The Camp Fire Girls on the March
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Jane L. Stewart >> The Camp Fire Girls on the March
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"Oh, they'd have done it themselves, as soon as they heard. I didn't
suggest a thing--I just told them the news, and they thought of
everything else all by themselves. The only thing I thought of was using
your farm so that it would really pay you."
"Now that you've told us how, it seems so easy that I wonder I never
thought of it myself."
"Well, lots and lots of farmers just waste their land and themselves,
Mrs. Pratt. You're not the only one. My father has a farm, and in his
section he's done his level best to make the regular farmers see that
there are new ways of farming, just as there are new ways of doing
everything else."
"That's what my poor husband always said. He had all sorts of
new-fangled ideas, as I used to call them. Maybe he was right, too. But
he didn't have money enough to try them and see how they'd do, though we
always made a good living off this place."
"Well, the advantage of my idea is that you don't need much money to
give it a trial, and if you don't succeed, you won't lose much."
"I think we'd be pretty stupid if we didn't succeed, after the fine
start you've given us, and the way you've told me what to do."
"Well, I think so myself," said Eleanor, with a frank laugh. "And I know
you're not stupid--not a bit of it! It's going to be hard work, but I'm
sure you'll succeed. You'll be able to hire someone to do most of the
work for you before long, I think, and then you'll have to have a rest,
and come down to visit me in the city."
"Well, well, I do hope so, Miss Mercer! I ain't been in the city since I
don't know when. Tom--my husband--took me once, but that was years and
years ago, and I expect there's been a lot of changes since then."
"I'm going to keep an eye on you, Mrs. Pratt. And I feel as if I were a
sort of partner in this business, so if you don't make as much money as
I think you ought to, why, you'll hear from me. I can promise you that!
Girls, we'll sleep in the lean-to to-night, and in the morning we'll be
off, bright and early."
"Oh," said Mrs. Pratt, "have you really got to go? And you'll not sleep
out to-night! You'll take the house, and we'll be the ones to sleep
outside."
"Nonsense, Mrs. Pratt! Who should be the ones to sleep in this fine new
house the first night but you? We love to sleep in the open air, really
we do! It's no hardship, I can tell you."
And, despite all of Mrs. Pratt's protests, it was so arranged.
"I'll hate to go away from here--really I will!" said Dolly, to Bessie.
"It's been perfectly fine, helping these people. And I feel as if we'd
really done something."
"Well, we certainly have, Dolly," said Bessie.
"I do hope that butter and egg business will do well."
"I _know_ it's going to do well," said Eleanor, who had overheard. "And
one reason is that you girls are going to help. Now we must all get to
sleep, or we'll never get started in the morning. I think we'll have to
ride part of the way to the seashore in the train, after all. We don't
want to be too late in getting there, you know."
And in a few minutes silence reigned over the place. It was a picture of
peace and content--a vast contrast to the scene of the previous night,
when desolation and gloom seemed to dominate everything.
Parting in the morning brought tears alike to the eyes of those who
stayed behind and those who were going on. The experience of the last
two days had brought the Pratts and the girls of the Camp Fire very
close together, and the Pratt children--the younger ones at least--wept
and refused to be comforted when they learned that their new friends
were going away.
"Cheer up," said Eleanor. "We'll see you again, you know. Maybe we'll
all come up next summer. And we've had a good time, haven't we?"
"We certainly have!" said Mrs. Pratt, and there was sincerity, as well
as pleasure, in her tone. "I've often heard that good came out of evil,
and joy out of sorrow, but I never had any such reason to believe it
before this!"
Before the final parting, Eleanor had shown Mrs. Pratt exactly what she
meant about the new way in which the butter was to be made.
"Of course, as your business grows, you will want to get better
machinery," she had said. "That will make the work much easier, and you
will be able to do it more quickly too, and with less help than if you
stuck to the old-fashioned way."
"I'm going to take your advice in everything about running this farm,
Miss Mercer," Mrs. Pratt had replied. "You've certainly shown that you
know what you're talking about so far."
"Take a trip down to my father's farm some time, Mrs. Pratt, and they'll
be glad to show you everything they have there, I know. My father is
very anxious for all the farmers in his neighborhood to profit by any
help they can get. The only trouble is that a good many of them seem to
feel that he is interfering with them."
"Well, if they're as stupid as that, it serves them right to keep on
losing money, Miss Mercer."
"But it's natural, after all. You see they've run their farms their own
way all their lives, and it's the way they learned from their fathers.
So it isn't very strange that they're apt to feel that they know more,
from all that practice and experiment, than city people who are farming
scientifically."
"Does your father enjoy farming?"
"He says he does--and it's a curious thing that he makes that farm pay
its way, even allowing for a whole lot of things he does that aren't
really necessary. That's what proves, you see, that his theories are
right--they pay.
"Of course, he could afford to lose money on it, and you can't make a
whole lot of those farmers in our neighborhood believe that he doesn't.
So now he is having the books of the farm fixed up so that any of the
farmers around can see them, and find out for themselves how things are
run."
Tired as the girls of the Camp Fire had been the night before, they were
wonderfully refreshed by their night's sleep. The weather was much more
pleasant than it had been, and a brisk wind had driven off much of the
smoke that still remained when they reached the Pratt farm as a reminder
of the scourge of fire. So the conditions for walking were good, and
Eleanor Mercer set a round, swinging pace as they started off.
"I'll really be glad to get out of this burned district. It's awfully
gloomy, isn't it, Bessie?" said Dolly.
"Yes, especially when you realize what it means to the people who live
in the path of the fire," answered Bessie. "Seeing the Pratts as they
were when we came up has given me an altogether new idea of these forest
fires."
"Yes. That's what I mean. It's bad enough to see the forest ruined, but
when you think of the houses, and all the other things that are burned,
too, why, it seems particularly dreadful."
"Tom Pratt told me that a whole lot of animals were caught in the fire,
too--chipmunks, and squirrels, and deer. That seems dreadful."
"Oh, what a shame! I should think they could manage to get away, Bessie.
Don't you suppose they try?"
"Oh, yes, but you see they can't reason the way human beings do, and a
lot of these fires burn around in a circle, so that while they were
running away from one part of the fire they might very easily be heading
straight for another, and get caught right between two fires."
Soon, however, they passed a section where the land had been cleared of
trees for a space of nearly a mile, and, once they had travelled through
it, they came to the deep green woods again, where no marring traces of
the fire spoiled the beauty of their trip.
"Ah, don't the woods smell good!" said Dolly. "So much nicer than that
old smoky smell! I never smelt anything like that! It got so that
everything I ate tasted of smoke. I'm certainly glad to get to where the
fire didn't come."
Now the ground began to rise, and before long they found themselves in
the beginning of Indian Gap. The ground rose gradually, and when they
stopped for their midday meal, in a wild part of the gap, none of the
girls were feeling more than normally and healthfully tired.
"Do many people come through here, Miss Eleanor?" asked Margery.
"At certain times, yes. But, you see, the forest fires have probably
made a lot of people who intended to take this trip change their minds.
In a way it's a good thing, because we will be sure to find plenty of
room at the Gap House. That's where we are to spend the night. Sometimes
when there's a lot of travel, it's very crowded there, and
uncomfortable."
"Is it a regular hotel?"
"No, it's just a place for people to sleep. It's where the trail starts
up Mount Sherman, and it's the station of the railroad that runs to the
top of the mountain, too, for people who are too lazy to climb. There's
a gorgeous view there in the mornings, when the sun rises. You can see
clear to the sea."
"Oh, can't we stop and see that?"
"We haven't time to climb the mountain. If you want to go up on the
incline railway, though, we can manage it. You get up at three o'clock
in the morning, and get to the top while it's still dark, so that you
can see the very beginning of the sunrise."
There was not a dissenting voice to the plan to make the trip, and it
was decided to take the little extra time that would be required.
"After all," said Eleanor, "we can get such an early start afterward
that it won't take very much time. And to-morrow we'll finish our tramp
through the gap, and stop at Windsor for the night. Then the next day
we'll take the train straight through to the seashore. I think really
we'll have more fun, and get more good out of it if we spend the time
there than if we go through with our original plan of doing more walking
before getting on the train."
"Yes. We've lost quite a little time already, haven't we?" said Margery.
"Two whole days at Lake Dean, and two days more staying with the
Pratts," said Eleanor. "That's four days, and one can walk quite a long
distance in four days if one sets one's mind and one's feet to it."
"Well, we certainly couldn't help the delay," said Margery. "At Lake
Dean the fire held us--and I wouldn't think very much of any crowd that
could see the trouble those poor people were in and not stay to help
them."
They slept well in the early part of that night in the rough quarters at
the Gap House, and, while it was still dark, they were routed out to
catch the funicular railway on its first trip of the day up Mount
Sherman.
At first, when they were at the top of the mountain, there was nothing
to be seen. But soon the sky in the east began to lighten and grow pink,
then the fog that lay below them began to melt away, and, as the sun
rose, they saw the full wonder of the spectacle.
"I never saw anything so beautiful in all my life!" exclaimed Bessie
with a sigh of delight. "See how it seems to gild everything as the
light rises, Dolly!"
"Yes, and you can see the sea, way off in the distance! How tiny all the
towns and villages look from here! It's just like looking at a map,
isn't it?"
"Well, it was certainly worth getting up in the middle of the night to
see it, Bessie. And I do love to sleep, too!"
"I'd stay up all night to see this, any time. I never even dreamed of
anything so lovely."
"We were very fortunate," said Eleanor, with a smile. "I've been up here
when the fog was so thick that you couldn't see a thing, and only knew
the sun had risen because it got a little lighter. I've known it to be
that way for a week at a time, and some people would stay, and come up
here morning after morning, and be disappointed each time!"
"That's awfully mean," said Dolly. "I suppose, though, if they had never
seen it, they wouldn't mind so much, because they wouldn't know what
they were missing."
"They never seemed very happy about it, though," laughed Eleanor. "Well,
it's time to go down again, and be off for Windsor. And then to-morrow
morning we'll be off for the seashore. We're to camp there, right on the
beach, instead of living in a house. That will be much better, I
think."
CHAPTER IX
A STARTLING DISCOVERY
"Bessie, why are you looking so glum?" asked Dolly, as they started on
the last part of their walk, taking the Windsor road.
"Am I? I didn't realize I was, Dolly. But--well, I suppose it's because
I'm rather sorry we're leaving the mountains."
"I think the seashore is every bit as nice as the mountains. There are
ever so many things to do, and I know you'll like Plum Beach, where
we're going. It's the dandiest place--"
"It couldn't be as nice as this, Dolly."
"Oh, that seems funny to me, Bessie. I've always loved the seashore,
ever since I can remember. And, of course, since I've learned to swim,
I've enjoyed it even more than I used to."
"You can't swim much in the sea, can you? Isn't the surf too heavy?"
"The surf's good fun, even if you don't do any swimming in it, Bessie.
It picks you up and throws you around, and it's splendid sport. But down
at Plum Beach you can have either still water or surf. You see, there's
a beach and a big cove--and on that beach the water is perfectly calm,
unless there's a tremendous storm, and we're not likely to run into one
of those."
"How is that, Dolly? I thought there was always surf at the seashore."
"There's a sand bar outside the cove, and it's grown so that it really
makes another beach, outside. And on that there is real surf. So we can
have whichever sort of bathing we like best, or both kinds on the same
day, if we want."
"Maybe I'll like it better when I see it, then. Because I do love to
swim, and I don't believe I'd enjoy just letting the surf bang me
around."
"Why, Bessie, you say you may like it better when you see it? Haven't
you ever been to the seashore?"
"I certainly never have, Dolly! You seem to forget that I've spent all
the time I can remember in Hedgeville."
"I do forget it, all the time. And do you know why? It's because you
seem to know such an awful lot about other places and things you never
saw there. I suppose they made you read books."
"Made me! That was one of the things Maw Hoover used to get mad at me
for doing. Whenever she saw me reading a book it seemed to make her mad,
and she'd say I was loafing, and find something for me to do, even if
I'd hurried through all the chores I had so that I could get at the book
sooner."
"Then you used to like to read?"
"Oh, yes, I always did. The Sunday School had a sort of library, and I
used to be able to get books from there. I love to read, and you would,
too, Dolly, if you only knew how much fun you have out of books."
Dolly made a face.
"Not the sort of books my Aunt Mabel wants me to read," she said
decidedly. "Stupid old things they are! It's just like going to school
all over again. I get enough studying at school, thanks!"
"But you like to know about people and places you've never seen, don't
you!"
"Yes, but all the books I've ever seen that tell you about things like
that are just like geographies. They give you a lot of things you have
to remember, and there's no fun to that."
"You haven't read the right sort of books, that's all that's the matter
with you, Dolly. I tell you what--when we get back to the city, we '11
get hold of some good books, and take turns reading them aloud to one
another. I think that would be good fun."
"Well, maybe if they taught me as much as you seem to know about places
you've never seen I wouldn't mind reading them. Anyhow, books or no
books, you're going' to love the seashore. Oh, it is such a delightful
place--Plum Beach."
"Tell me about it, Dolly."
"Well, in the first place, it isn't a regular seaside place at all. I
mean there aren't any hotels and boardwalks and things like that. It's
about ten miles from Bay City, and there they do have everything like
that. But Plum Beach is just wild, the way it always has been. And I
don't see why, because it's the best beach I ever saw--ever so much
finer than at Bay City."
"I'll like the beach."
"Yes, I know you will. And because it's sort of wild and desolate, and
off by itself that way, you can have the best time there you ever
dreamed of. Last year we put on our bathing suits when we got up, and
kept them on all day. You go in the water, you see, and then, if you lie
down on the beach for half an hour, you're dry. The sun shines right
down on the sand, and it's as warm as it can be."
"I suppose that's why you like it so much--because you don't have the
trouble of dressing and undressing."
"It's one reason," said Dolly, who never pretended about anything, and
was perfectly willing to admit that she was lazy. "But it's nice to have
the beach to yourselves, too, the way we do. You see, when we get there
we'll find tents all set up and ready for us."
"Is there any fishing?"
Dolly smacked her lips.
"You bet there is!" she said. "Best sea bass you ever tasted, and about
all you can catch, too! And it tastes delicious, because the fish down
there get cooked almost as soon as they're caught. And there are
lobsters and crabs--and it's good fun to go crabbing. Then at low tide
we dig for clams, and they're good, too--I'll bet you never dreamed how
good a clam could be!"
"How about the other things--milk, and eggs, and all those!"
"Oh, that's easy! There are a lot of farms a little way inland, and we
get all sorts of fine things from them."
"I wonder if Mr. Holmes will try to play any tricks on us down there,
Dolly. He has about everywhere we've been since Zara and I joined the
Camp Fire Girls, you know."
"I'm hoping he won't find out, Bessie. That would be fine. I certainly
would like to know why he is so anxious to get hold of you and Zara. I
bet it's money, and that there's some secret about you."
"Money? Why, he's got more than he can spend now! Even if there is a
secret, I don't see how money can have anything to do with it."
"Well, you remember this, Bessie: the more money people have, the more
they seem to want. They're never content. It's the people who only have
a little who seem to be happy, and willing to get along with what they
have. How about your old Farmer Weeks?"
"That's so, Dolly. He certainly was that way. He had more money than
anyone in Hedgeville or anywhere near it, and yet he was the stingiest,
closest fisted old man in town."
"There you are!"
"Still I think Mr. Holmes must be a whole lot richer than Farmer Weeks,
or than all the other people in Hedgeville put together. And it doesn't
seem as if there was any money he could make out of Zara or me that
would tempt him to do what he's done."
"Do you know what I've noticed most, Bessie, about the way he's gone to
work?"
"No. What?"
"The way he has spent money. He's acted as if he didn't care a bit how
much it cost him, if only he got what he wanted. And people in the city
never spend money unless they expect to get it back."
"Who's the detective now! You called me one a little while ago, but it
seems to me that you're doing pretty well in that line yourself."
"Oh, it's all right to laugh, but, just the same, I'll bet that when we
get at the bottom of all this mystery, we'll find that the chief reason
Mr. Holmes was in it was that he wanted to get hold of some information
that would make it easy for him to get a whole lot more than it cost
him."
"Well, maybe you're right, Dolly. But I'd certainly like to know just
what he has got up his sleeve."
"I think he'll be careful for a little while now, Bessie. He never knew
that Miss Eleanor had that letter he'd written to the gypsy. And it must
have damaged him a lot to have as much come out about that as did."
"I expect a lot of people who heard it didn't believe it."
"Even if that's so, I guess there were plenty who did believe it, and
who think now that Mr. Holmes is a pretty good man to leave alone. You
see, that proved absolutely that he had really hired that gypsy to carry
you off, and that is a pretty mean thing to do. And people must know by
this time that if there was any legal way of getting you and Zara away
from the Camp Fire and Miss Mercer, he would do it."
"But he didn't get into any trouble for doing it, Dolly."
"He's got so much money that he could hire lawyers to get him out of
almost any scrape he got in, Bessie. That's the trouble. Those people at
Hamilton were afraid of him. They know how rich he is, and they didn't
want to take any chance of making him angry at them."
"Yes, that's just it. And I'm afraid he's got so much money that a whole
lot of people who would say what they really thought if they weren't
afraid of him, are on his side. You see, he says that I'm a runaway,
just because I didn't stay any longer with the Hoovers. And probably he
can make a whole lot of people think that I was very ungrateful, and
that he is quite right in trying to get me back into the same state as
Hedgeville."
"They'd better talk to Miss Eleanor, if he makes them think that.
They'll soon find out which is right and which is wrong in that
business. And if she doesn't tell them, I guess Mr. Jamieson will--and
he'd be glad of the chance, too!"
"Let's not worry about him, anyhow. I hope he won't find out where we
are, too. We haven't seen or heard anything of him since we went back to
Long Lake from Hamilton, so I don't see why there isn't a good chance of
his letting us alone for a while now."
They reached Windsor, the little town at the other end of Indian Gap,
late in the afternoon, having cooked their midday meal in the gap.
"I know the people in a big boarding-house here," said Eleanor, "and
we'll be very comfortable. In the morning we'll take an early train, so
that we can get to Plum Beach before it's too late to get comfortably
settled. I've sent word on ahead to have the tents ready for us, but,
even so, there will be a good many things to do."
"There always are," sighed Dolly. "That's the one thing I don't like
about camping out."
"I expect really, if you only knew the truth, Dolly, it's the one thing
you like best of all," smiled Eleanor. "That's one of the great
differences between being at home, where everything is done for you,
and camping out, where you have to look after yourself."
"Well, I don't like work, anyhow, and I don't believe I ever shall, Miss
Eleanor, no matter what it's called. Some of it isn't as bad as some
other kinds, that's all."
Eleanor laughed to herself, because she knew Dolly well enough not to
take such declarations too seriously.
"I've got some work for you to-night," she said. "I want you and Bessie
to go to a meeting of the girls that belong to one of the churches here,
and tell them about the Camp Fire. They found out we were coming, and
they would like to know if they can't start a Camp Fire of their own.
"And I think they'll get a better idea of things, and be less timid and
shy about asking questions if two of you girls go than if I try to
explain. I will come in later, after they've had a chance to talk to you
two, but by that time they ought to have a pretty clear idea."
"That's not work, that's fun," declared Dolly.
"I'm glad you think so, because you will be more likely to be
successful."
And so after supper Bessie and Dolly went, with two girls who called for
them, to the Sunday School room of one of the Windsor churches, ready to
do all they could to induce the local girls to form a Camp Fire of their
own. And, being thoroughly enthusiastic, they soon fired the desire of
the Windsor girls.
"They won't have just one Camp Fire; they'll have two or three,"
predicted Dolly, when she and Bessie were walking back to the
boarding-house later with Eleanor Mercer. "They asked plenty of
questions, all right. Nothing shy about them, was there, Bessie?"
Bessie laughed.
"Not if asking questions proves people aren't shy," she admitted. "I
thought they'd never stop thinking of things to ask."
"That's splendid," said Eleanor. "The Camp Fire is the best thing these
girls could have. It will do them a great deal of good, and I was sure
that the way to make them see how much they would enjoy it was to let
them understand how enthusiastic you two were. That meant more to them
than anything I could have said, I'm sure."
"I don't see why," said Dolly.
"Because they're girls like you, Dolly, and it's what you like, and show
you like, that would appeal to them. I'm older, you see, and they might
think that things that I would expect them to like wouldn't really
please them at all."
"What's the matter with you, Bessie?" asked Dolly suddenly, as they
reached the house. She was plainly concerned and surprised, and Eleanor,
rather startled, since she had seen nothing in Bessie to provoke such a
question, looked at her keenly.
"Nothing, except that I'm a little tired, I think."
But Dolly wasn't satisfied. She knew her chum too well.
"You've got something on your mind, but you don't want to worry us," she
said. "Better own up, Bessie!"
Bessie, however, would not answer. And in the morning she seemed to be
her old self. Just as they were starting for the train, though, Bessie
suddenly hung back at the door of the boarding-house.
"Wait for me a minute, Dolly," she said. "I left a handkerchief in our
room. I'll be right down. Go on, the rest of you; we'll soon catch up."
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