CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER VIII
Time passed, a great many things happening. Gwenny, accompanied by her mother (there being plenty of money for everything), was taken away to the place of her great trial. When the question arose as to what should be done with Mary and Tommy and Myron and Luella and Baby Christopher, Rosanna thought of Minnie, always so good and kind. She went to see her, and the result was that Minnie volunteered to stay at Gwenny’s and run the little house and take care of the children as long as Mrs. Harter was needed in Cincinnati. Both Doctor MacLaren and Mr. Horton went with Mrs. Harter and Gwenny, and made the journey as comfortable as they possibly could. The great Doctor Branshaw, after seeing his patient, said that she must have at least a week of rest under his own eye before he would be willing to try the operation. So Gwenny was settled in a sunny room at the hospital where she at once became the pet of the ward and Doctor MacLaren and Mr. Horton came home.
Late in the afternoon, the very next Sunday, Mr. Horton came into the house looking the picture of gloom. He scarcely spoke to his mother andRosanna but rushed up to his room and immediately there was a sound of things being dragged around, and many footsteps. And the door opened and shut a great many times. Mrs. Horton wondered what that boy was up to now and went on reading. But Rosanna listened with a black suspicion growing in her mind.
And, sure enough, Mr. Horton came down presently to announce that he was going away for a few weeks. He was getting stale, he said, and needed a little change. When he saw Rosanna’s round eyes fixed on him, he looked away but repeated that he felt stale.
“It is that War,” said his mother, as though the war should be severely reprimanded. “Before you went into that war, you were always contented. Now nothing contents you for long.”
“Perhaps you are right,” admitted Robert absently. “At all events I can be spared from the office just now better than at any other time, and I am going to go away.”
And go he did an hour later. Mrs. Hargrave and Elise came in presently to take Sunday night luncheon.
“Where is Robert?” asked Mrs. Hargrave, seeing that no place was set for him.
“Gone off for a vacation,” said his mother.
“Dear me, isn’t he well?” asked Mrs. Hargrave.
“Perfectly, but he just took one of his notions and went.”
“Anything—er—happened, do you suppose?” questioned Mrs. Hargrave. “Anything—er,youknow. Misunderstanding?”
“Possibly,” answered Mrs. Horton. “That is what I suspect. But I don’tknowanything.”
“Oh dear, oh dear!” cried Mrs. Hargrave, folding her fine old hands together. “It is too bad! Can’t something be done? Why, Robert is the finest boy in this world! He is just what I dream my son would have been if I had had one. Do you suppose one could say anything to the other person?”
“No, indeed,” said Mrs. Horton. “I don’tknow, you see. I only suspect.”
So Uncle Robert went away, and Gwenny was off at the hospital, and Rosanna and Helen spent all their time drilling Elise in the requirements of the Tenderfoot examination. Elise was quick to learn, but she found more difficulty in learning this because her knowledge of English was of course limited. The girls were anxious to make a brilliant showing with their recruit.
Over and over they drilled her in the Tenderfoot examination, at the last requiring her to write the answers to the examination paper which read as follows:
Then followed the demonstration of knots and knot tying. Over and over they drilled her, and Elise was an apt pupil. Her delicate little fingers seemed to know of themselves what to do.
“I am glad she is towritethat examination,” sighed Helen the day before Elise was to go toCaptain Hooker and take her examination formally. She was to be examined on Friday afternoon, and at the meeting Saturday night she was to become a Tenderfoot Scout member of their patrol.
“What difference does it make whether she writes the exam, or recites her answers?” returned Rosanna. “She speaks brokenly, of course, but that does not matter.”
“All it matters is that no one could hear her speak of General Washington the way she does in her funny broken English, without wanting to scream. It is so funny.”
Funny or not, Elise went through her examination most successfully and Saturday night accompanied Helen and Rosanna to the meeting at Miss Hooker’s house. Their little Captain had fitted up a room specially for her girls, where they could keep their various documents and where the seats, the neat desk for the secretary, and the standard for the big silk flag did not need to be disturbed in the intervals between meetings.
Elise was thrilled beyond words.
As they entered the room she saw that the two girls saluted their little Captain. Not knowing if she was expected to salute before becoming a Scout, Elise dropped a shy curtsey and followed Rosanna to a seat where they awaited the full number of Scouts and the shrill whistle from the Lieutenant which brought the meeting to order.
“The first whistle meansAttention,” whispered Helen.
Once again it sounded.
“That is for Assembly,” whispered Rosanna on the other side, as all the girls rose.
Leaving Elise in her seat, the Scouts formed in double ranks at a distance of forty inches between ranks and an interval of sixty inches between patrols.
The eight girls who formed a patrol took their places in groups as signified by the crosses.
Elise found out afterward that number one in the front rank of each patrol is the Patrol leader, and number four the Corporal.
At the command “Company, attention!” from the little Captain, now standing so straight and so stern that Elise scarcely recognized her, the Company as a whole stiffened to attention.
The Lieutenant, a tall, pretty girl of nineteen, then commanded, “Corporals from Patrols!” and the three Corporals stepped forward two paces, made two right turns, and stood facing the center of the patrol. The Corporals then snapped out together, “Attention! Right Dress!” after whichthey faced left, took two paces, made right turn, right face, and looked critically down the line to see that it was perfectly straight. After two short left steps to straighten the rear line, they faced right, took four paces forward, and with two right turns got back in position facing patrol and called the command “Front! Count off!”
The Corporals then one after the other called the roll of her Patrol, and finishing that, turned and reported to the Lieutenant that the Patrol was formed, after which they returned to their places in the ranks, and the Lieutenant, saluting the Captain, reported, “Captain, the Company is formed.”
Inspection then followed. Each girl, saluting, stepped forward and her hair, teeth, hands, nails, shoes and general appearance was scrutinized.
Elise watched all this with great interest, interest which deepened as the Captain commanded “Color guard, march!” and three girls stepped from the ranks and stood side by side for a moment, then at a word of command marched to the flag. There they saluted and marched back; when the Captain and the Lieutenant faced about, and the Captain in her silvery voice said:
“The Flag of your Country; pledge allegiance!”
With one voice the girls united in the beautiful pledge to the flag, “I pledge allegiance to the flag, and to the republic for which it stands; one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
Elise looked at the silken folds of the glorious red, white and blue with tears in her eyes. How glad she was to make that pledge! Had not that flag, the flag that was now her own, floated over the shell-racked fields of France? Oh, shelovedit!
The color guard returned, and the fresh young voices rose in the first verse of America.
“Scouts, your promise!” said the Captain.
“To do my duty to God and to my country.To help other people at all times.To obey the laws of the Scouts.”
“To do my duty to God and to my country.
To help other people at all times.
To obey the laws of the Scouts.”
the voices rang out.
“The laws!” said the Captain.
Again the chorus of girls repeated:
A Girl Scout’s honor is to be trusted.A Girl Scout is loyal.A Girl Scout’s duty is to be useful, and help others.A Girl Scout is a friend to all, and a sister to every other Girl Scout.A Girl Scout is courteous.A Girl Scout keeps herself pure.A Girl Scout is a friend to animals.A Girl Scout obeys orders.A Girl Scout is cheerful.A Girl Scout is thrifty.
A Girl Scout’s honor is to be trusted.
A Girl Scout is loyal.
A Girl Scout’s duty is to be useful, and help others.
A Girl Scout is a friend to all, and a sister to every other Girl Scout.
A Girl Scout is courteous.
A Girl Scout keeps herself pure.
A Girl Scout is a friend to animals.
A Girl Scout obeys orders.
A Girl Scout is cheerful.
A Girl Scout is thrifty.
“Dismissed!” said the little Captain and, breaking ranks, the girls went to their seats where they sat talking in low tones until the sharp sound ofthe Lieutenant’s whistle called them to attention again.
“Now I do come,” said Elise to herself, and her heart commenced to hammer in quite an alarming fashion. But it was not quite time for her to rise. Looking at Rosanna, she saw her give a slight shake of the head, and Elise leaned back in her seat while all the business of the meeting was settled and plans made for some aid for a poor family living near.
One thing Elise noticed particularly. The girls present were widely different in looks, and Elise with her delicate perceptions saw plainly that they belonged in widely differing classes, so called. A few of the girls, Rosanna among them, had the carefully cared for and delicately nurtured look of the very rich. More were like Helen, clean, carefully groomed and almost precise in her dress and accessories. Others were very evidently poor, with rough little hands that already told the story of hard work and few toilet creams. But whoever they were, they saw no difference in each other. They were Girl Scouts in the fullest and best sense of the word: sisters pledged to each other, and living up to that pledge in all earnestness and honor.
Elise, waiting for her summons to go forward, and understanding nothing of the business that was going on, threw her thoughts backward. She saw herself the idolized child of the gay, rich young couple in the great château, where long paintedlines of powdered and frilled and armor-clad ancestors looked down at her from the long galleries, and where dozens of willing servants danced to do her bidding. Then the picture changed, and with the roll of drums and the thunder of cannon she saw the hated foe march across her land, destroying as they came. Father, mother, grandmother, home, riches; all went down as under a devouring tide. Then the promises of her Monsieur Bob, and after long, long weary days spent with the ladies of the Red Cross came the journey into the Unknown, that trip across an ocean that was to forever separate her from a past that was too terrible for a little girl to have known.
To have found refuge in Mrs. Hargrave’s tender arms, to have won such love and such friends—to be able to be a Girl Scout—
Elise turned her eyes, brimming with sudden tears, to the flag.
“Never,neverwill I zem disappoint!” she whispered tenderly, using as best she could the unfamiliar words of her adopted tongue.