"Chautauqua! Chautauqua!Chau-tau-qua!Nineteen-fourteen!Rah! Rah! Rah!"
came the shout in the unaccustomed voices of the Dickens Class.
"Show 'em how to do it!" Mrs. Morton heard Roger urging his flock in an undertone.
"Chautauqua! Chautauqua!Chau-tau-qua!Nineteen-fourteen!Rah! Rah! Rah!"
rang out the yell heartily from three score unabashed juvenile throats.
"Great!" commended Roger in a half whisper.
"Fine! Thank you!" responded the Dickensians gratefully.
Along the lake front the long line twisted, banners shining, handkerchiefs waving. The moving picture man ground his crank painstakingly; kodakers snapped along the pathway; relatives called out, "There's Mary," or, in shriller tones, "Hullo, Marmer."
The marshal of the division preceded the gleaming white Dickens banner, bearing the class name and year; just behind it followed the class officers and then the smiling ranks wound once more between greeting graduates and the boys and Flower Girls into the Amphitheatre.
With the procession seated in the auditorium the young people's work was ended. The girls and boys went off to be refreshed with ice cream cones and the older boys rested under shady trees until such time as they would have to take back the banners to the class rooms in Alumni Hall.
"It's a great show," commented Tom Watkins, passing his handkerchief over his perspiring forehead.
"A feller doesn't get tired of it if he has seen it all his life," agreed James, falling on to his back with his knees crossed high in air.
"We'll have to read the Course ourselves so as to take part in every section of the performance," said Roger who had disposed of his charges and was not sorry to sit down after his unaccustomed duties.
Again the young people fringed the Hall of Philosophy in the afternoon when the Chancellorgave out the diplomas and pronounced the members of the class of 1914 full fledged members of the Alumni Society of the Hall in the Grove.
"What hath Mother done to make her graduate?" asked Dicky in a far-reaching whisper as Mrs. Morton received her diploma and was applauded for the Bishop's announcement that she had earned ten seals.
"She has read certain books and magazines faithfully for four years," explained Helen, "She didn't read a little bit and then say she was sick of that book, the way I do sometimes; she stuck right to them and read them very carefully, so the Chancellor has given her a diploma, telling what she has done."
"When I grow up," declared Dicky, "I'm going to be a Chanthellor and give people diplomaths and make 'em laugh and clap."
"Mother," said Ethel Brown in the afternoon when Mrs. Morton and Mr. Emerson and their admiring family had returned to the cottage, "would you object if we had a party this evening while you and Grandfather and Grandmother are at the C. L. S. C. banquet?"
"What sort of party, dear?"
"Oh, I'd like to ask the Hancocks and the Watkinses to supper to celebrate—to celebrate—I don't know just what!" Ethel ended tamely.
"I think in your own mind you'd like a celebration of having finished an unselfish week. Isn't that it? You can make it a celebration for the Watkinses if you initiate them into the United Service Club this evening. Will that do?"
IN CAMP
BY the time that the Ethels had learned how to swim well enough to induce Mrs. Morton to let them go across the lake to the Girls' Club camp the season was so far advanced that they had trouble in getting their names on the list at all. Dorothy and Della waited to take their turn at the same time, and when the Institution motor-boat at last carried them over it was the last trip of the season.
They found the camping ground on the other side in perfect order for their coming.
"Every squad of campers finds all that it needs to pitch camp with immediately, even down to the wood to make the camp fire," explained Miss Roberts.
"See," cried Ethel Blue, "there it is, stacked up for us. Who does it?"
"The last campers. There was a detachment from the Boys' Club here last night."
"They were fine cleaners—for boys," commented Della.
"Boys are good cleaners," asserted Ethel Brown.
"Oh, Roger has Army and Navy ideas about neatness, but ordinary boys aren't so careful."
"On an earlier trip you girls would leave the camp in just the order in which you found it, woodand all. This is the last one, however, so you won't have to chop wood, but everything else must be so arranged that the men who come over to dismantle the camp will find everything in its place."
It was an evening of delight, to all the girls but especially to Ethel Blue, who had heard her father tell of his camping experiences so often that she felt as if she were repeating one of them through the kind influence of some good fairy who had touched her with her wand without her knowledge.
Pitching the tents was not easy but the girls managed it under the direction of one of Miss Roberts's assistants. Their united strength was needed for that, but when it was done they divided the remainder of the tasks. Dorothy was one of the squad that made the fire. Ethel Brown went with the girls who took the camp pails to the nearest farmhouse to draw drinking water from the well. Della and three others went up the road a little farther to a dairy to get the evening's supply of milk. Ethel Blue helped unpack the food supplies that had come over in the launch.
When everything was out of the boat and it was chug-chugging away from the shore the campers felt that now they were really cut off from home even if they were not on a desert island.
Not one of the girls ever had eaten a supper that tasted so good as that prepared in the open air and eaten with appetites sharpened by the exercise of preparation. Dorothy and three of her companions of the cooking class volunteered to prepare the main dishes, while Ethel Blue, who had become expert inthe water, assisted the swimming teacher to give a lesson to a few girls who had arrived only a week before. At a suitable time after the lesson was over every girl was directed to cut a forked stick from a near-by hedge. Then they gathered about the fire and each one cooked her own bacon on the end of the fork. Sometimes the flames leaped up and caught the savory bit, and then there was a scream at the tragedy. A huge broiler propped against a stick driven into the ground held a chicken whose skin turned a delicate brown in response to the warmth of the blaze. Potatoes in their jackets and ears of corn in their husks were buried in the ashes with heated stones piled over them so that they should be roasted through evenly. The elders made coffee by the primitive method of boiling it in a saucepan and clearing it with a dash of cold water, and they maintained that no coffee with a percolator experience ever tasted better. None of the girls drank coffee at night, but they all praised the delicious milk that they had brought from the dairy, and started a rivalry of enthusiasm.
When everything was made tidy after supper the fire was heightened to a roaring blaze and the girls sat around it cross-legged and told stories. "Br'er Rabbit" and the "Tar Baby" seemed just in the shadows beyond the flames and if you listened hard you could hear the hiss of the water as an Indian canoe slipped down the lake in pursuit of Brule or La Salle. A folk dance in the firelight ended the evening's amusement.
Bedtime brought an orderly arrangement of thesleeping equipment and a quick going to sleep, for the girls were tired enough to have fatigue overcome the strangeness of their surroundings.
The Ethels, Dorothy, and Della were together. It was at that end of the night when darkness is just giving way to the dim light that comes before the rosiness of the dawn, that Dorothy was roused by heavy breathing outside the tent. A chill of fear stiffened her. In the space of an eyeflash her mind went back many years to a faraway land where she had been roused in just this way by heavy breathing outside her window. Then there had been a low call and her father had come into her room and exchanging a word or two over her bed with the man beneath the window, had gone out doors. Almost before she realized that he had gone there was the snap of a revolver and a sharp cry of agony and her mother had shrieked and rushed out, leaving her alone. She was wide awake then and she lay in her narrow bed shivering and wondering.
Her mother came back weeping, and little yellow men had brought in her father's limp body and he had lain on the bed for two days, not opening his eyes, not stirring, until men came once more and carried him away, and she never saw him again.
She had almost outgrown the nightmare that attacked her every once in a while after her father's death, but the memory of the whole happening came back to her now with the sound of the heavy breathing. The suspense was more than she could endure. She reached over and touched Ethel Blue's hand.
Ethel Blue roused and was about to ask what wasthe matter when Dorothy, scarcely visible in the dim light, made a sign for silence. Both girls sat up in their cots and listened. Nearer and nearer came the sound. It seemed too heavy for a man's breathing,—yet—they had been talking about Indians before they went to bed—perhaps Indians breathed more heavily than white men. No man would come at such an hour with a good purpose—perhaps bad men breathed more heavily than good men. Ethel Blue clapped her hand over her mouth to stifle a scream. Dorothy crawled down into the bed and drew the cover over her head.
At that instant a roar boomed through the tent. Every girl sat up in her bed with a sharp, "What's that?" There were stirrings in the other tents; but the roar came again right there beside Ethel Blue's cot, and so near that it seemed in her very face.
"It's something awful!" she thought, chilled with fright; and then, "I won't let my imagination run away with me. It may not be as bad as it sounds. If it does hurt me I can bear it!"
Slowly she pushed back her blanket and looked down whence the clamor had come. The roar was followed by a tearing sound and a noise of struggle.
"Oh, girls," cried Ethel Blue, "it's a cow! It's nothing but a cow! Poor old thing, she's caught her horns under the edge of the tent and she can't get loose."
Dorothy's head came out from its covering.
"A cow!" she breathed with relief and sank back, weak but thankful.
"She's going to pull the tent down!" screamed Della.
"Can't you shoo her out, Ethel Blue?" asked Ethel Brown. "You're nearest."
Ethel Blue was well aware that she was nearest. She was startlingly near. But the cow seemed to want to withdraw quite as much as the girls wanted her to, and that encouraged Ethel Blue to help her. Leaning out of her cot she lifted the edge of the tent as far as she could with one hand and with her slipper in the other slapped the cow on her forehead as a hint that backwards was her next best move.
With a gasp of disgust the invader departed and the girls heard Miss Roberts, who had been aroused from her tent, driving her away. In fact, everybody was wide awake by this time.
"Let's get up," suggested Della. "I've never seen the sun rise and this is a good chance."
Evidently the girls in the other tents were holding a caucus to the same effect and there shortly appeared a shivering group of campers. Ethel Brown was the only one who seemed not to think the happening good fun, but she was ashamed to seem cross when everybody else was in good humor, and when Miss Roberts set her to work on the breakfast preparations she soon forgot that she had not made a brave showing before the marauder. Dorothy was pale but gave no other sign of having been especially disturbed. After breakfast came the packing up and setting of the camp in order and then two of the girls who had been studying signalling, wig-waggedacross the lake for the launch to come for them.
"Since we've made such an early start we might as well go back early," decided Miss Roberts, "because to-night is the exhibition of the School of Physical Education, you remember, and those of you who are in it will be glad of the extra time for rehearsing."
The girls left with the feeling that they had had almost as memorable a time as if the camp had been attacked by Indians. Now that it was over they were glad the cow had happened in. Ethel Blue had a real glow when she recalled that although she had been badly scared she had pulled herself together and really driven the cow away, and Dorothy felt that since her nightmare had once had so laughable an ending perhaps it would not come again.
Because of their early rising all the girls took a nap in the afternoon.
"You want to put spirit into your folk dances to-night," Mrs. Morton replied to the Ethels' remonstrances against this hardship. "I want my girls to move with life and not as if they were half asleep."
"Sleep now and you won't sleep then," added Helen, who was taking the last stitches on a pierrot dress which Ethel Blue was to wear.
The seats in the pit of the Amphitheatre were all removed so that the audience was crowded into the benches on the sloping sides. The parents of the boys and girls who were to take part were present in force and the members of the Boys' Club andGirls' Club who were not to take part sat together in solid blocks at the front.
A grand procession of all the participants opened the program.
"There's Roger," cried his grandmother.
"Tom Watkins is with him and James is just behind," Grandfather Emerson informed his wife after looking through his glass.
"Some one of those funny pierrots is Ethel Blue, but you can't distinguish her."
"She is to march with Dorothy, and Ethel Brown and Della are to be together in the butterfly dance."
"And Helen?"
"She is in one of the folk dances. She must be in this division wearing gymnasium suits."
"Or in the next one; that first detachment looked to me as if it was made up of teachers of gymnastics who are taking a normal course here."
The program continued with a set of exercises by the smallest members of the Boys' Club who executed a flag drill with precision and general success, although Dicky wandered from the fold when Cupid Watkins trotted his bowlegged way on to the stage looking for some member of his human family. Nevertheless, Dicky won the applause of the audience by seizing Cupid in his arms and planting a kiss on the cross-piece of his muzzle before leading him off on his search.
The butterfly dance was charming, the little girls waving in exact time to the music the filmy wings that hung from shoulder and wrist. Mrs. Morton never succeeded in making out Ethel Brown andDella but the whole effect was delicately graceful. Ethel Blue and Dorothy were equally indistinguishable among the pierrots who stamped and whirled and stretched arms and legs with funny rapid motions.
Ethel Brown had a part in a dance in which rubber balls were bounced in time with a difficult series of steps. Helen and Margaret and Tom Watkins were in one of the folk dances, and Roger and James, with some other large boys and young men, illustrated various wrestling holds in a fashion both graceful and exact. On the whole, the audience seemed to think the program was well worth their commendation.
Into this busy week was crowded yet one more event of especial interest to the Morton household and its friends—the annual circus of the Athletic Club. Roger had been playing baseball on the second team all summer and this team was asked to take part in a burlesque game which was to be one of the numbers on the program. There had been much practicing in private and Roger had come home one day with a black eye which seemed to promise that when he made his slide for base in the show it would be a spectacular performance.
The baseball teams, absurdly dressed, and taking Dicky and Cupid with them for mascots, had a float to themselves in the procession that wound about the grounds in the early part of the afternoon. The Superintendent of Grounds and Buildings led the way in his buggy and behind him came a detachment of Chautauqua police, one man strong. The specialfeatures were led by another buggy, this one drawn by a mule wearing a pair of overalls on his front legs.
A pretty pink and white float was filled with small children from the Elementary School; another was laden with a host of Girls' Club members in the pierrot costume of the Exhibition dance. Ethel Blue and Ethel Brown were among them, Ethel Brown wearing Della's dress because Della preferred to ride with Dorothy on the float with the Model Cooking Class.
James Hancock was in the baseball team with Roger but Tom Watkins provided the legs for one of the herd of three ostriches which walked with dignity behind the floats. The line ended with a flock of bicycles all aflutter with ribbons and pennants.
The performance was on the baseball field and it began as soon as the parade arrived and the trousered mule was securely tied. Small boys laden with popcorn and ice cream cones went through the grandstand with their wares, a policeman wearing a badge of giant size kept order, and a solemn-faced announcer presented the numbers of the program. There were several comic dances, some funny songs, a contortionist who twisted himself into such knots that the announcer expressed doubts as to whether he would ever straighten out enough to leave Chautauqua when the season was ended, a snappy banjo quartet, excellent horizontal bar work, and Roger's baseball team.
The baseball team took the prize awarded by theMen's Club for the best exhibit. TheDailyof the next morning described their playing as "distinctly original," and mentioned especially the superb slide to base made by Roger Morton, who, as short-stop, picked balls out of the sky with no apparent difficulty.
It was when the Mortons reached home, aching with laughter at the jokes which the clown pretended to get off and didn't, that they were surprised to find awaiting them a telegram from Captain Morton, Ethel Blue's father.
"Leaving Vera Cruz to-day," it read. "Reach Chautauqua next Thursday. Love."
"MY BRAVE LITTLE GIRL!"
THE Mortons had been talking all summer about having a family picnic, but there had been so many things to do every day for every one of the household that there never had seemed to be any opportunity. Now, however, all the chief events of the season were out of the way and once more their thoughts turned to a day out of the grounds.
"Let's go to Barcelona," suggested Roger a day or two after the circus.
"What's Barcelona?" questioned Ethel Brown.
"Don't you remember Grandmother told us about the fishing village on Lake Erie when we were coming over on the trolley?"
"Helen remembers that because there is some history about it," laughed Ethel. "I know she'll vote for Barcelona."
"I would—I'm crazy to see it—only it seems as if we ought to wait for Uncle Richard to come so that he can go with us."
Ethel Blue's eyes beamed affectionately at her cousin.
"He would like it, wouldn't he?" she said, smiling back.
"Let's go to Panama Rocks, instead," suggested Ethel Brown.
"What are Panama Rocks?" inquired Mrs. Morton.
"The strangest collection of rocks you ever saw, all jumbled together and cleft into miniature canyons. They're about ten miles from here."
"Oh, Daddy wouldloveto see those," cried Ethel Blue so anxiously that no one could help laughing.
"Don't be worried, my dear. We'll save all the very nicest picnics for your father," decided Mr. Emerson. "We'll just go across the lake. There's a place over there where we can make a fire without getting into trouble, and we can have a hot luncheon and take a swim and have a good time even if we aren't out of sight of the Miller Bell Tower."
Ethel Blue's face brightened.
"How do we get there?" she asked.
"By motor boat."
"Then can't we trail a rowboat so Roger can give me a lesson in rowing? I shall be ashamed to tell Daddy that I haven't learned all summer."
"Good work," cried Roger. "I'll hitch a light one on behind and I'll guarantee that before you come back you'll know all you need to to pull it. You won't need anything afterwards except practice."
"And perhaps a little cold cream," commented Helen drily.
It was the following Wednesday before a time could be found that would interfere with no one's plans. On that morning the entire Morton-Emerson family, including Mary, boarded the launch, engineeredby Jo Sampson, whose employers, the Springers, had been called home before the season ended. It did not take long to speed across to the other side of the lake and the party was soon near enough to the shore to recognize objects at which they had been looking all summer from a distance.
"Those trees aren't near the farmhouse at all! I thought they were right side of it!"
"The trees in the orchard are full grown. They seem like mere babies from the other shore!"
"And the barn is a long way from the house! Well, well!"
It was a glorious day with a breeze that made it no burden to carry the baskets up the slope to the shelter where the materials for making a fire were awaiting them. Jo and Roger arranged everything in places convenient for the cooks and then Jo went to the farmhouse to see if he could find fresh butter and sweet apples. Grandfather and Grandmother strolled off on a botanizing trip; Mary, who was to have a holiday from any kitchen duties, wandered into the woods with Helen and Dicky.
"Here's a good opportunity for you to give the Ethels their rowing lesson, Roger," suggested Mrs. Morton. "Teach them the main points before luncheon and perhaps they can do a little practicing in the afternoon."
"But you'll be all alone here," objected Roger.
"I shall be glad to be quiet here for a while. It won't be for long; some one is sure to come back in a few minutes."
So Roger and the girls went to the water's edgeand the girls stood on the narrow beach while Roger untied the rowboat from the stern of the motor-boat and ran it up on the shore.
"You must learn to get in without being helped," he insisted, "because you'll have to do it lots of times when there isn't any one around to give you a hand. The unbreakable rule is,Step in the middle of the boat. If you step on the side you're going to tip it and then you'll have a picnic sure enough and perhaps two drowned pic-a-ninnies."
"Pic-a-nothing!" retorted Ethel Brown. "We don't care if we do upset. We can swim."
"Clothes and shoes and all? I wouldn't risk it just yet if I were you. Now, then, right in the middle. That's it. Ethel Brown on the seat nearest the stern and Ethel Blue on the other."
Roger pushed off with a mighty shove and crept carefully down the boat, steadying himself by a hand on each girl's shoulder as he passed. He seated himself in the stern.
"Which way are you going, goose?" he inquired fraternally of Ethel Brown. "Sit facing me. It's a funny thing a sailor's daughter doesn't know that."
"Now, Roger, if you're going to tease I'll get some one else to teach me."
"I won't tease you. Don't stand up to turn around; when you make a mistake like that, squirm around on your seat. Always keep as nearly as possible in the center of the boat. What you want to remember is never to give the boat a chance to tip."
"There are only two oars here."
"One oar apiece is enough to begin with. Put yours out on the left side of the boat, looking forward, Ethel Brown. That's the port side. Look out!" for Ethel Brown thrust out her oar with a circular sweep that would have given Roger a smart blow on the ear if he had not ducked with great agility.
"Put yours out on the starboard side, Ethel Blue," he went on when he recovered himself. "That's the right hand side as you face the direction you are going. Secretary Daniels has changed 'port' and 'starboard' in the navy to 'left' and 'right,' but you might as well learn the old terms."
"Starboard, right; port, left; starboard, right; port, left," repeated the Ethels in chorus, as Ethel Blue brought her oar into place by raising it straight in the air, a movement which brought a "Good" from Roger.
"Ethel Brown is stroke."
"Why is she?" demanded Ethel Blue.
"Because she happens to sit nearest the stern where all the other oarsmen—meaning you—can see her. The stroke oar sets the stroke for the other rowers."
"When I go fast you must go fast, Ethel Blue."
"You can't go too fast for me," returned Ethel Blue smartly. "Have I got a name?"
"You're the bow oar. Now, then, ladies, pay attention to me. Do you see that piece of wood fitting in notches nailed across the floor of the boat? That is called a stretcher and you brace your feet against it."
"Perhaps you can, but I can hardly reach it with my toes."
"Move it up to the closest notch, then. That's the idea. Now put one hand on the handle of your oar and the other hand a few inches away from it on the thick part."
"So?"
"So. You're ready now to begin to row. Push your arms forward as far as they will go and let your body go forward, too. That gives you a longer reach and a purchase on the pull back, you see. Bear down a little on the oar, enough to raise it just above the water. When you get the hang of this you can learn how to turn the blade flat so as not to catch the wind or choppy waves. That's called 'feathering'; but we won't try that now."
"When I push the handle of my oar forward the blade goes backward," said Ethel Blue.
"Correct! Observant young woman! When you've pushed it as far as you can, let it go into the water just enough to cover it—no, don't plunge it way in, Ethel Blue! Don't you see you can't pull it if you have such a mass of water resisting you? Get your oar under water, Ethel Brown. If you don't catch the water at all you 'catch a crab'—just so," he chuckled as Ethel Brown gave her oar a vigorous pull through empty air and fell backward off the seat. "Hurt yourself, old girl? Here, grab root," and he extended a helping hand.
"Get these few motions right and you have the whole groundwork of rowing," went on Roger. "Forward, dip, pull, lift; forward, dip, pull, lift;forward, dip, pull, lift. Keep that up and you have the thing done. One, two, three, four; one, two, three, four."
The new crew pulled vigorously for some distance until Roger commanded a rest.
"Pull your oar in way across the boat and push it down until the handle catches in the ribs of the opposite side," he directed, "or turn the blade toward the bow and run the handle under the seat before you. Then it won't slip out of the rowlock and sail off, leaving you to wait until somebody happens along to pick you up. You might have to wait some time."
"How are we going to turn round?" Ethel Brown asked when they were rested.
"Pull one oar and the boat will turn away from the side of that oar. You pull, Ethel Blue. See it turn?"
"It's mighty slow work," puffed Ethel Blue.
"And a huge big circle you're making," laughed Roger. "Ethel Brown can help you by backing water."
"How do I do that?"
"It's the exact opposite of regular pulling. That is, dip your oar into the water first and then push your arms and body forward. Do you see? That makes the boat go stern first instead of bow first. Here's your count; dip, push, lift, pull; dip, push, lift, pull."
The two girls tried it together and the boat soon was going backward as fast as they had previously made it go forward.
"Now we'll try this turning around business again," directed Roger. "Ethel Blue will row the regular way; that will turn the boat in a wide circle as we saw. Ethel Brown will back water at the same time. That will make the boat turn a much smaller circle, and in a minute we'll lay our course for the shore. Ready? One, two, three, four; one, two, three, four. Now stop backing water, Ethel Brown, and row ahead. One, two, three, four," counted Roger patiently until the bow grated on the pebbles.
"That's enough for to-day," he decided. "You mustn't get so tired out that you won't want to have another go at it to-morrow. Remember, step in the middle of the boat and way out over the side. There you are," and he walked away toward the grove of trees where he had left his mother, whistling loudly and followed by the Ethels' cheerful "Thank you."
"It makes you hungry," commented Ethel Brown. "I believe I'll go and see if there are any signs of luncheon."
"I'll be there in a little while. I think I'll rest under that tree over there for a few minutes."
Ethel Blue was more tired than she realized, and, when she had made herself comfortable, curled up under an oak that was separated from the landing by a narrow point of land and some tall sedges, she fell sound asleep.
It was perhaps half an hour later that she roused sharply at some sound that pierced her dreams. Asshe came to herself another scream brought her to her feet.
"Dicky!" she gasped. "Where?"
She ran toward the landing, but there was no sign of him. The sound had seemed nearer to her tree she thought as she dashed back to her napping spot, but she had been so sleepy that she could not tell whether it came from the bushes behind her or from the beach.
The beach? The water? Was Dicky in the water? She flew to the water's edge and strained out over the tiny waves that lapped gently in from a steamer that had gone down the lake five minutes before.
There it was again—that scream. And there was Dicky's yellow head bobbing up for an instant and there was his hand thrown into the air.
In a second Ethel had slipped off her skirt and her shoes and was running into the water in her bloomers. It could not be very deep where Dicky was, just beyond the tip of the point. The sedge grass must have thrown him down when he started to wade. How it happened flashed into Ethel's mind as clearly as if she had seen it and all the time she was wading out as fast as she could go. Even now it was only a trifle above her knees; if Dicky could only get his footing he would be all right—and as she thought it, her own feet slipped from under her and she fell down a steep under-water bank sloping sharply away from the point.
This was the reason then. But though startledshe was cool and fell at once into an easy swimming stroke. Her middy blouse hampered her but not seriously. It needed only a few strokes to reach the eddy made by Dicky's struggle. She could see him clearly and she seized him by the back of his rompers. He made no resistance, poor little man. All the struggle had gone out of him when she lifted him to the surface.
The point was nearer than the beach and a few strokes brought her to it with her limp burden. The child was a slender little chap but he was a heavy armful for a girl of thirteen and Ethel tugged herself out of breath before she brought him high up on dry land.
"What was the first thing Roger said?" she asked herself, and instantly remembered that she must turn Dicky on to his face to let the water run out of his throat. She bent his limp arm under his forehead and then left him for a second while she ran for her skirt to roll up under his chest. As she ran she tried to scream, but only a faint squeak came from her lips.
As she flew back she rolled the skirt into a bundle. The child still showed no signs of breathing and she copied Roger's next move on that long ago day when she had been his subject. Thrusting the roll under Dicky's chest to raise his body from the ground and then kneeling beside him she pulled him on to his side and then let him fall forward again on to his face, counting "one, two, three, four," slowly for each motion.
Her arms ached cruelly as she tugged and tuggedagain at Dicky's little rolling body. Wouldn't anybody ever come? Over and over she tried to scream, but she had only breath enough to keep on pulling. She was counting "One, two, three, four," silently now.
At last, at last, came a flicker of Dicky's eyelid and a whimper from his mouth. Ethel worked on harder and harder. Dicky grew heavier and heavier, but she saw dimly through her own half-shut eyes that he was opening his and that his face was puckering for one of the yells that only Dicky Morton could give.
"You let me alone, Ethel Blue," he whispered savagely, and then she lost sight of the water and the sedge grass and her weary arms fell at her sides.
When she opened her eyes again she found a heavy coat thrown around her and a face that she had not seen for a very long time, smiling down into hers—a face that she never forgot, the face that flashed before her every night when she said her prayers.
"My little girl!" Captain Morton was saying soothingly as he rocked her in his arms; "my brave little girl!"
Hisbravelittle girl!
"Dicky?" Ethel murmured, looking up at her father.
"He's all right, dear. Aunt Marion has taken him to the fire."
Then Ethel leaned her face against her father's shoulder and lay without stirring, utterly content.
FOLLOWING A CLUE
WHEN Jo Sampson came running with a glass of hot milk and her Aunt Marion's instructions that Ethel Blue was to drink it at once, he said that he was preparing the launch for an immediate return across the lake. It was after they were packed into the boat and Ethel Brown had squeezed the water out of Ethel Blue's bloomers, that she shrugged herself comfortably into her father's coat and propped herself against his shoulder and asked if anybody knew how it happened.
Nobody did, it seemed. Dicky had gone to walk with Helen and Mary and when they came back and began to busy themselves about the luncheon he had slipped away. It was not until Captain Morton, who had reached Chautauqua a day earlier than he expected, and had followed them across in another launch, suddenly arrived and asked for Ethel Blue that they noticed that both Ethel Blue and Dicky were missing. The first point of search was the neighborhood of the rowboat where Ethel Brown had left her, and they must have come upon her only an instant after she had collapsed, for Dicky complained tearfully that "The hurted me and then the tumbled down."
Ethel Blue was the heroine of the day and noteven her father was prouder of her than Ethel Brown, who patted her and praised her without stint.
So great was the disturbance created at home by Dicky's experience which necessitated the calling of a doctor to make sure that he and Ethel Blue were getting on safely, and so frequent were the runnings up and down stairs with hot water and hot cloths and hot drinks and dry clothes that it was nightfall before Mrs. Morton had a chance to ask her brother-in-law how it happened that he had a furlough just at that time. Ethel Blue had begged not to be sent to bed and she was lying in the hammock, wrapped in a blanket and holding her father's hand as if she were trying to keep him always beside her. The rest of the family had gone to bed or to the Amphitheatre.
"Is my namesake asleep?" inquired Captain Morton. "Then sit down and let me tell you why I am here. I asked for leave because something had happened that made me think that we might perhaps be able to find Sister Louise again."
"Oh, Richard! After all these years! Have you really a clue?"
"It seems to me a very good one. I was doing some inspection work at the time General Funston cleaned up Vera Cruz. It necessitated my going into a great many of the Mexican houses. In one of them—a rather small house in a shabby street—I saw on the wall looking down on me a picture of my sister."
"Of Louise! How could it have come there?"
"I was amazed. I stared at the thing with my mouth open. But I could not be mistaken; it was a photograph of her that I was familiar with, taken before she was married."
"Could you make the proprietor of the house understand that you knew her?"
"Oh, yes; I've picked up enough Spanish to get on pretty well now. The man said that the original of the picture, Doña Louisa, had boarded with them several years ago. It took a lot of calculation to remember how long ago, but he finally concluded that it was the year before his third son broke his leg, and that was in 1907, as far as I could make out."
"Eight years ago that she was there. How extraordinary! What became of her?"
"The story is a tragedy. Louise's husband—Don Leonardo, the Mexican called him—was a musician, as you know. That was the chief reason for Father's disliking him. It seems that he had wandered to Vera Cruz with the orchestra of a theatrical company that stranded there. He was in sore straits pretty often. 'The little girl used to cry from hunger,' my man said."
"Poor little thing!"
"It was the first I knew of there being a child. The father finally got work in the orchestra of a small theatre and managed to make a fewpesosa week. That seems to have relieved the situation somewhat, but it also brought on Leonard the anger of some of the other musicians in town who had wanted the 'job' that he had secured."
"He probably needed it more than they."
"But he was a 'gringo' and they hated him. And"—with a glance toward Ethel Blue, swinging gently in the darkness, "and he died suddenly."
"Oh, poor Louise!" exclaimed Mrs. Morton, and "Poor little girl!" exclaimed Ethel.
"Somehow or other Louise managed to scrape together money enough to take the child back to the States, but there was business to be attended to and she left a permanent address with the Señor who had looked after some legal matters for her in Vera Cruz."
"Did you find him? Did he tell you the address?"
"I found him, and when he understood why I wanted to know he gave me the name of the Chicago lawyer whom she would always keep informed of her whereabouts."
"So you got a furlough and you're on your way to Chicago now?"
"I've been to Chicago."
"And the man knew? Did he tell you?"
"He knew. He told me. Where do you suppose she is?"
"I haven't the remotest idea, Richard."
"At Chautauqua."
"At Chautauqua!" repeated Mrs. Morton in a stupefied tone.
"Here!" cried Ethel Blue, amazed.
"Her address is here until September first. I hustled right on here, as you may imagine, to catchher before she left. Now the question is, how do you find out where people are on these grounds?"
"There is a registration office where everybody is supposed to register. Of course not every one does, but that is the first place to apply. We'll go there early in the morning."
"Of course you come upon hundreds of Smiths everywhere, but in a place of this size they may be present in scores instead of hundreds. Have you met any?"
"Two or three. There is a Mrs. Smith in my C. L. S. C. class, and there is one who has a cottage near the Hall of Philosophy, and there's Mother's embroidery teacher at the art store—she's a Mrs. Smith."
"Do you know the first names of any of them?"
"I don't. Do you know Dorothy's mother's name, Ethel?"
"I don't know, Aunt Marion. I'll ask her to-morrow."
"We'll hunt every Smith to his lair," said the Captain seriously; "and your lair is where you ought to be at this minute, young woman. Kiss me 'Good night.'"
The next morning immediately after breakfast, Mrs. Morton and her brother-in-law started off on their quest of the Chautauqua Smiths. Both Ethels were eager to go too, but the elders thought that the fewer people there were about when the meeting took place the less embarrassing it would be for their Aunt Louise.
"If you really do find her here," exclaimed Helen,"Roger will have to acknowledge that there is some romance left in the world."
Mrs. Smith had not reached the art store when Captain and Mrs. Morton stopped there on their way up the hill, so they went on to the registration office and looked through the cards in the catalogue.
"Here are Smiths from every State in the Union, I should say. Warren, Ohio; San Francisco, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Galena, Illinois; Wichita, Kansas; Bartow, Florida—"
"You can't tell anything from those home addresses, for to tell you the truth, I was so excited at getting this Chautauqua address from the Chicago man that I forgot to ask him where she had been before."
"Let's try the first names, then. We want L's, whether we're looking for 'Louise' or 'Leonard.'"
"Here's 'Lucy,' 'Laura,' 'Lester,' and one, two, three with just 'L.'"
"Those will be the ones for us to try first I'll copy their Chautauqua addresses," and Captain Morton drew out a notebook with a hand that trembled.
In spite of the number being so reduced, the search was disappointing. One Mrs. L. Smith lived near the College and proved to be a young woman with a black-eyed baby who demanded her attention imperatively when her callers asked about her acquaintances among the other Smiths of the place.
A second Mrs. L. Smith lived near the fence back of Alumni Hall and was as much too old as the first Mrs. Smith was too young. The third Mrs.L. Smith was just enough a matter of doubt to Captain Morton for him to begin his interview diplomatically.
"Have you ever been in Mexico?" he asked.
"Yes," she answered promptly, though evidently surprised.
"About how long ago?" ventured the Captain.
"It's nearly twenty years now. I was about twenty at the time."
The Mortons excused themselves and continued on their rounds.
"It's a rather doubtful experiment hunting up a person of middle age whom you haven't seen since she was a young woman. With all respect to the lady we just interviewed I'm glad she proves to be not my sister. But I can depend on your affection, Marion, to meet Louise with love no matter what sort of person she proves to be."
"You may, indeed. And I know she'll call out all my love. In the first place she's the sister of the best possible husband and the finest sort of brother-in-law, and in the next place she deserves love for the sake of the hardships she has been through."
"I saw Brother Roger for an hour just before I left Vera Cruz and he said that I could depend on you to be just as true tohisas you were tohim."
As they passed along the streets they stopped at two or three houses where Mrs. Morton remembered that she had met Smiths or where she could make inquiries about Smiths, but every call was fruitless.
"I believe we shall have to start a house to house search after dinner. Helen and Roger can help."
"We might stop here at the art store again as we pass," suggested Mrs. Morton.
Just at that moment Dorothy's mother came down the steps of the Arcade. She nodded pleasantly to Mrs. Morton, and then glanced at her companion.
"Richard!" she gasped. "Oh, Richard!"
"Louise! Is it Louise? Your hair! It's white!"
Mrs. Morton slipped an arm around Mrs. Smith's waist and drew her across the lawn to the shelter of the cottage.
"I'm so thankful it'syou!" she exclaimed with a smile that relieved the tension of the meeting. "I like you so much better than any of the other Mrs. Smiths we have met this morning!"
"I guessed, of course, from your boys' names, that you were my brother's wife," said the newly found sister, sinking into a chair; "but the children said there was no chance of their father or their uncle coming North this summer, and you never had seen me, so I took the risk of staying on until the first of September when my engagement at the art store ends."
"Why didn't you tell me, Louise? It would have been such a happiness to me—to the children—to know. We've been defrauded of nearly two months' joy."
"I shall be going in a week or ten days more," stammered Mrs. Smith, looking at her brother.
"You can tell me your plans later," he answered,"but don't look at me as if I were driving you. Why, I came up here from Vera Cruz to find you and for no other purpose."
"You found a clue there?"
The slender woman seemed to shrink into her chair, her high-piled white hair shining against its red back and her eyes gleaming with tears.
He told her how he had come upon her picture.
"Did the Mexican tell you that my husband was shot there? My little Dorothy wakes even now in the night and thinks she hears voices whispering in thepatiounder her window, voices of the men that called her father out to his death."
"We can all help make her happy enough to forget the hard days—and you, too, dear Louise."
Mrs. Morton threw her arms around her sister as the Ethels and Dorothy came rushing into the room from their morning on the bathing beach.
"Children, there's good news. Dorothy is your very own cousin."
"Our cousin?"
"Really our cousin?"
"Grandfather Emerson always said our noses were alike."
"Nothing so good ever happened to us," and the Ethels seized Dorothy and the three went through the steps of the butterfly dance with joyous smiles that reassured Dorothy's mother as to her child's welcome into the family.
"I'm so glad it'syouwho are the Aunt Louise we've wanted to know all our lives," cried Helen softly, kissing her aunt.
Roger shook hands with her gravely, feeling himself the representative of his father on an occasion of such family importance.
The Ethels rushed on to the porch when they heard Dicky coming up the steps.
"Dicky, Dicky, we've got a new aunt! Come in and see her."
Dicky went slowly into the room for purposes of inspection.
"Thatain't a new aunt," he exclaimed; "that'th jutht my fire lady," and he curled up like a kitten in his Aunt Louise's lap.