That afternoon at the Scout Camp taught the city visitors many things about the outdoor life that now interested their girls. Then when it was time for Mr. Marvin to drive home, he suddenly remembered something most important.
“How could it have slipped my mind?” said he, as he took several folded papers from his breast pocket.
He adjusted his glasses and read: “Miss Norma Evaston, Floriculturist, Green Hill, Greenville, New York.”
This long paper was handed to Norma who opened it with much curiosity. She glanced at it and then exclaimed in surprise,
“Oh, splendid! What does it mean?”
“Well, I’ll tell you. I told a few friends ofyour idea of keeping their office desks refreshed with old-fashioned flowers during the summer, and each one signified a desire to be placed on your customer list. So, you see, when the plants blossom, many of us will expect bouquets.”
And then Mr. Marvin handed Belle a paper. She almost forgot her dignity in her joy.
“Mr. Marvin authorizes me to find him an old Colonial secretaire with diamond-paned glass in the upper doors, and the old urn and balls crowning the top. I’m sure I know just where to get such an one!”
“I want a mahogany one, Belle, and I am not particular about the cost, either. The condition of it will govern the price,” explained the lawyer.
Janet frowned over the paper which Mr. Marvin now gave her. “What’s the matter with your order, Janet?” asked Helene.
“Why, here I have orders for fresh eggs and broilers every week, and the horrid old hens won’t lay a single egg. Three of them insist upon setting, and I can’t keep them away from the nests that have China decoy eggs in them. The sillyold things just set on them and chuckle with satisfaction. If I shoo them away, they make themostfuss!”
Everyone laughed at Janet’s trials, but Mr. Marvin said, “That order stands good for all season, Janet. When your hens do begin to lay, you’ll have to ship the eggs by the car-load.”
“How about an order for me?” called Natalie, seeing a paper in Mr. Marvin’s hand.
“‘Last but not least,’” laughed he. “We have all voted to turn vegetarians after this, just to order your crops, Natalie. Here is an order for our winter potatoes, all the sweet corn you have left to sell, and other fresh things.”
Natalie laughed and opened her paper. She laughed still louder as she read the orders given her to fill at some future date.
Then the city visitors said good-by. As Mr. Marvin started the engine, he called back over his shoulder: “A month from to-day I am coming out with a truck for deliveries.”
The girls laughed and waved their hands athim, and soon the car was out of sight. Then they sat down to discuss the marvellous opportunity given them by Mr. Marvin.
After a time, Sam sauntered up to the side piazza and waited for an opportunity to speak to Mrs. James. Seeing him anxiously awaiting his chance, she smiled.
“What rests so heavily on your conscience, Sam?”
“I jus’ walked down Miss Natalie’s garden path to have a look at her wegetables, an’ I see dem brush peas is ’way up. She oughta get her brush to-morrer, sure, er she’ll have trouble makin’ t’ vines cling. Ef she says t’ word, I’ll go an’ cut down some good brush in t’ woodland afore she gets up in t’ mornin’ an’ have it ready to use when she comes out.”
“Oh, Sam! Will you, please? I didn’t know those peas needed anything to hold to. I wasn’t sure whether I planted the dwarf peas first, or the climbing variety,” exclaimed Natalie.
“That ain’t all, either, Miss Nat,” added Sam seriously. “I saw you got lima beans plantedin one bed, an’ no poles on hand fer ’em. Did you order any bean poles f’om Ames?”
“Bean poles! Why, no!” returned Natalie.
The girls laughed at her surprise, but Sam continued:
“How did you ’speckt the vines to clim’?”
“I never knew they did climb! I thought they just naturally grew and branched out and bore beans,” explained Natalie, to the great amusement of Mrs. James and the girls.
“Well, den, I’d better hunt up some decent poles, too, in t’ woods, eh?” asked Sam.
“Would you have to cut down any good trees?”
“I’d choose any what looked sickly, er maybe some dead young trees. Don’t worry ’bout me choppin’ down any fine ones.”
“Say, Nat, I think it will be fun for us all to go with Sam in the morning before breakfast, and help cut the brush and bean poles,” suggested Janet.
“I’m willin’,” said Sam, smiling at the girls.
So the five girls went with Sam at sunrise thenext morning, and by breakfast-time, Natalie had sufficient poles and brush at her garden beds to help all the peas and beans she could find room for that year.
The stock-grower and florist, and even the antiquarian, took such an interest in sticking the brush into the garden for the peas and helping the tendrils cling to their new support, that they left their own tasks undone.
Sam had driven Frances in the car to the store after breakfast, so he was not around when the girls planted the bean poles. He had not pointed out the particular bed where the limas were growing, as he thought, of course, that Natalie knew. But she had not followed Mrs. James’ advice given a few weeks before, when the seed was sown—to register each bed with the ticket of the vegetable that was planted there. Now she had to depend on her own memory to determine which of the different plants were beans.
The three other girls carried the poles where she directed, and carefully walked on the boards Natalie laid down for their feet, to keepthe beds from being trodden while they dug holes and firmly placed a seven-foot pole in each hill of beans.
“There now, don’t they look business-like?” exulted Natalie, as she surveyed with pride the rows of bean poles.
Sam stopped the automobile near the side porch just after Natalie made this remark, and seeing the girls still at the garden, he hurried there to see if he could help them in any way.
“All done, Sam! Aren’t the poles nice?” exclaimed Natalie.
“Yeh, Miss Natalie, the poles is nice enough, but you ain’t got ’em planted in the lima-bean garden,” said Sam slowly, so as to break the news gently.
“What?” cried three girls in one voice.
“Nah. Them green plants is dwarf string-beans, and t’ lima beans is on the other side.”
“Oh goodness’ sake!” wailed Natalie, sitting down plump on the radish bed. “All that work done for nothing?”
Norma and Belle frowned at the poles, butJanet laughed. “If this isn’t the funniest thing, yet!” she exclaimed.
The greater part of the morning had passed before the error made in the garden had been corrected. Natalie was so tired by the time she reached the house that she dropped wearily upon the steps and sighed.
Mrs. James came out upon the piazza when she saw her approaching the house, and at the sigh she said: “What’s wrong?”
“Oh, that horrid old garden issucha care! I wish to goodness I had chosen stock-raising instead. Then I could have had the pleasure of watching the little things run about and show their gratitude when one feeds them. But lifeless old seeds and expressionless vegetables are such uninteresting things to work for!”
Mrs. James understood that something had gone awry, so she wisely remarked: “Oh, I don’t know! Janet seems to have as much trouble with her stock as anyone has with other work.”
“Well, she doesn’t have to dig holes and plant bean poles for her pigs to climb up on!”
Mrs. James barely kept from laughing outright at the funny excuse given. But she replied: “Janet had a dreadful time just now, trying to catch two of the little pigs that escaped and started to run down the road.”
“No,—really!” exclaimed Natalie, sitting up with great animation. “Where is she now?”
“Trying to repair the fence that they broke down. They are growing so big and strong that the rickety enclosure she made at first will never keep them in, now.”
“I just hope they get away and give her a chase all the way to the Corners!” cried Natalie.
“Why should you wish such hard luck for poor Janet?” asked Mrs. James, laughingly.
“Because she laughed at my bean poles and refused to help us dig them up again.”
“Dig them up again! Did you bury them?”
Then Natalie found she had made an admission that would have to be explained.
“No, not buried them, but we mistook the plants. It was such an easy thing to do—to believe the string-beans were limas, you know.”
“Oh! Then you never followed my advice about tagging the different beds.”
But Natalie did not reply.
The following morning, Janet asked Frances to inquire if there was a package for her at the post-office, as it should have arrived several days before.
“Is it a big package?” asked Frances.
“No, it’s a book that I ordered from the city. It’s all about raising things. Not that I need to find out about chickens and pigs, but I expect to buy that calf from Mr. Ames, and Belle saw some sheep in a pasture up in the Hills the other day, when she was hunting for antiques. I am wondering if they are difficult to raise. That is why I want the book.”
The book arrived that morning, and Janet straightway applied herself to studying its pages, in order to learn what other farmyard animals she could keep that would not give her too much trouble, and repay her for the expense incurred.
The result of that reading was to rouse Janet’s growing ambition to fever-heat. She determinedupon a plan by which she could borrow the capital from her father and buy her stock without further loss of time. But her experiences are told in the volume following this one, called “Janet: a Stock-Farm Scout.”
Natalie’s garden beds began to look most flourishing, for every seed had sprouted and the transplanted greens were growing like wildfire. She began to figure ahead to find how soon she might gather crops, but she kept this vision a secret, as she knew the girls would tease if they heard of it.
The very impressive paper that conveyed the rights of Solomon’s Seal Troop to take its place in the Girl Scout Organization arrived that week, also, so that Natalie realized that great things were already growing out of her coming to Green Hill Farm that summer. But how they multiplied and developed thrilling experiences will be narrated in the second volume of this Girl Scout Country Life Series.
THE END
THE END