do whatever I’m told. You 
 needn’t worry about that.” 
 
 “That’s good, Dolly. The first thing, of course, 
 is never to get far away from the camp alone. 
 We mustn’t come over this way at all, or go any- 
 where near Loon Pond as long as those gypsies 
 are still there.” 
 
 “Oh, Bessie, do you think we’ll have to tell 
 Miss Eleanor about this?” 
 
 “I’m afraid so, Dolly. But there’s no reason 
 why you should mind doing that. She won’t 
 blame you, it really wasn’t your fault.” 
 
 “Yes, it was, Bessie. Don’t you remember the 
 way I changed the signs? If I hadn’t done that 
 we wouldn’t have gone to Loon Pond, and if we 
 hadn’t gone there—” 
 
 “We wouldn’t have seen the gypsies? Yes, I 
 know, Dolly. But Miss Eleanor is fair, you know 
 that. And she may scold you for playing the 
 trick with the signs, but that’s all. She won’t 
 blame you for having misunderstood that gypsy.” 
 
 Then they came to the crossing of the trails, 
 and Dolly replaced the signs as they had been be- 
 fore she had played her thoughtless prank. 
 
 “We must hurry along, Dolly,” said Bessie. 
 “It’s getting dark, and we don’t want to be out 
 here when it’s too dark. I think it’s safe enough, 
 but— ’ ’ 
 
 “Oh, suppose that horrid gypsy followed us 
 
64 
 
 'THE CAMP PIEE GIELS 
 
 througli the woods, Bessie? That’s what you 
 mean, isn’t it? Let’s get hack to the camp just 
 as fast as ever we can.” 
 
 “Bessie, I’m an awful coward, I’m afraid,’^ 
 Dolly said, as the camp was approached. “Will 
 you tell Miss Eleanor what happened; everything? 
 I’m afraid that if I told her myself I wouldn’t 
 put in what I did wdth the signs.” 
 
 “You wouldn’t tell her a story, Dolly?” 
 
 “'No, hut I might just not tell her that. You 
 see, I wouldn’t have really to tell her a story, and, 
 oh, Bessie, I want her to know all about it. Then 
 if she scolds me, all right. Can’t you under- 
 stand?” 
 
 “I’ll do it if you like, Dolly, hut I’m quite sure 
 you’d tell her everything yourself. You’re not a 
 hit of a coward, Dolly, because when you’ve done 
 something wrong you never try to pretend that 
 it was the fault of someone else, or an accident.” 
 
 “Do you think I ought to tell Miss Eleanor my- 
 self?” said Dolly, wistfully. “I will if you say 
 so, Bessie, hut I’d much rather not.” 
 
 “No, I’ll tell her,” Bessie decided. “I think 
 you’re mistaken about yourself, Dolly, and the 
 reason I’m going to tell her is because I think 
 you’d make her think you were worse than you 
 were, instead of not telling her the whole thing. 
 Do you see?” 
 
 “You’re ever so good, Bessie. Really, I’m go- 
 ing to try to stop worrying you so much after 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 65 
 
 this. It seems to me that you’re always having 
 things to bother you on account of me.” 
 
 Miss Eleanor, at first, like Dolly, was inclined 
 to laugh at what Bessie told her of the gypsy and 
 his absurd suggestion that Dolly should stay with 
 his tribe until she was old enough to be married 
 to him. 
 
 “Why, he must have been joking, Bessie,” she 
 said. “You say he talked well; as if he were 
 educated? Then he surely knows that no Ameri- 
 can girl would take such an idea seriously for a 
 moment.” 
 
 “But American girls do live with the gypsied 
 and marry them. Miss Eleanor. Often, I’ve heard 
 of that. And if you’d seen him when he got in 
 our way on the trail you’d know why he fright- 
 ened me. His face was perfectly black, he wafe 
 so angry. And when Dolly laughed at him he 
 looked as if he would like to beat her,” 
 
 “I can understand that,” laughed Miss Eleanor. 
 “I’ve wanted to beat Dolly myself sometimes 
 when she laughed when she was being scolded for 
 something!” 
 
 “Oh, but this was different,” said Bessie, 
 earnestly. “Eeally, Miss Eleanor, you’d have 
 been frightened too, if you’d seen him. And I do 
 think Dolly ought to be very careful until they’ve 
 gone away from Loon Pond.” 
 
 Bessie was so serious that Miss Eleanor was 
 impressed, almost despite herself. 
 
66 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 ‘‘Well, yes, she must be careful, of course. I 
 don’t want the girls going over to Loon Pond, 
 anyway. I want them to have this time in the 
 woods, and live in a natural way, and the Loon 
 Pond people at the hotel just spoil the woods for 
 me. But I don’t believe there’s any reason for 
 being really frightened, Bessie.” 
 
 “Suppose that man tried to carry her off?” 
 
 “Oh, he wouldn’t dare to try anything like 
 that, Bessie. I don’t believe the gypsies are half 
 as bad as they are painted, anyhow’, but, even if 
 he would be willing to do it, he’d be afraid. The 
 guides would soon run him out of the preserve 
 if they found him here ; no one is supposed to be 
 on it, without permission. And a gypsy couldn’t 
 get that, I know.” 
 
 “But it’s a pretty big place, and there aren’t 
 so very many guides. We didn’t see one to-day, 
 and we really took quite a long walk.” 
 
 “But, Bessie, what would he do with her if he 
 did carry her off? Those people travel along the 
 roads, and they travel slowly. He must know 
 that if anything happened to Dolly, or if she dis- 
 appeared, he’d be suspected right away, and he’d 
 be chased everywhere he went.” 
 
 “I think it would be easy to hide someone in 
 their caravans, though. Miss Eleanor. And those 
 people stick together, so that no one would betray 
 him if he did anything like that. We might be 
 perfectly sure that he had done it, but we wouldn’t 
 be able to prove it.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 67 
 
 “I’ll speak to the guides and have them keep 
 a good watch in the direction of Loon Pond, 
 Bessie. There, will that make you feel any bet- 
 ter? And those gypsies won’t stay over there 
 very long. They never do. ” 
 
 “Have they been here before, Miss Eleanor?” 
 
 “Oh, yes; every year when I’ve been here.” 
 
 “Well, I’ll feel better when they’ve gone. Miss 
 Eleanor. ’ ’ 
 
 “So will 1. You’ve made me quite nervous, 
 Bessie. I think you’d better tell Dolly, and be 
 careful yourself, not to tell the other girls any- 
 thing about this. There’s no use in scaring them, 
 and making them feel nervous, too.” 
 
 “No. I thought of that, too. Some of them 
 would be frightened, I’m sure. I think Zara 
 would be. She ’s been very nervous, anyhow, ever 
 since we got her away from that awful house 
 where Mr. Holmes had hidden her away from 
 us.” . 
 
 “I don’t blame her a bit; I would be, too. It 
 was really a dreadful experience, Bessie, and par- 
 ticularly because she knew it wa^, in a way, her 
 own fault.” 
 
 “You mean because she believed what they said 
 about being her friends, and that she would get 
 you and me into trouble unless she went with them 
 that night when they came for her?” 
 
 “Yes. Poor Zara! I’m afraid she guessed, 
 somehow, that I had been angry with her, at first. 
 
m 
 
 THE CAMP FIHE GIKLS 
 
 She’s terribly sensitive, and she seems to be able 
 to gness what’s in your mind when you’ve really 
 scarcely thought the things yourself.” 
 
 “Weil, I think it will be a good thing if she 
 doesn’t know about this gypsy trouble. Miss 
 Eleanor. S9 I’ll go and find Holly, and tell her 
 not to say anything.” 
 
 “Do, Bessie. And get Dolly to come to me be- 
 fore dinner. She wms wrong to play, that trick 
 with the signs, but I don’t mean to scold her. I 
 want to comfort her, instead. I think she’s been 
 punished enough already if she’s really fright- 
 ened about that gypsy.” i 
 
 Dolly seemed to be a good deal chastened,' after 
 her talk with Eleanor, and Bessie felt glad that 
 the Guardian, though she evidently did not take 
 the episode of the gypsy as seriously as did 
 Bessie, had still thought it worth while to let 
 Dolly think she did. 
 
 “I’m going to stay close to the camp after this, 
 Bessie,” she said. “And, oh. Miss Eleanor said 
 that there were footprints this morning near the 
 water that a deer must have made. I’ve got my 
 camera here; suppose we try to get a picture of 
 one to-night? We could go to sleep early, and then 
 get up. Miss Eleanor said it would be all right, 
 just for the two of us. She said if any more sat 
 up it would frighten the deer.” 
 
 “All right,” agreed Bessie. “That would be 
 lots of fun. ’ ’ 
 
I.ONG LAKE 
 
 69 
 
 So they slept for an hour or so, and then, about 
 midnight, got up and went down to the shore of 
 the lake, to a spot where a narrow trail came out 
 of the woods. There they hid themselves behind 
 some brush and placed Dolly’s camera and a flash- 
 light powder, to be ready^ in case the deer ap- 
 peared. 
 
 They waited a long time. But at last there was 
 a rustling in the trees, and they could hear the 
 branches being pushed aside as some creature 
 made its way slowly toward the water. 
 
 “All ready, Bessie?” whispered Dolly. “When 
 I give you a squeeze press that button; that will 
 set the flashlight off, and I’ll take the picture as 
 you do it. ” 
 
 They waited tensely, and Bessie was as excited 
 as Dolly herself. She felt as if she could scarcely 
 wait for the signal. Dolly held her left hand loose- 
 ly, and two or three times she thought the grip 
 was tightening. But the signal came at last, and 
 there was a blinding flash. But it was not a deer 
 which stood out in. the glare ; it was the gypsy who 
 had pursued Dolly ! 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 A THIEF IN THE NIGHT 
 
 The glare of the explosion lasted for only a 
 moment. Dolly's eyes were fixed on the camera, 
 as she bent her head down, and Bessie realized, 
 thankfully, that she had not seen the evil face of 
 the gypsy. As for the man, he cried out once, but 
 the sound of his voice was drowned by the noise 
 of the explosion. And then, as soon as the flash- 
 light powder had burned out, the light was suc- 
 ceeded by a darkness so black that no one could 
 have seen anything, so great was the contrast be- 
 tween it and the preceding illumination. 
 
 “Come, Dolly! Quick! Don’t stop to argue! 
 Bun!” urged Bessie. 
 
 She seized Dolly’s hand in hers, and made otf, 
 running down by the lake, and, for a few steps, 
 actually through the water. Her one object was 
 to get back to the camp as quickly as possible. 
 She thought, and the event proved that she was 
 right, the gypsy, if he saw them nearing the camp 
 fire, which was still burning brightly, would not 
 dare to follow them very closely. 
 
 He had no means of knowing that there were no 
 men in the camp, and, while he might not have 
 been afraid to follow them right into camp had 
 
 70 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 71 
 
 he known that, Bessie judged correctly that he 
 would take no more chances than were necessary. 
 
 “Bessie, are yon crazy!” gasped Dolly, as they 
 came into the circle of light from the fire. “My 
 feet are all wet! ¥7hatever is the matter with 
 you! You nearly made me smash rny camera!” 
 
 “I don’t care,” said Bessie, panting, hut im- 
 mensely relieved. “Sit down here by the fire and 
 take off your shoes and stocldngs; they’ll soon get 
 dry. I ’m going to do it. ” 
 
 She was as good as her w’ord, and not until they 
 had dried their feet and set the slices and stock- 
 ings to dry, would she explain what had caused 
 her wild dash from the scene of the trap they had 
 laid for the deer, and which had so nearly proved 
 to be a trap for them, instead. 
 
 “If you’d looked up when that powder went off 
 you’d have ran yourself, Dolly, without being 
 made to do it,” she said, then. “That wasn’t 
 a deer -we heard, Dolly. ” 
 
 “What was it, a hear or some sort of a wild 
 animal!” 
 
 “No, it was a man.” 
 
 Dolly’s face was pale, even in the ruddy glow of 
 the fire. 
 
 “You don’t mean— it wasn’t—” 
 
 “The gypsy? Yes, that’s just who it was, 
 Dolly. He’s found out somehow where we are, 
 you see. It’s just what I was afraid of, that he 
 would manage to follow us over here. But I’m 
 
72 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 not afraid now, as long as we know he’s around. 
 I don’t see how he can possibly do you any harm,” 
 
 “Oh, Bessie, what a lucky, lucky thing that we 
 saw him! If we hadn’t just happened to try to 
 get tha,t picture we would never have done it. The 
 nasty brute ! The idea of his daring to follow 
 us over here. Do you think he would have really 
 tried to carry me back to his tribe, Bessie ? ’ ’ 
 
 “I don’t know, Dolly. His face looked avffiil 
 when I saw it in the glare. But then, of course, 
 he was terribly surprised. He probably thought 
 he was the only soul awake for miles and miles, 
 and to have that thing go off in one’s face would 
 startle anybody, and make them look pretty 
 scary.” 
 
 “I should say so! You have to pucker up your 
 face and shut your eyes. Do you think he saw 
 us, Bessie!” 
 
 “I shouldn’t think it was very likely, Dolly. 
 You see, it’s just as you say. The glare of a 
 flashlight is blinding, when it goes oft' suddenly 
 like that, right in front of you. I don’t think 
 you’re likely to see much of anything except the 
 glare. And, of course, he hadn’t the slightest rea- 
 son to be expecting to see us. I expect he’s more 
 puzzled and frightened than we are; he’s certain- 
 ly a good deal more puzzled.” 
 
 “Then maybe he’ll be so frightened that he’ll 
 go back to his people and let me alone, Bessie.” 
 
 “I certainly hope so, Dolly. It really doesn’t 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 73 
 
 seem possible that be’d dare to carry yon off, even 
 if he could get hold of you. He’d know that we’d 
 be sure to suspect that he was the one who had 
 done iV and even a gypsy ought to know what 
 happens to people who do things like that. I don’t 
 see how he could hope to escape.” 
 
 “But, Bessie, I was thinking: suppose he didn’t 
 carry me to the place where the other gypsies are ? 
 Suppose he took rne right off into the woods some- 
 where, and hid?” 
 
 “You’d both have to have food, Holly, And as 
 he couldn’t get that very easily, he’d be taking a 
 big chance of getting caught. No, what I really 
 think is that he wants to see you, and try to per- 
 suade you to go with him willingly. Then he 
 wouldn’t be in any danger, you see.” 
 
 “Ugh! He must be an awful fool to think he 
 could do that!” 
 
 “Well, he’s not bad looking, Dolly. And he’s 
 probably vain. The chances are that all the gypsy 
 girls set their caps at him, because, if you remem- 
 ber, he was about the only good looking young 
 man there in their camp. Most of the men were 
 married. So, if he’s always been popular with 
 the girls of his own people, he may have got the 
 idea that he’s quite irresistible. That all he’s got 
 to do is to tell a girl he wants to marry her to 
 have her fall right into his apns, like a ripe apple 
 falling from a tree.” 
 
 ‘ ‘ The horrid brute ! If he ever comes near me 
 again, I’ll slap his face for him.” 
 
74 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 “You’d better not do anything of the sort. The 
 best thing for you to do if yon ever see him any- 
 where near you again is to run, just as hard as 
 you can. Dolly, you’ve no idea of the rage a man 
 like that can fly into. If you struck him you can ’t 
 tell what he might try to do. But I hope you’ll 
 never see him again.” 
 
 Dolly shivered a little. 
 
 “Are you sleepy, Bessie?” she asked. 
 
 “No, I think I’m too excited to be sleepy. It 
 was so startling to be expecting to see a deer, and 
 then to see his face in the light. No, I’m not 
 sleepy.” 
 
 “Oh, Bessie! Isn’t it possible that you were 
 mistaken? You know, you couldn’t have seen his 
 face for more than a moment, if you did see it. 
 Weren’t you thinking so much of that gypsy that 
 you just fancied you saw him, when you really 
 didn’t at all?” 
 
 1 “No, no, I’m quite sure, Dolly. I was perfectly 
 certain it was a deer, and that was all I was think- 
 ing about. And I heard him cry out, too. That 
 would be enough to make me certain that I was 
 right. A deer wouldn’t have cried out, and it 
 wouldn’t have stood perfectly still, either. It 
 would have turned around and run as soon as it 
 saw the light; any animal would have. It would 
 have been too terrified to do anything else.” 
 
 “But don’t you suppose he was frightened? 
 Why didn’t he run?” 
 
LONG LAKE 
 
 75 
 
 “Were you ever so frightened that you couldn’t 
 do a thing but just stand still? I have been; so 
 frightened that I couldn’t even have cried out 
 for help, and couldn’t have moved for a minute 
 or so, for anything in the world. 
 
 “I think he may have been frightened that way. 
 Men aren’t like animals, they’re more likely to be 
 too frightened to move than to run away because 
 they’re afraid. And the fear that makes a man 
 run away is a different sort, anyhow. ’ ’ 
 
 “It’s getting cold, isn’t it?” 
 
 “Yes, the fire’s burning low. We’d better get 
 to bed, Dolly.” 
 
 “Oh, no; I couldn’t. I don’t want to be there 
 in the dark. I’m sure I couldn’t sleep if I -went 
 to bed. I’d much rather sit out here by the fire 
 and talk, if you’re not sleepy. And you said you 
 weren’t.” 
 
 “I suppose we could get some more wood and 
 throw it on the fire. It would be warm enough 
 then, if we got a couple of blankets to wrap around 
 us.” 
 
 “I think it’s a good idea to stay awake and 
 keep watch, anyhow, in case he should come back. 
 Then, if he saw some one sitting up by the fire 
 he would be scared off, I should think.” 
 
 ' ‘ All right. Slip in as quietly as you can, Dolly, 
 and get our blankets from the tent, while I put on 
 some more wood. There’s lots of it, that’s a good 
 thing. Thei'e’s no reason why we shouldn’t use 
 it.” 
 
76 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 So, while Dolly crept into their tent to get the 
 blankets, Bessie piled wood high on the embers 
 of the camp fire, until the sparks began to fly, and 
 the wood began to burn with a high, clear flame. 
 And when Dolly returned she had with her a box 
 of marshmallows. 
 
 “Now we’ll have a treat,” she said. “I for- 
 got all about these. I didn’t remember I’d brought 
 them with me. Give me a pointed stick and I’U 
 toast you one.” 
 
 Bessie looked on curiously. The joys of toasted 
 marshmallows were new to her, but when she 
 tasted her first one she was prepared to agree 
 with Dolly that they were just the things to eat 
 in such a spot. 
 
 “I never liked them much before,” said Bessie. 
 “They’re ever so much better when they’re 
 toasted this way.” 
 
 “They’re good for you, too,” said Dolly, her 
 mouth full of the soft confection. “At least, 
 that’s what everyone says, and I know they’ve 
 never hurt me. Sometimes I eat so much candy 
 that I don’t feel well afterwards, but it’s never 
 been that vray with toasted marshmallows. My, 
 but I’m glad I found that box!” 
 
 “So’m I,” admitted Bessie. “It seems to make 
 the time pass to have them to eat. Here, let me 
 toast some of them, now. You’re doing all the 
 work.” 1 
 
 “I will not, you’d spoil them. It takes a lot of 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 77 
 
 skill to toast ffiarshmallows properly,” Dolly 
 boasted. “Heavens, Bessie, when there is some- 
 thing I can do well, let me do it. Aunt Mabel 
 says she thinks I’d be a good cook if I world put 
 my mind to it, but that’s only because she likes 
 the fudge I make.” 
 
 “How do you make fudge?” 
 
 “Why, Bessie King! Do you mean to say you 
 don’t know? I thought you were such a goo<J 
 cook ! ” 
 
 “I never said so, Dolly. I had to do a lot of 
 cooking at the farm when Maw Hoover wasn’t 
 well, but she never let me do anything but cook 
 plain food. That’s the only sort we ever had,, 
 anyhow. So I never got a chance to leam to make 
 fudge or anything like that.” 
 
 “Well, I’ll teach you, when we get a good 
 chance, Bessie,” promised Dolly, seriously. 
 
 “I’ll be glad to take lessons from you, Dolly,’*" 
 she said. “I think it v/ould be fine to Imow how 
 to make all sorts of candy. Then, if you did Imow,, 
 and could do it really well, you could make lots 
 of it, and sell it. People always like candy, and 
 in the city a lot of the shops have signs saying" 
 that they sell Home Made Gandy and Pudge. SO' 
 people must like it better than the sort they make 
 in factories.” 
 
 “I should say so, Bessie. But most of those-^ 
 stores are just cheating you, because the stuff they 
 sell isn’t home made at all. Everyone says mine- 
 is much better'.” 
 
THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 18 
 
 Bessie grew serious. 
 
 *‘Wiiy, Dolly,” she said, ‘1 think it would he 
 a. fine idea to make candy to sell ! I really believe 
 I’d like to do that—” 
 
 “I bet you would make just lots and lots of 
 money if you did,” said Dolly, taking hold of a 
 aew idea, as she always did, with enthusiasm. 
 "‘ And we could get one of the stores to sell it for 
 and keep some of the money for their trouble. 
 Suppose we sold it for fifty cents a pound, the 
 store would get twenty or twenty-five cents and 
 we’d get the rest. And—” 
 
 Bessie laughed. 
 
 “You’re not forgetting that it costs something 
 to make, are you?” she asked. “You have to allow 
 for what it costs before you begin to think of how 
 you’re going to spend your profits. But I really 
 do think it would work, Dolly. When we get back 
 to town we’ll figure it all out, and see how much 
 it would cost for butter and sugar and nuts and 
 ■chocolate and all the things we’d need.” 
 
 “Yes, and if we used lots of things we’d get 
 them cheaper, too, Bessie,” said Dolly, surprising 
 Bessie by this exhibition of her business knowl- 
 edge. '“Oh, I think that would be fine. I’d just 
 love to have money that I ’d earned myself. , Some 
 of the other girls have been winning honor beads 
 by earning money, but I never could think of any 
 way that I could do it.” 
 
 Dolly was beginning to yawn, and Bessie herself 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 79 
 
 felt sleepy. But when she proposed that they 
 should go into the tent now Dolly protested. 
 
 “Oh, let’s stay outside, Bessie, ”^she said. “If 
 we went in now we’d just wake ourselves up. We 
 can sleep out here just as well as not. ■ What's 
 the difference?” 
 
 And Bessie was so sleepy that she was glad to 
 agree to that. In a few moments thej^- were sound 
 asleep, with no thought of the exciting episodes 
 of the day and night to disturb them. 
 
 The fire was low when Bessie awoke with a 
 start. At first everything seemed all right; she 
 could hear nothing. But then, suddenly, she 
 looked over to where Dolly had been lying. There 
 was no sign of her chum! And, just as Bessie 
 herself was about to cry out, she heard a muffled 
 call, in Dolly’s tones, and "then a loud crashing 
 through the undergrowth near the camp, as some- 
 one or something made off swiftly through the 
 woods! The gypsy had come hack! 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE PURSUIT 
 
 For a moment Bessie was too paralyzed with , 
 fear even to cry out. It was plain that the gypsy 
 had carried poor Dolly away with him, and that, 
 moreover, he had muffled her one cry for help. 
 For a moment Bessie stood wondering what to 
 do. To alarm the camp would be almost useless, 
 she felt; the girls, waking up out of a sound sleep, 
 could do nothing imtil they understood what had 
 happened, and even then the chances were against 
 their being able to help in any practical man- 
 ner. 
 
 And so Bessie fought down that blind instinct 
 to scream out her terror, and, in a moment, throw- 
 ing off her blanket, she began to creep out into 
 the black woods, dark now as pitch, and as im- 
 penetrable, it seemed, as one of the tropical 
 jungles she had read of. 
 
 One thing Bessie felt to be, above everything, 
 necessary. She musf find out what the gypsy 
 meant to do, and where he was taking Dolly. If, 
 by some lucky chance, she could track him, there 
 would be a far better opportunity to rescue Dolly 
 in the morning, when the guides would be called 
 to help, and, if necessary, men from the hotel 
 at Loon Pond and other places in the woods. To 
 
 80 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 81 
 
 such a call for help, Bessie knew well there would 
 be an instant response. 
 
 ‘‘He’ll never go back to the camp,” Bessie told 
 herself, trying to argue the problem out, so that 
 she might overlook none of the points that were 
 involved, amd that might make so much difference 
 to poor Dolly, who wms paying so dear a price for 
 her prank. “If he did, he’d be sure that there 
 would be people there, looking for him, as soon as 
 the word got around that Dolly was missing.” 
 
 She stopped for a moment, to listen attentively, 
 but though the woods were full of slight noises, 
 she heard nothing that she could decide positively 
 was the gypsy. Still, burdened as he was with 
 Dolly, it seemed to Bessie that he must make some 
 noise, no matter how skillful a woodsman he might 
 be, and how miich training he had had in silent 
 traveling in his activities as a poacher and, hunter 
 of game in woods where keepers were on guard. 
 
 “He’ll find out some place where they’re not 
 likely to look for him, and stay there until the 
 people around here have given up the idea of find- 
 ing him,” said Bessie to herself. “That’s why 
 I’ve got to follow him now. And I’m sure he’s 
 on one the trails; he couldn’t carry Dolly through 
 the thick woods, no one could. Oh, I wish I could 
 hear something!” 
 
 That wish, for the time, at least, was to be de- 
 nied, but it was not long before Bessie, still tramp- 
 ing through thick undergrowth in the direction 
 
82 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 she was sure her quarry had taken, came to a 
 break in the woods, where it was a little lighter, 
 and she could see her way. 
 
 She saw at once that she had come to a trail, 
 and, though she had never seen it before, she 
 guessed that it was the one that led to Deer 
 Mountain, from what Miss Eleanor had told her 
 about the trails about the camp. And, moreover, 
 as she started to follow it, convinced that the 
 gypsy, on finding it, would have abandoned the 
 rougher traveling of the uncut woods, she saw 
 something that almost wrung a cry of startled 
 joy from her. 
 
 It was not mnch that she saw, only a fragment 
 of ^vhite cloth, caught in the branches of a hush 
 that had pushed itself out onto the trail. But 
 it was as good as a long letter, for the cloth was 
 from Dolly’s dress, and it was plain and unmis- 
 takable evidence that her chum had been carried 
 along this trail. 
 
 She vfalked on more quickly now, pausing about 
 once in a hundred yards to listen for sounds of 
 those who were, as she was convinced, ahead of 
 her, and, about half a mile beyond the spot where 
 she had found that white pointer, she saw another 
 piece of mute hut convincing evidence, of exactly 
 the same sort, and caught in the same way. 
 
 As Bessie kept on, the ground continued to rise, 
 and she realized that she must be on the crest 
 of Deer Mountain, one of the heights that lifted 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 81 ? 
 
 itself above the level of the surrounding woods- 
 Altbougli a high mountain, the climb from Long 
 Lake was not a particularly severe one, for all the 
 ground v/as so high that even the highest peaks 
 in the range that was covered by these woods did 
 not seem, unless one were looking at them from 
 a distance of many miles, in the plain below, to 
 be as high as they really were. 
 
 The trail that Bessie follovfed, as she knew, was 
 leading her directly away from Loon Pond and 
 the gypsy camp, but that did not disturb her, since 
 she had expected the gypsy to bear away from his 
 companions. Her mind was working quickly now,, 
 and she wondered just how far the gypsies were 
 likely to go in support of their reckless companion. 
 
 She knew that the bonds among these nomads 
 were very strong, but there was another element 
 in this particular case that might, she thought, 
 complicate matters. Tlie man who had carried 
 Dolly off was engaged to be married to the dark 
 eyed girl they had talked with, and it was possible 
 that that fact might make trouble for him, and 
 prevent him from receiving the aid of his tribe, 
 as he would surely have done in any ordinary 
 struggle with the laws of the people whom the 
 gypsies seemed to despise and dislike. 
 
 Undoubtedly the girl’s parents, if she had any, 
 would resent the slight he was casting upon their 
 daughter, and if they were powerful or influential 
 in the tribe, they would probably try to get him 
 
84 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 cast otit, and cause the other gypsies to refuse him 
 the aid he was probably counting upon. 
 
 The most important thing, Bessie still' felt, was 
 to find out where Dolly was to be hidden. And, 
 as she pressed on, tired, but determined not to 
 -give up what seemed to her to be the best chance 
 of rescuing her chum, Bessie looked about con- 
 stantly for some fresh evidence of Dolly’s pres- 
 ence. 
 
 But luck was not to favor her again. Sharp as 
 was her watch, there were no more torn pieces of 
 Dolly’s dress to guide her, and, evei^ had Bessie 
 been an expert in woodcraft, and so able to fol- 
 low their tracks, it was too dark to use that means 
 of tracing them. 
 
 Bessie, did, indeed, think of that, and of wait- 
 ing imtil some guide should come, who might be 
 able to read the message of the trail. But she re- 
 flected that it was more than possible that none of 
 the men in the neighborhood might be able to do 
 so, and it seemed to her that it was better to take 
 the slim chance she had than abandon it in favor 
 of something that might, after all, turn out to be 
 no chance at all. 
 
 The darkness was beginning to yield now to the 
 first forerunners of the day. In the east there 
 was a faint radiance that told of the coming of 
 the sim, and Bessie hurried on, since she felt sure 
 that the gypsy would not venture to travel in day- 
 light, and must mean to hide Dolly before the 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 .85 
 
 coming of the sun lightened the task of his pur- 
 suers, since he must feel certain that he would he 
 pursued, although he might have no inkling that 
 anyone was already on his trail. 
 
 But now Bessie had to face a new problem that 
 did, indeed, force her to rest. For suddenly, the 
 well defined, broad trail ended, and broke up into 
 a series of smaller paths. Evidently this was a 
 spot at which those who wished to reach the sum- 
 mit of the mountain took diverging paths, accord- 
 ing to the particular spot they wanted to reach, 
 and whether they were bound on a picnic or 
 merely wanted to get to a spot whence they might 
 see the splendid view for which Deer Mountain 
 was famed. 
 
 In the darkness there was absolutely no way of 
 telling which of these many diverging trails the 
 gypsy had followed, and Bessie, ready to cry with 
 disappointment and anxiety for Dolly, was forced 
 to sit down on a stump and wait for daylight. 
 Even tliat might not help her. 
 
 Her best chance, however, was fo wait until the 
 light came, and then, despite her lack of acquaint- 
 ance with the art of reading footprints, to try to 
 distinguish those of the gypsy. All that she 
 needed was some clue to enable her to guess which 
 path her quarry had taken; beyond that the mes- 
 sage of the footprints was not necessary. 
 
 As she sat there, watching the slov/, slow lighten- 
 ing in the east, Bessie wondered if the day was 
 
86 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 ever coming. Slie had seen the sun rise before, 
 but never had it seemed so lazy, so inclined to 
 linger in its couch of night. 
 
 But every wait comes to an end at last, and 
 finally Bessie was able to go back a little way, be- 
 fore the other trails began to branch off, and 
 bending over, to try to pick out the footprints of 
 the man who had carried Dolly off. It was easy toi 
 do, fortunately, or Bessie could scarcely have 
 hoped to accomplish it. 
 
 There had been a light rain the previous morn- 
 ing, enough to soften, the ground and wipe out 
 the traces of the numerous parties that had made 
 Deer Mountain the objective point of a tramp in 
 the woods, and, mingled with her own small foot- 
 steps, Bessie soon found the marks of hobnailed 
 feet, that must, she was sure, have been made 
 by the gypsy. 
 
 Step by step she followed them, and she was 
 just about at the first of the diverging trails when 
 a sound behind her made her turn, terrified, to 
 see who was approaching. 
 
 But it was not the man who had so frightened 
 her whom she saw as she turned. It was a girl— 
 a gypsy, to be sure— but a girl, and Bessie had no 
 fear of her, even when she saw that it was the 
 same girl the scamp she was pursuing was to 
 marry. Moreover, the girl seemed as surprised 
 and frightened at the sight of Bessie, crouching 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 87 
 
 there, as Bessie herself had been at the other’s 
 coming. 
 
 “Where is he; that wicked man you are to 
 marry?” cried Bessie, fiercely, springing to her 
 feet, and advancing upon the trembling gypsy 
 girl. “You shall tell me, or I will— ” 
 
 She seized the gypsy girl’s shoulders, and shook 
 her, before she realized that the girl, whose eyes 
 were filled with tears, probably knew as little as 
 she herself. Then, repentant, she released her 
 shoulders, but repeated her question. 
 
 “You mean John, my man!” said the girl, a 
 quiver in her tones. “I do not know, he was not 
 at the camp last night. I was afraid. I think he 
 does not love me any more.” 
 
 Something about the way she spoke made Bessie 
 pity her. 
 
 ‘AVhat is your name?” she asked. 
 
 “Lolla,” said the gypsy. 
 
 “I believe you do not know, Lolla,” said Bessie^ 
 kindly. “And you do not want him to be sent 
 to prison, perhaps for years and years, do yout 
 You love this John?” 
 
 “Prison? They would send him there? What 
 for? No, no— yes, I love him. Do you know where 
 he is; where he was last night?” 
 
 “I know where he was last night, Lolla, yes. 
 He came to our camp and carried my friend away. 
 You remember, the one who was with me yester- 
 day, when we looked at your camp? That is why 
 
THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 I am looking for Mm, He says lie will make her 
 marry him later on ; that he will keep her with 
 your tribe until she is ready.” 
 
 Leila’s tears ceased suddenly^ and there was a 
 gleam of passionate anger in her eyes. 
 
 ‘‘He will do thats” she said, angrily, “My 
 brothers, they will kill him if he does that. He 
 is to marry me, we are betrothed. You do not 
 know where he is? You would like to find your 
 friend?” 
 
 “I must, Lolla.” 
 
 “Then I will help you, if you will help me. 
 Will you?” 
 
 Lolla looked intently at Bessie, as if she were 
 trying to tell from her eyes whether she really 
 meant what she said. 
 
 “Oh, I v/ish I knew whether you are good; 
 whether you speak the truth,” cried the gypsy girl, 
 passionately. “That other girl, your friend. She 
 wants my John. So—” 
 
 Bessie, serious as the situation was, could not 
 help iagghing. 
 
 “Listen, Lolla,” she said. “You mustn’t think 
 that. Dolly— that’s my friend— thinks John is 
 good looking, perhaps, but she hasn’t even thought 
 of marrying anyone yet, oh, for years and years, 
 i^e’s too young. We don’t get married as early 
 as you. So you may be sure that if John has 
 her all she wants is to get away and get back 
 te her friends,” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 89 
 
 Lolla’s eyes lighted with relief. 
 
 “That is good,” she said. “Then I will help, 
 for that is what I want, too. I do not want her 
 to live in the tribe, and to be with us. Yon are 
 sure John has taken her?” 
 
 Then Bessie told her of the face they had seen 
 in the flashlight, and of how Dolly had been 
 spirited away from the camp fire afterward. And 
 as she spoke, she was surprised to see that Lolla’s 
 eyes shone, as if she were delighted by the recital. 
 
 “Why, Lolla, you look pleased!” said Bessie. 
 “As if you were glad it had happened. How can 
 that be ; how can you seem as if you were happy, 
 about it?” 
 
 Lolla blushed slightly. 
 
 “He is my man,” she said, simply. “He is 
 strong and brave, do you pot see ? If he were not 
 brave he would not dare to act so. He is a fine 
 man. If I were bad, he would beat me. And he 
 will beat anyone who is not good to me. Of course 
 I am glad that hd was brave enough to act so, 
 thou^ I did not want him to do it.” 
 
 Bessie laughed. The primitive, elemental idea 
 that was expressed in Lolla’s words was beyond 
 her comprehension, and, in fact, a good many peo- 
 ple older and wiser than Bessie do not understand! 
 it. 
 
 But Lolla did not mind the laugh. She did not 
 understand what was in Bessie’s mind; what she 
 had said seemed so simple to her that it required 
 
90 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 no es^>latiation. And now her mind was bent en- 
 tirely upon the problem of getting Dolly back to 
 her friends, in order that John might turn back to 
 ber and forget the American girl whose appeal to 
 him had lain chiefly in the fact that she was so 
 different from the women of his o^vn race. 
 
 “He will not take her back to camp,” said Lolla, 
 thoughtfully . ' “He knows they would look there 
 first.” 
 
 “But will the others— your people— help him?” 
 
 “He may tell them that he has stolen her to get 
 a ransom; to keep her until her friends pay well 
 for her to be returned. Our old men do not like 
 that, they say it is too dangerous. But if he were 
 to say that he had done so, they might help him, 
 because our people stand and fall together. But,” 
 and her eyes shone, “I will tell my brothers the 
 truth. They will believe me, and— Quick! Hide 
 in those bushes; someone is coming!” 
 
 Bessie obeyed instantly. But, once she had 
 hidden herself, she heard nothing. It was not for 
 a minute or more after she had slipped into the 
 bushes that she heard the sound that had disturbed 
 Lolla. But then, looking out, she saw John com- 
 ing down one of the paths, peering about him 
 eautiously. 
 
CHAPTEE IX 
 
 AN UNEXPECTED ALLY 
 
 Bessie’s heart leaped at the sight of the mao 
 who had given her her wild tramp through the 
 night, and it was ail she could do to resist her 
 impulse to rush out, accuse him of the crime she 
 knew he had committed, and demand that he give 
 Dolly up to her at once. It was hard to believe 
 that he was really dangerous. 
 
 Here, in the early morning light, his clothes 
 soaked by the wet woods, as were Bessie ’s for that 
 matter, he looked very cheap and tawdry, and not 
 at all like a man to be feared. But a moment’s 
 reflection convinced Bessie that, for the time at 
 least, it would be far wiser to leave mattei's in 
 the hands of Lolla, the gypsy girl, who under- 
 stood this man, and, if she feared him, and with 
 cause, did so from reasons very different from 
 Bessie ’s. 
 
 For a moment after he came in sight John did 
 not see Lolla. Bessie watched the pair, so differ- 
 ent from any people she had ever seen at close 
 range before, narrowly. She was intensely inter- 
 ested in Lolla, and wondered mightily what the 
 gypsy girl intended to do. But she did not have 
 long to wait. 
 
 Lolla, with a little cry, rushed forward, and, 
 91 
 
THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 oo 
 
 casting herself on the, ground at her lover’s feet, 
 seised his hand and kissed it. At first she said 
 not a word; only looked. up at him with her black, 
 brilliant eyes, in which Bessie could see that a 
 tear was glistening. 
 
 “Lolla! What are you doing here?” 
 
 At the sight of the girl John had started, ner- 
 vously. It was plain that he did not feel secure; 
 that he thought his pursuers might, even thus 
 early, have tracked him down, and, in the mo- 
 ment before he had recognized Lolla Bessie saw 
 him quail, while his face whitened, so that Bessie 
 knew he was afraid. 
 
 That Imowledge, somehow, comforted her vast- 
 ly. It removed at once some of the formidable 
 quality which John had acquired in her eyes 
 when he stole Dolly after the fright that he must 
 have had when the flashlight powder exploded, 
 almost in his face. But Bessie remembered that 
 he had plucked up his courage after that scare; 
 the chances were that he would do so again now. 
 
 But, if Bessie v/as afraid of the kidnapper, 
 Lolla was not. She rose, and faced him defiantly. 
 Bessie thought there was something splencM about 
 the gypsy girl, and she wondered why John, with 
 such a girl ready and anxious to marry him, had 
 been diverted from her by Dolly, charming though 
 she was. 
 
 “I have come to save you, John,” said Leila. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 93 
 
 “Where is the American girl yon stole from her 
 friends?” 
 
 John started, evidently surprised by Lolla’S 
 knowledge of what he had done, and said some- 
 thing, sharply, in the gypsy tongue, which Bessie, 
 of course, could not understand. Her question, 
 it was plain, had frightened, as well as startled 
 h im ; but it had also made him veiy angry. Lolla, 
 however, did not seem to mind his anger. She 
 faced him boldly, without giving ground, although 
 he had moved toward her with a threatening ges- 
 ture of his uplifted hand. 
 
 ‘ ‘ Hit me, if you will, ’ ’ she said. ‘ ‘ I am not your 
 wife yet, but when I am it will be your right to 
 strike me if you wish. But I know what you 
 have done. I know, too, that the Americans know 
 it. Do you think you can escape from these woods 
 without being caught?” 
 
 John stared at her angrily. 
 
 “I am going now to the camp,” he said, “If 
 they come looking for news of the girl, they will 
 find me there, and plenty to swear that I have 
 been there all this night, and so could not have 
 done what they charge. My tribe will help me; 
 it is my right to call upon it for help. ’ ’ 
 
 “You forget me,” said Lolla, dangerously. “I 
 will swear that I saw you here, where I came to 
 look for you because you had stayed away from 
 the camp all the night. And when I tell my 
 brothers, what will they swear?” 
 
94 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 Again tlie man muttered sometliing in tlie gypsy 
 tongue, but under bis breath. When he spoke 
 aloud to Lolla it was in English. 
 
 “They are Barlomengri; they will support me. 
 They will never let the policemen take me away. 
 They are my brothers—” 
 
 “Do you think you can jilt their sister, the girl 
 you asked for as your wife before all the tribe, 
 and escape their vengeance? Do ymu think they 
 will not punish you, even by seeing that you die 
 in a prison, in a cell?” 
 
 And now John, beside himself with anger, ful- 
 filled the threat of his uplifted hand, and struck 
 Lolla sharply. 
 
 “Strike me again!” cried Lolla, furiouslya “I 
 have done no wrong! I am trying only to save 
 you from your own folly. Tell me, at least, where 
 you have hidden the girl? Would you have her 
 starve? Yon will be watched, so that you may 
 not bring her food. Had you thought of that?” 
 
 “Will you betray me? If you do not I shall 
 not be watched. They will know as soon as they 
 look for me that I was in the camp all through 
 the night. Lolla, you fool, I love you,, only you. 
 I want her to win a ransom. They will pay to 
 have her back, those Americans.” 
 
 Lolla had guessed right when she had said that 
 this would be his plea. But Bessie was surprised, 
 and thought Lolla must also wonder at his telling 
 her such a story. Lolla looked scornfully at John. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 95 
 
 ‘‘I am no baby that I should believe such a tale 
 as that,” she said, witheringly. “I give you your 
 cbanee, John, your last chance. Will you take 
 this girl back to her people, or set her free and 
 show her the road! Or must I bear witness 
 against you, and tell the tribe that you would 
 shame me by forsaking me even before I am your 
 wife ! ” 
 
 “Let me go,” said John, furiously. “We shall 
 see if a woman’s talk is to be taken before mine. 
 You fool ! Even your brothers will laugh at your 
 jealousy, and rejoice with me over the money this 
 girl will bring us. Let me pass — ” 
 
 “Tell me, at least, where you have hidden her! 
 She will starve, I tell you—” 
 
 “She will not starve. Think you I know no 
 more than that of doing such a piece of work? It 
 is not the first time we have made anxious fathers 
 pay to win their children back! Ha-ha! . Peter, 
 my friend, comes to take my watch. He will see 
 to it that she does not suffer for food. And he 
 will keep her safe from me. Out of my way!” 
 
 He brushed Lolla aside roughly, and strode off 
 down the trail that Bessie had followed. For a 
 moment, while she could hear the sound of his 
 retreating footsteps, Lolla did not move. But then 
 she raised herself, a smile in her eyes, and beck- 
 oned to Bessie. 
 
 “Go up that path, quickly,” she whispered. 
 “Somewhere up there, hidden, you will find your 
 
9G 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 frieud. Comfort her, but do not let her move. 
 
 If she is tied up, leave her so. Tell her that help 
 is near. I will free her.” 
 
 “But why— why not come with me, and free 
 her now?” protested Bessie, eagerly. “We can 
 find her, for he came down that path, so he must 
 have left her somewhere up there. Oh, come, 
 Lolla, you will never regret it!” 
 
 “Did you not hear him say that Peter was com- i 
 ing? Peter is his best friend; they are closer 
 together, and are more to one another, than • 
 brothers. If we tried to escape with her now, 
 Peter would find us, and his hand is heavy. We 
 should do your friend no good, and be punished ' 
 ourselves. We must wait. But hurry, before he j 
 comes. Tell her to be happy, and not to fear. I | 
 will save her, and you. We will work together to 
 save her.” 
 
 And with that Bessie, much as she would have 
 liked to get Dolly out of the clutches of her cap- 
 tor at once, had to be content. She realized fully 
 that in Lolla she had gained an utterly unexpected j 
 ally, in whom lay the best possible chance for the ; 
 immediate release of her chum, and the mere ' 
 knowledge of where Dolly was hidden would be 
 extremely valuable. 
 
 After all, it was all, and, possibly, more, than ^ 
 she had expected to accomplish when she had ^ 
 plunged into the woods after the gypsy and his | 
 prisoner, and she felt that she ought to be satis- a 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 97 
 
 fied. So slie liiirried at once up the path that 
 Lolla pointed out, leaving the gypsy girl below as 
 a guard. 
 
 The path was rough and steep, rising sharply, 
 but Bessie paid little heed to its difficulties, since 
 she felt that it was taking her to Dolly. She kept 
 her eyes and ears open for any sight or sound 
 that might make it easier to find Dolly, but she 
 did not call out, since she felt that it was prac- 
 tically certain the gypsy had managed, in some 
 manner, to make it impossible for poor Doily to 
 cry out, lest, in his absence, she alarm some 
 passerby and so obtain her freedom. 
 
 Bessie was sure that Dolly would not be left 
 in some place that could be seen from the path, 
 but she was also sure that she could not be far 
 from it, since there had not been time for the 
 gypsy to make any extended trip through the 
 woods off the trail. Bessie had traveled fast 
 throu^ the night, and she was sure that John, 
 with the weight of Dolly to carry, had not been 
 able t® move as fast as she, and could not, there- 
 fore, have been more than twenty minutes or half 
 un heiiir ahead of her in reaching the trail she 
 was now following. 
 
 So she watched carefully for some break in the 
 thick undergrowth that lined the trail, for some 
 opening through which John might have gone 
 with his burden. There might even, she thought, 
 be another of those precious sign posts that, back 
 
98 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 on the other trail, had been made by the torn 
 pieces from Dolly’s skirt. 
 
 But, careful as was her search, she reached the 
 end of the trail without finding anything that 
 looked like a promising place, or seeing anything 
 that made her think Dolly was within a short dis- 
 tance of her. The trail led to an exposed peak, a 
 rugged outcrop of rock, bare of trees, and cov- 
 ered only with a slight undergrowth. 
 
 Once there Bessie understood why the trail had 
 been made through the woods. The view was won- 
 derful. Below her were the waving tops of count- 
 less trees, and beyond them she could look down 
 and over the cultivated valleys, full of farms, 
 whose fields, marked off by stone fences, looked 
 small and insignificant from her high perch. 
 
 Bessie, however, was in no mood to enjoy a 
 view. She wasted no time in admiring it, but 
 only peered over the edge of the peak on which 
 she stood, to satisfy herself that Dolly was not 
 hidden just below her. One look was enough to 
 do that. There was a way, she soon saw, of de- 
 scending, and reaching the woods again, but no 
 man, carrying any sort of a burden, could have 
 accomplished that descent. 
 
 It was a task that called for the use of feet and 
 hands and Bessie turned desperately, convinced 
 that she must, in some manner, have overlooked 
 the place at which John had turned off the main 
 trail with his burden. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 99 
 
 Now, as she went downward, she searched the 
 woods at each side with redoubled care, and at 
 last she found what she had been looking for, or 
 what, it seemed to her, must be the place, since 
 she had seen no other that offered even a chance 
 for a succssful passage through the thick growth 
 of trees and underbrush. 
 
 Without hesitation she turned off the trail, and, 
 though the going was rough, and her hands and 
 face were scratched, while her clothes were torn, 
 she was rewarded at last by finding that the 
 ground below her grew smooth, showing that 
 human feet had passed that way often enough to 
 wear the faintest sort of a path. 
 
 Once she became aware of the path her heart 
 grew light, for she was sure now that she was 
 going in the right direction at last. And, indeed, 
 it was not more than five minutes before she al- 
 most stumbled over Dolly herself, bound to a tree, 
 and with a handkerchief stuffed in her mouth so 
 that she could not cry out. 
 
 “Oh, Dolly! I’m so glad, so glad! Listen, dear; 
 I can’t stay. You’ll have to be here a little while 
 longer, but we will soon have you back at the 
 camp, as safe and well as ever. Are you hurt? 
 Does it give you pain? If it doesn’t, shake your 
 head sideways.” 
 
 Dolly managed to shake her head, and in her 
 eyes Bessie saw that now that she knew help was 
 near Dolly’s courage would sustain her. 
 
100 
 
 THE CAMP PIPE GIELS 
 
 “That gypsy girl we saw is near, hut the man 
 who carried you off is going to send another man 
 to watch, -and if I let you go now we’d only 
 meet him, and be in more trouble than ever. But 
 be brave, dear; it won’t be long now.” 
 
 Poor Dolly could not answer, for Bessie, re- 
 membering that Lolla had seemed to fear the man 
 Peter more than she did John, dared not even 
 loosen the gag. She saw, however, that while it 
 must be making Dolly terribly uncomfortable, she 
 could breathe, and that it was probably worse in 
 appearance than in fact. So she leaned down and 
 kissed her chum, and whispered in her ear. 
 
 “I’m going back to Lolla now, dear, but I’ll 
 soon be back with enough help so that we needn’t 
 care how many of the gypsies there are near us. 
 If I stay now I’m afraid they’ll catch me, too, 
 and then no one would know where you were. 
 They can’t get you away from here, so you’re 
 sure to be safe soon.” 
 
 DoUy nodded to show that she understood, and 
 Bessie moved silently away. But, as she turned 
 down the trail that would take her back to the 
 spot where she had left Lolla, she had a new causa 
 for fright. She hoard Lolla ’s voice, raised loudly, 
 arguing with a man who answered in low, gut- 
 tural tones. "Wiiat they were saying she could not 
 distinguish, hut somehow she understood that 
 Peter had come even sooner than Lolla had feared, 
 and the gjjMj girl, at the risk of angering 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 101 
 
 him, was trying to warn her, so that she might not 
 descend the trail and so stumble right into his 
 arms. 
 
 So, although the prospect frightened her, she 
 turned and made her way swiftly up to the peak 
 again, determined that if the man should go past 
 the opening that led to the place where Dolly lay, 
 she would risk the danger and the difficulty of the 
 rocky descent from the peak itself. 
 
 As she hastened along silence fell behind her, 
 and she knew that Peter must have started. He 
 was whistling a queer gypsy tune and Bessie heard 
 him pass the partly masked opening that she had 
 herself found with so much difficulty. 
 
 After that she hesitated no longer, but rushed 
 to the reeky top of the peak, and in a moment she 
 was making her way down, with as much caution 
 as possible, swinging from one ledge to the next, 
 hanging on to a bush here, and a projecting piece 
 of rock there. 
 
 Even an expert climber, equipped with rope and 
 sharp pointed stick, would have found the descent 
 difficult. And all that enabled Bessie to succeed 
 was her knowledge that she must. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 A TEEEIBLK StTRPKISE 
 
 Bessie, tiiongli slie had to pause more than once 
 in her wild descent of the rocks, dared not look 
 hack to see if the gypsy, Peter, was pursuing her, 
 or even whether he was looking down after her. 
 She had two reasons. For one thing, the task 
 was difficult and terrifying enough as it was, and 
 to know that there was danger from behind, as 
 well as the peril involved in the descent itself, 
 would, she feared, unnerve her. 
 
 And, moreover, even if Peter saw her, he might 
 not, if she paid no attention to him, suspect that 
 she had anything to do with Dolly, or that he and 
 his companion had anything to dread from her. 
 Bessie did not know whether he would recognize 
 her as having been at the gypsy camp with Dolly, 
 but she felt that it would be as well not to take 
 the chance. Things were bad enough without run- 
 ning the risk of complicating them still further. 
 
 The descent was a long and hard one, but when 
 she was about half way down to the comparatively 
 level ground at the foot of the peak, all real dan- 
 ger of a crippling fall was over, since there a 
 path began. Evidently some trampers who were 
 fond of climbing had worn it through the rough 
 surface to a point where a good view was to be 
 
 102 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 103 
 
 had, and liad stopped there, content with the dis- 
 tance they had gone, and not disposed to try the 
 further ascent. And, as soon as Bessie reached 
 that point she was able to stop and get her breath. 
 
 Meanwhile she 'wondered what had become of 
 Loila. The gypsy girl, as Bessie understood thor- 
 oughly, was rimning severe risks. If the t'wo men 
 knew that she was in league with Dolly’s friends 
 they would certainly take some steps to silence 
 her. But John, Bessie felt sure, did not believe 
 that Loila, no matter how jealous she might be, 
 would actually betray her own people to the hated 
 Americans. He had smiled in a confident man- 
 ner while Loila had made her threats, and Bessie 
 thought he regarded tile girl as a child in a tem- 
 per, but sure to come to her senses before she 
 actually put him in danger. 
 
 What to do next was a problem. Bessie, when 
 she had followed the rough path until it led to 
 a trail, was completely lost. She knew, roughly, 
 and in a general way, the direction of Camp Man- 
 asquan, as the camp at Long Lake was called, but 
 that was about all. 
 
 “If I go straight ahead I may be going just as 
 straight as I can aw’ay from anyone who can help 
 DollyJ’ she reflected. “Or I may get over toward 
 Loon Pond, and run into that awful gypsy, and 
 then I’d be worse off than ever! Oh, I do wish I 
 knew where I was, or how I can find Loila. She 
 
104 
 
 THE CAMP FISE GIRLS 
 
 must know these woods, and she’d he able to help 
 me, I’m sure.” 
 
 Finally, however, Bessie determined to move 
 slowly along the trail in a direction that would, 
 she thought, take her around the bottom of Deer 
 Mountain. She remembered that just a little 
 while before she had come to the place where she 
 had first seen Lolla, a side path had crossed the 
 trail on which she had followed Dolly and her 
 captor, and it seemed likely to her that that path 
 would also cross the trail she was now on. 
 
 If it did she could work back to a spot she 
 knew, and so find her bearings, at least. Then, if 
 there was nothing else to be done, she would cer- 
 tainly be able to get back to Long Lake. For her 
 to stay in the woods, lost and hungry, would not 
 help Dolly. 
 
 So she set out bravely, walking as fast as she 
 could. The sun wms high in the heavens now, and 
 it was long after breakfast time, so that Bessie 
 was hungry, but she thought little of that. 
 
 As she ha'd hoped, and half expected, she came, 
 presently, and at what seemed to her the proper 
 place, upon a trail that crossed the one she was 
 following, and she turned to the left without hesi- 
 tation. She might, she felt, be going in the wrong 
 direction altogether, but she could not very well 
 be more hopelessly lost than she was already, and, 
 if she had to be out in the woods without a clue 
 to the proper way to turn, she felt that it made 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 105 
 
 very little difference whether she was in one place 
 or in another. 
 
 The new trail was one evidently little nsed, and 
 when Bessie had been on it for perhaps ten min- 
 ntes, and was beginning to think that it was time 
 she came in sight of the larger trail from Long 
 Lake to Deer Mountain, she heard someone coming 
 toward her, and, rounding a bend, came into sight 
 of Lolla. 
 
 The gypsy girl seemed overwhelmed with joy at 
 the sight of Bessie. 
 
 “Oh, how glad I am!” she exclaimed. “I was 
 afraid that Peter had caught and tied yon np 
 with 3^onr friend, and that yon would think I had 
 sent yon np there so that he wonld trap yon ! How 
 did yon escape?” 
 
 “I climbed down the rocks,” said Bessie simply, 
 and smiled at Lolla ’s gasp of astonishment, 
 
 ‘^You climbed down the rocks!” cried the 
 gypsy. “However did yon do that? There ain’t 
 many men~not even many of onr men— wonld 
 try that, I can tell yon. I thohght perhaps yon 
 wonld try to do that, and I was coming aronnd 
 this way to get to the foot of the rocks and see 
 if I eonld find ont what had become of yon. ’ ’ 
 
 “Yon know where we are and how to get back, 
 then?” asked Bessie. 
 
 “Of eonrse I do. I know all these woods.” 
 I^olla langhed. “I have set traps for partridges 
 rabbits here many and many a time, bnt the 
 
106 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 guides never saw me. You knew wkere you were 
 going, didn’t you I If you’d kept on as you were ■ 
 going when you met me you would have come to 
 the main trail in a minute or two, and then, if 
 you’d turned to the right, and kejDt straight on, 
 you ’d have come to Long Lake, where you started 
 from. ’ ’ 
 
 “I thought that was what would happen, Lolla, 
 but I wasn’t quite sure.” 
 
 “Did you hear me shouting when Peter came 
 along? I hoped you would understand and hide 
 yourself some way, so that he wouldn’t find you. 
 What I was most afraid of was that you would be 
 in the woods with your friend, and that you 
 wouldn’t hear us.” 
 
 “Yes, I heard you, and I knew what you were 
 doing, Lolla; that you meant to warn me that 
 Peter had come sooner than you thought he would. 
 I was grateful, too, but I was afraid just to hide 
 myself and let him go by, because the woods were 
 so thick on each side of the trail that I was 
 afraid he would see where I had broken through 
 and catch me.” 
 
 Lolla nodded her head. 
 
 “You are wise. You would be a good gypsy, 
 Bessie. You -would soon learn all the things we 
 know ourselves. Peter has very quick eyes, and 
 he is very suspicious, too. He saw you at the 
 camp, you know, and he would have guessed right 
 
I 
 
 AT LONG LAKE 107 
 
 away, if he had seen you there, that you were 
 looking for Dolly.” 
 
 “That was just what I was afraid of, Lolla. He 
 would have tied me up with her if he had found 
 me, wouldn’t he?” 
 
 “Yes. He’s a bad man, that Peter. I think if 
 John and he were not so friendly John would not 
 have done this. He is kind, and brave, and he 
 always tried to stop anyone who wanted to steal 
 children. He would steal a horse, or a deer, but 
 never a child ; that was cowardly, he said.” 
 
 “He didn’t hurt you, did he, Lolla?” 
 
 The gypsy girl laughed. 
 
 “Oh, no. He tried to hit me, but I got away 
 from him too quickly. I would not let him touch 
 me. With John it is different. He is my man; 
 he may beat me if he likes. But not Peter ; I hate 
 him. If he beat me I would put this into him.” 
 
 Bessie, surprised by the look of hate in Lolla ’s 
 eyes, drew back in fear as Lolla produced a long, 
 sharp knife from the folds of her dress, and 
 flourished it for a moment. 
 
 “Oh, Lolla, please put that away!” she ex- 
 claimed. “There’s no one here to be afraid of.” 
 
 Lolla laughed. 
 
 “No, but I have it if I need it,” she said, mean- 
 ingly. 
 
 “What are we going to do now, Lolla? We 
 can’t leave Dolly up there much longer. They’ve 
 got her tied up, and gagged, so that she can’t 
 
108 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 call out, and she’s terribly uncomfortable, though 
 I don’t think she’s suffering much.” 
 
 “We will get her soon,” said Lolla, confidently. 
 
 ‘“You stay near where she is, so that they can’t 
 get her away,” said Bessie, “and I’ll go and get 
 help. Then we shan’t have any trouble.” 
 
 But Lolla frowned at the suggestion. 
 
 “You would get those guides, and they would 
 catch my man and put him in prison, oh, for years, 
 perhaps ! No, no ; I will get her away, with you 
 to help me. Leave that to me. Peter is stupid. 
 ComQ with me now; I know what we must do.” 
 
 “YTiere are you going? This isn’t the way 
 back to where Dolly is, ’ ’ protested Bessie, as Lolla 
 pressed on in the direction from which Bessie had 
 come. “We can never get up those rocks, Lolla; 
 it was hard enough to come down. ” 
 
 . “We are not going there, not yet,” said Lolla. 
 “I must go to the camp and find out what John is 
 doing. If he comes back to watch her himself it 
 will be harder. But if he has to stay, and Peter 
 looks after her, then we shall have no trouble. You 
 shall see ; only trust me. I managed so that you 
 saw her, didn’t I? Doesn’t that show you that I 
 can do what I say?” 
 
 “I suppose so,” sighed Bessie. “I should think 
 you wouldn’t care if that man does go to prison, 
 though, Lolla. He isn’t nice to you, and you say 
 he’ll beat you when you’re married. American 
 men don’t beat their wives. If they did they would 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 109 
 
 be sent to prison. I sbonld think yon’d give h.im 
 up—” 
 
 Lolla’s dark eyes flamed for a moment, but then 
 sbe smiled, as if she had remembered that Bessie^ 
 not being a gypsy, could not be expected to under- 
 stand the gypsy ways. 
 
 “He is a good man,” she said. “He will always 
 see that I have enough to eat, and pretty things 
 to wear. And if he beats me, it will be because I 
 have been wicked, and deserve to be beaten. 'When 
 I am his wife he will be like my father; if I am 
 bad he will punish me. Is it not so among your 
 people!” 
 
 Bessie struggled with a laugh at the thought of 
 the only married couple she had ever knovm at ali 
 well : Paw and Maw Hoover. The idea that Paw 
 Hoover, the mildest and most inoffensive of men, 
 might ever beat his wife would have made any- 
 one who knew that couple laugh. 
 
 Instead of turning when they reached the trail 
 which Bessie had followed after her descent from 
 the rocks, Lolla led the way straight on. 
 
 “Are you sure you know whei'e you are going, 
 Lolla!” asked Bessie. 
 
 Lolla smiled at her scornfully. 
 
 “Yes, but it is not the way you would go,” she 
 said. “The trail to the camp will be full of peo- 
 ple. They will be out all over the camp partic- 
 ularly. We must come to it from another direc- 
 tion. That is why we are going this way. ’ ’ 
 
110 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 It was not long before Bessie was as thoroughly 
 lost as if she had been in a maze. Lolla, however, 
 seemed to know just Where she was going. She 
 left one trail to turn into another without ever 
 showing the slightest doubt of her direction, and, 
 at times, when the v/oods were thin, she would take 
 short cuts, leading the way through entirely path- 
 less portions of the forest with as much assurance 
 as if she had been walking through the streets of a 
 city where she had lived all her life. Even Bessie, 
 used to long walks around Hedgeville, in which 
 ■she had learned the country thoroughly, was sur- 
 prised. 
 
 “I don’t believe I’d ever get to know these 
 woods as weU as you do,” she said, admiringly. 
 “Why, you never seem even to hesitate.” 
 
 “I’ve been here every summer since I was 
 born,” said Lolla, in a laughing tone. “I ought 
 to know these woods pretty well, I think.” 
 
 “I hope no one sees us now,” said Bessie, ner- 
 vously. “I really do feel as if it were wrong for 
 me to keep away. Miss Mercer must be as anxious 
 about me as she is about Dolly.’’ 
 
 “Is she the lady who is with you girls'?” 
 
 ^‘Yes, You see, she probably thinks that I was 
 carried off, as well as Dolly.” 
 
 “She will stop being anxious all the sooner for 
 not knowing where you are. I think it will not 
 be long now before we get your friend away from 
 that place where she is hidden,” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 111 
 
 “Well, I certainly hope so. Listen! I think 
 I can hear voices in front of us. ” 
 
 “I heard them two or three minutes ago,” said 
 Lolla, with a smile. “Stay here, now; hide be- 
 hind that clump of hushes. I will go ahead and see 
 what I can find. Even if it is some of your friends 
 they would not suspect me ; they would think I was 
 just out for a walk. ’ ’ 
 
 So Bessie waited for perhaps ten minutes, while 
 Lolla crept forward alonfe. But the gypsy was 
 back soon, smiling. 
 
 “All is safe now,” she said. “Come quickly, 
 though, so we shall get behind them and be able 
 to get near the camp. There is a place there 
 where you may hide while I find out what is going 
 on.” 
 
 They reached the spot Lolla meant in a few 
 minutes more, and again Bessie had to play the 
 inactive part and wait while Lolla went on to gain 
 the information she needed. When she came back 
 she was smiling happily. 
 
 “That John is stupid, though he is so brave,” 
 she said to Bessie. “He went back there to the 
 camp, and he is sitting in front of his wagon. 
 There is a guide with a gun sitting near him, and 
 my sister tells me that the guide says he will fol- 
 low hi m and shoot him if he tries to get away. 
 
 “There are many people there, and the whole 
 camp is angry and frightened. The king says he 
 will punish John, but John will not admit that he 
 
112 
 
 THE CAMP PIPE GIELS 
 
 knows where ypnr friend is. We are safe from 
 him. They will not let him get away for a long 
 time. ’ ’ 
 
 Bessie was comforted by the news. With her 
 captor under guard, Dolly had nothing to fear 
 from him, and, though Peter might be a sullen and 
 a dangerous man, Bessie felt that Lolla was right, 
 and that he was too thick witted to be greatly 
 feared. 
 
 They made the return trip with hearts far 
 lighter than they had been as they made their way 
 to the gypsy camp. Bessie had seen that Lolla 
 was afraid of John, though now that he had been 
 over-reached she was ready enough to laugh at 
 him. 
 
 ‘ ‘ What are you going to do 1 How are you go- 
 ing to get her away, Lolla f ’ ’ asked Bessie, as they 
 neared the point where she had first seen her ally. 
 
 “I don’t know yet,” said Lolla, frankly. “If 
 Peter is on the trail it will be harder. I hope he 
 will be inside, so that we can slip by without his 
 seeing us. If he is, and we get by, then you are 
 to wait until you hear me sing. So. ’ ’ 
 
 She sang a bar or two of a gypsy melody, and 
 repeated it until Bessie, too, could hum it, to prove 
 that she had it right, and would not fail to recog- 
 nize it. 
 
 ‘ When you hear me sing that, remember that 
 you must run down and, go to your friend. Here 
 i? toy knife. Use it to cut the cords that tie her. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 113 
 
 Then yon and slie must go back toward the rocks 
 where you went down. And when you hear me 
 sing again you are to go down, as quickly as you 
 can, but quietly, and, as soon as you are past the 
 place where she was hidden, you must start run- 
 ning. I will try to catch up with you and go wdth 
 you, but do not wait for me. ” 
 
 “I don’t quite understand,” Bessie began. 
 
 But now Lolla was the general, brooking no de- 
 fiance. She stamped her foot. 
 
 “It does not matter whether you understand or 
 not,” she said sharply. “If you want me to save 
 your friend and get back to the others you must 
 do as you are told, and quicldy. Now, come.” 
 
 They went on up the trail, and, at a bend just 
 below the spot where she had broken through to 
 reach Dolly before, Bessie waited while Lolla, 
 who had recognized the place from Bessie’s de- 
 scription of it, crept forward to make sure that 
 the way was clear. 
 
 “All ^•ight,” she whispered. “Come on.” 
 
 Silently, but as swiftly as they could, they crept 
 past the place, and, w'hen they were out of sight, 
 stopped. 
 
 “Now, you will know my song when you hear 
 it?” 
 
 “Yes, indeed, Lolla. Why, what have you got 
 there?” 
 
 “What I need to make Peter come with me,” 
 laughed Lolla. “See, a fine meal, is it not? I 
 
114 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 got it at the camp. Let him smell that stew and he 
 would follow me out of the woods.” 
 
 Bessie began to understand Lotla’s plan at last. 
 She was going to tempt Peter to betray his orders 
 from his friend by appealing to his stomach. And 
 Bessie wondered again, as she had many times 
 since she had met Lolla, at the cunning of the 
 gypsy girl. 
 
 Her confidence in Lolla was complete by now, 
 and she did not at all mind waiting as she saw 
 the little brightly clad figure disappear amidst 
 the green of the trail. 
 
 It was some time, however, before she heard 
 any signs that indicated that Lolla had obtained 
 any results. And then it was not the song she 
 heard, but Lolla ’s clear laugh, rising above the 
 heavy tones of Peter. 
 
 “Oh, oh! You would give me orders when I 
 bring your breakfast? No, no, Peter; that won’t 
 do. Come, she is safe there ; come and eat with 
 me, where she cannot put a spell on your food to 
 make it choke you.” 
 
 “Do you think she would do that?” 
 
 That was Peter’s voice, stupid and filled with 
 doubt. Bessie laughed at Lolla’s cleverness. 
 Peter, she thought, would be just the sort of man 
 to yield to the fears of superstition. 
 
 “I know she would; she hates us. Come, Peter; 
 does it not look good?” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 115 
 
 * ‘ G ive it to me. There, I ’ll catch y or.— ” 
 
 Then there was a sound of scuffling and running^ 
 but Bessie, noticing that it drew further and fur- 
 ther away, laughed. Lolla was a real strategist. 
 She understood how to handle the big gypsy, evi- 
 dently. And a moment later Bessie, her nerves 
 quivering, all alert as she waited for the signal, 
 heard the notes of Lolla ’s song. At once she 
 rushed down, broke through the tangled growth, 
 and was at Dolly ’s side, cutting away at the cords 
 that bound Dolly, and, first of all, tearing the 
 handkerchief from her mouth. 
 
 “It’s all right now, we’re safe, Dolly. Only 
 you’ll have to come quickly, dear, when I get yon 
 free. There, that’s it. Are you stiff? Can yon 
 stand up?” 
 
 “I guess so,” gasped Dolly. “Oh, I’d do any- 
 thing to get away from here. Bessie, look!” 
 
 Bessie turned, to face Peter and Lolla, their 
 faces twisted into malignant grins. Lolla had be- 
 trayed her! ' 
 
CHAPTEE XI 
 
 THE MYSTEKIOtrS VOICE 
 
 For a moment Bessie stared at the two gypsies, 
 their eyes glowing with malicious triumph and de- 
 light at her shocked face, in such dazed astonish- 
 ment that 'she could not speak at all. She had 
 been completely outwitted and hoodwinked. She 
 had trusted Loila utterly ; had made up her mind 
 that the girl’s jealousy was not feigned. 
 
 Even now, for a wild moment, the thought 
 flashed through her mind that perhaps Lolla had 
 been unable to help herself ; that Peter might have 
 insisted on ceming back, and that Lolla was forced, 
 in order to be of help later on, to seem to fall in 
 with his plans. 
 
 But Lolla herself soon robbed her of the com- 
 fort that lay in such a thought. 
 
 ‘‘You thought I would betray my people!” she 
 oried, shrilly. “We do not do that; no, no. Ah, 
 but it was easy to deceive you ! When I saw you 
 I knew you would be dangerous. I could not hold 
 you by force until John came, I had to trick you. 
 I thought we would catch you when you went up 
 there. I did not think you would be brave enough 
 to go down the rocks.” 
 
 Bessie said not a word, but only clung to Dolly’s 
 hand and stared at the treacherous gypsy. 
 
 116 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 117 
 
 “So then, when you had gone, I had to find you 
 again, and send word to Peter to do as I said, so 
 that we could catch you, and stop you from going 
 to your friends and telling them where we had 
 hidden your friend who is there with you now. 
 Now we have two, instead of one. Oh, I have 
 done well, have I not, Peter?” 
 
 Peter grinned, and grunted something in his 
 own tongue that made Lolla smile. 
 
 “Tie them up again, Peter,” said Lolla, look- 
 ing viciously at Bessie, and obviously gloating 
 over the way in which she had tricked the Amer- 
 ican girl. And Peter, nothing loath, advanced to 
 do so. But Bessie had stood all she could. 
 
 Dolly, terribly cast down by this sudden upset- 
 ting of all the hopes of rescue that the coming of 
 Bessie and her release from the cords that bound 
 her had raised, was close beside her, shivering 
 with fright and despair. 
 
 And Bessie, with a sudden cry of anger, seized 
 the knife Lolla had given her, which had been 
 lying at her feet. Furiously she brandished it. 
 
 “If either of you come a step nearer I’ll use 
 it!” she said, scarcely able to recognize her own 
 voice, so changed was it by the anger that Lolla ’s 
 treachery had aroused in her. “You’d better not 
 think I’m joking. I mean it!” 
 
 Peter hesitated, but Lolla, her eyes flashing, 
 urged him on. 
 
 “Go on! Do you want me to tell all the women 
 
118 
 
 THE CAMP PIPE GIELS 
 
 that you were frightened by a little girl ; a girl I 
 you could crush with one hand?” she cried, I 
 angrily. “You coward! Tie them up, I tell you! I 
 Oh, if my man John were here he’d show you 1 1 
 Here-” 1 
 
 Peter, stung by her taunts, made a quick rush | 
 forward. For a moment Bessie did not know I 
 what to do. She wondered if, when it came to the ; 
 test, slie would really be able to use the knife ; to ^ 
 try to cut or stab this man. He was getting nearer > 
 each moment, and, just as she was almost within 
 his grasp she darted back and aimed a blow at 
 him with the knife. 
 
 There was no danger that it would strike him; 
 Bessie thought that, if she could only convince i 
 him that she had meant what she said, he would ' 
 hesitate. And she was right. He gave a cry of * 
 alarm as he saw the steel flash toward him and 
 drew back. 
 
 “She would stab me!” he exclaimed, furiously, 
 to Lolla. “I was not to be struck with a knife. 
 John said nothing about that. He told me only 
 to guard this girl—” 
 
 “She wouldn’t really touch you with it,” 
 screamed Lolla, so furious that she forgot the 
 need of keeping her voice low. “John wouldn’t 
 let her frighten him that way, he is too brave. 
 Oh, how the women will laugh when they hear 
 how the brave Peter was frightened by a girl with 
 a little knife!” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 119 
 
 But Bessie, in spite of her own indecision, had 
 managed, somehow, to convince the man that she 
 was serious, and Lolla’s taunts no longer affected 
 him. He drew back still further, and stood look- 
 ing stupidly at the two girls. 
 
 “You’re wiser than she,” said Bessie, approv- 
 ingly. “I meant just what I said. Keep as far 
 as that from me, and you’ll be safe. I’m not 
 afraid of you any more.” 
 
 Nor was she. Her victory, brief though it might 
 be, had encouraged her, and revived her droop- 
 ing spirits. Dolly, too, seemed to have gained new 
 life from the sight of the big gypsy quailing be- 
 fore her chum. She had stopped trembling, and 
 stood up bravely now, ready to face whatever 
 might come. 
 
 “Good for you, Bessie!” she exclaimed. She 
 darted a vicious look at Lolla. “I wish that 
 treacherous little gypsy would come somewhere 
 near me,” she went on, angrily. “I’d pull her 
 hair and make her sorry she ever tried to help 
 those villians to keep us. When they put her in 
 prison I’m going to see her, and jeer at her!” 
 
 Lolla, looking helpless now in her anger, said 
 nothing, but she glared at the two girls. 
 
 “I think these people are very superstitious,” 
 whispered Dolly to Bessie, when it became plain 
 that, for the moment, the two gypsies intended 
 only to watch them, without making any further 
 attempt to tie them up. 
 
120 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 ‘H think so too,” returned Bessie, in the same 
 tone. “But I don’t see what good that is going 
 to do us, Dolly.” 
 
 “Neither do I, just yet, Bessie. But I can’t 
 help thinking that there must be some way that we 
 could frighten them, if we could only think of it; 
 so that they would be frightened and run away.” 
 
 “We might tell them— Oh, I’ve got an idea, 
 Dolly.” 
 
 She looked at Peter and Lolla. They were at 
 the very edge of the little clearing in which Dolly 
 had been imprisoned. 
 
 “Listen, Lolla,” said Bessie, calmly. “I be- 
 lieve that you are a good girl, though you have 
 lied to me, and tried to make me think you were 
 my friend, when all the time you were planning 
 how you could betray me. This place is dan- 
 gerous. ’ ’ 
 
 Lolla looked at her scornfully and tossed her 
 head. 
 
 “Don’t think you can frighten me with your 
 stories,” she said, with a laugh. “It is dangerous 
 — for you. When my man comes you will find 
 that he is not a coward, like Peter, to be fright- 
 ened with your knife. He will take it away from 
 you and beat you, too, for trying to frighten Peter 
 with it. ” 
 
 “Yes, he is brave, Lolla. We saw that when he 
 ran away from the fire that he saw last night near 
 the lake. ’ ’ 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 121 . 
 
 Bes&ie was taking a cliance when she said that. 
 She did not know whether Lolla had heard of the- 
 mysterions flashlight explosion or not, bnt she 
 thought it more than probable that John had told 
 her of it. And she was reasonably sure that he 
 was still wondering Avhat had caused the light 
 that had so suddenly blinded him. Her swift look 
 at Lolla showed her that her blow had struck home. 
 
 “He is a brave man, indeed, to keep on with 
 his wicked plan to steal my friend after such a 
 warning,” Bessie went on sternly. “But his 
 bravery will do him no good. There is a spirit 
 looking after us. It made the fire that frightened 
 him, and the next time he will not only see the 
 fire; he will feel it, too.” 
 
 Now she looked not only at Lolla, who seemed 
 shaken, but at Peter, who was staring at her as 
 if fascinated. Evidently he, too, had heard of the 
 strange fire. Bessie had reckoned on the prob- 
 ability, that seemed almost a certainty, that John 
 would not have been able to explain, even to him- 
 self, the nature of the flashlight explosion. And 
 evidently she was right. Then she took another 
 chance, guessing at what she thought John would 
 probably have said to explain the fire. 
 
 “I know what he told you,” she said, slowly. 
 “He said that the fire came from a spirit that 
 was guiding him, and was trying to help him. But 
 he only said that because he did not understand. 
 It meant just the opposite ; that it would be better 
 
122 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 for him to go home, and forget the wicked plot 
 he had thought of.” 
 
 Peter seemed to be weakening, but Lolla tossed 
 her head again. 
 
 “Are you a baby? Do you think that is true?” 
 she said to him. “Don’t you see that she is only 
 trying to frighten you, as she did with the knife?” 
 
 ^‘Indeed I am not,” said Bessie, earnestly. “I 
 am not angry with you, any more than I am afraid 
 of you now. If you stay here something dreadful 
 will happen to you both. You would not like to 
 go to prison, would you, and stay there all through 
 this summer, and the next winter, and the sum- 
 mer of next year, when you might be travelling 
 the road with your brothers?” 
 
 “Make them keep quiet, Peter,” cried Lolla, 
 furiously. “She is quite right. There is danger 
 here, but it comes from her friends. She thinks 
 that if she can fool us into letting her talk, they 
 may pass by and hear her voice.” 
 
 “You keep quiet,” said Peter, doggedly, evi- 
 dently deciding that, this time, he could safely 
 ©bey Lolla ’s orders, and quite ready to do so. 
 “If you make any more noise I will—” 
 
 He left the sentence uncompleted, but a savage 
 gesture showed what he meant. He had a stout 
 stick, and this he now swung with a threatening 
 air. 
 
 Bessie had hoped to work on the superstitious 
 nature of the gypsy man, and to frighten him, per- 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 123 
 
 haps, if she had good luck, into letting her go off 
 with Dolly. Bnt Lolla’s interference had put that 
 out of the question. She turned sadly to Dolly, to 
 see her companion’s eyes twinkling. 
 
 “Never you mind, Bessie,” she said. “They’re 
 stupid, anyhow. And as long as they don’t tie 
 us up we’re all right. I’d just as soon be here as 
 anywhere. Someone will go along that trail pres- 
 ently looking for us, and when they do we can 
 shout. They’ll probably make a noise themselves, 
 so as to let us know they are near. And I’m not 
 frightened any more; really I’m not.” 
 
 But Bessie, tired and disappointed, was nearer 
 to giving in than she had been since the moment 
 when she had awakened and found that Dolly was 
 missing. She felt that she ought to have dis- 
 trusted Lolla; that she had made a great mistake 
 in thinking, even for a moment, that the gypsy 
 girl meant to betray her own people. 
 
 Then, suddenly a strange thing happened. A 
 new voice, that belonged to none of the four who 
 were in the clearing, suddenly broke the silence. 
 It seemed to come from a tree directly over the 
 heads of Lolla and Peter, and, as it spoke, they 
 stared upward with one accord, listening intently 
 to what it said. 
 
 “Will you make me come down and punish 
 you?” said the voice. It was that of an old, old 
 man, feeble with age, but still clear. 
 
 Bessie stared too, as surprised as the gypsy, 
 and the voice went on: 
 
124 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “I gave your companion a sign last night that 
 should have warned him. I speak to you now, to 
 warn you again. The next time I shall not give a 
 warning ; I shall act, and your punishment will he 
 swift and terrible. Take heed ; go, while there is 
 time.” 
 
 For a moment the two gypsies were speechless, 
 looking at one another in wonder, and Bessie was 
 not disposed to blame them. Her own head was 
 in a whirl. 
 
 “Quick; it is in that tree!” said Lolla, easily 
 the braver of the two of them. “Climb up there, 
 and see who it is that is trying to frighten us, 
 Peter.” 
 
 But Peter was not prepared to do anything of 
 the sort. He was trembling, and casting nervous 
 glances behind him, as if he were more minded to 
 make a break and run down the trail. 
 
 “Climb yourself ! I shall stay here,” he retorted. 
 
 And Lolla, without further hesitation, sprang 
 into the branches of the tree and began to climb. 
 
 As she did so the mysterious voice sounded 
 again. 
 
 “You cannot see me, yet,” it said. “You can 
 only hear me. See, my voice is in your ears, but 
 you cannot see as much as my little finger. Be- 
 ware ; go before you do see me. For when you 
 do, you will regret it; regret it as long as you 
 live!” 
 
 "When Lolla, a moment later, reached firm 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 125 
 
 ground again, slie was trembling, and Bessie saw 
 that her courage was beginning to fail. She looked 
 about her nervously, as Peter was doing. And 
 sudd.enly the voice spoke again, but this time it 
 shouted, and it was in a stronger, more vigorous 
 tone, and one of great anger. 
 
 ‘‘Must I show myself? Must I punish you?” 
 it said, furiously. “Pear me; you will do well! 
 Go-GO!” 
 
 With a yell of terror Peter turned suddenly, 
 and ran through the thick bushes toward the trail, 
 crying out as he went, and stumbling. 
 
 ‘ ‘ Come ; it is the devil ! I saw his horns and his 
 tail then,” he screamed. “Come, Lolla; this is 
 an accursed place. I told John it was wrong to 
 try to do this ; that we ’would get into trouble. ’ ’ 
 “He is wise; he is safe!” said the mysterious 
 voice. “Gro too, Lolla; I am gro-wing impatient. 
 Go, if you want to see John, your lover, and the 
 brothers that you love, again. The time is grow- 
 ing short. I come; I come; and when I come—” 
 And then at last Lolla ’s nerves, too, gave way, 
 and she followed Peter, screaming, as he had done, 
 while she ran. Bessie, as astonished and almost as 
 frightened as the two gypsies had been, turned 
 then to see how Dolly was bearing this extra- 
 ordinary affair, to see her chum rolling about on 
 the ground, with tears in her eyes. 
 
 ‘ ‘ Oh, that was funny ! ’ ’ Dolly exclaimed. ‘ ‘ They 
 were easy, after all, Bessie.” 
 
126 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “TheyVe gone! It’s all right now,” said 
 Bessie. “But who was it, Doily? "Who could it 
 have been?” 
 
 “It was me!” exclaimed Dolly, weakly, between 
 gasps of laughter, forgetting her grammar alto- 
 gether. “I learned that trick last summer. They 
 call it ventriloquism. It just means throwing your 
 voice out so that it doesn’t seem to come from you 
 at all, and changing it, so that people won’t recog- 
 nize it.” 
 
 Bessie stared at her, in wonder and admiration, 
 
 “Why, DoUy Eansom!” she said. “However 
 do you do it? I never heard of such a thing!” 
 
 “I don’t know how I do it,” said Dolly, re- 
 covering her breath. “No one who can does, I 
 guess. It’s just smnething you happen to be able 
 to do.” 
 
 “You certainly frightened them,” said Bessie. 
 “And you saved us with your trick, Dolly. I 
 think they’ve run dear away. We can follow 
 them down the trail; they won’t stick to it, and I 
 think we can go right back to Long Lake, now, 
 without being afraid any more. Come on, we’d 
 better start. I don’t want to stay here.” 
 
CHAPTER Xn. 
 
 OUT OP THE PRYING PAN 
 
 . “Stay lioref I should say not!” exclaimed 
 Doiiy, “I’m almost starved— and, Bessie, they 
 must be terribly worried about us, too. And now 
 teil me, as we go along, how you ever found me. 
 I don’t see how you managed that.” 
 
 So, as they made their way down the trail, 
 Bessie told her of all that had happened since 
 her rude awakening at the camp fire, just after 
 the gyj:!Sj had carried Dolly off. 
 
 “Oh, Bessie, it was perfectly fine of you, and 
 it’s only because of you that we’re safe now! But 
 you oughtn’t to have taken such a risk! Just 
 think of what might have happened!” 
 
 “That’s just it, Dolly. I’ve got time to think 
 about it now, but then I could only think of you, 
 and what was happening to you. If I’d stopped 
 to tiiink about the danger I’m afraid I wouldn’t 
 liave come.” 
 
 “But you must have known it was dangerous! 
 I don’t know anyone else who would have done 
 it for me.” 
 
 “Gc, yes, they would, Dolly. That’s one of the 
 things we promise when we join the Camp Fire 
 Girls— always to help another member of the 
 Camp Fire who is in trouble or in danger.” 
 
 127 
 
128 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 “Yes— but not like that. It doesn’t say any- 
 thing about going into danger yourself, you 
 know.” 
 
 “Listen, Dolly. If you saw me drowning in 
 the water, you’d jump in after me, wouldn’t you I 
 Or after any of tbe girls— if there wasn’t time 
 lo get help?” 
 
 “I suppose so— but that’s different. It just 
 means going in quickly, without time to think very 
 much about it. And you had plenty of time to 
 think while you were tramping along that horrid 
 dark trail after me.” 
 
 “Well, it’s all over now, Dolly, and, after all, 
 you had to save both of us in the end.” 
 
 “That was just a piece of luck, and a trick, 
 Bessie. It didn’t take any courage to do that — 
 and, beside, if it hadn’t been for you I would never 
 have had the chance to do that. I wonder why 
 Lolla let you have her knife to cut those cords 
 about me?” 
 
 “I think she’s a regular actress, Dolly, and 
 that she wanted to make me feel absolutely sure 
 she was on our side, so that we would both be 
 there in that trap when she and Peter came back.”^ 
 
 “It’s a good thing he was such a coward, Bes- 
 sie.” 
 
 “Oh, I think he’d be brave enough if he just 
 had to fight with a man, so that it was the sort 
 of fighting he was used to. You see it wasn’t his 
 plan, and when I said I’d use that knife he 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 129 
 
 couldn’t see why he should run any risk when all 
 the profit was for the other man.” 
 
 “And when you played that trick with your 
 voice he was frightened, because he’d never heard 
 of anything of that sort, and he didn’t know what 
 was coming next, I think that would frighten a 
 good many people who are really brave.” 
 
 “Bessie, why do I always get into so much- 
 trouble ? x\ll this happened just because I changed 
 those signs that day.” 
 
 “Oh, I don’t know about that, Dolly. It might 
 have happened anyhow. I’ve got an idea now 
 that they knew we were around, and that John 
 planned to kidnap one of us and keep us until 
 someone paid him a lot of money to let us go. 
 Something Lolla said made me think that.” 
 
 “Then he was just playing a joke when he said 
 he wanted to marry me!” 
 
 “Yes, I think so, because I don’t think he was 
 foolish enough to think he could ever really get 
 you to do that. I did think so at first, but if that 
 had been so I’m quite sure that Lolla wouldn’t 
 have helped him.” 
 
 “She’d have been jealous, you mean?” 
 
 “Yes, I’m quite sure, you see, that she saw him 
 and talked to him when we went over to their 
 camp that time, so that she could take orders 
 from him to Peter. He knew he’d be watched, 
 so he mur'c have made up his mind from the first 
 that he ;ould have to have help. ’ ’ 
 
130 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 “I wonder wliat he is doing now, Bessie.” 
 
 “I certainly hope he’s still over there at the 
 camp, sitting near that guide. The guide said 
 he would shoot him if he tried to get away, you 
 know. ’ ’ 
 
 “My, hut I’ll het there’s heen a lot of commo- 
 tion over this. ” 
 
 “I’m sure there has, Dolly. Probably all the 
 people at the hotel heard about it, too. I’ll bet 
 they’ve got people out all through the woods look- 
 ing for us.” 
 
 “I wish we’d meet some of them— and that 
 they’d have a lot of sandwiches and things. Bes- 
 sie, I’ve simply got to sit down and rest. I want 
 to get back to Miss Eleanor and the girls, but if 
 I keep on any longer I’ll drop just where we are. 
 I’m too tired to take another step without a rest.” 
 
 “I am, too, Dolly. Here— here’s a good place 
 to sit down for a little while. We really can’t 
 be so very far from Long Lake now. ’ ’ 
 
 “No,” said a voice, behind them. “But you’re 
 so far that you’ll never reach there, my dears!” 
 
 And, turning, they saw John, the gypsy, leering 
 at them. His clothes were torn, and he was hot 
 and dirty, so that it was plain that he had had a 
 long run, and a narrow escape from capture. But 
 at the sight of them he smiled, evilly and trium- 
 phantly, as if that repaid him amply for any hard- 
 ships he had undergone. 
 
 “Don’t you dare touch us!” said Bessie, shrilly. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 i«j>i 
 
 She realized even as she said it, that he was 
 not likely to pay any attention to her, but the 
 sight of his grinning face, when she had been so 
 sure that their troubles were over at last, was 
 too much for her. 
 
 She sank down on a log beside Dolly, and hid 
 her face in her hands, beginning to cry. Most 
 men, no matter how bad, would have been moved 
 to pity by the sight of her sufferings. But John 
 was not. 
 
 “Don’t cry,” he said, with mock sympathy. “I 
 am not going to treat you badly. Yon shall stay 
 in the woods with me. I have a good hiding 
 place— a place where your friends will never find 
 you until I am ready. You are tired. So am I. 
 We will rest here. It is quite safe. A party of 
 your friends passed this way five minutes ago. 
 They will not come again— not soon. I was with- 
 in a few feet of them, but they did not see me.” 
 
 Bessie groaned at the news. Had they only 
 reached the place five minutes earlier, then, they 
 would have been safe. She was struck by an idea, 
 however, and lifted her voice in a shout for aid. 
 In a moment the gypsy’s hand covered her mouth 
 and he was snarling in her ear. 
 
 “None of that,” he said, grittingly, “or I will 
 find a way to make you keep still. You must do 
 as I tell you now, or it will be the worse for you. 
 Will you promise to keep quiet?” 
 
 Bessie realized that there was no telling what 
 
132 THE CAMP FISE GIELS 
 
 this man would do if she did not promise— and 
 keep her promise. He was cleverer than Peter, 
 and, therefore, much more dangerous. She felt, 
 somehow, that the trick which had worked so well 
 when Dolly had used it before would he of no 
 avail now. He might even tmderstand it; he was 
 most unlikely, she was sure, to yield to supersti- 
 tious terror as Peter and Lolla had done. And, 
 leaning over to Dolly, she whispered to her. 
 
 “Don’t try that trick, Dolly. You see, if the 
 others had dared the voice to do something they 
 would have found out that there was really noth- 
 ing to be afraid of— and I’m afraid he’d wait. 
 It may be useful again, but not with him, now. 
 If we tried it, and it didn ’t work— ’ ’ 
 
 “I understand,” Dolly whispered back. “I 
 think you are right, too, Bessie. We’d be worse 
 off than ever. I was thinking that if only some 
 of the other gypsies were here we might frighten 
 them so much with it that they’d make him let 
 us go.” 
 
 “Yes. We’ll save it for that.” 
 
 The gypsy was still breathing hard. He looked 
 at the two girls malignantly, but he saw that they 
 were too tired to walk much unless he let them 
 rest, and, purely out of policy, and not at all 
 because he was sorry for them, and for the hard- 
 ships he had made them endure, he let them sit 
 still for a while. But finally he rose. 
 
 “Come,” he said. “You’ve been loafing here 
 
AT LONG lAKE 
 
 133 - 
 
 long snongli. Get up now, and walk in front of 
 me— back, tlie way you came.” 
 
 They groaned at tbe prospect of retracing tbeir 
 footsteps once more, but be held tbe upper band, 
 and there was nothing for it but obedience. That 
 much was plain. Desperately, as they began to 
 drag their tired feet once more along the trail, 
 they listened, hoping against hope for the sounds 
 that would indicate that some of the searchers 
 they were sure filled the woods were in the neigh- 
 borhood. 
 
 But no comforting shouts greeted them. The 
 woods were silent, save for the calls of birds and 
 animals, which, friendly though they might be, 
 were powerless to aid the two girls against this 
 traditional enemy of every furred and feathered 
 creature in the forest. 
 
 Steadily they plodded on. Bessie knew the 
 ground well by this time, and, one by one they 
 passed the landmarks she knew so well, until they 
 came at last to the cross path which had brought 
 Bessie back to the trap Lolla had prepared for 
 her. And there they came upon a startling inter- 
 ruption of their journey. 
 
 For suddenly Lolla herself, who had evidently” 
 been hiding there when they had passed, alone, be- 
 fore their meeting with John, sprang out and 
 stood in front of them. Long as she had resisted 
 her fear of the supernatural force that had come 
 to the aid of the girls, she was plainly afraid of 
 
134 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 it still, for at sight of them her cheeks paled, and v, 
 
 she cried out in terror. And behind her, as scared i 
 
 ■ \ 
 
 as she was herself, came Peter, the big gypsy, 
 shaking in every limb. | 
 
 ‘‘A fine mess you made of things— letting them | 
 escape,” growled John, as he saw his two com- ? 
 patriots. “If I hadn’t found them on the trail, t 
 by sheer luck, they’d have been back at the lake 
 by this time.” ■ 
 
 “Let them go— for heaven’s sake, let them go,, i 
 John,” wailed Lolla. “There is a devil fighting ^ 
 for them— he will kill you if you try any longer 
 to keep them from their friends.” 
 
 “Pah! What child’s talk is. this! Be thankful 
 that I do not beat you with my stick for letting 
 them get free!” 
 
 “Listen to her, John,” said Peter, warningly. 
 “She speaks the truth. It was a devil that spoke 
 from the air. I saw his horns and his red tail. 
 Be careful— he may be here now.” 
 
 John laughed, scornfully. 
 
 “Run away, if you are afraid,” he said. “I 
 will manage alone now. I would not trust you — 
 you have failed me once, both of you. Do not 
 think you can frighten me into failure because 
 you are as brave as a— chicken!” 
 
 “Let them go, I say,” said Peter, wuth a stern- 
 ness in his voice that gave Bessie a new ray of 
 hope. “I have had my warning, I will profit by it.”- 
 “You coward!” sneered John. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 135 
 
 But that was too much for Peter. With a cry; 
 of rage he sprang forward. 
 
 “I fear no man, no man I can see or touch,” he 
 cried. “And no man shall call me coward!” 
 
 In a moment the two were grappling in a furious 
 fight. John was smaller than Peter, but he was 
 wiry and as lithe and powerful as a trained athlete, 
 so that he was a match, at first, for the rugged 
 strength of Peter. But he had had a hard day, 
 and gradually Peter’s strength wore him down, 
 and, as they crashed to the ground together, Peter 
 was on top, and plainly destined to be victor in 
 the fight. He looked up at the two girls. 
 
 “Go!” he said. “I will have nothing to do 
 with you. I am fighting with my friend to save 
 him, not for your sakes, you who have a devil to 
 hek: you. If he keeps you harm will come to him. 
 cCin, listen to me: I do this because you are my 
 friend.” 
 
 Bessie and Doily needed no second invitation. 
 Amazing as was this latest intervention in their 
 favor, they were too happy to stop to question 
 it. It was their chance to escape, and five min- 
 utes later they were, out of sight, and making 
 their way, as fast as their tired bodies would allow 
 them to do, toward Long Lake and safety. 
 
CHAPTEE Xm 
 
 SAFE AT LAST 
 
 Indeed, any lingering fear Bessie and Dolly 
 might have had that John had succeeded in 
 escaping from his two anxious friends who were 
 so determined to protect him against his own reck- 
 lessness, was dissipated before they came in sight 
 of the lake, when, at a crossing of the trail, a glad 
 cry hailed them and a sturdy guide stepped across 
 their path. 
 
 “Well, I’ll be hornswoggled ! ” he exclaimed. 
 “Ain’t you the two that was lost, or stolen by 
 that gypsy critter?” 
 
 “We certainly are,” said Dolly and Bessie, in 
 one breath. “Were you looking for us?” 
 
 ‘ ‘ Lookin ’ f er you ! ” he exclaimed. ‘ ‘ Every one 
 in these here woods has been a-lookin’ fer you 
 two since sun-up, I guess. Godfrey, but we was 
 scared! Didn’t know but that there gypsy might 
 have snaked you clean out of the woods! How 
 did you all ever come to get loose? Or was you 
 just plain lost?” 
 
 “No, we weren’t lost,” said Bessie. “He car- 
 ried Dolly off all right ; this is Dolly Kansom, you 
 know. But he didn’t catch me.” 
 
 “Then how in tarnation did you come to be 
 lost, too? You was, wasn’t you? They told us 
 two girls was missin’.” 
 
 136 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 137 
 
 “Well, we were asleep in the open air, outside 
 the tent, and I woke np jnst as he was carrying 
 Dolly off. I didn’t wake up until he’d got out of 
 the firelight, and there wasn’t any use calling any- 
 one else. So I just followed myself. ’ ’ 
 
 “She says anyone would have done it,” Dolly 
 broke in, her eyes shining. “But I don’t believe 
 it, do youl” 
 
 “No, by Godfrey!” he said, emphatically. “A 
 greenhorn, goin’ out in them woods at night, in 
 the dark, and a girl, at that! I guess not!” 
 
 He looked at Bessie, as if puzzled to learn that 
 she had actually done such a thing. 
 
 “Well, you’re all right now,” he said. “Here, 
 I’ll just give the signal we fi:sed up. Listjen, 
 now!” 
 
 He raised his rifle, and, pointing it straight in 
 the air, fired two shots, and then, after a brief 
 interval, two more. 
 
 “The sound of that’ll carry a long way,” ho 
 explained, “and that means that you’re both 
 found. The other fellows who are searchin’ for 
 you will quit lookin’, now, and come into Long 
 Lake. If I’d fired just two shots, and hadn’t 
 fired the second two, that would have meant that 
 one of you was found, and they’d have kept right 
 on a-lookin’ fer the other. I’ll walk along with 
 you now, an’ I guess that varmint won’t bother 
 you no more. If he does — ” 
 
138 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 He patted his rifle with a gesture that spoke 
 more plainly than words could have done. 
 
 “Tell me all about it as we go along,” he said. 
 “I guess maybe there’ll be some work for us to 
 do after we all get together— runnin’ those gypsies 
 out. They’re a bad lot, but this is the fust time 
 they ever done anythin’ around here that give ns 
 a real chance to get even with them. We’ve sus- 
 pected them of doin’ lots of things, but a deer 
 can’t tell you who killed him out o’ season, 
 ’specially when all you find of the deer is a little 
 skin and bones.” 
 
 He listened admiringly as Bessie told her story. 
 At the tale of Lolla’s treachery he laughed. 
 
 “They’re all tarred with the same brush,” he 
 said. “One’s as bad as another.” 
 
 And when he heard of the trick by which Dolly 
 had worked on the superstitious fears of Lolla 
 and Peter his merriment knew no bounds, and he 
 absolutely refused to keep on the trail until Dplly 
 had given him a demonstration of just how she 
 had managed it. 
 
 “Well, by Godfrey!” he said, when she had 
 thrown her voice far overhead, and once so that 
 it seemed to come from just above his shomcicr. 
 “Don’t that beat the Dutch! I don’t wonder you 
 skeered ’em! You’d have had me gpin’, I guess, 
 an’ I ain’t no chicken, nor easy to skeer, neither. 
 You cwo certainly done a smart job gettin’ away 
 from them.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 139 
 
 And, so when they reached Long Lake, the girls 
 and the guides, who had scattered all over the 
 woods searching for them, agreed, when they 
 straggled in, one party after another. Eleanor 
 Mercer was one of the first to return, and when 
 she had finished proving her gratitude for their 
 safe return, she turned a laughing face toward thfe 
 chief guide. 
 
 “Do you know the thing that pleases me best 
 about this, Andrew?’' she asked him. 
 
 “I can guess, ma’am,” he said, with a grin. 
 “You told us when you come up here that you 
 was goin’ to prove that a party of girls could 
 get along without help from men. And I reckon 
 it looked to you this morning as if you was goin’ 
 to need us pretty bad, didn’t it?” 
 
 “It certainly did, Andrew,” she answered, 
 gravely. “And I don’t want you to think for a 
 moment that we’re not grateful to you for the 
 way you turned out and scoured the woods. ’ ’ 
 
 “Don’t talk of gratitude, Miss Eleanor. We’ve 
 known you for years, but even if we’d never seen 
 you before, and didn’t know nothin’ about the 
 girls that thief had stolen, we’d ha’ turned out 
 jest the same way to rescue them. An’ I guess 
 any white men anywhere would ha’ done the same 
 thing. 
 
 “But if it was only us you’d had to depend on, 
 I’m afraid the young lady’d still be out there. It 
 was her friend that saved her. Too bad she 
 
140 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 trusted tliat Lolla witch. If she’d gone to Jim 
 Shelly when she was near the gypsy camp that 
 time, an’ told him where her chum was, he’d have 
 had her free in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.” 
 
 think Dolly and Bessie must be awfully 
 hungry,” said Zara, who had listened with shining 
 eyes to the tale of her friends’ adventures. 
 
 “Oh, they must, indeed!” said Eleanor, re- 
 morsefully. “And here we’ve been listening to 
 them, and letting them talk while they were starv- 
 ing. ’ ’ 
 
 She turned toward the fire, but already two of 
 the guides had leaped forward, and in a moment 
 the smell of crisp bacon filled the air, and coffee 
 was being made. 
 
 “Oh, how good that smells!” said Dolly. “I 
 am hungry, but it was so exciting, remembering 
 everything that happened, that I forgot all about 
 it! Isn’t it funny? I was dreadfully scared when 
 I was alone there, and again afterward, when we 
 thought we were safe, and that horrid man caught 
 us. 
 
 “But now that it’s all over, it seems like good 
 fun. If one only knew that everything was com- 
 ing out all right when things like that happen, 
 one could enjoy them while they v/ere going on, 
 couldn’t one? But when one is frightened half to 
 death there isn’t much chance to think of how 
 nice it’s going to be when it’s all over, and you’re 
 safe at home again.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 141 
 
 “That’s jnst the trouble with adventures, 
 Dolly,” said Eleanor. “You never can be sure 
 that they will come out all right, and lots of times 
 they don’t. It’s like the thrilling story that the 
 man told about being chased by the bear.” 
 
 “What was that. Miss Eleanor?” 
 
 “Well, he told about how the bear chased him, 
 and he got into a trap, and the bear was between 
 him and the only way of getting out, and it 
 seemed to him as if he was going to be killed. Se 
 they asked him what happened; how he got 
 away!” 
 
 “And how did he?” 
 
 “He said he didn’t; that the bear ate him up!” 
 
 “Miss Eleanor,” said Andrew, the old chief 
 guide, as the two ^rls began, ravenously, to eat 
 the tempting camp meal that the other guides had 
 so quickly prepared, “we’ve got something more 
 to do here. ’ ’ 
 
 Eleanor looked at him questioningly. 
 
 “We’ve got to find that gypsy,” he said, “and 
 see that he spends the night in jail, where he be- 
 longs. If I’m not mistaken, he’ll spend a good 
 many nights and days there, too, after he’s been 
 tried.” 
 
 “I suppose he must be caught and taken to a 
 place where he can be tried,” said Eleanor. “I 
 don’t like the idea of revenge, but—” 
 
 “But this ain’t revenge. Miss Eleanor. If yon 
 was a-goin’ to say that you was quite right. It’s 
 
142 
 
 THE CAMP. FIRE GIRLS 
 
 self protection, and protection for yonng girls 
 everywhere.” 
 
 “Yes, you’re right, Andrew. Well, what do 
 you want me to do? I am afraid I wouldn’t be 
 much good in helping you to catch him.” 
 
 Andrew laughed heartily. 
 
 ■“I ain’t sayin’ that, ma’am, but there’s men 
 enough of us to catch him, all right. Maybe you 
 didn’t notice it, but I sent out some of the men 
 ’most as soon as they got here, just so’s they’d 
 be able to fix things for him to have to stay where 
 we could catdi him. Trouble is, none of us don’t 
 know him when we see him. I was wonderin’—” 
 
 “Oh, no, not now, Andrew. I know what you 
 mean. You want the girls to go with you, so as 
 to point him out, don’t you? But they’re so 
 tired, I’m sure they couldn’t do any more tramp- 
 ing to-day.” 
 
 “I know they’re tired, ma’am, and I wasn’t 
 aimin’ to let them do any more walkin’. I’ve got 
 more sense than that. But we could rig up a sort 
 of a swing chair, so’s two of the boys could carry 
 one of them, easily. Then we could take her over 
 there, and she could tell us which was him, and 
 never be tired at all. She’d be jest as comfort- 
 able, ma’am, as if she was a settin’ here by the 
 lake, watchin’ the water.” 
 
 “Well, I suppose we can manage it if you do 
 it that way, Andrew, if you think it’s really nec- 
 essary.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 143 
 
 WLen it came to a clioice, since it was neces- 
 sary for only one of the girls to go, Dolly insisted 
 on being the one. 
 
 ‘‘Bessie is mneh more tired than I am,” she 
 said, stoutly. “I was carried a good part of the 
 way and she tramped all around with that wretched 
 little liolla, when she thought Lolla wanted to help 
 her get me away. So I’m going, and Bessie shall 
 stay here and rest.” 
 
 “Don’t make no difference to me,” said An- 
 drew. “Let the other girls come along with us, 
 if you like, kliss Eleanor. And you can stay be- 
 hind here with the one that stays to rest. See?” 
 
 And so it was arranged. Bessie, lying on a cot 
 that had been brought from Eleanor’s tent, 
 watched Dolly being carried off in the litter that 
 had been hastily improvised, and Eleanor sat be- 
 side her. 
 
 “You’ve certainly earned a rest, Bessie,” said 
 Eleanor, happily. It delighted her to think that 
 Bessie, whom she had befriended, should prove 
 herself so well worthy of her confidence. “I don’t 
 know what we’d have done witiiout you. I’m 
 afraid that Dolly would still be there in the woods 
 if you’d just called us, as most girls would have 
 done. ’ ’ 
 
 “I don’t quite understand one thing, even yet, 
 Bessie,” continued Eleanor, frowning. “You 
 know, at first, it seemed as if the idea we had wns 
 right; that this man hgd some crazy idea that ho 
 might be able to mmke a gJT^y of Dolly. 
 
144 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 “I’m beginning to think that there was some 
 powerful reason back of what he did ; that he ex- 
 pected to make a great deal of money out of kid- 
 napping her. It seems, too, as if he knew where 
 we were going to be, and who we all were, more 
 than he had had any chance to find out. ’ ’ 
 
 “I thought of ^at, too,” said Bessie. “If it 
 had been Zara he tried to steal— but it was Dolly. 
 And she hasn’t been mixed up at ail in our 
 affairs.” 
 
 “I know, and that’s what is so puzzling, Bessie. 
 Maybe if they catch him, though, he’ll tell why 
 he did it. I think those guides will frighten him. 
 They’re all perfectly furious, and they’ll make 
 him sorry he ever tried to do anything of the sort, 
 I think— Why, Bessie! What’s the matter?” 
 
 “Don’t turn around. Miss Eleanor. But I saw 
 a pair of eyes, just behind you. I wonder if he 
 could have sneaked back around and come here ? ’ ’ 
 “Oh, I wish we’d had one of the men stay. I 
 was afraid of something like that, Bessie. ’ ’ 
 
 “I’m going to find out. Miss Eleanor. I’ll pre- 
 tend I don’t suspect anything, and get up to go 
 into the tent. Then, if it’s John, I think he’ll show 
 himself. ’ ’ 
 
 She rose; and in a moment their fears were con- 
 firmed. John, his eyes triumphant, stepped out, 
 abandoning the concealment of the bushes. 
 
 “'Where is the other?” he said. “The one 
 called Bessie— Bessie King? It’s not you I 
 want— ’ ’ 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 145 
 
 “Hands up!” cried the voice of Andrew, the 
 chief guide. 
 
 And the gypsy, wheeling 'with a savage cry, 
 faced a half circle of grinning faces. He made one 
 wild dash to escape, but it was useless, and in a 
 moment he was on the ground, and his hands were 
 tied. In the struggle a letter fell from his pocket, 
 and Bessie picked it up. Suddenly, as ^e was 
 looking at it idly, she saw something that made her 
 cry out in surprise, and the next moment she and 
 Miss Mercer were reading it' together. 
 
 “Get this girl, Bessie King, and I will pay 
 you a thousand dollars,” it read. “She is dark, 
 and goes around with a fair girl called Dolly. It 
 will be easy, and if you once get them to me and 
 out of the woods, I will pay you the mosey, and 
 see that you are not in danger of being arrested. 
 I will back you up.” 
 
 “Who wrote that letter? Turn over, quickly!” 
 cried Eleanor. 
 
 “I know without looking,” said Bessie. “Now 
 we can guess why he was so reckless ; why he took 
 such chances ! He thotight I was Dolly, because of 
 that mistake about our hair! Yes, see; it is Mr. 
 Holmes who sent him this letter!” 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THE gypsy's motive 
 
 But, despite tlie revelation of that letter, the 
 gypsy himself maintained a sullen silence when 
 efforts were made to make him tell all he knew 
 and the reason for his determined effort to kid- 
 nap Dolly. He snarled at his captors when they 
 asked h i m questions, and so enraged Andrew and 
 the other guides by his refusal to answer that only 
 Eleanor’s intervention saved him from rough 
 handling. 
 
 “No, I won’t let you use violence, Andrew,” 
 said Eleanor, firmly. “It would do no good. He 
 won’t talk; that is his nature. You have him now, 
 and the law will take him from you. There isn’t 
 any question of his guilt; there will be evidence 
 enough to convict him anywhere, and he will go to 
 prison, as he deserves to do. All I hope is that 
 he won’t be the only one, that we can get the 
 man who bribed him to do this, and see that he 
 gets punished properly, too.” 
 
 “I’m sure with you there, ma’am,” said old 
 Andrew. “He’s a worthless critter enough, I 
 know, but he ain’t as bad as the man that set him 
 on. If the law lets that other snake go, ma’am, 
 jest you get him to come up here for a little hunt- 
 ing, and we’ll make him sorry he ever went inttf 
 
 146 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 147 
 
 such business. I’d like to get my hands on him. 
 I’m an old man, but I reckon I’m strong enough 
 to thrash any imitation of a man what would play 
 such a cowardly trick as that. Afraid to do his. 
 own dirty work, is he! So he hires it done. Well, 
 much good it’s done him this time.” 
 
 “I’ll keep this letter,” said Eleanor. “I think 
 it was mighty foolish of him to sign his name to 
 it. ‘It’s a pretty good piece of evidence against 
 the man, if he is rich and powerful. If there’s 
 any justice to be had, I think he’ll suffer this 
 time.” 
 
 “How did you ever get back here, just when 
 you were so badly needed 1 ’ ’ Bessie asked Andrew, 
 
 He smiled at that. 
 
 “Well, we get sort o’ used to readin’ tracks in 
 our work around here. Miss, and we seen that 
 someone who might be this feller was doublin’' 
 around mighty suspicious. So, bein’ some worried 
 about leavin’ you two here alone anyhow, I de- 
 cided to come back v/ith three or four of the men 
 here, an’ we did it, leavin’ the others to go on 
 an’ see if they could pick up the other two 
 gypsies. 
 
 “To tell the truth, I thought it’d be mighty 
 strange if we found him anywhere near that camp. 
 Seemed like he must know that we’d be lookin’^ 
 fer him, and that there was the fust place we’d 
 go to. So here we were, and mighty timely, as 
 you say, Miss.” 
 
148 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 It was no great while before the sounds of the 
 other party, returning, resounded through the 
 woods, and soon Lolla and Peter, the man bound, 
 and the girl carefully guarded by two guides, each 
 of whom held one of her arms, were brought into 
 the clearing about the camp. Lolla, at the sight 
 of John, lying against a tree, his arms and his 
 feet bound, gave a cry of rage, and, snatching her 
 arms from her guardians ran toward him, wail- 
 ing. 
 
 ‘ ‘ Go away, you fool ! ’ ’ muttered J ohn. ‘ ‘ This 
 is your doing. If you and Peter had not been 
 afraid of your own shadow, this would not have 
 happened. I am glad they have caught you; you 
 will go to prison now, like me.” 
 
 “Look here, young feller,” said Andrew, 
 angrily, “that ain’t no way to talk to a lady, hear 
 me? She may be a bad one, but she’s stuck to 
 you. If you get off any more talk like that I’ll 
 see if a dip in the lake will make you feel more 
 polite, like. See?” 
 
 John gave no answer, but relapsed into his sul-^ 
 len silence again. 
 
 Eleanor approached Lolla gently. 
 
 “We are not angry with you, Lolla,” she said, 
 kindly. “No, nor with John. You love him, do 
 you?” 
 
 Lolla gave no answer, but looked up into 
 Eleanor’s face with eyes that spoke plainly 
 enough. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 149 
 
 thought so. Then you do not want him to go 
 to prison. Try to make him tell why he did this. 
 If he will do that, perhaps he can go free, and you 
 and Peter, too. You wouldn’t like to have to leave 
 your people, and not be able to travel along the 
 road, and do all the things you are used to doing, 
 would you? 
 
 ‘‘Well, I am afraid that is what will happen to 
 you, unless John will tell all he knows. They will 
 take you away, soon now, and you will go down 
 to the town and there you will be locked up, all 
 three of you, and you and John will not even see 
 one another, for a long time— two or three years, 
 maybe, or even longer— ” 
 
 Still Lolla could not speak. But she began to 
 cry, quietly, but with a display of suffering that 
 moved Eleanor. After all, she felt, Lolla was 
 little more than a girl, and, though she had done 
 wrong, very wrong, she had never had a proper 
 chance to learn how tg do what was right. 
 
 “I’m sorry for you, Lolla,” said Eleanor. “We 
 all are. We think you didn’t know what you were 
 doing, and how wicked it was. I will do my best 
 for you, but your best chance is to make John tell 
 all he knows. ’ ’ 
 
 “How can I? He blames me. He says if I 
 and Peter hadn’t been such cowards all would 
 have been well. He is angry at me ; he will not 
 forgive me.” 
 
 ' ..“Oh, yes, he will, Lolla. I am sure he loves 
 
150 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 you, and that he did this wicked thing because he 
 wanted to have much money to spend buying nice 
 things for you; pret^ dresses, and a fine wagon, 
 with good horses. So he will be sorry for speak- 
 ing angrily to you, soon, and you will be able to 
 make him tell the truth, if you only try. Will 
 you try?” 
 
 “Yes,” d,ecided Lolla, suddenly. “I think you 
 are good— that you forgive us. Do you!” 
 
 “I certainly do. After ail, you see, Lolla, you 
 haven’t done us any harm.” 
 
 Lolla pointed to Bessie. 
 
 “Will she forgive me!” she inquired. “I 
 tricked her— made a fool of her— but she made a 
 fool of me afterward. I lied to her ; will she for- 
 give me, too, like you!” 
 
 “Did you hear that, Bessie!” asked Eleanor, by 
 way of answer to the gypsy girl’s question. 
 
 “Yes,” said Bessie. “I’m sorry you did it, 
 Lolla, because I only wapted to help your man, and 
 if you hadn’t done what you said you were going 
 to do, and helped me to get Dolly away from him, 
 he wouldn’t be in all this!> trouble now. 
 
 ‘ ‘ But you didn ’t understand about that, and you 
 helped your oWn people instead of a stranger. I 
 don’t think that’s such a dreadful thing to do. It’s 
 something like a soldier in a war. He may think 
 his country is wrong, but if there ’s a battle he 
 has to fight for it, just the same.” 
 
 “But remember that the best way to help John 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 151 
 
 now is to make him see that he has been wrong, 
 and to try to make him understand that he can 
 make np for his wickedness by helping us to pun- 
 ish the bad man who got him to do this,” said 
 Eleanor. ‘^That man, you see, was too much of 
 a coward, to do liis work himself, so he got youi’ 
 man to do it, knowing that if anyone was to be- 
 punished he would escape, and John would get 
 into trouble. 
 
 “John doesn’t owe anything to a man like that; 
 he needn’t think he’s got to keep him out of 
 trouble. The man -wouldn’t do it for him. He 
 won’t help him now. He’ll pretend he doesn’t 
 know anything about this at all.” 
 
 “I will try,” promised Lolla. “But I think 
 John is angry with me, and will not listen. But 
 I^will do my best.” 
 
 And, after a little while, which the guides used 
 to cook a meal, and to rest after their strenuous 
 tramping in the effort to find the missing girls, 
 Andrew told off half a .dozen of them to make 
 their way to the county seat, a dozen miles away, 
 with the three gypsies. 
 
 “Just get them there and turn them over to the 
 sheriff, boys,” said the old guide. “He’ll hold 
 them safe until they’ve been tried, and we won’t 
 have any call to worry about them no more. But 
 be careful while you’re on your way down. , 
 They’re slippery customers, and as like as not to 
 try to run away from you and get to their own 
 people. ’ ’ 
 
15^ THE CAMP FIEE GIKLS 
 
 '‘‘You leave that to me,” said the guide who 
 was to be in charge of the party. ‘ ‘ If they get 
 away from us, Andrew, they’ll be slicker than any- 
 one I ever heard tell of, anywhere. We won’t hurt 
 them none, but they’ll walk a chalk line, right in 
 front of us, or I’ll know the reason why.” 
 
 “All right,” said Andrew. “Better be getting 
 started, then. Don’t want to make it too late when 
 you get into town with them. Let the girl rest once 
 in a w;hile; she looks purty tired to me.” 
 
 Bessie and Dolly and the other girls watched 
 the little procession start off on the trail, and 
 Bessie, for one, felt sorry for Lolla, who looked 
 utterly disconsolate and hopeless. 
 
 “We couldn’t let them go free, I suppose,” said 
 Eleanor, regretfully. “But I do feel sorry for 
 that poor girl. I don’t think she liked the idea 
 from the very first, but she couldn’t help herself. 
 She had to do what the men told her. Women 
 don’t rank very high among the gypsies ; they have 
 to do what the men tell them, and they’re ex- 
 pected to do all the work and take all the hard 
 knocks beside.” 
 
 “‘You ’re right; there’s nothing else to do, 
 ma’am,” said old Andrew. “Well, guess the rest 
 of us guides had better be gettin’ back to work. 
 Ain’t nothin’ else we can do fer you, is there, 
 ma’am?” 
 
 “I don’t think so. I don’t suppose we need be 
 afraid of the other gypsies, Andrew? Are they 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 15a 
 
 likely to try to get revenge for what Las happened 
 to their companions?” 
 
 Pshaw! They’ll he as qniet as lambs for a 
 long time now. They was a breakin’ up camp 
 over there by lujoon Pond when the boys come 
 away last time. Truth is, I reckon they’re madder 
 at John and his pals for gettin’ the whole camp 
 into trouble than they are at us. 
 
 “You see, they know they needn’t show their 
 noses around here fer a long time now; not until 
 this here shindy’s had a chance to blow over an’’ 
 be forgotten. And there ain’t many places where 
 they’ve been as welcome as over to the pond.” 
 
 “I shouldn’t think they’d be very popular here 
 in the woods.” 
 
 “They ain’t, ma’am; they ain’t, fer a fact. 
 More’n once we’ve tried to make the hotel folks' 
 chase themmway, but they sort of tickled the sum> 
 mer boarders over there, and so the hotel folks 
 made out as they weren’t as bad as they were 
 painted, and was entitled to a chance to make camp 
 around there as long as they behaved themselves.” 
 
 “I suppose they never stole any stuff from the 
 hotel?” 
 
 “That’s jest it. They knew enough to keep out 
 the right side of them people, you see, an’ they 
 did their poaehin’ in our woods. Any time 
 they’ve been around it’s always meant more work 
 for us, and hard work, too.” 
 
154 
 
 THE CAMP, FIEE GIELS 
 
 “Well, I should think that after this experience 
 the people at the hotel would see that the gypsies 
 -aren’t very good neighbors, after all.” 
 
 ■“That’s what we’re counting on, ma’am. Seems 
 to me, from what I just happened to pick up, that 
 there was some special reason, like, for this var- 
 mint to have acted that way to-day, or last night, 
 maybe it was. Some feller in the city as was back 
 of him.” 
 
 There was, Andrew, I’m afraid; a man who 
 "Ought to know better, and whom you wouldn’t sus- 
 pect of allowing such a dreadful thing to be 
 •done. ’ ’ 
 
 Andrew shook his head wisely. 
 
 “It’s hard to know what to wish,” she said. 
 “Sometimes a man is much worse when he comes 
 out of prison than he was when he went in. It 
 seems just to harden them, and make it impossible 
 for them to get started on the right road again.” 
 
 “It’s their fault for going wrong in the fust 
 place,” said the old guide, sternly. “That’s what 
 I say. I don’t take any stock in these new 
 f angled notions of makin’ the jail pleasant for 
 them as does wrong. Make ’em know they’re 
 goin’ to have a hard time, an’ they’ll be less 
 willin’ to take chances of goin’ wrong and bein’ 
 caught with the goods, like this feller here to-day. 
 I bet you when he gets out of jail he’ll be so 
 scared of gettin’ back that he’ll be pretty nearly 
 «s good as a white man.” 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 155 
 
 “Of course, tlie main thing is to frighten any 
 of the others from acting the same way,” said 
 Eleanor. “I think the hotel will be sorry it let 
 those gypsies stay around there. Because it’s 
 very sure that mothers who have children there 
 will be nervous, and they’ll go away to some place 
 where they can feel their children are safe. 
 
 “Well, good-bye, Andrew. I’m glad you think 
 it’s safe now. I really would like to feel that 
 we can get along by ourselves here, but, of course, 
 I wouldn’t let any pride stand in the way of 
 safety, and if you thought it was better I’d ask 
 you to leave one of the men here.” 
 
 “No call for that, ma’am. You’ve shown you 
 can get along all right. We didn’t have nothin’ 
 to do with gettin’ Miss Dolly away from that 
 scamp to-day. It was her chum done that. Good- 
 bye.” 
 
CHAPTEE XV 
 
 A FBIENDLY CONTEST 
 
 Morning found both Dolly and Bessie refreshed^ 
 nd, though the other girls asked them anxiously 
 about themselves, neither seemed to feel any ill 
 effects after the excitement of the previous dhy, 
 with its series of surprising events. Dolly, at 
 first, was a little chastened, and seemed wholly 
 ready to stay quietly in camp. And, indeed, all 
 the girls decided that it would be better, for the 
 time at least, not to venture far into the woods. 
 
 “I think it’s as safe as ever now, along the 
 well known trails that are used all the time, ’ ’ said 
 Miss Eleanor, “but, after all, we don’t know much 
 about the gypsies. Some of them may be hanging 
 around still, even if the main party of them has 
 moved on, and we do know that they are a re- 
 vengeful race; that when one of them is hurt, or 
 injured in any way, they are very likely not to 
 rest until the injury is avenged. They don’t care 
 much whether they hurt the person who is guilty 
 or not; his relatives or his friends will satisfy 
 them equally well.” 
 
 “I’m perfectly willing to stay right here by the 
 lake,” said Margery Burton, “for one. It’s as 
 nice here as it can possibly be anywhere dse I’d 
 like someone to go in swimming with me.” 
 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 157 
 
 “If it isn’t too cold I will,” cried Dolly, eheer-- 
 fnlly. 
 
 And so, after the midday meal— two honrs 
 afterward, too, for Eleanor Mercer was too vase 
 a Guardian to allow them to run any risk by going 
 into the water before their food had been thor- 
 oughly digested— bathing suits were brought out, 
 and Margei’y Burton, or Minnehaha, as the one 
 who had proposed the sport, was unanimously 
 elected a committee of one to try the water, and 
 see if it was warm enough for swimming. 
 
 “And no tricks, Margery!” warned Dolly. “I 
 know you, and if you found it was cold it would 
 be just like you to pretend it was fine so that we’d 
 all get in and be as cold as you were yourself I ’ ’ 
 
 “I’ll be good; I promise,” laughed Margery, 
 and, without any preliminary hesitation on the 
 water’s edge, she walked to the end of the little 
 dock that was used for the boats and plunged 
 boldly in. She was a splendid swimmer, a fact 
 that had once, when Bessie had first joined the 
 Camp Fire, nearly cost her her life, for, seeing 
 her upset, no one except Bessie had thought it nec- 
 essary to jump in after her, and she had actually 
 been slightly stunned, so that she had been unable 
 to swim. 
 
 But this time there was no accident. She dis- 
 appeared under the water with a beautiful for- 
 ward dive, and plunged along for many feet be- 
 fore she rose to the surface, laughing, and shak- 
 
158 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 ing the water out of her eyes. Then, treading 
 water, she called to the group on the dock. 
 
 ‘Ht’s all right for everyone hut Dolly, I think,” 
 she cried. “I’m afraid it would he too cold for 
 her. I like it; I think it’s great!” 
 
 “You can’t fool me,” said Dolly, and, without 
 any more delay, she too plunged in. But she 
 rose to the surface at once, gasping for hreath, 
 and looking about for Margery. 
 
 “Why, it’s as cold aS ice!” she exclaimed. 
 <<XJgh! I’m nearly frozen to death! Margery, 
 why didn’t you tell me it was so cold?” 
 
 “I did, stupid!” laughed Margery. “I said 
 it was warm enough for me, hut that I was afraid 
 it would he too cold for you, didn’t I?” 
 
 “I— I thought you were just fooling me; you 
 knew I’d never let the others go in if I didn’t!” 
 
 “It’s not my fault if you wouldn’t believe me. 
 All I promised was to tell you whether it was cold 
 or not ! Come on, you girls ! It is cold, hut you 
 won’t mind it after you’ve been in for a minute!” 
 
 “Look out! Give me room for a dive!” cried 
 Eleanor Mercer, suddenly appearing from her 
 tent. “I know this water; I’ve been in it every 
 year since I was a lot smaller than you. I’m 
 afraid of it every year the first time I go in, hut 
 how I do love it afterward ! ’ ’ 
 
 And, running at full speed, she sped down to 
 the edge of the dock, leaped up and turned a 
 somersault, making a beautiful dive that filled th0 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 15 ^ 
 
 girls who were fetill dry with envy. And a moment 
 later they were all in, swimming happily, and en- 
 joying themselves immensely. All, that is, except. 
 Zara, who could not swim. 
 
 “Oh, I wish I could dive like that. Miss 
 Eleanor ! ’ ’ exclaimed Bessie, who had been one of 
 the first to go into the water. 
 
 “Oh, that’s nothing; you can learn easily, 
 Bessie. You swim better than any of us. Isn’t 
 this water cold for you? I should think you 
 wouldn’t be used to it. All the others have been 
 in pretty cold water before noAV.” 
 
 “Oh, so have I! You see, around Hedgeville 
 we used to go into , the regular swimming holes, 
 and they never get very warm. There ’s no beach, 
 you just go in off the bank, and most of the swim- 
 ming holes haA^e trees all around them so that 
 they’re shady, and the sun doesn’t strike them. 
 They’re in the shade ail the time, and that keeps- 
 the water cold. This is warmer than that, ever 
 so much.” 
 
 “I tell you what we’ll do, girls; we’ll fix up a 
 spring-board and have some, lessons in real diving. 
 Wouldn’t that be fun?” 
 
 “It certainly would! I’d love to be able to 
 do a backward dive!” 
 
 “Well, this is a good place to learn; no one 
 around to make you nervous, and good deep 
 water.’ It’s sixteen or seventeen feet off that dock, 
 all the time, and that’s deep enough for almost 
 
160 THE CAMP FIEE GIELS 
 
 any diving; for any tliat we’re likely to do, cer- 
 tainly. ’ ’ 
 
 Later they talked it over again, wken tliey kad 
 dried and resnmed tlie clothes they wore about 
 the camp, and Eleanor Mercer, her enthusiasm 
 warming her cheeks, told them something they 
 had not heard even a hint of as yet. 
 
 “A friend of mine is scoutmaster of a troop 
 of Boy Scouts,” she said. “And he has teased 
 me, sometimes, about our work. He says we just 
 imitate the Boy Scouts, and that we just pre- 
 tend we’re camping out and doing all the things 
 they do. Well, I told him that some time we’d 
 have a contest with them, and show them; a reg- 
 ular field day. And, just for fun, we made up a 
 sort of list of events.” 
 
 “Oh, what were they?” 
 
 “Well, we planned to start in, all even, some 
 morning, and make a regular trip, cook two meals, 
 and come back. And on the way we were to di- 
 vide into parties; there are three patrols in his 
 troop, you know, and we could divide up the same 
 way. The parties were to keep in touch with one 
 another by smoke signals— they’re made with 
 blankets— and there was to be a fire-making con- 
 test, to see which could make fire quickest without 
 matches. And, oh, lots of other things.” 
 
 “That would be fine.” - 
 
 “Then I got reckless, I think. I said my girls 
 could beat his boys in the water— that we could 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 161 
 
 swim better— I meant more usefully, not just 
 faster, in a race, because I think they’d beat us 
 easily in just a plain race. And I’m afraid I 
 boasted a little.” 
 
 '‘I bet you didn’t; I bet we can do just as well 
 as any old Boy Scouts!” exclaimed Dolly. “I 
 wish we just had the chance, that’s all.” 
 
 “Well, you have,” said Eleanor, with a smile. 
 ^‘That’s what I’m trying to tell you, girls. Mr. 
 Hastings is over at Third Lake right now with 
 one patrol of his troop. He got there yesterday 
 and the way I ha;ppened to hear about it was that 
 he was on his way over yesterday morning— he 
 got in ahead of the boys— to help us look for 
 Dolly and Bessie, when they were found.” 
 
 “Oh, that’s fine! And shall we have that field 
 day?” 
 
 “Later on, before we go home, yes. But he 
 began teasing me again yesterday, and I told him 
 we’d have a water carnival any time he wanted to 
 bring his boys over. And he said they’d come 
 Saturday. ’ ’ 
 
 “We’ll have to get ready and show them what 
 we can do, then,” said Margery Burton, with de- 
 termination in her voice. “My brother’s a Boy 
 Scout, and I know just what they’re like; they 
 think we’re just the same as all the other girls 
 they know. I tell you what would be fun ; to get 
 up a baseball team.” 
 
 “Maybe we’ll try that later,” said Eleanor. 
 
162 
 
 THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS 
 
 “But now we want to be ready for Satur- 
 
 day. So 111 teach you everything I can. And 
 I’m quite sure we can beat them in a life-saving 
 drill; their three best against our three. We’d 
 have you, Margery, and Bessie, and Dolly Ran- 
 som.” 
 
 So it was agreed, and they all began to prac- 
 tice. 
 
 “I wish I could do something,” said Zara, wist- 
 fully. “But I don’t believe I could learn to swim 
 before Saturday. ’ ’ 
 
 “You could leaim to keep yourself afloat,” said 
 Margery. “But that wouldn’t be much good, of 
 course. You’d rather not go in at all, I suppose, 
 unless you could really swim.” 
 
 “I know what I..could do, though,” said Zara, 
 suddenly, after she had watched Bessie go through 
 the life saying drill. But she would not confide 
 her idea to anyone but Miss Mercer^ who looked 
 more than doubtful when she heard/it. 
 
 “I don’t know, Zara,” she said, “I’ll see. It 
 seems a little risky. But I’ll think it over. It 
 would be splendid, but, well, we’ll see.” 
 
 Speed swimming, pure racing, was barred when 
 Saturday came. But Avith Scoutmaster Hastings 
 and Miss Mercer as referees, and three summer 
 visitors from the Loon Pond Hotel, who had no 
 prejudice in favor of either side as judges, several 
 contests were arranged that called for skill rather 
 than strength. - 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 “In this diving,” Hastings explained to the 
 judges, “what we want to figure on is the way 
 they do it. If a dive is graceful, and the divei 
 strikes the water true, going straight down, with 
 arms and legs held close together, you give so 
 many points for that. I’ll make each dive first; 
 that will serve as a model, you see.” 
 
 Scoutmaster Hastings was not speaking in a 
 boastful manner. He was a noted diver, and had 
 won prizes and medals in many meets for his 
 skill. And, when everything was arranged, he 
 did all the standard dives from the spring-board 
 at the end of the dock, and three members of each 
 organization followed him. 
 
 Bessie had taken remarkably well to these new 
 tricks, as she considered them. Her powers as a 
 swimmer no one had questioned, but it was re- 
 markable to see how quickly she had acquired the 
 ability to dive well and gracefully. And, to the 
 surprise and chagrin of the Boy Scouts, who had 
 expected, as boys always do, when they are pitted 
 against girls, to win so easily that they could 
 afford to be magnanifnous, and to abstain from 
 gloating, the judges were unanimous in deciding 
 that she had done better than any of the six com- 
 petitors in all five of the standard dives in which 
 Hastings showed the way. 
 
 As there were six competitors, the judges 
 awarded six points for first place in each dive, 
 five for second, four for third, three for fourth. 
 
164 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE CIELS 
 
 two for fiftii, and one for sixtli place. And in 
 two of the dives, second place went to Margery 
 Burton, while one of the Boy Scouts, Jack Perry, 
 was second in the other four. 
 
 To the disgust of the other hoys, Margery was 
 placed third in the four dives in which Jack Perry 
 heat her, and Holly, a good, hut not a really won- 
 derful diver, was fifth in every one of the dives, 
 heating at least one hoy in each. So sixty-six 
 points altogether went to the Camp Fire Girls, 
 while the Boj^ Scouts, who had expected to finish 
 one, two, three, had to he content with forty-eight, 
 and were soundly heaten. 
 
 “That girl that was first is a wonder,” said 
 Hastings admiringly to Miss Mercer. “I take 
 it all hack, Eleanor. But I didn’t think you’d 
 have anyone as good as she is. Why, she ’s better 
 than j"ou are, and I always thought you were the 
 nearest to a fish of any girl I ever saw in the 
 water. She could win the woman’s championship 
 with a little more practice.” 
 
 “Mayhe you won’t crow so much over us after 
 this,” said Eleanor, with a laugh. 
 
 “Not about the diving, certainly,” said Hast- 
 ings, generously. “But that’s tricky, after all. 
 The life saving is going to he different. There 
 strength figures more. I really think my hoys 
 ought to give a handicaj) in that.” 
 
 “Not a hit of it,” said Eleanor. “Women have 
 been taking handicaps from men too long. 
 
AT LONG LAKE 
 
 16 & 
 
 They’ve got so that they think they can’t do any- 
 thing as well as a man. This Camp Fire move- 
 ment is going to show you that that’s all over 
 and done with.” 
 
 “Well, we’ll go through the tests first,” said 
 Hastings. “Then your girls will know what 
 they’ve got to beat, anyhow.” 
 
 The tests for life saving were to be conducted 
 on a time basis. From a boat a certain distance 
 out in the lake a boy or a girl was to be thrown 
 overboard, and, at the same moment, the com- 
 petitor was to leap in after the one who repre- 
 sented the victim and take him or her to shore, 
 the winners being those who did it in the shortest 
 time. Again, as there were to be six competitors, 
 the first place was to count six points, the second, 
 five, and so on. 
 
 First, the boys went out and went through their 
 exercise in fine style. Although the boy who 
 played the part of victim could swim, he made no 
 move to help himself, simply staying perfectly 
 still and letting his “rescuer” take him in. 
 
 Then, when the three boys had finished, with 
 cnly five seconds between the fastest and the 
 slowest, Eleanor and Hastings rowed out with the 
 three who represented the Camp Fire Girls, and, 
 as “victim,” Zara! 
 
 Zara had insisted. 
 
 “I really would be disowned if they didn’t save 
 me,” she said, “so it will be a real test.” 
 
166 
 
 THE CAMP FIEE GIRLS 
 
 with, that added spur, each of the three 
 girls actually managed to heat the fastest time of 
 the boys. Margery was first, Bessie was second, 
 apd Dolly third. Hastings, as soon as he dis- 
 covered that Zara could not swim, was full of 
 admiration. 
 
 “That’s the nerviest thing I ever heard of,” he 
 said. “Of course they did better. But it’s your 
 ‘victim’ that deserves the credit. She’s certainly 
 plucky.” 
 
 “So I really did help, didn’t I?” said Zara. 
 “My, I was seared at first. But then I knew the 
 girls wouldn’t let me go down, and, after the 
 first time, it wasn’t so bad.” 
 
 “Well, you gave us a surprise, and a licking,” 
 said Scoutmaster Hastings. “Bui we’ll be ready 
 for you when we have that field day. How about 
 some day next week?” 
 
 “Splendid,” said Eleanor. “And we’ll give 
 you a chance to get even.” 
 

 FAR PAST THE; FRONTIER 
 
 By |AMES A. BRADEN 
 
 The sub-titJe “Two Boy Pioneers” indicates the nature of this 
 story — that it has to do with the days when the Ohio Valley and 
 the Northwest country were sparsely settled. Such a topic is an 
 unfailing fund of interest to boys, especially when involving a 
 couple of stalwart young men who leave the East to make their 
 fortunes and to incur untold dangers. 
 
 “ Strong, vigorous, healthy, manly .” — Seattle Times, 
 
 CONNECTICUT BOYS IN 
 THE WESTERN RESERVE 
 
 By JAMES A. BRADEN ' 
 
 The author once more sends his heroes toward the setting sun. 
 “ In all the glowing enthusiasm of youth, the youngsters seek their 
 fortunes in the great, fertile wilderness of northern Ohio, and 
 eventually achieve fair success, though their progress is hindered 
 and sometimes halted by adventures innumerable. It is a lively, 
 wholesome tale, never dull, and absorbing in interest for boys who 
 love the fabled life of the frontier .” — Chicago Tribune, 
 
 THE TRAIL of THE SENECA 
 
 By JAMES A. BRADEN 
 
 In which .we follow the romantic careers of John Jerome and 
 Return Kingdom a little farther. 
 
 These two self-reliant boys are living peaceably in their cabin 
 on the Cuyahoga when an Indian warrior is found dead in the 
 woods nearby. The Seneca accuses John of witchcraft. This means 
 death at the stake if he is captured. They decide that the Seneca’s 
 charge is made to shield himself, and set out to prove it. Mad 
 Anthony, then on the Ohio, comes to their aid, but all their efforts 
 prove futile and the lone cabin is found in ashes on their return. 
 
 CAPTIVES T nmmK 
 
 By JAMES A. BRADEN 
 
 JAMES 
 
 A tale of frontier* life, and how three children — two boys and a 
 girl — attempt to reach the settlements in a canoe, but are captured 
 by the Indians. A common enough occurrence in the days of our 
 great-grandfathers has been woven into a thrilling story. 
 
 BOOTD IN CLOTH, each handsomely 
 illustrated, cloth, postpaid « 
 
 $1 
 
 C/>e Saalfield TttbUshin^ Co, 
 
 AKRON, OHIO 
 
FICTION FOR GIRLS 
 
 BETTY, The SCRIBE 
 
 By LILIAN TURNER 
 Drawings by Katharine Hayward Greenland 
 
 Betty is a brilliant, talented, impulsive seventeen-year-old girl, 
 who is suddenly required to fill her, mother’s place at the head of a 
 household, with a literary, impractical father to manage. 
 
 Betty writes, too, and every time she mounts her Pegasus dis- 
 aster follows for home duties are neglected. Learning of one of 
 these lapses, her elder sister comes home. Betty storms and refuses 
 to share the honors until she remembers that this means long hours 
 free to devote to her beloved pen. She finally moves to the city 
 to begin her career in earnest, and then — well, then comes the 
 story. 
 
 “Miss Turner is Miss Alcott’s true successor. The same healthy, 
 spirited tone is visible which boys and girls recognized in LITTLE 
 MEN and LITTLE WOMEN.” -- Bookman 
 
 CLOTH, 1 2 mo, illustrated, - 50 cts* 
 
 Eli 2 ak.beth Hobacrt 
 Sk.i Exeter H 1 1 
 
 By JEAN K . BAIRD 
 
 Illustrated by R. G. Vosburgh 
 
 A spirited story of every-day boarding-school life that girls 
 like to read. Full of good times and girlish fun, 
 
 Elizabeth enters the school and loses no time in becoming one 
 of the leading spirits. She entertains at a midnight spread, which 
 is recklessly conducted under the very nose of the preceptress, who 
 is “scalped” in order to be harmless, for every one knows she 
 would never venture out minus her front hailt ; she champions an 
 ostracized student ; and leads in a daring plan to put to rout the Se- 
 niors’ program for class day. 
 
 CLOTH, i 2 mo, illustrated, - 50 cts. 
 
 Books sent postpaid on receipt of price. 
 
 Saalfield Tubti^hinj^ Co,, 
 
 AKRON, OHIO 
 
BillyWhiskers Series 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANCES TREGO MONTGOMERY 
 
 Billy "Whiskers — frolicsome, mlsehief-making, adven- 
 ture-loving Billy Whiskers — is the friend of every boy and 
 girl the country over, and the things that happen to this 
 wonderful goat and his numerous animal friends make the 
 best sort of reading for them. 
 
 As one reviov/er aptly puts it, these stories are ^^just 
 full of fun and good times/’ for Mrs. Montgomery, the 
 author of them, ,has the happy faculty of knowing what the 
 small boy and his sister like in the way of fiction. 
 
 TITLES 
 
 BILLY mm WfllSKERS’ OMFIDCflliaiSEM 
 
 BILLY KIDS BILLY WHISKERS’ VACATION 
 
 BILLY WHISKERS, M. BILLY WHISKERS KIDNAPED 
 
 BSLIY WHISKERS’ TRAVELS BILLY WHISKERS’ TWIN’S 
 
 BILLY WHISKERS AT THE CSRCUS BILLY WHISKERS B AN AEROPLINE 
 BILLY WHISKERS AT THE FAIR BILLY WHISKERS IN TOWN 
 BILLY WHISKERS^ FRIENDS BILLY WHISKERS IN PANAMA 
 
 BILLY Whiskers, jr. and bis chums 
 
 Each Volume a Quarto, Bound in Boards, Cover and Six 
 Full Page Drawings in Colors, Postpaid Price $1.00 
 
 j The Saallisld PllbllshM-^ Co., Akron, Ohio