"Why, Bessie's a regular brick!" said Charlie, as they sat at dinner that night. Eleanor and the two girls were going back to Long Lake on the first train in the morning, and they were celebrating with the best dinner the town of Hamilton could afford. "I told you I needed a nurse, Nell, and here one of you had to save me for the second time since I came here to look after you!"
"That man was terribly clever," said Eleanor, gravely. "I never even knew I was locked in—I was let out before I had had a chance to find it out for myself."
"Bessie and I didn't know it, either, until she saw him tying Mr. Jamieson up," said Dolly. "We'd have found it out as soon as we wanted to leave the room to go down for lunch, of course, but he was so quiet about locking us in that neither of us heard him at all."
"He was just a little bit too clever," said Charlie. "If he hadn't been so anxious to make a little more money out of me, he would have got clean away and given that paper to Holmes."
"Not getting it seemed to upset Mr. Holmes a good deal, didn't it?" laughed Eleanor. "Is it true that he left town by the first train after he heard that the letter had been found when they searched that wretched man?"
"Quite true," said Charlie, happily.
"Just what did happen in court this afternoon?" asked Dolly. "I thought we were going to be witnesses and have all sorts of fun. And now it's all over and our trip down here has just been wasted!"
"Why, Holmes's lawyer, Curtin, threw up the case as soon as he heard about that letter, Dolly. There wasn't anything else for him to do. With that, added to the stories you two girls had to tell, there wasn't any way of getting those gypsies off."
"Are they going to send them to prison?"
"John will go to jail for six months. He's the one who actually carried Dolly off, you know. As for Peter and Lolla, who helped him, they get off easily. They were sentenced, too, but the judge suspended sentence. If they forget, and do anything more that's wrong, they'll have to serve out their term."
"I'm very glad," said Eleanor. "Poor souls! I don't believe they understood what a dreadful thing they were doing."
"It was a good thing for them they decided to plead guilty and take their medicine," said Charlie. "Or, I should say, it's a good thing that Curtin decided it for them. Don't worry about them any more. Holmes will have to pay John a good deal of money when he comes out of jail to make him keep quiet—if he manages, first, to shut up the people here, so that the whole story doesn't come out."
"Can he do that, now that they've seen that letter?"
"I'm half afraid he can. He's got a tremendous lot of money, you see, and this is a time when he naturally wouldn't hesitate much about spending it. And I don't know that it's such a bad thing. It gives us a starting point, you see. And if the thing isn't made public, he may get more reckless, and give us another chance to land him where he belongs, and that's in the penitentiary. He's cleared out now and we couldn't persuade these people to go after him, even if it was worth while, which I don't believe it is."
"How on earth did you get down?" Eleanor asked Bessie.
"Oh, I saw there wasn't anything else to do," said Bessie, modestly. "If you could have seen that man's face! I was terribly frightened. I didn't know what he might be going to do to Mr. Jamieson, so I just knew I had to get help. And I was afraid to call out of the window."
"Why? Someone would have been sure to hear you," said Eleanor.
"Because I thought the only person who was absolutely sure to hear me was that man who was tying Mr. Jamieson up. And I didn't know what he would do, but I was afraid he might do something dreadful right away if I called out and he knew that he was being watched."
"You're all right, Bessie!" said Jamieson, admiringly. "Was it very hard, going down the waterspout?"
"No, it really wasn't. Dolly was afraid I was going to fall, and she wanted to go herself. But I said I had seen it, and made the plan, and so I had a right to be the one to go. It really wasn't so far."
"Far enough," said Jamieson, grimly. "You might easily have broken your neck, climbing down three flights that way."
"Oh, but it wasn't three! It was only one. You see, there was a balcony outside the window, and on the next floor there was another, and I thought that window was pretty sure to be open. It was, so I got inside, and then I found the room I was in was empty, and the door was open, so all I had to do was to walk down the stairs and tell the manager. They all came up and, well, you know what happened then yourself."
"I certainly do!" said Jamieson. "And I don't think I'm likely to forget it very soon, either. That was a pretty tough character. I'll remember his face, all right."
"Well," said Eleanor, happily, "all's well that ends well, they say. I really believe Dolly had the worst time, when you think about it. She had to watch Bessie climbing down that waterspout."
"That was dreadful," said Dolly, shuddering at the memory. "But I think it was much worse for Mr. Jamieson and Bessie than for me."
"Bessie was so busy getting down that I don't believe she had much time to think about the danger," said Eleanor. "And Mr. Jamieson didn't know her door was locked, so he had the relief of thinking that she'd been able to get help in just an ordinary fashion. Of course, if he or I had known what a risk she was running we'd have been half wild with anxiety about her. So you see it really was hard for you not to scream or do anything to startle that man."
"That was what I was afraid of most," said Bessie. "I don't know what I'd have done if Dolly had screamed."
"You needn't have been afraid! I was too frightened even to open my mouth," said Dolly, honestly. "I couldn't have uttered a sound, no matter what depended on it, until I saw you were all right. And then I just slumped down and laughed—as if there was something funny."
"Well, we can all laugh at it now," said Eleanor. "Are you going back to the city to-night, Charlie?"
"No, I guess I'll be held up here until about noon to-morrow," he answered. "I've got to appear against that poor chap, and there are one or two other matters I want to attend to while I'm here. I'll see you on your train in the morning, and I'll try to look out for myself when you're gone."
It was an enthusiastic and eagerly curious crowd of girls that welcomed them back to Long Lake the next day when, in the middle of the morning, the well-remembered camp appeared. Miss Drew, who had taken Eleanor's place as Guardian, laughed as she greeted her friend.
"I don't know how you do it, Nell," she said. "I never saw anything like these girls of yours. They did their best not to let me know, but I managed to find out, without their knowing it, that you did about everything in a different way from mine—and a much better way."
"Nonsense!" said Eleanor. "I've made a few changes in the theoretical rules of the Camp Fire. All Guardians are allowed to do that, you know. But it's only because they seemed to suit us a little better—my ideas, I mean."
"You know," said Anna Drew, thoughtfully, "I think that's the very best thing about the Camp Fire. It doesn't hold you down to hard and fast rules that have got to be followed just so."
"If it did, it would defeat its own purposes," said Eleanor. "What we want to do—and it's for Guardians, if they're youngsters like you and me, as well as for the girls—is to train ourselves to attend to our jobs properly."
"Why, what jobs do you mean?"
"The job every girl ought to get sooner or later—running a home. It's a lot more of a job, and a lot more difficult, and important, too, than waiting on people in a shop, or being a stenographer, and yet no one ever thinks an awful lot about it before it comes along."
"That's so, Nell. I never thought of it just that way. But you're right. We get married, and a whole lot of us don't have any idea at all of how to look after a house."
"It isn't fair to the men who marry us. Marriage is supposed to be a partnership—husband and wife as partners. But if the man knew as little about his part of the job as the woman generally does about hers when she gets married, most married couples would be in the poorhouse in a year."
"That sounds old-fashioned, but I don't believe it is, somehow."
"It certainly is not. It's what I try to keep in mind. That's why we don't go in much for talking about votes for women. I'm not saying we ought not to vote, or that we ought to. But I do think there are a lot of things we ought to think about first. Times have changed a lot, but after all women and men don't change so very much. Or, at least, they ought not to change."
"I think I see what you're driving at. You mean that your great grandmother and mine probably spun cloth and made clothes for themselves and most of the family, and did all sorts of other things that we never think of doing?"
"Yes. And I don't mean that we ought to go back to that. A man can buy a better shirt in a shop now for less money than you or I would have to spend in making him one. But there are plenty of other things we could do in a house that we never seem to think of, somehow."
"I don't see how you think of all that! I thought I'd spent a lot of time studying the Camp Fire, but I never got hold of those ideas."
"Oh, they're not all mine—not a bit of it! You ought to talk to Mrs. Chester, our Chief Guardian. She'd make you think, and she'd make you believe you were doing it all by yourself, too."
"Yes, she's wonderful. I don't know her very well, but I hope to see more of her this winter. I want to be Guardian of a Camp Fire of my own. I've had just enough of the work, substituting for other girls, to want to spend a lot more time at it."
"You'll get the chance all right—don't worry about that! It's Guardians we need more than anything else. It isn't as easy as you would think to get girls and women who've got the patience and the time for the work. But that's chiefly because they don't know how fascinating it is, and how much more fun there is in doing it than in spending all your time going about having what people call a 'good time.' I've never had such a good time in my life as since we got up this Manasquan Camp Fire."
"Well, I wish I could stay with you, and go on this wonderful tramp with you. But I've got a lot of girls coming up to visit me, and I've simply got to be there to entertain them. So if you're really going to stay, and don't need me any more, I'll have to be getting Andrew to take me back home again."
"I wish you could stay, too, but if you can't, you can't. I'm ever so grateful to you for coming. I can tell you right now that there aren't many people I'd trust my girls to, as I did with you!"
"I know it's a compliment, Nell, so you needn't talk about gratitude. I'm the one to be grateful, I'm sure. The more experience I get before I'm a regular Guardian myself, the better chance I'll have to make good when the time comes."
"I'm ever so glad you feel that way about it, Anna. You know, there are ever and ever so many girls who could do the work, and won't try. I'm not sure that it's so much 'won't' as—oh, I don't know! I think they're afraid—they haven't any confidence in themselves. They think it would be absurd for them to try to direct others. I felt that way myself."
"Nearly everyone who is at all likely to make good does, Anna. That's the strangest part of it. When I hear a girl talking about how easy it is to be a good Guardian, 'and how sure she is that she'll make good, I'm always afraid she's going to fail. If you make the girls understand they've got to help you, and that you know that if they don't you won't be able to succeed, you get them ever so much more interested."
"That's easy to understand. It makes them feel that they really do have a part in the work. I noticed that about your girls, particularly, Nell. They seemed to feel that they were all a part of the Camp Fire."
"Well, that's the spirit I've always tried to put into them. I'm very glad if I've really succeeded in doing it. It was a good deal of a trust for me, as well as for them—leaving them to you. It shows, I think, that the Camp Fire is in good shape and able to get along, not exactly by itself, but under different conditions. I might easily have to leave them, you know, and if they couldn't go right ahead under another Guardian, I'd feel that my work had been, in a way, at least, a failure."
"All ready, Miss Drew!" called old Andrew, and then the girls gathered on the beach and sung the Wo-he-lo song as the boat glided off.
Eleanor welcomed the quiet days that followed, during which she completed the plans for the field day in which the Boy Scouts were also to take part, and for the long tramp she planned as the chief event of the summer for her girls.
"It seems sort of slow, now that those gypsies have gone, and there's no one to make trouble for us," Dolly complained. But Bessie and Zara, who heard her, only laughed at her.
"You'd better be careful," said Zara. "First thing you know you'll be starting some new trouble."
"She's right," said Bessie. "You said when we got away from that gypsy that you'd had enough excitement for awhile, Dolly."
"Oh, well," Dolly pouted, "it is slow up here—no place to buy soda, no moving picture shows—nothing!"
"I call the swimming and the walks pretty exciting," said Zara. "I'm really learning. I went about twenty yards this afternoon."
"But I know how to swim, and one walk is just like another," said Dolly.
"Well, we'll have the field day pretty soon, and then, after that, we'll start on our long walk. There'll be plenty of excitement then, and one walk won't be just like another. I bet you'll be wishing for a train before we're down in the valley again."
The morning of the long-awaited field day dawned clear and bright. The camp was stirring with the first rays of the rising sun, that gilded the tree tops to the east, and painted the surface of the lake, smooth as a mirror, with a hundred hues. The day promised to be hot in the open, but there was no danger of great heat on the march, which was entirely through the woods.
"We won't worry about how hot it's going to be under the sun," said Eleanor Mercer as the girls sat at their early breakfast.
"No. Our work is under the trees, until we get to the camping spot," said Margery Burton.
"Now here's the plan of campaign," said Eleanor. "I am going to send two girls ahead to build the fire. That's the most important thing, really—to get the fire started."
"We can't use matches, can we?" asked Zara.
"No, the fire must be made Indian fashion, with two sticks. But we all know how to do that, I think. The idea of sending two girls ahead is to have that part of the work done when the main body reaches our camping ground."
"Where is that? We can know now, can't we, Wanaka?" asked Margery.
"Yes, it's all right to tell you now. You know those twin peaks beyond Little Bear Lake—North Peak and South Peak?"
"Yes," came the answer, in chorus.
"Well, our place is on North Peak, and Mr. Hastings will take his Scouts to South Peak. The trails are different, but they're the same length."
"Why was that kept such a secret?" asked Bessie.
"Because Mr. Hastings and I decided that it would be fairer if there was no chance at all to go over the trail first and learn all about it. Then there was the chance that if either party thought of it they could locate kindling wood and fallen wood that could be used for the fire-making. On a regular hike, you see, you would go to a place that was entirely strange, and it seemed better to keep things just as near to regular hiking conditions as we could."
"Oh, I see! And that's a good idea, too. It's just as fair for one as for the other, then."
"Who are going to be the two girls to go ahead? And why can't we all get there at the same time?" asked Dolly.
"One question at a time," said Eleanor, with a laugh. "I'll answer the second one first. We've got to carry all the things we need for making camp and getting a meal cooked. So if we send out two girls ahead, with nothing to carry, they can make much better time than those who have the heavy loads."
"Will they do the same thing?" asked Zara. "The Boy Scouts, I mean?"
Eleanor smiled.
"Ah, I don't know," she said. "They will if Mr. Hastings thinks of it, I'm sure, because it would be a good move in a race."
"Is it quite fair in case they don't happen to think of it?" asked Margery, doubtfully.
"Why not? This isn't just like a foot-race. It isn't altogether a matter of speed and strength, or even of endurance—"
"I should hope not!" declared Dolly. "If it was, what chance would we have against those boys?"
"Suppose we found some new way of rubbing sticks that would make fire quicker than the regular way, it would be fair to use that, wouldn't it, Margery?" asked Bessie.
"That's the idea. Bessie's right, Margery," said Eleanor. "We have a perfect right, and so have they, to employ any time-saving idea we happen to get hold of. And I'm quite sure this is a good one, and that Mr. Hastings will think of it, too."
"Well, I hope he doesn't do anything of the sort!" said Margery, wholly converted and now enthusiastic for the plan.
"You haven't told us yet who is to go ahead," said Dolly. "I'm just crazy to be one of the two—"
"We all are! Who wouldn't like to get out of carrying a load?" cried two or three girls in chorus.
Eleanor laughed at the eagerness they displayed.
"It won't be all fun for the pathfinders, as we'll call them," she said. "They've got a lot of responsibility, you see."
"What sort of responsibility?" asked Margery. "All they've got to do is to go just as fast as they can and make a fire when they get to the peak."
"That isn't all they've got to do, though. They've got to make a smoke signal, for one thing, by stopping the smoke with a blanket, and then letting it rise, straight up, three times. And they've got to go to work and get enough wood to keep the fire going, as soon as they've lighted it."
"But they'll be able to go along ever so easily on the trail!"
"It isn't a very well marked trail. Neither of the trails to the peak is, for that matter. And the pathfinders, if they find they're in any danger of making a wrong turn, must make a sign for us who follow. That might easily save us a good many minutes in getting there. So you see it isn't quite as easy as you thought. Now, I'll call for volunteers. Who wants to join the pathfinders?"
Every girl there put up her hand at once, amid a chorus of laughs and jesting remarks.
"Heavens! Well, you can't all be pathfinders, or there'd be no one to carry the dinner! We'll have to figure out some way of picking out two, because that's all there can be."
"We might draw lots," said Margery.
"I don't like that idea much," said Eleanor. "If you're all so anxious to go, we ought to make it a reward of some sort—a prize. It's too bad I didn't think of it earlier, because then we could have had a really good competition."
She frowned thoughtfully for a moment.
"I know what we'll do," she said. "There are just eight of you, and we'll divide all the dishes from breakfast into eight even piles. We can do that easily. Then you shall all start together—"
"Oh, that's good!" said Dolly. "And the ones who finish first will be pathfinders?"
"Yes, those who finish first, and put their dishes away properly, Dolly—not just finish washing and drying. I'll be the judge. Come on, Margery, we'll arrange the piles."
So the arrangements were made, and then, with each girl standing over her own pile of dishes, they waited eagerly for the word.
"I'll start you," laughed Eleanor. "Now, are you ready? Take dishes—wash!"
And at once there was a great splashing and commotion. But Eleanor broke in with a laugh.
"Time!" she called. "Stop washing'"
Everyone stopped, and looked at her curiously.
"Here's a rule," she said. "I only just thought of it. Anyone who breaks a dish is out of the race, even if she finishes five minutes ahead of the next girl. Understand?"
"Yes," they cried.
"All right. Dolly, you kept on washing for nearly half a minute after the others had stopped. When I give them the word to start again, don't you do it. I'll give you a starting signal of your own. You, too, Mary King! I'll call your names when you two are to start."
Then they bent to their piles again, and waited for Eleanor's "Ready? Wash!"
Dolly and Mary King, forced to restore the time they had unwittingly stolen from the others, waited as patiently as they could until they heard "Now, Dolly!" and after a moment more, "All right, Mary!"
"Oh, this is fine sport!" cried Dolly, washing with an energy she had never displayed before. "I think we ought to have races like this ever so often. They're much better fun than most of the games we play!"
"Anything that makes you act as if you liked work is a fine little idea, Dolly," said Margery. "But I haven't got time to talk—I've got to wash. I never thought anyone could wash dishes as fast as you're doing it!"
"I'm in practice," laughed Dolly. "I hate them so, that I'm always trying to get them done just as quickly as I can."
And a moment later Dolly, to the general surprise, had put away her last dish, an easy winner.
It was plain to her in a moment that the struggle, now that she was out of it, would be between Margery and Bessie. They had finished washing almost at the same moment, with Margery perhaps a couple of spoons ahead.
"Hurry, Bessie, do hurry!" pleaded Dolly. "We've done so much together up here, we ought to be pathfinders together, too. Can't I help her, Miss Eleanor?"
"No, that wouldn't be fair, Dolly," laughed Eleanor. "Each one has got to win or lose on her own merits in this race."
Bessie smiled as she heard Dolly's impulsive appeal. She wanted to win, too, because it was impossible for her to engage in any contest without wanting to come out ahead, or as far ahead as she could. This time, of course, second place was all she could hope for, but she was not one of those people who, if the chief prize is beyond their reach, relax their efforts to do as well as they can.
As she finished wiping each dish dry she arranged it, stacking her dishes in order of their size, so that they could all be carried easily to the tent where they were to be laid away.
Margery, on the other hand, grew nervous as she neared the end. Once a plate slipped through her hand, but, fortunately, her cry of dismay as it fell was premature, for it did not break. But she was putting her dishes down anywhere, without regard for their size or for convenience in carrying them, and as a result, though she had finished the actual drying nearly a minute before Bessie, she was still frantically gathering her piled dishes together in her arms when Bessie wiped the last spoon.
Then, without haste, Bessie picked up her whole pile, and, starting before Margery, walked carefully over to the tent. She put away her last dish before Margery was half done, and the contest was over.
"Go on, girls!" cried Eleanor, as she saw that interest was slackening with the choice of the second pathfinder. "You don't want to be last, do you? I should think you'd all want to avoid that!"
The reminder was enough, and the others were soon busily finishing their tasks. Zara was fourth, right after Margery, and then there was a wild scramble among the last four. They finished almost together, and Eleanor, with a laugh, had to declare that there was a tie for sixth, seventh and eighth places.
"So no one was really last!" she declared, merrily. "My, but that was good fun! It certainly was, if you enjoyed racing half as much as I did watching you! It's a pity we never thought of that before."
"I'll beat you next time, you two!" vowed the panting Margery, shaking her first in mock anger at Bessie and Dolly. "More haste, less speed! That's what beat me! But I'll know better next time."
"We'll have a team race some time," said Eleanor. "Two teams of four—that ought to be good fun. Oh, there are lots of ways of having a good time if you only think of them!"
Then she clapped her hands as a sign for attention.
"Now we've got to take our fun for the rest of the day more seriously," she said. "You girls will have to take your fire-making sticks, and an old blanket. You understand how to make smoke signals, don't you?"
"Yes, indeed!" cried Dolly and Bessie, in one breath.
"All right, then. How will you make signs to show us which way to go?"
"With a hatchet. We'll blaze the trees," suggested Bessie. "Then you'll be sure to see it. There's no way that a sign like that can be blown away, or get moved by accident. With the thin end of the blaze in the direction you are to take, if there's a choice."
"All right. Hatchet, old blanket, fire-making sticks. You'd better carry water bottles, for you'll be thirsty on the way."
"Why, we'll find plenty of water. There must be springs!" Dolly protested.
"Undoubtedly; but you don't know just where they are, and you'd waste time looking for them. If you have your water bottles, with a little bit of lemon juice in the water, you can have a drink wherever you like."
"I like the taste of lemon juice, too."
"It isn't only because you like it that it's a good thing to have it, but it will quench your thirst better than plain water, and it will make your water last better, too, because you don't need to drink so much of it."
"It's fine if you're hot, too," said Margery, approvingly. "A little lemon water will cool you off better than half a dozen of those ice-cream sodas you're so fond of, Dolly."
Dolly made a face at her.
"I think it's mean of you to tease me about soda when you know I can't have it, no matter how much I want it," she said. "But I don't care, really. I wouldn't have an ice-cream soda now, if I had a pocket full of money and I could get one by going across the street!"
Eleanor smiled at her.
"What a reckless promise! Only you know you are perfectly safe," she said, half mockingly.
"I really mean it," protested Dolly. "I'm going to swear off—for a long time, anyhow. Bessie and Zara and I are going to try to get enough honor beads to be Fire-Makers as soon as we get back to the city, and that's one of the ways I'm going to try."
"Then you've started already?" said Eleanor.
"No, not yet," said Dolly. "I'm going to wait—"
A shout of laughter interrupted her.
"Oh, yes, we know! Until you have just one or two last ones—"
Dolly flushed dangerously for a moment. But her new control over herself, that she was fighting so hard to maintain, saved her from the sharp reply that was on her tongue.
"You might let me finish," she said. "If I swore off now I suppose the time while we're here would count toward an honor bead, but what's the use of swearing off something I can't get, anyhow? I'm going to swear off the first time I see a soda fountain!"
"Good for you, Dolly!" exclaimed Eleanor, heartily. "That's the right spirit."
It did not take the two pathfinders long to get so far ahead of the main party that they were out of sight and almost out of hearing. The girls who carried the necessary provisions and utensils, however, made their way light by singing Camp Fire songs as they walked, and their voices echoed through the woods.
"This is great! Oh, I love it!" said Dolly, happily. "I'm so glad you beat Margery, Bessie!"
"I thought you liked Margery, Dolly?"
"I do, but you're my very dearest chum, Bessie! I think Margery's great, but she is just a little bit superior, sometimes. I expect I deserve it when she gives me a lecture, but I like you because you don't preach, though you're just as good as she is any day in the week!"
"I'll probably lecture you some time, Dolly, if I think you need it."
"Go ahead! I don't mind when you do it, or if you do it. I don't know why, but it's the same way with Miss Eleanor. She's scolded me sometimes, but she isn't a bit like my Aunt Mabel, or the teachers at school."
"How do you mean? They're kind to you, I suppose? It isn't that that makes the difference?"
"No. I don't just know what it is, except that she makes me feel as if I had made her unhappy, and they always talk just as if they thought it was their duty."
"It probably is, Dolly. You ought to have had the sort of scoldings I used to get from Maw Hoover! Then you'd know what a real scolding is like."
"Oh, I just hate that woman, Bessie, for the way she treated you. Don't you hate her, too?"
"I don't know. I used to, but I'm sort of sorry for her, Dolly."
"I don't see why!"
"Well, since I've been away from the farm, I've seen that she didn't have a very much better time than I did. She had to work all day long, and she never got much pleasure."
"That wasn't any excuse for her treating you so badly."
"I think maybe it was, Dolly. I suppose she was nervous, like a whole lot of other women, and she had to have something to wear herself out on. She took things out on me. I'm beginning to think that maybe she wasn't really mad at me when she acted like that. I believe she used to get so upset about things that she had to sort of kick out at whatever was nearest—and it happened to be me."
"Well, I hate her, just the same! You can forgive her if you like, but I'm not going to!"
"It's a good thing she never did anything to you, Dolly. If you hate her like that when you've never even seen her, what would you do if you had some real reason for it?"
Dolly laughed.
"I suppose I am silly," she said, "but I can't help it. I just feel that way, that's all. Do you know what I wish, Bessie?"
"Nothing dreadful, I hope, Dolly."
"She'd think it was, I'm sure—spiteful old cat! I wish you'd find out all about your father and mother, and that they'd not be lost any more."
"Oh, Dolly, so do I! But that wouldn't seem dreadful to Mrs. Hoover, I'm sure. I think she'd be glad enough."
"Let me finish. I wish you'd find them or that they'd find you, and turn out to be ever so rich. They might, you know. It might all be a mistake, or an accident, or something."
"I wouldn't care if they weren't rich, Dolly, if only I knew what had become of them, and why they had to leave me there all that time with the Hoovers."
"I just know there's some good reason, Bessie. You're so nice that you're bound to be happy some time. Of course you'd like to have your father and mother, whether they were rich or not. But wouldn't it be great if they really were rich?"
"I don't know. I don't know what it's like to be rich, Dolly."
"Oh, you could do all sorts of things! You could make them take you back to Hedgeville in an automobile, just for one thing."
"There are lots and lots of places I'd rather go to, Dolly."
"Oh, yes, of course! But think of how everyone would stare at you, and how envious they would be! I bet they'd be sorry then that they weren't nice to you."
Bessie smiled wistfully at the fantastic idea Dolly's lively brain had conjured up.
"It would be fun," she sighed. "They did tease me dreadfully, some of the girls. You see, the Hoovers didn't have so very much money, and my clothes were mostly old things that Maw made over to fit me when she was through with them."
"You could go back in better dresses than any of those Hedgeville girls ever even saw, Bessie. And just think of how that horrid Jake Hoover would feel then."
"Oh, well, there's no use thinking about it, Dolly. It won't ever happen. So I shan't be disappointed, anyhow."
"Well, it might happen and I think it's simply great to dream about things that might happen to you. It doesn't do any harm, and it's awfully good fun."
"You do the dreaming, Dolly, and tell me about your dreams. You can do it better than I could. I'm no good at dreaming that way at all."
"All right, that's a bargain. And right now I guess we'd better stop thinking about dreams and attend to pathfinding. Here's a turn. Which way ought we to go?"
"Straight ahead, I'm sure," said Bessie. "See how the trail narrows in the other direction, and it doesn't look as if it had ever been made like the main trail. It's more as if people had just broken through one after another, until a sort of trail was made."
"Yes, and it isn't straight ahead, either. When there's a big tree in the way, the trail goes around it, and on the regular trail the guides went along a straight line and chopped down trees when they had to."
"All right. Give me the hatchet, and I'll mark the proper way to go."
Deftly Bessie, who had had long practice in the use of a hatchet when she lived with the Hoovers, cut off a strip of bark on a tree at the meeting point of the two trails, so that it formed a plain and unmistakable guide to anyone who knew anything at all of woodcraft.
Then they pressed on. They walked fast, and, with nothing to delay them, they made good time, pausing only once in a while to take a sip from their water bottles.
"I can't hear the girls singing any more, can you?" asked Dolly, presently.
"No," said Bessie, pausing to listen. "I guess we must be quite a little way ahead of them now. We ought to be, of course."
"How much sooner than they ought we to reach the peak?"
"That's pretty hard to tell. I don't know how far it is. But I should think we ought to walk about four miles to their three. So if it's ten miles, we ought to be about two miles and a half ahead of them when we get there—and they ought to walk that in about half an hour—say a little more, forty minutes."
"That would give us plenty of time to get things ready."
"I should hope so! We really haven't so very much to do when we get there. It's quite an honor for us to be allowed to make the fire, isn't it?"
"Yes, it is. But we won the right to do it, Bessie. You must remember that. And, of course, it isn't like a ceremonial fire."
"No, but it's a real fire, and an important one. Look! We're beginning to go down hill now. We'll be climbing again before we get there, though."
"Let's hurry! I'm just crazy to get the fire started. Who is going to make the light?"
"Why, you are, Dolly! You won the dish-washing race, so you've certainly got the right to do that."
"I'll let you do it if you want to, Bessie. I don't care about the old race."
"No. You earned the right. And I believe you can do it better than I can, anyhow."
"It's just a trick, when you once know how. I used to think it was a wonderful thing to do, but it's just as easy as threading a needle."
"That's another thing that isn't easy until you know just how to do it, though."
"I guess that's so. I've seen boys try to do it, ever and ever so many times, and they usually threw the needle and thread away two or three times before they managed it."
"Are we to cook lunch as soon as we all get to the camping spot?"
"I don't think so. It would be too early, you see."
"I guess the fire will be made, though. Do you know what we are going to have?"
"Potatoes. I saw those. And I believe we're going to have a ham, too. And coffee, of course, and a lot of fruit for dessert."
"Well, the ham would take quite a long time to cook. I guess maybe we'd have to start in cooking right away to get finished in time."
"The boys ought to be having just the same sort of meal that we do. Or else it wouldn't be fair, because some things take longer to cook than others, and you can't hurry them, either."
"Oh, I remember now that Miss Eleanor spoke about that. That's one of the rules."
"I believe we're getting near, for the trail is rising pretty sharply now," said Dolly.
"That's so. See how hilly it is getting to be. It's quite clear on top of the peaks, I believe. I wonder if we'll be able to see them on the other peak and if they'll be able to see us?"
"We'll see the smoke, anyhow. There's nearly half a mile between the two peaks, Miss Eleanor said."
"Come on, let's hurry. I'll be dreadfully disappointed if they get their fire started first."
"So will I."
Then the ascent grew so sharp that for a time they needed all their breath for the climb before them. But the prospect of reaching their destination prevented them from being weary; they were too excited by this strange sort of race in which the contestants could not see one another at all.
"I think this is splendid!" panted Bessie. "This being on our honor. Either side could cheat, and the other wouldn't know it—but neither side will."
"Oh, there's no fun in cheating," said Dolly, scornfully. "If I win anything, I want to know I've really won it, not that I got it because I was smarter than someone else that way."
"That's right. Of course it's no fun to cheat! I always wonder why people who cheat play games at all. I don't believe they really know themselves, or they wouldn't do it."
Then came the last part of the ascent, and they went at it with a will, though they were ready for a rest. But when they reached the summit, and were able to stand still at last in an open space almost altogether clear of trees they were amply rewarded for all their exertions.
First of all they looked eagerly to the south, toward the peak that was the twin of their own. A happy exclamation burst from them simultaneously.
"No smoke there yet!" cried Bessie.
"We're here in time!" echoed Dolly.
"We mustn't waste any time, though," cried Bessie. "Get your sticks started while I lay a fire, Dolly."
Swiftly Dolly sank to her knees and arranged her fire-making apparatus, the bow, the socket and the drill. Then, while she drew the bow steadily and slowly, making the drill revolve in the socket which was full of punk, Bessie brought small, dry sticks and a few leaves, so that when the spark came in the punk, it would have fuel upon which to feed.
"There it is—the fire!" cried Dolly. "See how it runs along in the leaves, Bessie."
First a little glowing ember; then tiny flames, that crackled and sputtered. And then arose a wisp of smoke. Carefully Bessie piled on stick after stick, carefully chosen and well dried by sun and wind, so that they would burn quickly.
"Oh, the beautiful fire!" cried Dolly. "I do love it, Bessie. See, how it runs along. Really, it's a splendid fire!"
Merrily it blazed up, bright and clear.
"Now we want some green wood that will make a smoke," said Dolly. "Here's some. I think it's burning well enough now, don't you?"
"Yes. Let's make the smoke now."
On went the green, damp wood, resinous and full of oil. And in a moment a thick smoke hid the bright, leaping flames.
"Here's the blanket!" cried Dolly. "Catch the other side—now!"
Standing on either side of the fire, the blanket held over it, they dipped it down now, so that the smoke was caught and held under the obstruction. Then they lifted it clear of the fire altogether, and the smoke, released, rose straight up in a long, tall column, that was visible for miles where the trees did not obscure the view. Once and again they repeated this, making three separate columns of smoke before they left the fire to itself.
And still there was no answering smoke from the other peak. The girls had won their race.
"Did the Indians really use those signals?" asked Dolly.
"They certainly did. Out on the plains, you see, smoke like that could be seen for miles and miles. And so, if there were Indians a few miles apart, signals could go very, very quickly for great distances, and they could send messages for hundreds of miles almost as quickly as we can send them now by telegraph."
Then they piled on more dry wood, and built the fire up so that it was a great, roaring blaze.
"Now we will just find the water. They'll need that for cooking."
In less than five minutes after they separated to look for the spring they knew was near, Dolly cried out that she had found it. And in the same moment the first smoke rose from South Peak.