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Title: The Girl Scout Pioneers
       or Winning the First B. C.

Author: Lillian C Garis

Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5263]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on June 19, 2002]
[Date last updated: July 31, 2005]

Edition: 10

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GIRL SCOUT PIONEERS ***




Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team




The Girl Scout Pioneers

or

Winning the First B. C.


By Lillian C. Garis


Author of "The Girl Scouts at Bellair," "The Girl Scouts at Sea
Crest," etc.


Illustrated




CONTENTS

CHAPTER
    I.   GIRLS AND GIRLS

   II.   WOODLAND THRILLS

  III.   A NOBLE DEED UNDONE

   IV.   PATHS DIVIDING

    V.   A FRIENDLY ENEMY

   VI.   A NOVEL JAIL

  VII.   TENDERFOOT ADVENTURES

 VIII.   CLUE TO THE MISSING

   IX.   TRIBUTE OF ROSES

    X.   TELLING SECRETS

   XI.   THE TANGLED WEB

  XII.   TESSIE

 XIII.   BROKEN FAITH

  XIV.   WOODLAND MAGIC

   XV.   VENTURE TROOP

  XVI.   MORE MYSTERIES

 XVII.   JACQUELINE

XVIII.   DAISIES AND DANGERS

  XIX.   THE FLYING SQUADRON

   XX.   CLEO'S EXPERIMENT

  XXI.   FORGING AHEAD

 XXII.   THE WHIRLING MAY-POLE

XXIII.   RAINBOW'S END




CHAPTER I

GIRLS AND GIRLS


It was much like a scene in a movie play. The shabby dark room
lighted by a single oil lamp if any light could make its way
through the badly smoked glass that served as a chimney, the
broken chair, and the table piled high with what appeared to be
rags, but which might have been intended for wearing apparel, the
torn window curtain hanging so disconsolately from the broken cord
it had one time proudly swung from, and the indescribable bed!

Like some sentinel watching the calamitous surroundings, a girl
stood in the midst of this squalor, her bright golden hair and her
pretty fair face, with its azure blue eyes, marking a pathetic
contrast to all the sordid, dark detail of the ill-kept room. She
took from the side pocket of her plaid skirt a bit of crumpled
paper, and placing it directly under the lamp, followed its
written lines. Having finished the reading, she carefully folded
the worn slip again, and returned it to her pocket. Then she threw
back her pretty head, and any frequenter of the screen world would
have known instantly that the girl had decided--and further, that
her decision required courage, and perhaps defiance.

With determination marking every move, she crossed to the tumbled
bed, and stooping, dragged from beneath it a bag, the sort called
"telescope," and used rarely now, even by the traveling salesman,
who at one time found the sliding trunk so useful. It would
"telescope," and being thus adjustable, lent its proportions to
any sized burden imposed upon it. Into this the girl tossed a few
articles selected from the rummage on the table, a pair of shoes
gathered from more debris in a corner, and on top a sweater and
skirt, taken from a peg on the door. All together this composed
rather a pretentious assortment for the telescope.

But the girl did not jam down the cover in that "movie" way common
to runaways, rather she paused, glanced furtively about the gloomy
place, and finally taking a candle from a very high shelf, lighted
the taper, evidently for some delicate task in the way of
gathering up her very personal belongings.

In a remote corner of the room an upturned orange box served as
sort of stand. The front was covered and festooned with a curtain,
dexterously made of a bright skirt, hung over the sides, and
draped from a knot at the top. The knot was drawn from the waist
band of the skirt, and tied with the original string into a
grotesque rosette. All over the box top were such articles as a
girl might deem necessary in making a civilized toilette, except
at the knot--where the table cover irradiated its fullness into
really graceful folds, falling over the orange box-here, on
account of the knob, no article was placed, and the rosette stood
defiant over the whole surrounding.

The girl placed the candle on a spot made clear for that small
round, tin stand, and then glancing anxiously at the door, stole
over to make sure that the bolt was shot, hurried back and
proceeded to untie the knot of string responsible for the drapery
over the orange box. By the glare of the candle's flame her
fingers could be seen stained with oil, and grim, as they expertly
worked at the tied-up skirt, and finally succeeded in pulling
apart the ragged folds. Quickly she slipped one small hand beneath
the calico, and, obtaining her quest, drew back to examine it.

One, two, three green bills. Her savings and her fortune. Lights
and shadows crossing the youthful face betrayed the hopes, and
fears mingling with, such emotions as the girl lived through in
this crowded hour, but no sooner had she slipped the small roll of
bills into the flaring neck of her thin blouse, than a shaking at
the door caused her to kick the telescope bag under the bed,
hastily readjust the cover of the orange box, blow out the
capering candle flame, and then open the door. A woman young in
face but old in posture scuffled in. She wore a shawl on her head,
although the season was warm April, and the plentiful quantities
of material swathed in her attire proclaimed her foreign.

"Oh, Dagmar. I am tired," she sighed. "I thought you would come
down to fix supper for papa. You do not change your skirt? No?"

"I was going to, so I locked the door," replied the girl Dagmar.
"But I, too, was tired."

"Yes, it is so. Well, the mill is not so bad. It has a new window
near my bench, and I breathe better. But, daughter, we must go
down. Keep the door locked as you dress. Those new peoples may not
tell which is the right room." With a glance at the fair daughter,
so unlike herself in coloring, the working mother dragged herself
out again, and soon could be heard cliptrapping down the dark
stairs that led to the kitchens on the first floor of the mill
workers, community lodgings.

Dagmar breathed deeply and clasped her hands tightly as her
mother's tired foottread fell to an echo. Love filled the blue
eyes and an affectionate smile wreathed the red lips.

"Poor mother!" she sighed aloud. "I hate to--"

Then again came that look of determination, and when Dagmar
slipped down the stairs she carried the telescope and her
crochetted hand bag. Her velvet tarn sat jauntily on those
wonderful yellow curls, and her modern cape flew gracefully out,
just showing the least fold of her best chiffon blouse. Dagmar
wore strickly American clothes, selected in rather good taste, and
they attracted much attention in the streets of Flosston.

Once clear of the long brown building, through which spots of
light now struck the night, out of those desperate rows and rows
of machine-made windows, Dagmar made her way straight to the
corner, then turned straight again to another long narrow street,
her very steps corresponding to that painful directness of line
and plan, common to towns made by mill-owners for their employees.
Even the stars, now pricking their way through the blue, seemed to
throw down straight lines of light on Flosston; nothing varied the
mechanical exactness, and monotonous squares and angles of
streets, buildings, and high board fences.

One more sharp turn brought the girl within sight of a square,
squatty railroad station, and as she sped toward it she caught
sight of the figure of another girl, outlined in the shadows. This
figure was taller and larger in form than herself, and as Dagmar
whistled softly, the girl ahead stopped.

"Oh, you got my note," said the other. "I am so glad. I was afraid
you would not come."

"I'm here," replied Dagmar, "bag and baggage, mostly bag," kicking
the accommodating and inoffensive telescope. "I hate to carry this
thing."

"Oh, that's all right," replied the taller girl, who, under a
street lamp, showed a face older than Dagmar's and perhaps a
little hard and rough. Just that bold defiant look, so often
affected by girls accustomed to fighting their way through the
everyday hardships of walled-in surroundings.

"Tessie, I am afraid," confessed the younger girl. "I almost cried
when Mama asked me to fix supper."

"Oh, baby! You are too pretty, that's all's the matter with you.
But just wait. Hush! There's that crowd of nifty-nice, preachy,
snippy scout girls. Duck, or they'll be on our trail," and she
dragged her companion around the corner of the high fence, where,
in the shadow of its bill-posted height they crouched, until the
laughing, happy girls of True Tred Troop, just out from their
early evening meeting at Sunset Hall, over the post-office, had
passed down into Elm Street.

"I think they saw us," whispered Dagmar, "I heard one girl say
some one was hiding by the signboard."

"We should worry," flippantly replied Tessie. "I guess they are
too busy thinking about their old wigwagging to notice mill
girls."

"Oh, you're mean, Tessie. I think they are real nice. They always
say hello to me."

"That's because you are pretty," snubbed the older girl, with
something like common spite in her voice.

"Here they come back! Guess they lost something."

"We'd better be moving the other way, then. Pshaw! We will sure be
late if they keep up their trailing around. Come along. Just be so
busy talking to me they won't get a chance to give you their
lovely hello. It would be all up with us if they spied us." With a
persuasion not entirely welcome to Dagmar, Tessie again dragged
her along, this time turning away from the dim lights that showed
through the window of Flosston station.

Presently the group of scout girls could be heard exchanging
opinions on the possibility of finding something lost. One thought
it might have dropped in the deep gutter, another declared she
would have heard it fall if it hit the many stones along the
sidewalk, and still another expressed the view that it would be
impossible to find it until daylight, no matter where it had
fallen.

"But I just got it, and wanted to wear it so much," wailed the
girl most concerned. "I think it is too mean--"

"Now, we will be sure to find it in daylight," assured the tall
girl, evidently the captain. "I will be around here before even
the mill hands pass. Don't worry, Margaret. If we don't find it, I
shall send to headquarters for another."

"But I shall never love it as I did that one," and tears were in
the voice. "Besides, think of all the lovely time we had at the
presentation!"

"Now come," softly ordered the tall girl. "No use prowling around
here, we can't see anything with matches. I promise you, Margaret,
you shall have another badge in time for the rally if we do not
find this," and reluctantly the party of searchers turned again in
the direction of the village.

Watching their opportunity, the two mill girls came out from the
shadows of the high fence they had been trusting to shield them
from the view of the scouts. With quickened step they now turned
again towards the station.

"Dear me!" exclaimed Tessie. "Haven't we had awful luck for a
start? Hope it won't follow us along."

"Well, the more we delay the more I want to go back home," Dagmar
replied rather timidly. "Tessie, I am afraid I will not be able to
look at things your way. I seem to have different ideas."

"Now, Daggie. Don't go getting scary. I don't care whether you
think my way or not. I won't fight about it. Let's hurry," and
with renewed protestations of real companionship, the older girl
grasped the arm of the younger, as if fearful of losing her hold
on the other's confidence.

"Oh, please don't call me Daggie," objected Dagmar, freeing
herself from the rather too securely pressed arm grasp. "You know
how I hate that. Always makes me feel like a daggar. Call me
Marrie. That's American, and I am an American, you know."

"All right, little Liberty. I'll call you Georgianna Washington if
you say so, Marrie. That's like putting on airs for Marie. But
just as you say," evidently willing to make any concession to have
the younger girl accept her own terms.

"Wait! My foot struck something," exclaimed Dagmar, just reaching
the spot where burnt matches left the trail of the girl scout
searchers. "There, I found the badge."

"Oh, let's look! Is it gold?" They stopped under the street lamp
to examine the trinket.

"No, it isn't gold, I think, but isn't it pretty?"

"Kinda," urging Dagmar along. "Say, kid, what is this anyway? A
stopover we've Struck? Are we going tonight or some other night?"

"I'll have to give this badge back."

"Why will you? Didn't you find it? Isn't it yours?"

"Of course not. It belongs to the girl who lost it."

"Oh, I see. That's why I should call you Georgianna Washington,"
with a note of scorn in her voice. "Well, if you want to go back,
and get some one to go out ringing the town bell with you, you may
find the nice little girl scout who lost her baby badge. As for
me--I'm going."

Sheer contempt now sounded unmistakably in the voice of the girl
called Tessie. She shook herself free from Dagmar, and darted
ahead with determination long delayed, and consequently more
forceful.

For a moment the young girl hesitated. She sort of fondled the
little scout badge in her hands, and might have been heard to
sigh, if a girl of her severely disciplined temperament ever
indulged in anything so weakly human as a sigh.

But as the fleeing girl more surely made her tracks to the
station, thus leaving the other alone in the night, Dagmar, too,
quickened her steps.

"Tessie," she called finally. "Tessie, wait. I can't go back now."

That was all Tessie wanted. She waited, and when again they took
up tangled threads of their adventure it was scarcely possible
either would allow any further interruptions to delay them.

And Dagmar clutched in her tightly clasped hand the lost scout
badge.




CHAPTER II

WOODLAND THRILLS


It was Margaret Slowden who lost the Badge of Merit. The pretty
gilt wreath, with its clover leaf center on a dainty white ribbon
hanger, had been presented to Margaret on such an auspicious
occasion, that the emblem meant much more to the girl scout than
its official value of rank indicated.

The True Tred Troop of Flosston had been organized one month when
Margaret won the medal. Shortly after the holidays, an event of
unusual importance occurred in the mill town, when its small
company of service boys returned from "Over There." They were
royally welcomed by the entire town folks, together with the many
officials of the silk industries, from whose ranks the boys had
marched away.

With the lads returned was Margaret's brother Tom. He was handsome
and a Marine, and well might Mrs. Slowden and Margaret take pride
in the honor their soldier brought them. On the night of the Great
Welcome Home, the scout girls, then newly organized, assisted with
ushering and attending to the platform needs of the speakers and
honored heroes, each of the latter receiving a special small, gold
military cross, the gift of the silk mill magnates. This insignia
was presented by the most famous authorities of army and navy
available, and Tom Slowden was given the special honor of a real
military presentation of the D. S. C., he being the only member of
Flosston recruits to receive such a notable tribute.

As might have been expected this gave real distinction to the
Welcome Home, and Margaret was suffused with pardonable pride. But
when she took her place in the check room, to attend to the coats
and other belongings of the distinguished visitors--she was
forgotten by her troop, and she remained there all during Tom's
presentation. She never heard a word of major's wonderful speech,
when the people fairly roared for Tom's glory. There she was,
downstairs in the dark, lonely cloak room.

"Oh, my dear!" deplored Captain Clark. "I never meant that you
should stay down here at this time."

"But it was my task," returned the melancholy Margaret.

"I would not have had you miss your brother's presentation for the
world! Such a thing can never come again. Why did you not call
some of the girls to relieve you?"

"If Tom did anything like that he could never have received the D.
S. C., and I am a Scout and pledged to honor commands," returned
Margaret nobly.

For that sacrifice she received from the same platform, one week
later, her own badge of merit, and the occasion was a real rally,
with officials from headquarters, and all the neighboring troops
participating.

Was it strange then that Margaret should lament her loss?

No other badge could actually take the place of that one, and
while Captain Clark would immediately advise headquarters of the
loss, and order a new one, the brave little scout girl would still
feel she had lost that one vested with the special presentation
honors.

On the morning following the loss, the girls of True Tred were
seen out on the road so early, the station master, old Pete,
hurried to his window, and got ready for business, surmising an
excursion or at least a local convention imminent.

But no such occurrence was probable, it was only the troop out
looking for the badge, and inevitably they did not find it. Signs
made by Captain Clark were posted in the station, the post-office,
and at prominent corners, but Margaret was disconsolate. She had
called her badge the "D. S. C." because of its connection with
Tom's insignia, and though the big brother had promised the scout
sister all sorts of valuable substitutes, offering her the little
hand carved box he had brought for "another girl," and which
Margaret had openly coveted, even this did not seem adequate
compensation.

All day at school the girls of True Tred planned and contrived
little favors for their unhappy sister, and it was noticeable
those of the classes who usually scoffed at the scouts and their
activities, could not well conceal their admiration for the spirit
of kindliness displayed.

The True Treds had members in the seventh and eighth grammar
grades, and the girls' ages ranged from thirteen to fifteen years.
Margaret Slowden was fifteen, Cleo Harris fourteen and Grace
Philow and Madaline Mower were thirteen. This group was most
active in the scout girls' movement, and although the organization
was only three months old in Flosston, few there were in the town
who had not seen and admired the smart little troopers, in their
neat uniforms, always ready to assist in the home or in public at
any task consigned to them. It was to be expected they would meet
opposition in the way of criticism from such girls as are always
indifferent to team play, and the best interests of the largest
numbers, but the scouts knew how much they enjoyed their troop,
and realized how beneficial was the attractive training they were
receiving from its rules and regulations.

Grace and Madaline were still in the tenderfoot class, and wore
the little brooch at the neck of their blouses. Margaret and Cleo
were already in the first class, and permitted to wear the left
sleeve badge, while others showed their rank in the Tenderfoot,
the first and third class, three patrols of eight members each
making up Flosston troop.

The real work of the scouts is so interesting in character that
the writer has no idea of detracting from it, by relating the
detail, feeling the charm and significance is best expressed in a
real story of the live girls as they live their characteristic
scout life. Nevertheless, it may not be amiss to call attention
here to the value of such training given almost in play, and
without question in such attractive forms as to make character
building through its influence an ideal pastime, a valuable
investment, and a complete program, for growing girls, who may
emerge from the "bundle of habits" as strong members of society,
progressive business women, or nicely trained little helpers for
the home, or for the more sheltering conditions in whatever path
of life they may be selected to tread.

That schools or even homes cannot compete with such training is
evident, when one considers that a girl is creative, and should
have ample chance to develop her character without force or rigid
self defacing, instead of self creating rules; also it must be
apparent that guidance is only successful when imposed gently, and
with that subtle persuasion, ever aiming to show the result of
correct training, and thus affording the principles of freedom for
selection, with a knowledge of what that selection will result in.

What sensible girl will deliberately choose to go her own careless
way, when she realizes that nothing satisfactory can be expected
from such a choice, and that the very freedom coveted makes her a
slave to the most cruel limits of prospects or attainments?

But we will not sermonize; even at this distance we may hold out
the strong arm of influence, assuring our readers that the highest
aims of writers and publishers are for the advancement of the
younger girls, whose minds, for the moment, are entrusted to our
keeping.

Coming back to our group of Girl Scouts, now holding conclave in
the school yard of Flosston grammar grades, we find Grace and
Madeline forming themselves into a committee of two, with the
avowed intention of getting lip a hiking party for their own
special benefit. These younger girls must soon undergo the test
necessary for their qualification as second class scouts, and a
hike on this lovely spring afternoon would aid them greatly in
acquiring the outdoor knowledge necessary.

Margaret was rather inclined to dissent when the jaunt was
proposed, she did not feel quite as hiky as usual, and she
promptly remembered she had promised her mother some assistance in
the little kitchen garden both were developing.

"Oh, come on," pleaded Grace. "If you say you want to go, I am
sure Captain Clark will agree. I know where we can get the
loveliest watercress."

This lure won Margaret, who had now fully recovered her scout
cheer, and was trying bravely to forget the loss of her cherished
badge".

"Mother loves watercress," she conceded, "and I would go, if we
are sure to be back by five. I have to go call for the mail before
dark."

"Oh, goody-good!" sang out Grace. "Now I can surely get my nature
work all nicely covered. I'll tell Madaline. She is over there
coaxing Cleo," and with a risky flourish of her red tie, a hop,
skip and a jump, the Tenderfoot pranced across the big green
schoolyard, in a fashion that belied her limitations on the
tenderfoot basis.

"Yes, I'll go," Cleo was agreeing, "but I am afraid we can't get
Captain Clark. I know she is going out to Kingsley to form a
troop. Maybe we can get Lieutenant Lindsley. She is free from
Normal at four. They have a lecture after two-thirty almost every
day."

"Oh, Lieutenant Lindsley would be lots of fun. She knows
everything in hill and dale, and is not afraid of snakes or cows.
But do you think we should notify the other girls? It is rather
hard to get in touch with them in time," Grace ranted on.

By this time Margaret and Madaline had joined the group, and now
all the scouts in seventh and eighth grammar grades were
discussing plans for the precipitous hike. There were Mable Blake,
also a tenderfoot, Adaline Allen and Mildred Clark, second grades,
and the McKay twins, first class scouts. All of these willingly
agreed to make the foot trip out to the Falls.

The afternoon school session received scant attention from the
prospective hikers, the Tenderfoots especially being absorbed in
the prospects of a spring afternoon in the woods.

So interested were Grace and Madaline they exchanged preparatory
notes in the five minute rest period, although that time was set
aside for real relaxation, and no one was supposed to use eyes or
fingers during the short rest.

When school was finally dismissed the girls arranged to pass the
homes of most of the group, as many of them lived on the same
Oakley Avenue, and thus notify parents of their scout plans for
the hike, and when Lieutenant Lindsley was eventually picked up
from the practicing department of the Normal School, the ranks
were filled, and the hike moved off towards the River Road.

It was a glorious afternoon, in late April. The peach blossoms
were just breaking into pink puff balls, and the pear trees were
burdened with a crop of spring "snow," fragrant in their whitest
of dainty blossoms.

But the still life beauties were not more attractive than the
joyous, happy, romping girls, who capered along from the more
noisy town streets, into the highways and byways of the long green
stretch of country leading to the river brink, and to the woods on
its border.

"I'm going to do something really great," declared Grace. "I don't
care just what it is, but I want to have a real record, when I am
called up to take my degree test. I am not afraid of anything in
daylight, so beware! I may do something very desperate and rash
this afternoon."

"Spare us," pleaded Madaline. "I have seen some of our courage
worked out in the woods before. Remember the time you nearly set
fire to the river? Well, don't, please, go try anything like that
today."

"No, it must be something for which I should receive a badge of
courage, if I were in the first class. I want to blush with
fitting modesty when Captain Clark invests me with the next
degree, and I shall only blush when reminded of my noble deed this
afternoon."

"Since you are not particular about what deed shall be the noble
one, won't you just give me a hand, and help me save this heel of
mine from a blistering shoe? The shoe was all right in school, but
just now it has picked up a snag, somehow, and between the shoe
and the snag, my life is not worth living."

"Poor Madie," soothed her chum. "Let us sit right down here and
diagnose the case. I'm first rate at diagnosing anything but why
my bureau can't stay fixed. It has chronic upsettedness, and all
my operations are of no avail. There go the girls down into the
hazel nut gully. Let's sit on this lovely mossy couch, and look
after the heel. Doesn't moss grow beautifully smooth under the
cedars? I wonder how it ever gets so velvety?"

At the twined and natural woven seat, wrought from the uncovered
roots of a great hemlock, the girls caressed and patted the velvet
moss that formed a veritable carpet--no--it was softer than
carpet, a silken velvet throw, over a natural cedar divan. Even
the suffering heel was forgotten, in the joy of nature study, in
green, with the darker green canopy of cedars, and the music of a
running river at the foot of the sloping hill. Here the scent of
watercress vied with the hemlock and cedar, for its place as
nature's perfume, and only such mingling of wild ferns, trailing
arbutus, budding bush, and leafing vine, could produce the aroma
of incense that just then permeated the woody glen.

"Don't let the girls get too far away from us," cautioned
Madeline. "I wouldn't like to get really lost, even for the joke
of having you find me, Gracie."

"But you would do a little thing like that to help me out on my
personal bravery stunt?" teased her companion. "I wonder why only
the first class girls are permitted to do all those wonderful
things and get all the really high honors?"

"Because they have gone through all the necessary trials and
examinations," replied Madaline sagely. "You and I can get credit
for our deeds, but we must show our full records to get the
highest B. C. That's fair. You can't make a major out of a
private. He has got to go up by degrees."

"Well, maybe it is fair, but I just love the glory of
presentations. I am so sorry for Margaret. I would have dug up the
town today to find that Merit Badge she lost last night."

"I like the way she braved it out, though," added Madaline. "She
felt badly enough, and it did mean so much to her," finished the
sympathetic scout.

"Oh, yes, I suppose so," rather reluctantly agreed the ambitious
Grace. "But I shouldn't relish the feeling that some grimy mill
girl was wearing the badge in a smoky factory."

"Oh, Grace, shame! That's not scouty. You must not speak so of the
mill girls. We hope to take some of them in our troop before long.
We would have no right to public support if we did not do
something definite for others, and the mill girls have so few
chances. So don't, Gracie dear, ever speak like that again."

"I won't if you say so, also if it isn't scouty. I am out to win
the goal, and I don't mind what I may have to do to get my scout
good conduct ball into the official basket. Now, how's the heel?
Did the little pad of soft leaves help to keep the pressure off?"

"Yes, that was a fine idea, and I shall see to it that some day,
when original work is called for, you get credit for the nature-
aid heel pad. Rather a clumsy title, but when we explain how easy
it is to get soft leaves to make pads for suffering feet, I am
sure it will be welcome news to many an ambitious hiker."

"Oh, Madie dear," suddenly exclaimed Grace. "Where are the girls
gone? They are not in the hazel nut clump, and I can't hear a
sound!"

"Oh, my! Suppose they have gone looking for us the other way?"

Both girls in alarm, now scurried through the woods, calling and
giving the "Coo-ee" call, but not a sound answered them. Birds
were flitting about from limb to branch, and the strange stillness
of the woods frightened the little Tenderfoots.

"You go along the bank, and I'll scour the elderberry patch. This
wood is so dense in spots, and so clear under the hemlocks, it is
easy to lose and hard to find anyone in it," declared Grace. "I'm
glad I brought my big rope. I intended to tie every knot in the
course, and cut them all out to fetch back finished, and I haven't
even unwound the rope."

"If there is anything easier than getting lost in the woods it
must be getting caught at whispering in the eighth grade,"
grumbled Madaline. "I wish my old heel had behaved itself."

"And all the plans for my brave stunt gone to naught," put in the
now breathless Grace. "I would never have made up the hike if I
had not determined to get a glory mark out of it. Now see where we
are! Miles from home, and darkness coming on at each end. Where
could those girls have gone to?"

"Sure as shooting they have gone on searching for us. There's the
reservoir road, going in the opposite direction, and also Chestnut
Hill. To go either of those roads meant getting entirely away from
the foolish little scouts who stopped to chatter and chin. Just
shows what we can do when we don't know we shouldn't."

For some moments they brushed their way through the thicket,
beating down briars with their stout sticks, then coming to a
broad clearance they found themselves in a great grove of pines,
clean as a floor, except for the layer of savory pine needles, and
almost dark as night from the density of the pine canopies.

"My, how lovely!" exclaimed Grace.

"Yes, if we could only enjoy it," demurred Madaline.

"Grace! What's that? Over under that thick tree!"

"A man! Let's run!"

"And there is a big bag beside him," whispered Grace. "See the
things sticking out of it!"

"No, I don't want to see anything. Run, I tell you!"

"Wait! Maybe I could make this my bravery act. Suppose I tie him
with my strong rope?"

"Grace Philow! Are you crazy?" and the more frightened girl
attempted to drag the other away. "Please--don't speak loud. If he
wakes I shall die."

"No, don't you dare! Just keep still. I am going to see if I can
tie up one town tramp. There are plenty loose, and this is my
golden opportunity!"




CHAPTER III

A NOBLE DEED UNDONE


"Now Grace! If you attempt to go near that dreadful man I shall
scream and wake him up," threatened Madaline, in real alarm.

"No, you won't either. You would be afraid to. Hush, keep still. I
want to see if I can lasso his old bag. Wouldn't it be fine if I
could rescue Mrs. Johnston's washing? You know it was stolen off
her line two nights ago." With this the daring girl stole up more
closely to the sleeping figure.

The quiet lull of the flowing river, as it fell over a little
cascade, was acting as a potential lullaby to the wayfarer at the
foot of the tree. His figure was grotesque, but at the distance
the girls were viewing him from it was not possible to discern
more than a figure--it might be that of almost any sort of a man,
for all they could tell.

Grace untied her nice clean coil of rope, while Madaline besought
her in every kind of cabalistic sign she could summon to her aid,
to desist in her reckless intention of tieing the man to the tree.
But the temptation was evidently too much for the frolicsome
Grace, for as Madaline cast a wild eye over her shoulder in her
flight from the spot, she could just see Grace, tip-toeing up to
that figure.

A few seconds later came a stifled cry!

"Wait, oh, Madie, wait!" called Grace, and, stopping in the briar
path, Madaline glimpsed the imperturbable Grace, making her way
through the thicket and dragging something heavy behind her!

"Mercy me!"' exclaimed Madaline. "What can she be tugging along!"

"Wait, help me!" now called Grace in a bolder voice.

"No, I will not! Grace Philow, are you crazy?" gasped Madaline.

"Crazy, not at all," sang out Grace in a laughing voice. "I've got
it!"

"Got what?" Madaline cried anxiously.

"Mrs. Johnston's wash!"

"Oh, Grace, you will get us both arrested."

"For recovering stolen property! You have a fine sense of scout
laws," Grace retorted. "If you don't help me get out of the briars
I shall report you to the captain--if we ever find her," and
another laugh grated on the frightened ears of Madaline.

"I can't help you, Grace," Madaline replied in a more conciliatory
tone. "The briars are so thick here, they almost tore off my shoe--
it is not laced tight, you know."

"Well, they are tearing up Mrs. Johnston's wash," admitted Grace,
still tagging at the trailing bag, that could not be seen in the
thicket and brambles she dragged it over.

"Oh, Grace! There he comes!" screamed Madaline, as a moving figure
could be outlined in the shadows of the low brush, and tall swamp
berry trees, that just towered high enough to hide the form that
bent and broke the impeding young birches. It was the swish and
motion of the brush that indicated his advance and location.

"Mercy!" yelled Grace, alarmed now in spite of her boasted
courage. "Let's run. But I won't drop this wash. I don't care if
he follows me into the post-office for it," and at that, she gave
the rope one more terrific jerk, the force of which brought the
trailing obstacle out into the path where it had a clear track to
follow the girl, who held madly to the other end of the rope.

No words were wasted as the girls scampered and scurried through
that wood. Grace held firmly to the rope, and could feel that it
still dragged her quarry, while Madaline never turned her head to
see whether or not the pursuing man was at their heels. That they
had not been struck down was enough, to be thankful for, thought
Madaline.

And in all of this, no trace of the other members of the hiking
party was discovered. More than once the girls heard something
they decided ought to be their "Coo-ee" call, but each time it
turned out to be nothing more friendly than the astonished birds,
either laughing at the scouts, or rooting for their successful
escape from the pursuer.

Beaching the big rock that covered the path, and always had to be
climbed over "by hand," the girls scrambled up, then down, and
when Grace gave a necessarily vigorous tug at her rope it sprang
up to her face in a real caress! In fact it actually coiled around
her like a friendly thing.

Mrs. Johnston's wash was gone!

"Oh, he grabbed it!" wailed Grace. "He got hold of my rope when we
had to stop to make the rock and now--he has got it again!"

"Don't you dare stop one minute!" panted Madaline. "You have
almost murdered us as it is," she proclaimed in her excitement,
which always banished her ordinarily sparse supply of reasonable
language.

"Nice way you help a sister," mocked Grace. "I thought you were
going to help me win honors," and she gathered up her delinquent
rope with a much disturbed expression on her pretty face.

"I think I have helped you save your life, if you only knew it,"
Madaline managed to articulate. "The idea--"

"All the same I did tie him up," admitted Grace, bolder now that
she could see the end of the woods. "I don't see how he got loose.
I used the running bow-line, and a couple of clove hitches. Our
old knots came in useful, but they didn't hold evidently. Hark!
Wasn't that a whistle! Sounded like Margaret's trill."

"Yes, and it's away over on the Avenue. Whatever will Captain
Clark say?"

"Now, Madie, you just promise you will say nothing about my man
and Mrs. Johnston's wash. I tried to do something noble and it
didn't pan out, so if you are a good little pal, and a first rate
sport, you will keep mam as a clam, won't you, please, Madie?"

"Well, since it did not end in a tragedy I suppose I may keep
quiet without breaking honor, but you know, Gracie, I am six
months older than you, and I would be held accountable at a
trial."

"Don't you fret," and Grace was now shaking her curly head and
throwing her blazing cheeks up to the clearance light, with,
renewed defiance. "I certainly had a lovely time while it lasted."

"There are the girls!" exclaimed Madaline joyously. "It would have
been dreadful if they were obliged to go all the way into Flosston
without us. They would have come back with the mill bell man
looking for us."

"Whoo-hoo!! Coo-ee, Coo-ee!!" trilled Grace, and back came the
welcome answer.

"Coo-ee! Coo-ee! Whoo-hoo!"

Realizing the lost was found, Lieutenant Lindsley stood on top of
the little hill, just over the turn of the macadam road, that
outlined Oakley Avenue, the one street of distinction that ran
through the country and gave tone to little Flosston on its way.
She was an attractive figure standing there in her plain serge
suit, and soft tam-o'-shanter on her finely poised head, and even
at a distance one would be correct in describing Romaine Lindsley
as an attractive, fine-looking young girl.

Around her were the other members of the hiking party, all of whom
had come to an abrupt halt, at the call of Grace and Madaline from
the woodlands.

"Don't run to meet them," cautioned the lieutenant, "that might
mean another mixup," and she gave a double quick trill to notify
the delinquents they were expected to report promptly. "After all
there appears to be no harm done, other than the loss of an
afternoon's sport."

"But I did not get my watercress," wailed Winnie, the blonde of
the McKay twins.

"And I lost a perfectly good side comb mother just received from
Philadelphia," complained Cleo. "I wanted this kind and could not
get them around here. Now one is lost and the other useless."

"But we must not complain, Cleo," admonished the lieutenant
pleasantly. "It isn't good scouting, you know."

By this time the runaways, or lost sheep, had caught up with the
awaiting contingent. That they would be deluged with questions,
and all but stampeded for answers, was to be expected.

"It was an accident," Grace managed to inject finally. "Madie's
foot went blistered--and I hunted around for some--some medicated
leaves," this was said in an apologetic tone, "and when the heel
was all fixed we were thoroughly lost."

Madaline sighed and smiled alternately, and agreed without
venturing to say so.

"Well, we are glad you met with no mishap," declared the
lieutenant, to whom girls lost in the woods was not a new
adventure. "We were going back for you just now. The trouble was
we took the left road to look for you, when, of course, you were
hugging due right. Didn't you see our trail?"

"Yes, after we struck it," responded spokes-man Grace. "We were so
deep in the cedar grove we had no chance to strike trails. Oh,
girls, you should see the wonderful picnic grounds we discovered!"
she enthused, with the very evident intention of getting
Madaline's mind off the man and the bag of wash. "It is a perfect
little park, all carpeted with pine needles, and canopied with the
loveliest trees--"

"All right, Grace," cut in the lieutenant. "But come along. We
must be making tracks. No time just now for a panoramic view. We
will certainly have to take this hike all over again to compensate
the girls for their disappointment. However, no doubt we have
learned something."

"You bet," Grace whispered to Madaline, as she fell into step for
the homeward march. "I learned that the bow-line will slip."

"Hush," begged Madaline. "I am not sure yet but that--you know--
may be after us."

"Wish it--you know, was," defied the other.

"What ever were you two up to?" asked Margaret, falling back to
take step with the refugees. "I am sure you were never fixing a
single foot all that time."

"We each had feet, you know," Grace quickly made answer. "And
really there are the most interesting things in that wood. I am
going back first chance--"

"You do!" threatened Madaline, with a glance Grace rightfully
interpreted. "I will never, as long as I live, go into the Cedar
grove again. It's too scary for words."

"I loved it," drawled Grace. "I am going again. See if I don't.
Want to come, Maggie?"

"Maybe, but just now I want an alibi for mother's promised
watercress. Grace, you are a great scout! You lure us all out
here, with the most tempting offer of prize watercress, and here
we go home with a bunch of last year's cattails. What shall we say
to all our loved mothers, who allowed us to cut house work for
this wonderful afternoon?" asked Margaret.

"Say that I, Grace Gollivar Philow, will go back first chance I
get, and fetch watercress for the whole community. Only next time
I go, I am going to fetch a gun--"

Margaret laughed, but Madaline shivered. Scout girls were supposed
to know how to use a gun, but fortunately Grace was still in the
Tenderfoot class. Perhaps before she could possibly get permission
to try gunning, she would have outgrown her tendency to capture
tramps with ostensibly stolen washes. Madaline sincerely hoped so.

When almost in town Grace gained an opportunity to whisper to
Madaline:

"Now remember, Madie. Never a word. I am not sure my man got away,
you know. He may be tied up there yet. And also, I may get someone
to go with me and reclaim Mrs. Johnston's wash. I know about where
it broke loose."




CHAPTER IV

PATHS DIVIDING


But the happenings in the woods were quickly forgotten, at least
so far as the scout girls were concerned, by the unexpected
development in the case of the two girls, Dagmar and Tessie, who
had stolen out of Flosston.

In that section of the town where the girls lived, the
Americanized foreigners had little in common with such families as
those of the girls of True Tred Troop. In fact, few happenings in
the mill community ever reached the ears of the so-called
"swells," that inappropriate term being applied to those whose
fathers held some executive position in the great silk industries
of Flosston.

Thus it was easy to understand why the scouts had heard nothing
next day of the mysterious disappearance of Dagmar and Tessie.

A contrary situation existed in Millville, however. Here the
families of both girls were causing a search to be made in that
peculiar fashion of confusion and excitement, usually ending in
making the condition more complicated, and giving rise to
absolutely no clues worthy of attention.

Mrs. Brodix, Dagmar's mother, good, kind mother that she was,
spent her time wringing her hands and rolling her big black eyes,
otherwise in extolling the hitherto undiscovered virtues of the
lost daughter.

In her distress she forsook the English tongue, and lapsed into a
conglomeration of Polish and Yiddish made intelligible only
through the plentiful interpretation of dramatic gesticulation.

"Oh, my beautiful Dagmar!" she wailed. "It is that vile street
runner Theresa, who has carried her away!" was the burden of her
lamentations.

"The smartest girl in all Millville was my Tessie," insisted Mrs.
Wartliz. "It was that baby-faced kitten, Dagmar Brodix, who coaxed
her off. She would earn as much money as me" (good enough English
for Mrs. Wartliz), "and she had money in the bank, too."

It was probably this last fact that really led the girls to seek
what they considered was a broader field for their talent. If
Tessie's money in the bank had been a joint account with her
mother's name, she would not have been able to draw out the funds
for her escapade, but what did Mrs. Wartliz know about such
supervision for a daughter, who was absorbing America at one end--
the attractions--and ignoring America at the other--honorable
conduct?

What actually happened was this. When Dagmar ran after Tessie, who
was threatening to leave her to her own resources, that dark night
when both had planned to shake the dust of Millville from their
well worn shoes, the older girl finally agreed to take Dagmar
along if "she would quit her babying, and act decent."

"Now the train is gone," scolded Tessie, "and we have to take that
horrid old jitney out to the junction. Like as not we will meet
some one who will squeal on us."

"Tessie," pleaded Dagmar, afraid to speak, and fearful of the
consequences if she did not make her appeal. "Why can't we go to
Franklin? There is a fine mill there and it is nearer home--"

"Say kid" exclaimed the rougher girl, "if you want to go home you
have a swell chance right now, but if you want to come with me
quit simping and come," and she picked up her own bag in bad
temper, gave her brilliant scarf a twist and started off for the
jitney, leaving Dagmar to take the unattractive choice she had
just mentioned.

Dagmar was too frightened to notice the grimy mill hands who were
crowded into the old bus, making their way to another settlement
in search of an evening's recreation, but Tessie slunk deep down
in her corner, burying her face in her scarf and hiding her eyes
with her tam. She knew better than to run the risk of having her
cross father discover her in flight. After she had succeeded in
getting away Lonzo Wartliz would not spend time to go after her,
but while she was "on the wing," so to speak, he would have no
trouble in bringing her back. A day's time from the mill would be
too costly a sacrifice to make, while a police call to "fetch back
my girl" would cost him nothing. Also there was the thought that
Tessie might fix it at home by sending a letter filled with
glowing promises of good money--but she would require at least one
day to mail her promise to Flosston.

So Dagmar sat with a melancholy expression on her face while
Tessie hid her silent chuckles in her wearing apparel.

"Here we are," whispered the latter, as the jitney jolted to a
standstill. "Don't forget your Saratoga."

Dagmar dragged the hated "telescope" after her, as she dropped
down from the rickety high steps of the old motor wagon. It was
very dark now, and she was more frightened than she had any idea
of betraying to her companion. "Come on, kid," called the other.
"We have got to hunt up something. We may not get out of this
great white way to-night."

"Oh, Tessie! How could we stay in a place like this?"

"Just like the other folks. Do you think they are goin' to spread
out a wedding canopy for you? Oh, be a sport, Daggie. Tomorrow is
yet to come."

The training this young girl had received in the local movies was
now developing in a rather dangerous way. She was breathing
heavily in her new found adventure, she was out alone, or as good
as alone, in a strange place on a dark night, and perhaps she
would be kidnapped? In spite of the danger Tessie fairly thrilled
with the possibility, and it was with a very pronounced degree of
scorn that she regarded her weaker companion.

Not that the "movies" were exerting any better influence on
Dagmar. In fact it had been their uncertain propaganda that first
created in her breast the feeling of unrest, that first told her
Millville was mean, shabby, and an unfit place for an ambitious
girl to try to exist in. Her very love for her mother and father,
to say nothing of her affection for the other members of her
family, seemed a spur to her ambition "to get away and be
somebody."

But the getting away was by no means the pleasant dream she had
pictured it. Here they were, two young, inexperienced girls in a
strange town, without the slightest knowledge of how they might
find a safe place in which to stay for a single night, and even
they, with their minds open for adventure, realized how promptly
trouble comes to those who openly seek it.

"Let's go down this street and see what it runs into," suggested
Tessie. "Hope it doesn't flop off into a ditch."

"I think we ought to ask someone," put in Dagmar.

"Ask them what?" rudely demanded Tessie.

"Where we can go for the night? Are you sure we can't get a train?
We could sleep in the cars."

"Oh, say, you want a Pullman, you do, the kind we see go by the
factory with the coons all dolled up in dish towels," she sneered,
now seemingly set upon making things as unpleasant as possible for
poor, little, frightened Dagmar. But the latter was not altogether
a coward, and the blustering tone of Tessie was not too deep to
penetrate. Dagmar pulled herself together and dropped the
"telescope."

"You may do as you please, Miss Wartliz," she exclaimed. "But I am
not going to tramp these streets all night. I don't want to end up
in a nice little rat-ridden police cell. We don't have rats over
our way."

"And I suppose we do. Well, Miss Smarty, what do you propose to
do? Maybe you wouldn't mind letting your friend in on the game!"

"You know, Tessie, I don't mind slang, and I am not a goody-good,
but I am nervous, and I think we would get along better if we both
dropped that street stuff. It gets on my nerves."

"Oh, my sakes alive! Gettin' nerves!" and she dropped her voice
into the deepest tones of contempt. "I might-a known it. You would
be apt to have them with that face. Well, kid, what do you want to
do? I don't see no hospital for nerves out this way."

"Tessie! See that man!"

"Sure I do. He's a cop, too. Stop your whimpering and trot along.
We're goin' to grandma's," and Tessie grabbed the arm of the
trembling Dagmar as she started off with a determined step,
indicating a particular objective being sought for.

But the officer of the law could distinguish runaway girls without
a full confession from their painted lips. And he promptly started
after them.

"He's followin' us," whispered Dagmar.

"As if I thought he was playin' hop-scotch," scoffed the
tantalizing one. "Keep movin', we will give his legs a treat, even
if he intends to beat us out."

And they did walk very briskly indeed--all the more reason why the
officer should follow them!

"Makes me think of tryin' to get away from a strange dog," Tessie
had the temerity to interject. "The faster we ran the surer he is
to keep snappin'."

"He is sure to catch us," Dagmar said. "Why don't you stop and ask
him where we can go?"

"You poor simp. Want him to tell you?" and she almost laughed
outright.

"Wait--a minute--wait--a minute!" came the summons. "What's your
big hurry?"

They both stopped. Each knew enough for that. The man of the law,
shaking that treacherous stick on its red cord, was now beside
them. He pushed his cap back to make sure nothing interfered with
his gaze. This he fixed scrutinizingly on the two girls. Dagmar
flinched, but Tessie smiled in a foolish attempt to gain his good
will.

"Where are you two trottin' off to all alone?" he asked finally.

"We're goin' to grandma's," said Tessie, so ridiculously that she
almost burst out laughing. She had no idea the answer would sound
so silly.

"Oh! you be," he returned, his voice thick with irony. "Is the old
lady expectin' you?"

"Well, we didn't say we would be there tonight," Tessie had the
audacity to reply.

"No, I thought not," and he twirled that formidable stick almost
into Dagmar's scared face. "Well, shall we send her word?"

"Oh, we can find our way," put in Tessie again, attempting to
start off.

"Maybe so. But here in Franklin we have a curfew law, and we don't
allow little girls out alone so late."

"No?" sneered Tessie. "Lovely town. We expect to take the rest
cure here."

"Now, my young lady," in severe tones, "I'll show you where we
give that self same cure. Come--along--with--me!"

Quick as a wink Tessie grabbed her bag, and started to run. The
officer was so surprised he required a moment to realize she was
running away. When he did he sounded his whistle.

And there stood Dagmar, alone, and as the "movies" say,
"Forsaken!"

"Oh, Tessie," she called weakly. "Come back. You have my
pocketbook!"

But the fleeing girl did not stop to listen to Dagmar's cry or to
the shrill whistle the officer again sent out into the night. She
was making tracks so successfully, the minion of the law knew very
well his whistle would never summon help--the only other officer
in town being "out of town" to his personal knowledge. So Tessie
went, and with her Dagmar's pocketbook and the Girl Scout Badge!




CHAPTER V

A FRIENDLY ENEMY


"Now, don't you worry, little girl. You are not like that one
running away. I can see that by your manner," said the officer
kindly, as Dagmar pressed her handkerchief to her wet eyes. "I
don't have to take you to the calaboose, unless I set fit, and I
don't."

He touched her arm kindly. Jim Cosgrove hated to see anyone cry,
and his kind heart never seemed to interfere with the fulfillment
of his duty. When he was kind he had reason to be, and never yet
had the higher officials questioned his wisdom.

"Oh, thank you," said Dagmar, when she could find the words. "We
haven't done anything wrong."

"Well, it isn't exactly right for young girls to run away from
home, and I don't have to wait for all the particulars to decide
that is what you are both aiming to do. However, let us go along.
My wife doesn't mind takin' a girl in now and then, to save her
name from the records."

Dagmar breathed easier. She might even find a place to sleep! Why
hadn't Tessie waited?

In spite of the rather unpleasant situation, there was comfort in
the thought she would not have to go to some dreadful hotel, or
boarding house, and perhaps undergo all the hardships dealt out to
runaways in the "pictures." So Dagmar walked along with the
officer, unmindful of the sharp looks of the few passersby who
happened to be out in that section of the rather quiet town.

"Of course you will go straight back home in the morning?" asked
and answered the officer.

"Oh, I did so want to try something else," almost pleaded the
girl. "You see, mister, it is awful in the mill end of Flosston."

"Not very good, I'll admit," replied he, "but it will be my duty
to send you back."

They walked along in silence after that brief conversation. Dagmar
was thinking how difficult it would be to go back home on the
morrow, and in the company of an officer! As if the man divined
her thoughts, he said presently:

"We will see how we make out when we get to my house. My old woman
is as good a help to me as the other man on the post, and better.
She helps me a lot with the girls, and I often say she should have
had a uniform. Maybe we can fix it so she will take you back
home."

"Oh, that would be better," replied Dagmar. "I would hate to go
with a man."

"Course you would and I don't blame you. But I must hurry and put
you up with Mary. If I don't find your pal I will have to give the
word to the next town. Can't have a girl like that running around
loose all night."

"I wish she had stayed. Tessie is--not really wild, but she has so
much freedom at home. All her folks seem to care for about her is
her money."

"Lots of folks are foolish as that, then they have to spend a good
lot to make up for getting a little. And the funny part of it is,
the girls, who seem so wise, are the easiest fooled. Now, she
acted like a real grown-up, but I'll bet my badge she would go
along with the first person who offered her a hot pancake for
breakfast. They have so much nerve it dries up all their common
sense."

"I do wish she had not run away. She is always making fun of me
and calling me a baby. But I think, as you say, mister, it is
better not to have too much nerve."

"You're right, girl. But here we are. Don't you be the least bit
afraid of my wife. She is big and blustery, but has a heart of
gold."

The rugged outside of this man evidently hid a heart of his own
not far from pure gold, and Dagmar could not help thinking he was
the nicest policeman she had ever heard of, and that she had
encountered him seemed nothing short of wonderfully good luck.

Turning in at the gate, which even in the night could be seen to
form a little arch in vines and bushes, Officer Cosgrove tapped
lightly on the door, which was opened before the echo of his last
tap had died away.

"Here we are, Mary," he announced to the woman standing in the
portal. "I just brought you a little girl--who--is lost. Take care
of her while I go after the--other. She didn't take so kindly to
Jim as this one did," and with a friendly little push, he ushered
Dagmar into the narrow hall, and turned out into the roadway, from
whence his light footfall could immediately be heard hurrying over
the cinder-covered path.

"Come in, girl," ordered Mrs. Cosgrove. "What happened to you?"

Dagmar was bewildered. What had happened to her? What should she
answer!

"I am--away--from home," she managed to reply. "The officer said I
could go back tomorrow."

The inadequacy of her reply sounded foolish even to Dagmar, but
she was constrained to feel her way. She could never blurt out the
fact that she had actually run away from home!

"Oh, I see," said Mrs. Cosgrove with a tone of uncertainty. "Run
away, eh?"

"Yes'm," said Dagmar defencelessly.

"Too bad. Didn't your folks treat you right?"

"Oh, yes," hurried Dagmar to correct any such impression as that
question conveyed. "But I wanted to help them--all, and I thought
I--could!"

Tears were running over now, and Dagmar's courage was at lowest
ebb. The motherly woman took the ever-present "telescope," and
setting it down in a corner of the pleasant room, directed Dagmar
to a chair near the little stove, in which a small light glowed,
quite suitably opposed to the chill of early spring.

"Just sit down and I'll get you a bite. Of course you are hungry."

"Not very," gulped the girl, who had not tasted food since she
snapped the cover on her lunch box that eventful noon day, when
the girl, having agreed with Tessie to leave Milltown, had eaten
the dark bread and bologna, for what she supposed would be the
last time. So Dagmar was hungry, although her emotion for the time
was choking her, and hiding the pangs of actual hunger.

"All the same tea tastes good when we use up nerves," insisted the
woman, leaving the room, and presently clicking dishes and
utensils in the kitchen. Left alone for a moment Dagmar recovered
her composure and glanced about the room. It seemed almost
fragrant in its clean freshness. She had never occupied such a
room, with that peculiar, bracing atmosphere. The small mantel
with its prim vases looked a veritable home shrine, and the center
table with the sprigs of budding lilacs, seemed to the forlorn
girl something to reverence. The rag rugs under her feet were so
spotless, the curtains so white--it suddenly occurred to the girl
these things could not exist in the smoke and grim of a mill town.
It was the mill--always the mill found to blame for her misery.

"Come on, girl--what is your name?" came a voice from the kitchen.

Dagmar responded and took her place at the table with its white
oilcloth cover, and a snowy napkin neatly smoothed under the one
plate set for her.

"Molly has gone to Flosston to a Girl Scout meeting," announced
Mrs. Cosgrove, helping Dagmar to a dish of home-made pork and
beans. "She loves the Scout affairs, and wouldn't miss a rally,
even if she has to come home a little late. Martin, that's my boy,
will meet her at the jitney."

"Gone to Flosston?" repeated Dagmar. "That's where I came from--
that is the corner we call Milltown, it is out where the factories
are."

"Oh, I know the town well. Not too nice in spots. But start right
in. Drink your tea and eat up your bread and jelly. I'll finish
what I was at, and be back by the time you have cleaned your
plate."

Dagmar realized this action was taken out of sheer delicacy. And
she was very thankful to be left alone with her food. After all it
was not so bad to be arrested, if all jail sentences were served
in such nice clean kitchens, thought the girl.

But the reflection of a girl scout meeting at Flosston, and the
stinging memory of the honor badge, picked up that night and
carried off by the reckless Tessie, would torture her in spite of
the more important issues in the girl's experience.

Where would Tessie go? Where would she stay and what would become
of her? No doubt, as the officer had remarked, such a girl would
easily become the prey of the unscrupulous, and at this thought
Dagmar shuddered. What dreadful things always happen to runaway
girls in the movies? Again the standard asserted its power.

Next moment the opening door announced Mrs. Cosgrove was back, and
Dagmar had "cleaned her plate."

"There now, you will feel better," and the woman quickly gathered
up the tea dishes. "Come in the other room, and tell me your story
before Jim comes back; sometimes a woman can help a girl more than
a man can, and, as Jim says, I am sort of a wedge between the law
and the victim," and she laughed lightly at the idea of
interfering with her husband's business.

Dagmar told her story. She did not spare herself or attempt to
cover her mistakes. She had left home because she was tired of
Milltown and because she thought she would be better able to help
her folks by getting out of the factory. Yes, she had listened to
Tessie, and Tessie was different. Her mother allowed her out late
nights, and had no objections to her going to dances in the
factory hall, without brother or father. When Dagmar went her
brother Frank always accompanied her.

"Well, that's encouraging," spoke Mrs. Cosgrove when Dagmar
paused. "When folks have that much sense you can always talk to
them. Now, when Molly comes we will talk it over with her. I
wouldn't mind leaving off my work to-morrow, although I did plan
to clean the cellar, and I could go out and see your mother--that
is, if Molly thought there would be a chance for work for you
here, and perhaps we could fix it so you could stay for a while
anyway. I don't believe it would do you good to go right back in
that crowd again. What you need is new chums."

"Oh, I couldn't give you all that trouble," objected Dagmar. "I am
willing to go right back in the morning."

"It's right you should say so," continued the wise woman, "but you
see, my girl, when you go back, you get right in the same rut
again, and all those mill girls would just make life miserable for
you. I am not encouraging you to stay away from home, but as Molly
says, she is a leader in the scout girls you know--she always says
when a thing goes wrong in one place it is best to try it in
another. That is if the thing must be done, and, of course, you
must work. However, wait until Molly comes in. She has learned so
much since she has tried to teach others that I do believe she
knows more than I do."

"You say she is a scout lieutenant?"

"Yes, they only take girls eighteen or over for that office and my
Molly was eighteen two days before she was elected," and at the
thought Mrs. Cosgrove indulged in a satisfactory chuckle.

It was all very bewildering to Dagmar, but just how it happened
that she did not return to Flosston immediately was due to a very
interesting plan made by Molly and co-operated in by her official
father, and finally worked out by the near-official mother.




CHAPTER VI

A NOVEL JAIL


Thus it was that the girl scouts of Flosston and Lieutenant Molly
Cosgrove of Franklin stumbled over the same case of a sister in
need.

Returning from the big rally at the County Headquarters on that
eventful evening, Molly Cosgrove found more than her usual hot cup
of tea awaiting her. There was the strange young girl with the
wonderful blue eyes, around which a telltale pink rim outlined the
long silky lashes.

Molly thought she had never seen a prettier girl, while in turn
Dagmar decided Molly Cosgrove was the very biggest, dearest,
noblest girl she had ever seen. Formalities over, talk of the
rally quickly put the stranger at ease.

"We had a wonderful rally," Molly enthused, "and at a business
meeting held before the open session, it was decided to start
obtaining recruits from the mills."

"Oh, that will be splendid!" exclaimed Dagmar, who now felt quite
at home with the Cosgroves. "We have always wanted to know about
those girl scouts."

"Well, you will soon have an opportunity," continued the girl,
whose cheeks still glowed with rally excitement, "and I am a
member of the committee appointed to visit the mills."

"That is just the thing," declared Mrs. Cosgrove, "for your boss
always lets you follow the Troop orders, and by going into
Flosston you may fix it for this scared little girl to stay here
for a while."

"There, Mother, I always said you should be on the pay-roll. Isn't
she the loveliest cop?" Molly asked Dagmar. "No wonder the Town
Council thanked Mrs. Jim Cosgrove for her work among the women and
girls! Why, Mom, you are a born welfare worker, and could easily
have my position in the Mill. You see, I am what they call a
welfare worker," again Molly addressed Dagmar directly.

"Oh, yes, I know. We have one in the Fluffdown Mill. Her name is
Miss Mathews but she hardly ever comes in our room," offered
Dagmar.

"Well, now Molly," said Mrs. Cosgrove very decidedly, "I just
mentioned we might see that the girl got work in new surroundings,
with you and me to keep an eye on her, so she could cut away from
that crowd. What I have been able to find out is not much to its
credit and there's reasons (with a look that pointed at Dagmar's
beauty) why a girl like this should not run wild. It seems to me,"
smoothing out her big apron, by way of punctuation, "that it has
all happened for the best. We can fix it so Pop won't make it an
arrest after all, then you can get leave to go to Flosston first
thing in the morning, can't you?"

"Oh, yes, the welfare work of all the big mills is co-related,"
replied the daughter, while the mother put her feet on the little
velvet hassock, and seemed glad of the chance to draw her breath
after the long speech.

Dagmar was sitting in one of the narrow arm chairs of the old-
fashioned parlor suite. Her long, rather shapely hands traced the
lines and cross-bars in her plaid skirt, and the sudden shifting
of her gaze, from one speaker to the other, betrayed the
nervousness she was laboring under.

"All right then, that's one more thing settled. And do you think
the girl--say, girl, I don't like that name you have, what else
can we call you?" she broke off suddenly with this question to
Dagmar.

"My name is Dagmar Bosika, and I like Bosika best," replied the
little stranger.

"All right, that's number three settled. You will be Bose. I can
say that, but I never could think of the other queer foreign
name."

"And we will have to change your last name, too, I guess," put in
Molly, "as some one from Flosston might recognize it. We can just
leave off the first syllable and have it Rose Dix or Dixon. I
think Dixon would sound best."

"We are settling quite a few points," laughed Mrs. Cosgrove, "if
some one doesn't upset them. I have no fears from Pop--"

"Oh, Pop is putty in our hands," went on the resourceful Molly,
"no danger from his end. But how about your folks, Rose?"

Dagmar smiled before she replied. The new name struck on her ear a
little oddly, but it pleased her, she had never liked Dagmar, and
utterly despised the mill girls' nickname "Daggie."

"Mother and father have always said they would let me do what I
thought would be best for me," she said at length. "I never did
anything they told me I should not, and we often talked of my
getting in a store or something like that. Mother works in the
mill in another room, and she was always worried about me being
away from her."

"A store would be no good for you," objected Mrs. Cosgrove, again
including the girl's beauty in her scrutiny. "You would be best
off within the reach of a welfare worker like Molly. But look at
the time! Martin will be in from the club, and even Dad will be
comin' around for his midnight coffee, before we call this meetin'
to a halt. I say, Molly, we are runnin' an opposition scout
meetin' it seems to me," and she got up with that finality, which
plainly puts the period to all conversation.

A few moments later Rose had washed face and hands, brushed her
hair, as Molly kindly hinted she should, and taking her shabby,
washed, but unironed, night dress from the famous "telescope," she
said her prayers and was ready for bed. How comfortable the room
seemed! How strange she should be in it? And where was the
unfortunate, headstrong Tessie?

A prayer for the safety of the wandering one sprung from the heart
of this other girl, now away from home the very first night in her
young life. That her mother would believe her at a girl's home,
according to the little note left stuck in her looking glass, Rose
was quite certain, so there was no need to worry concerning
distress from the home circle, at least not yet, and tomorrow
morning young Miss Cosgrove would go to the mill and very quietly
arrange everything with her mother.

"The girl scouts are better than the police," she decided, not
quite understanding how both could work so intimately, along
different lines, yet each reaching the same result to assist
wayward girls.

This was, surely, a queer sort of arrest, a lovely kind of cell,
and a most friendly pair of jailers, the little runaway had fallen
among, and that she dreamed wonderful dreams, glowing with roses
and fragrant with perfume, was not to be wondered at, for Mrs.
Cosgrove's linen was sweet enough to induce even more delicious
fancies.

But what of poor, lost, erring, headstrong Tessie Warlitz? Rose
imagined her in all sorts of wild predicaments, but with that
kindness so marked in girls who have themselves suffered cruel
misunderstandings, Rose determined not to betray her chum, but
rather to do her utmost to find her, and win her back to good
standing among girls--somehow. Thus really began in so subtle a
manner her own interest in the principles of the Girl Scouts.

"To help an erring sister" is a fundamental of the cause, but Rose
little knew what that silent consecration would cost her. When all
was quiet, late that night, young Martin Cosgrove sauntered along
home and giving the familiar "three dots and a dash" whistle
notified his mother of his approach. The light in the sitting-room
window had in its turn told Martin his mother awaited him.

"S-s-sh!" whispered the mother, opening the door very softly.
"Don't make any noise."

"What's up or who's sick?" asked the good-looking young man,
pinching his mother's plump arm.

"There's a little girl asleep in the spare room. Don't wake her,"
cautioned the mother, who, to prevent even a hat falling, had
secured Martin's things and was putting them on the rack.

"Friend of Molly's? Some new girl scout?" he asked, when they
reached the seclusion of the kitchen.

"Well, no, not just that, but a poor child Dad found lost," she
compromised.

"Lost, eh! And Chief of Police Mrs. Cosgrove rescued the lost
chee-il-dd--as usual! Mom, you're a great cop, and I hear Molly is
following in your fair footsteps!"

"Stop your nonsense, Marty, and be off to bed. It's awful late!
There's your fresh shirt for the morning. Take it along with you."

"Thanks, Mom, and you have the Chink beat in his line, too,"
giving the freshly ironed cambric shirt an approving pat. "Tell
Molly to go easy out at Flosston. Those True Tred Girl Scouts are
a pretty lively little bunch from what I hear."

"What do you mean?" asked the mother. "What did you hear about
Flosston?"

"Oh, just heard the boys talking. Nothing very much, but some
girls ran away, not scouts, mill girls, mill detectives on their
trail, and the Girl Scouts went on a hike and lassoed some poor
guy by mistake. Oh, you know a lot of stuff like that, everybody
hears and no one knows the real sense of. Only I thought Molly,
just taking up with the Flosston work, ought to keep both eyes
open, and wear good sensible shoes. Night, Mom!" and he kissed her
very fondly. Mrs. Cosgrove indulged in two special brands of real
pride--her boy and her girl!




CHAPTER VII

TENDERFOOT ADVENTURES


The ends of this story are winding out like the strings of a
Maypole, and just like those pretty dancing streamers, do the
story lines all swing from the pole of the Girl Scout activities.

The Flosston rally was held for the purpose of planning a broader
program, and as told by Lieutenant Cosgrove, the arrangements
there were made to afford the mill girls a chance to enjoy the
meetings, and to participate generally in the regular membership.
These plans had already thrown their influence over an entire
chain of the big factories of Eastern Pennsylvania.

Most of the plants employed one or two women welfare workers in
their ranks, following the campaign waged by progressive women in
the interests of better conditions among women wage-earners. This
qualification pertained to girls as well as adults.

So it was that young Molly Cosgrove, an assistant welfare worker,
would be allowed to go from one mill to another in carrying out
the new movement of Girl Scouts for mill workers between the ages
of sixteen and twenty-two years. No girl under sixteen was
supposed to be at work in mills, and if any such was found she
must have been listed at the required minimum, sixteen.

The sensational news of two girls having run away from the
Fluffdown mills was now quickly making its way through Flosston
and near-by communities. The Wartliz family had done its part in
spreading the scandal, while the Brodix people said little, wagged
their heads and grieved sincerely, for their Dagmar was a
cherished daughter, and her loss had sadly strained the humble
home circle.

The fact that Miss Cosgrove had arrived at Fluffdown and talked
with Mrs. Brodix was known only to those workers directly at that
particular bench, and they quickly surmised the welfare worker was
making inquiries about Dagmar.

Instead, she had brought to the alarmed mother the news of her
daughter's safety and secretly a plan had been made, whereby this
little black-eyed woman would soon come out to Franklin on an
evening, to see Dagmar, now known as Rose, and so make sure that
the kind offices of the new found friends would be thoroughly
understood, and likewise agreed to by Mrs. Brodix.

Not even the talkative Kate Jordan, who worked next to Mrs. Brodix
and kept her eyes and ears attentive during Molly Cosgrove's visit
to the afflicted mill hand, guessed any of this, while the escape
of Tessie Wartliz, from the very grasp of Officer Cosgrove,
remained a secret with those who directly encountered the business
end of that experience.

Meanwhile the girls of True Tred were radiant with the prospect of
their work--that of assisting the mill girls and actually taking
part in real Americanization. To the younger girls, especially
Cleo, Grace and Madaline, the plan opened a field of exciting
adventure, for they had never been allowed to visit the mills, and
were not encouraged to make acquaintance among the workers.

"Now," said Cleo, when the three Tenderfoots got together after
school was dismissed, "we will have as much real fun with live
girls as we have ever seen played out in the pictures. Some mill
girls do the queerest things, talk so funny, you can scarcely
understand them, and they act--well, just like a play. Florence
Hayden says so, she helped with their Christmas Sunday School
entertainment last year."

"Oh, well," demurred Madaline more kindly, "they never went to our
schools. Some of them went to the Town Hall night school, but they
only met their friends there and never got a chance to learn our
ways."

"You're a real good little home missionary, Madie," commented
Grace, "and I'll vote for you when the mill committees are made
up, only," and she puckered her pretty mouth into a rosette
intended to express deep scorn, "of course we're too young, and we
are only in the Tenderfoot Class."

"I suppose Margaret will be picked," said Cleo, "she is fifteen
and first class and has had a merit badge."

"But she lost it," Grace reminded the trio.

"And is going to get another from headquarters, Captain Clark said
so."

"Well, she deserves it, I'm sure," protested Cleo.

"Oh, of course she does, but I would, too, if my plan worked out
the other day," went on Grace.

"What plan?" demanded Cleo, while Madaline pulled a long, serious
face.

"Oh, I wanted to do something noble and I tried to, but it did not
just work out," faltered Grace, "but--I--am going--to try it
again!" and her eyes blazed defiance at Madaline.

"You just do, Grace Philow, and I'll--"

"Who cares!" interrupted the unconquerable Grace, while Cleo
looked a whole volume of inquiries.

The McKay twins were romping over from a near-by playhouse, a
little tepee made of cast off "shutters" the janitor had put
outside after wrenching them from hinges, and the girls had
promptly availed themselves of the material for a most attractive
playhouse.

"Hello! hello!" called both. "Who wants a ride home? Mother is
sending the big car."

"Oh, we all do, of course," spoke Cleo, the first to mingle words
with her delight. "Who wouldn't love a ride in that big, spiffy
limousine!"

"Well, thank you just the same, but I don't, just today," Grace
surprised them with answering. "I have an appointment with Brother
Benny."

"Oh!" said Winnie McKay significantly.

"I see!" drawled her sister Norma.

"Suit yourself," deprecated Cleo.

"If you can't, you can't," philosophized Madaline.

"That's exactly it," amplified Grace. "I can't, so I can't. Thank
you, Winnie and Norma, for the lovely invitation, and please let
me put it down to my credit account? I would like a refund," and
she laughed her irresistible explosive outburst, in which the
whole party joined, whether willingly or from acute inflection.

A few moments later the party, all but Grace, climbed into the
lovely, softly lined car, and when Winnie told the chauffeur to
drive to the post-office first, Cleo was delighted to find she had
a postal card to drop in the box. That would give every one around
the Green a chance to see the style of the McKay twins and their
school chums.

And while the big car rolled smoothly over Oakley Avenue, Grace
and Bennie were hurrying about--over a woodland road too rough and
too narrow for other traffic than just nimble, willing feet.

"You're crazy!" declared Benny, halting at the prospect of the
long winding path Grace led him to, and insisted was the "right
way."

"That's what the girls say," answered the sister, "but really,
Benny, I am not at all. Just as sane as--Libby Lintot, and you
know every one says she is as crazy as a loon. But all the same if
we follow this path we will come to my tree, and maybe we will
find a lovely dead tramp all buried in the spring pine needles,
tied up by Grace Philow Tenderfoot!"

"Grace Philow lunatic!" answered the brother. "Nice thing to make
a fellow miss a whole afternoon on marbles, just to hunt a tied-up
tramp!"

"Would you rather hunt tigers'?" asked Grace, running along like a
wild squirrel, jumping over rocks and springing across the
perpetual little streams and brooklets.

"Sure I would, wouldn't you? What's an old tramp?" sneered Bennie.

"Wait till you see him," promised Grace, "he's lovely. That is I
think he is. I didn't exactly see his face, I was so busy tieing
him up," explained the sister.

Benny, two years younger than Grace, went forth on the man hunt,
armed with his pop gun and water pistol. It was actually two days
after the eventful experience of Grace and Madaline in River Bend
Wood, when the latter had made such a desperate attempt to rescue
the alleged "Mrs. Johnston's wash," but though many hours had
passed, Grace was still haunted with the awful possibilities of
her beloved tramp dying there, all tied up with clove hitches and
running bowlines, while the birds scattered spring blossoms over
his handsome face. True, she had hoped today, on this second
expedition, to recover the lost wash, but to get to that big tree,
and relieve the gnawing anxiety, was her first determination; dead
or alive she must have a look at the tramp! Nothing could be worse
than this awful uncertainty!

"That's the grove over there! See the big straight tree! That's my
tree!" she exclaimed, dragging along the erstwhile brave Benny,
who just now showed an inclination to come to a full stop. "Come
on, Benny, hold on to me. I'll peek first, from the other big tree
back of the ivy stump. Then we can see without being seen."

Like a pair of chipmunks they hopped from tree to tree, being
careful to keep well in the shadow of one before risking a new
position behind another.

"Just like shadow tag," Benny made chance to whisper. "Gee, Sis,
this is some little scouting."

"Better than your Boy Scouts' games, isn't it, Benny?" Grace
apologized, for indeed it was no easy matter to inveigle the big
boy into a little girl's sport. Benny felt much bigger, and
decidedly more mature than Grace--that is, he felt that way.

"Oh, Ben, see!" exclaimed the sister. "There's something flying-
over--maybe over a grave!"

"Swell chance he had to--make--his own grave!" in contemptuous
tones from Benny.

"Well--it is a red flag, flying over something!" Grace whispered
emphatically.

Benny sprang out from his tree and with one hand on the automatic-
loaded water pistol, and the other on the lead-loaded pop gun, he
confronted the hypothetical grave!

"Come on out, Sis," he invited the frightened Grace. "It isn't no
grave. It's just a red handkerchief on a stick."

Glancing furtively in the direction of the road, which ran
parallel with the river path, and near enough to it to carry a
voice from the woods to the road should emergency demand outcry,
Grace stepped very gingerly out from her hiding into the open
space in front of the famous "inhabited" tree.

Yes, there was the red flag! "Wasn't that a signal for war? The
flag was a red handkerchief, and it swayed from a stick cut from a
variegated birch.

"Oh!" sighed Grace, relief and excitement finding an outlet in
that short syllable.

"Look at the signal!" called Benny, now going straight up boldly
to the flag of fury. "See, it's a wig-wag, pointing to that big
rock. Let's look!" and be followed the pointing stick which, tied
to the top of the improvised flagpole plainly meant--due west--to
any one who understood the scout wig-wag code. "Here!" shouted
Benny, now casting caution to the light winds of murmuring pines.
"Here's more trail. See? It's our secret code of turned over
sliver leaves, and it leads to--let's see." Benny was visibly
excited and Grace was almost pulling him down from the rock in her
eagerness to follow the signs. He turned over a rock which showed
loose soil, and dried leaves clinging to its jagged sides. "Here
it is, Grace! Sure enough! Here is a letter from your dead tramp.
Maybe he died right after he wrote it," and even the small boy
found humor in the queer uncanny situation.

"Take it out by the roadway," suggested Grace, to whom the woods
were now a little treacherous. She glared at as many trees as two
brown eyes could embrace. "We can read it out under the big maple.
Come on, Benny," she begged, dragging him forth again away from
all the woodland mysteries.




CHAPTER VIII

CLUE TO THE MISSING


So many and such exciting sequels are divulged through helpless
little letters! How innocently the page of paper carries the
silent words, yet how powerful is the influence to cheer or
sadden!

Grace had read her mystic letter, but beyond confiding in Benny,
whose word of honor in secrecy she had exacted, not one single
syllable of that note was to be divulged to any one.

She had hopes that something really wonderful would develop from
her remarkable experience, and while she would have liked to tell
Madaline and Cleo, she feared antagonistic opinions, and, as it
was entirely her own personal secret, and not a matter of girl
scout business, or even chums' interest, it seemed decidedly
better to keep her own precious counsel.

"I'll tell them all when it happens!" she assured herself, by no
means being certain just what she hoped "would happen."

So the mystic letter was tucked away in the tiny, pink silk vanity
bag, which Cleo had given Grace the Christmas before, and in the
days following only her starry eyes threatened to betray the
interesting fact, that the little Tenderfoot harbored a dark,
delicious secret.

Meanwhile Rose had taken her place in the Franklin mill and was
being cared for by the benevolent Mrs. Cosgrove as a member of her
family.

"It was really providential," Molly told her mother one day at
lunch, after having seen for the second time the parents of Dagmar
Brodix, "for the family had to leave Pennsylvania, and it would
have been very hard for them to take Rose along. It seems Mr.
Brodix would not join the union, and both he and his wife had to
be discharged to appease the labor men. Rose, too, would have been
ordered out, as the whole family come under the ban imposed on the
father."

"Poor folks!" deplored Mrs. Cosgrove. "Those unions won't let
anybody think for themselves! Where are they going?"

"Away down east to a big silk mill," replied the daughter. "Mr.
Brodix knew the superintendent in his own country, and got in the
shop without a union card. But it is much better for Rose to stay
with us until they get settled at least."

"I took such a fancy to that child the moment I set eyes on her!"
Mrs. Cosgrove explained to Molly.

"You always do, Mumsey!" laughed the daughter, "but I entirely
agree with you this time. Where is Rose now?"

"Just gone to the post-office. She came in at twelve and finished
her dinner in time for a bit of fresh air before going back. How
is she getting on in her work?"

"First rate, the forelady reports. Rose is naturally quiet, and as
you predict, Mother, it is very important for her to be among new
companions. A girl's pretty face is not always a help to her best
interests."

"Exactly, Molly. Everybody seems to pick on a pretty girl, while
they leave the homely ones to tend their own business. But your
dad is much worried about that other damsel who got away. There is
no trace of her at all."

"Yes, she made a clear escape. I heard one of the mill detectives
making some inquiries. He did not have to question Rose. I gave
him our end of it. I am afraid that other girl has gotten herself
into more trouble. The detective did not say so outright, but I
judged so from his line of questions."

"Your father said as much, but like the detective, our own 'cop'
isn't giving us all the information he holds. I'm glad the mill
officials see the value of the girl scout movement. It's the only
fair way to reach the girls without forcing them. Let them take a
hand in their own interest--I always say."

"The mill men see the wisdom of that. I would not have been
engaged as a welfare worker if I had not been a scout lieutenant.
Well, I must run along. We have a meeting in Flosston tonight, and
I am going to take Rose with me."

"I would. The girls of the troop have never met her to know her,
and, at any rate, their training will check any possible
criticism. Good-bye, girl. Better take your umbrella. We will have
rain before sunset," and with this word mother and daughter
separated for their respective afternoon tasks.

Meanwhile Rose had called at the post-office. Her anxiety
concerning the wayward Tessie constituted the one flaw in her
otherwise happy new days. That she could not at once be with her
parents was clear and reasonable to the girl, reared in hardship,
and accustomed to many personal sacrifices, but that an
incriminating letter would surely one day come from Tessie kept
her nervously anxious.

Rose had contrived to visit the post-office daily, hoping when the
dreaded, yet longed-for, letter would come, she might receive it
personally and thus avert possible complications with the Cosgrove
family, who had official reasons for wishing to locate the runaway
girl.

With that keenness peculiar to foreigners when a matter vitally
concerns them, the Brodix people had readily adopted the more
useful name Dixon for their daughter, and today, when Rose
inquired for mail, a much-soiled letter addressed to "Rose Dixon,
care of Mrs. James Cosgrove," was handed out.

Not risking the publicity of opening the envelope until she was
well out of sight of observers, Rose hurried along, and turned an
unnecessary corner to seclude herself in a particularly quiet
street, there to open and read the letter. Somehow she felt it
would contain news of Tessie, and her premonition was correct.

"From mother!" she breathed affectionately, as the much handled
little sheet of note paper, with its queer foreign script, lay in
her hand. Then she noticed an inclosure. Yes! There was the note
from Tessie!

So anxious was Rose to know where Tessie was, she glimpsed through
the little note without actually reading one word of it. She was
just looking for a clue as to the girl's whereabouts, but to her
disappointment none was given! Not one word showed the capital
letter at its face, that would have marked the name of any place!
Tessie wrote English well enough to make herself understood, and
the brief note was almost explosive in its choice of strong
phrases. The "quarter whistle" blew, announcing to Rose the fact
that fifteen minutes of the precious noon hour still remained, and
as ten would be ample time for her to reach the mill, in the five
extra minutes she might read her letters.

Stopping at a little stone wall, which surrounded one of the
oldest houses in Franklin, Rose read first the note from Tessie.
As she expected, the "news" was more a compilation of strong slang
than an attempt to impart any real information, and although but a
short time removed from the acute influence of "chewing-gum
English," Rose had already developed a dislike for the more vulgar
of such forms of utterance. She read:

"Hello, kid! Where are you? Did you break loose from Grandpa? I
had some beatin' to do, but I done it and made a get-a-way good
'nough for the movies. Don't ask me where I'm at, for it's a
secret. But, say, Kid. Oh, you scout badge! It's a miracle worker--
and better than real coin. I wouldn't give it up for a Liberty
Bond. So long! can't tell you just now what my private post-office
box is but will later. My folks are cross-eyed looking for me, but
all they ever wanted was my pay-envelope, so I should worry about
them. Give my love to yourself and if you're not out of jail yet
for the love of molasses, don't be a simp! Get busy!" It was
signed "T. W."

And that was all; so like Tessie. Rose sighed audibly, then read
her mother's letter and while this was really interesting to the
daughter it now seemed tame in comparison, and it really was the
letter from Tessie that gave her blue eyes the preoccupied look
all that afternoon.

So the lost and found scout badge was serving the runaway girl as
a passport. Perhaps she was using it for unworthy purposes, and it
was unlawful to wear a scout badge without authority. The offence
was punishable by law. Rose thoroughly understood all this, but
how could she reach Tessie to warn her! Even a dismissed scout
must return her badge and buttons to the organization, and there
was Tessie Wartliz forging her way on the strength of that special
merit badge!

Such thoughts as these riveted the attention of Rose, when Molly
Cosgrove, passing through the room, whispered she could go with
the lieutenant to the Flosston meeting that night.

"All right. Thank you!" replied Rose to the invitation, but,
somehow, she dreaded its acceptance.




CHAPTER IX

A TRIBUTE OF ROSES


The little meeting room over the post-office in Flosston had
served as headquarters for True Tred Troop--and tonight Margaret
Slowden was to receive her new badge, to take the place of that
much-prized little gilt wreath with its clover leaf center, her
merit badge lost some weeks before.

"Hurry along!" called Grace, who was impatiently waiting for Cleo
and Madaline, both of whom seemed to enjoy lagging while Grace
wanted to be early rather than late. "Don't you know we have to
take our tests and Captain Clark ordered us to be at headquarters
at seven-fifteen sharp?"

"All right," responded Cleo, "but here come Mable Blake and
Mildred Clark. We can all be together if you just wait half a
second for us, Grace."

"I don't mind seconds, but I hate hours!" retorted Grace. "I don't
want to be a moment late and give anyone a chance to think up hard
questions for my tests."

"Oh, you needn't worry," Cleo assured her. "I know you can beat us
all at knots."

That brought back to Grace her attempt to make a "clove-hitch" and
a "running bowline carry out her noble deed" and she flashed a
significant look at Madaline, who shared a part of her secret.

"Oh, yes, I know the knots," she replied. "But you just ought to
see me try to light my fire in the open, with two matches! More
like two boxes I guess."

"And my simple dish," contributed Mildred Clark, who now, with her
companions, had joined the group, and all were merrily making
their way to the meeting room. "I thought I would select the very
simplest of the simple, and I took pork and beans."

"You did!" exclaimed a chorus.

"Yes, and it is a real wonder I am here. I thought I never would
get out of that old hot kitchen. Martha told me I should have
taken Irish stew but--"

"But you preferred the Boston Bake," interrupted Mable Blake.

"Of course Mildred wouldn't have anything to do with the Irish!"
teased Madaline, who was well known to have "leanings" in that
direction.

"Indeed, I will never scorn the Celts again!" sighed Mildred, "for
I had to brown the pork and it burned. I had to soak the beans all
night and they swelled up so I had to scoop them up on a dust pan
next morning. I didn't use those, of course," as the girls' looks
protested, "I had enough on the floor to plant a garden and I
really did plant them. Then, the big pan full I baked, and it took
all day. Did you ever know plain pork and beans constituted an
exact science in the preparation for the table? Why didn't I try
milk toast, and get finished in time for your ball game, girls?
Don't you think I am a real hero of the simple dish-pork and
beans?"

"We surely do, Millie, and I hope you get a perfect mark for all
that work," spoke up Grace. "My real trouble came in making a
bed. That sounds so easy, but our beds have lace covers, and no
sooner would I get one end straight, than the other would be all
draped up in little cascades. Don't you all just hate to make
beds?"

"Oh, no, I love to do it," declared Mabel. "But just let me show
you my flag. Doesn't it look like a crazy quilt design?" and from
her scout manual she unfolded a page of paper, with the required
American flag drawn and colored in crayons, and not really a poor
illustration of her beloved Old Glory.

"Well, you have all had your troubles, but I think mine was by far
the most complicated and exasperating," Cleo declared, coherent
conversation being made quite possible by the double file in which
the girls grouped themselves, as they walked along. "You should
just see me take my measurements. Of course I forgot to follow
instructions and 'see card at headquarters,' as the little blue
book directs."

"My sakes!" exclaimed Grace. "Do we have to have our measurements
tonight?"

"We must answer all test questions and that is one of them,"
replied Cleo. "But when I got my height by using a pencil over my
head on a door-post, of course we all do that, I had a set of
cords all knotted up at points to show waist, chest, arm, etc.,
and our pet kitten, Cadusolus, made a tackle for the whole bunch,
and before I could recover them she had taken her own measures on
my marked strings. I won't be sure of them now, for I had to
finish them in a big hurry after that."

"I know the Mariner's Compass by heart," called in Mabel Blake
from the rear line. "Brother Jack tested me, and he said I could
sail an ocean liner with my knowledge," she insisted proudly.

"We have our tests first, don't we?" asked Grace.

"Yes, of course, that all happens outside in the private troop
room, but I'll bet the other girls listen at the keyhole!" put in
Mildred.

"And last time a lot of boys on the back fence could see in the
window," Madaline reminded the anxious aspirants.

"Oh, there go all the other girls, let's hurry," urged Cleo, and
when the candidates mounted the stairs over the post-office, they
were but a small part of the noisy crowd that pounded its way on
the narrow and rather uncertain steps.

All of the officers assisted in the examinations so that not more
than a half hour was consumed in that detail, and when the girls
filed into the drill room, their smiling faces announced the good
news that all had passed.

Quickly at the given signal all the troops "fell in" and the
regulation "horse shoe" was formed with Captain Clark and
Lieutenant Lindsley in the gap, when the salute was given and the
other formalities complied with and each candidate was conducted
to the captain. After answering the captain's questions and
saluting, each candidate received her staff, neckerchief and knot
from the patrol leader, while the badge was pinned on the blouse
of the solemn-faced girls by the captain herself.

All of this was conducted with a striking degree of seriousness,
and as the exercises made Tenderfoots out of the newest
candidates, our own little friends looked on, with united dignity,
while they awaited their turn to receive degrees of the second and
first class.

The tests for Tenderfoot were but simple, and consisted mainly of
knots made and the knowledge of scout laws, with a few civic
questions, so that the beginners shared no part of the anxiety
experienced by Cleo, Grace and Madaline, and those of their higher
grades. The distinction of advancement is the privilege of wearing
the badge on the left sleeve, second class below the elbow and
first class above on the same arm, so that ceremonial occupied but
a brief space of time.

No conversation was permitted during the Investure, but the
presence of Rose, who sat in a corner looking on with wondering
eyes, had not been unobserved by the scouts. That she had come
from Franklin with Lieutenant Cosgrove was sufficient credential
for the privilege of being present during the ceremonial, but it
was Grace who talked with her eyes to Cleo, directing her
interpretative glances from the pretty little stranger, to the now
duly installed second-class scout, her message being, "See that
pretty strange girl over there?" and Cleo replying in turn with
her glance, "Yes, isn't she pretty? Who is she?"

With all her light-heartedness, which was sometimes termed "light-
headedness," Grace was fast developing a new sense, somewhat
related to our old friend Common Sense. Ever since she tried her
girl scout knot in the woods, and had eventually received a real
letter from the actual victim, she had been planning to "confess"
to the other girls, and seek their advice. First, she made up her
mind to tell Madaline, as that friend already knew a part of the
secret, but the fact that Cleo was credited with better judgment
swayed her toward that counsel. Then came such a succession of
busy days, busy afternoons and busy evenings, Grace could find no
available time for the portentous, confidential conventions of
chums. So no one but Benny had, as yet, heard anything of the
mysterious letter found in the holly rock in River Bend Woods.

But this evening during all the scout ceremony Grace and her
conscience were having a silent battle on the score of the
prolonged secrecy. Grace wished to wait a little while longer but
her conscience fought for immediate confession. Only the
importance of Captain Clark's speech seemed sufficiently strong to
drag her attention from this mental conflict.

"In striving for honors," the captain was now stating, "Girl
Scouts must be careful to use prudence and wisdom. It will not do
to rush into personal danger to do something that may seem to be
brave and noble, when a less hazardous means of accomplishing the
same end may be found, if intelligently sought for."

Grace sank back in her seat. The captain's eyes seemed to be
directed straight at her! Could anyone have told Captain Clark?

"All our special honor and merit badges are tokens of noble deeds,
done for humanity according to the principles laid down by our
rules, and explained in our manual, but none of these should be
interpreted as involving unnecessary risk to us, or the use of our
guns, our ropes, our staffs in any violence which might be
avoided!"

"Ropes!" repeated Grace under her breath. "We should not--use--our
ropes--"

"Grace!" whispered Madaline. "See that big bunch of roses over
there!"

"Yes!" nodded Grace.

"They are for Margaret Slowden when she gets her new merit badge,
and nobody knows who sent them!"

"Uh-hum-m!" breathed Grace in assent.

When Captain Clark finished her practical talk, the ceremony of
bestowing the substitute badge on Margaret was the nest feature of
the evening's exercises.

"You all recall our lovely ceremony on the evening of Margaret's
original presentation of her merit badge," the captain said, "but
this time we have merely to call attention to that great occasion
and our minds are filled with its pleasant memories. The noble
deed done to acquire this badge was one of unusual heroism and
peculiar wisdom," she went on, "for Margaret stayed at her post in
a dreary, lonely room, guarding her hats and cloaks with the same
spirit of attention to duty which at that same hour was bringing
her distinguished brother his consecrated D.S.C. We will now pin
upon Margaret's breast--a badge to take the place of that one,
lost some time ago, and we all hope she will be doubly rewarded by
the second badge of merit!"

There was a stir in the audience and Margaret was conducted to the
platform by her patrol leader. Captain Clark then pinned on her
coat the new badge, with the words of commendation, and this
concluded, an usher advanced with the bouquet. The captain glanced
at the card before indicating that the testimonial be presented.
It was inscribed merely--"A Friend."

Everyone was puzzled. It was very unusual to give hot-house
flowers in May. Then a side door was heard to creak on its hinges
and the pretty stranger, Rose Dixon, was just seen passing out.

"I wonder why she left?" Madaline asked Grace.

"Oh, I don't know, but I would like to leave myself," unexpectedly
retorted Grace.

"Sick?" persisted Madaline.

"No--just tired," and no one knew better than Grace what a
conscience prodder such a meeting as this proved to be--that is
"no one" except, perhaps, Rose Dixon.




CHAPTER X

TELLING SECRETS


Determined to wait no longer than the very next afternoon, Grace
asked both Cleo and Madaline over to her front porch directly
after school, assuring their acceptance to her invitation by the
lure of "a big secret to tell them." Needless to say, they came,
and there, in the shadow of the yellow and white honeysuckle
blossoms, with busy bees buzzing in and out of the honey-filled
cups, Grace disclosed the story of her second trip to River Bend
Woods.

The girls were fascinated. To think the tied-up man had written a
letter!

"Yes, but," argued Grace. "I am a little timid ever since. See, he
says he hopes he can lasso me some day with my own rope! Just
suppose he does!"

"Oh, I am sure he was just joking there," wise little Cleo
ventured. "He just said that to tease you, for teasing him."

"Maybe," replied Grace rather tonelessly.

"Let me see it again," begged Madaline, reaching for the well-
fingered little sheet of paper. "But he says," she read, "he liked
your courage, and he hated to spoil all your nice scout knots.
That must mean he is a good friend."

"Oh, it might just mean the opposite," gloomed Grace, who had read
the letter so many times every syllable weighed a clause to her.
"He may have meant that merely in sarcasm."

"Who ever do you suppose he was?" asked Madaline foolishly.

"Is, you mean," corrected Grace. "He didn't die, so he still is."

"Of course, that's what I mean. Only he isn't there now, so he
was, I think," insisted Madaline, without taking any offence at
the crispness of Grace's manner.

"Whether he is or whether he was, we might get along better if we
tried to guess who he could possibly be," Cleo assisted. "Have you
the least idea?"

"Not the slightest. You see, that sheet of paper came out of a
notebook, and anyone could own a notebook or even find one," Grace
speculated.

"Let me read the whole letter through?" asked Cleo. "We can't make
sense out of single sentences."

Grace handed over the much-criticized little missive. She read
aloud:

"LITTLE SCOUT BANDIT:

"I hate to spoil all your pretty knots, but I can't stay tied up
any longer. I am taking the rope along, and some day I hope to
lasso you in return. You gave me a merry chase after my bag--quite
a little runner you are. When I chance this way again I will look
for an answer in our hollow rock. Good luck, Scout Bandit--

"THE VICTIM."

"There!" exclaimed Madaline, "only an educated man could write
that!"

"But many wicked men are wonderfully educated!" Grace insisted on
worrying.

"He seems jolly," mused Cleo.

"All tramps joke," said Grace.

"Well, if you want a tramp, have one," laughed Cleo. "We won't
mind, Gracie."

"I'm not Gracie, and I hate tramps. I tried to be nice to one when
I was a little girl. Mother was giving him pie and coffee, and I
said it was hard for men to be tramps. He turned right around and
hissed: 'You're too gabby!' That's the way tramps appreciate
kindness."

"And you called him a tramp to his face!" exclaimed Madaline.

"Oh, girls, leave the old tramp alone and let's get to the new
wild-westerner," begged Cleo. "I'll tell you what we'll do. Let's
write an answer to his letter, and explain we only wanted to do
something brave for our Scout honors, but we understand better
now, and Grace, do you want to say you're sorry you tied him up?"

"No, indeed I do not!" snapped Grace. "Why should I, when I was
trying to get Mrs. Johnston's wash!"

"Oh, Cleo doesn't know about that," Madaline reminded Grace. "We
forgot that. You see, Cleo," she continued, "the man had a bag of
clothes beside him, and Grace got a hook made of a good strong
stick. She tied this to her rope (she had a lot of ropes with her
to practice her knots, you know), but when she saw the bag, and
thought she saw things like Mrs. Johnston's wash, why, of course,
she just tried to get it."

"And I did, too," insisted Grace, "I dragged it all the way to the
big rock. Then we heard some one coming, but I held fast, I never
lost it until the bag got stuck behind the rock. I wanted so much
to get poor Mrs. Johnston's wash," she lamented.

"Well, shall we write the letter?" Cleo followed up.

"I have to say I am afraid to go in the woods now," admitted
Grace. "Suppose he should capture us all!"

"We could make some excuse to bring a lot of girls along,"
Madeline suggested. "He couldn't capture a whole troop."

"Wouldn't it be better to get some big strong boy to fetch the
letter out there for us?" proposed the practical Cleo.

"Whom could we trust?" Grace asked.

"I wouldn't depend on brothers. They are too tricky. But how about
Hal Crane? He is always interested in our troop doings, and
besides he's a good scout himself. I think I would ask him," Cleo
determined.

"All right," agreed Grace, "and Cleo dear," with her arms around
the girl at the end of the bench, "won't you be a darling and
write the letter?"

"And get lassoed?" laughed her chum. "Well, I don't mind. I think
he must be a very nice man, and maybe I shall adopt him for my
hero."

"You may. I would be very glad to get rid of him," Grace
confessed. "I was so worried all this time, and I couldn't get a
chance to tell you a word about it."

"And I can imagine every rope you saw you just imagined was coming
your way," teased Cleo.

"Just about. But say, girls, another thing. Did you see that
pretty girl who came in last night with the lieutenant from
Franklin?"

"Oh, yes, the pretty blonde with the blue crocheted tam, I saw
her. I guess everyone did," Madaline replied.

"Well, she was so pretty I couldn't help watching her, and I am
sure she acted awfully nervous when the flowers were sent up to
Margaret."

"She went out directly the ushers took up the bouquet," Madaline
added. "And never came back for the ice cream," went on Grace.
"Well, what I wanted to say is, I have seen that pretty girl
before and I sort of think she was the one who used to be with the
dark-eyed girl they say ran away."

"Why, she came with Lieutenant Cosgrove, and surely wouldn't be a
companion to a runaway mill girl!" protested Madaline.

"You forget, newly second class, that we are taking in the mill
girls in our troop, and are all pledged to do our best to help
them," Grace declared. "I know more than one very nice girl in
Fluffdown. Daddy is one of the superintendents there."

"Yes, of course," Cleo acquiesced. "And my daddy is in charge of
the main office."

"I am sure we should be interested in that line, and our scouting
is so practical. I understand Lieutenant Lindsley is going to call
a special meeting of True Tred to make definite plans. Some of our
girls need education in social latitude, quite as much as do the
mill girls, she told us last night, and, judging from the way
Hattie Thompson laughed when a mill girl slipped in the mud the
other day, I think some of the girls need a special course in
common politeness," said Madaline.

"There come Ben's boys," Grace announced. "Let's go out on the
lawn and have a game of 'Heel and Toe.'"

"I can't, Grace. I have some shopping to do for mamma, and we have
been talking nearly an hour," Cleo declared, glancing at her wrist
watch. "You stay, Madaline. Don't go because I have to."

"I really must go," Madaline also insisted. "But be sure, Grace,
that Cleo understands all about the letter," she added.

"I will write it and call a meeting of this committee to consider
it," proposed Cleo. "Isn't it lovely and exciting?"

"You may think so, but I am glad I no longer have to lug that
secret around all alone," said Grace, as the girls were preparing
to leave.

"Almost as heavy as Mrs. Johnston's wash," teased Madaline. "Well,
good-bye, Grace. We will do all we can to find--you know."

Benny was almost close enough to hear the parting words, but in
his boyish head, chuck full of sports and frolics, he had little
room for girls' secrets, and even the knowledge thrust upon him by
Grace in her trip to the woods had long ago gone the way of his
lost game of "Bear in the Pit." Boys have a wonderful way of
forgetting failures, and it is that trait which later entitles
them to the claims of being good sports, using the title "sport"
in its best and most vigorous application.

"Well, that's over, thank goodness!" breathed Grace, referring to
her "confession," as she smilingly turned to her piano practice, a
duty indifferently done since her encounter with the writer of the
mysterious letter.




CHAPTER XI

THE TANGLED WEB


While the Girl Scouts of Flosston were arranging to extend their
troop activities so that they would include the girls from
Fluffdown mills, who wished to join, two other girls were becoming
more and more involved in an influence, seemingly subtle, but
surely sufficiently powerful to "win out" eventually.

Tessie Wartliz was enmeshed in that oftquoted "tangled web,"
coincident with the first attempt at deception.

"Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practice to
deceive!"

Reading those lines mean very little to the girl who has never
been so unfortunate as to know their fullest meaning, but Tessie
knew not the lines, it was their threat she felt, their dark story
she was living through.

Rose returned from the rally of the True Tred Troop with deeper
blue in her eyes and brighter pink in her cheeks. It had been so
wonderful! To see all those girls promising to do so much, not
only for one another, but for all girls, then the inspiring
ceremony, the lovely exercises, the music! It did not seem
possible that all this came to the good fortune of some girls in
that mill town, while others struggled to gain advantage over
their companions, as they worked in gloomy surroundings, prone to
some sort of rebellion.

And to think Rose had been asked to help carry this new story to
her former companions, and to those with whom she was now
associated!

Sitting for a few precious moments in her little room at Mrs.
Cosgrove's, although her light had been extinguished, and it was
too late to enjoy the tempting reverie, Rose, even in the dark,
could feel the comfort and sense the luxury of that simple, well-
ordered home. How strange that she should have been picked up from
the peril of waywardness, and become so safely sheltered by these
benevolent strangers! Was it because Molly Cosgrove, too, taught
and practiced the girl scout principles, and because Mrs. Cosgrove
was a pioneer from whom such principles emanate?

Gradually Rose sensed the difference in American and foreign
ideals, and now it was as if the curtain had lifted, and her own
mind was cleared of the confusing doubts and suspicions she had
heretofore struggled with.

The soft, sweet air of young summer wafted from the flowery vines,
caressed her pretty face as she stared out of the low window into
the velvet night, and she was glad, so glad she had sent those
roses!

"If only I could have returned that badge!" she pondered; "why did
Tessie run off with it!"

The dark thought immediately cast a shadow over her happiness just
at that moment, a vagrant cloud in a sky almost untarnished,
deliberately sailed into the moon, and blackened the window
through which Rose gazed.

"I guess that means bed!" she decided and promptly slipped between
the grateful covers. But not to sleep. The thoughts of Tessie and
her insinuating letters were too persistent to be immediately
banished. Try as she might, Rose could find no key to the problem
of how to reach the girl and reclaim the innocent badge, now
serving as a baneful influence in the uncertain career of Tessie
Wartliz.

"If only I could talk with her just a few minutes," Rose kept
repeating, and that wish became the source of a plan, from which
sprung a new resolve.

She must see Tessie!

Fixed in her brain, that resolve actually took root, and even in
sleep it seemed to grow, to get stronger with the hours, and to
mature with courage silently imparted through tired nature's sweet
restorer. Balmy sleep!

Troubled dreams discovered the runaway girl in strange
surroundings, now working in a dark gloomy mill, and flashing her
black eyes like lighted coals at every word of correction offered
by her superiors, again Tessie seemed to be enjoying the soft
luxury of some favored home, a wild flower in a garden of hot-
house blooms.

But it was all a dream, and Rose knew nothing of Tessie's
adventure, beyond the suspicions conveyed in the two sketchy
letters sent since the escapade.

A few days later the Leader, an evening paper, contained a story
startling to the girls of Flosston, and positively shocking to
Rose Dixon. This told of a young girl claiming to be a girl scout,
running off with a lot of ticket money, the funds she had obtained
by pretending to assist an entertainment being conducted for the
benefit of the Violet Circle of Shut-ins.

That a girl scout should rob cripples! And that a clue should lead
back to Flosston, inferring the culprit might belong in that town!
Instantly Rose knew the mystery meant Tessie, and that the
purloined badge had served as her scout credential!

Panic seized her! She had seen the paper on her way home from
work, and at table, when Molly Cosgrove discussed the item, Rose
felt her own guilt must be obvious to those around her. Yet no one
knew Tessie had taken the badge. No one knew Rose had found the
pretty emblem!

"How could a girl scout act so dishonorably?" Molly questioned
indignantly.

"And she actually got away with the money," Mrs. Cosgrove
repeated. "Some young bold girls can cover their tracks better
than hardened men."

Rose felt her cheeks pale. She had never known the antics of
nervous chill, but just now a series of "goose-flesh-flashes"
chased all over her.

"You must be very tired, Rose," remarked Molly keenly. "Better go
to bed early and omit the meeting. Mrs. Brennen, the welfare
leader at Conit, is coming over, but you can hear her another
time. You had nervous work on those scarfs to-day. I heard the
girls say that floss stuck like chiffon."

"It was sticky," Rose was glad to comment, "and I guess I won't go
over to the school house if you don't mind. Perhaps I will just
take a walk in the air and later write a few letters."

"The fresh air is what you want," Mrs. Cosgrove unconsciously
assisted in the plans seething through the troubled brain of Rose.
"I've noticed you are a bit pale lately. But we can't expect to
make a robust Rose out of you all at once. You feel all right,
don't you?"

"Oh, yes, thank you. I have a little headache, the reds and pinks
glare so, I guess they hurt the eyes a little," Rose qualified.

"They do indeed," agreed Mrs. Cosgrove. "Have you heard from your
folks?"

"Yes, I had a letter to-day," answered Rose truthfully. "They are
getting along splendidly, and father says he thinks he will soon
have a good place for me."

"That's fine. We are glad to have you with us, Rose, but with your
own folks will be better, when things get all nicely fixed up."

"Yes," put in Molly. "When you go off to take your own place now,
Rose, you will understand American ways much better than you did
when you came. And wherever you go, I am going to send word ahead
to the Girl Scouts so that you may join at once and keep up your
training. Our own troop is going to organize to-morrow night. We
are going to call ourselves the Venture Troop, as we will be the
first troop yet formed in a manufacturing plant."

"Then the Franklin's will be organized before the True Treds take
in the mill girls of Flosston?" queried Rose.

"They also meet this week to initiate a group of a dozen girls
from Fluffdown. These are to be scattered in two troops and they
will try the plan of putting the strangers in with the girls who
have had scout experience. You see, we have no troop at all in
Franklin, and I am ambitious to have the first formed of our own
girls exclusively. They are very enthusiastic."

"I will be sorry if I have to go away," Rose murmured, and her
eyes darkened into violet tones with deeper emotion.

"And I can't tell you how I shall miss you if you do have to go,"
spoke Molly. "But you are not gone yet. At least you will be made
a troop leader before you go from Franklin. Then, in your new
surroundings you will be able to assist others to do what you have
seen done here."

"I never knew how much girls could help girls until I saw the
scouts at that meeting the other night," said Rose, a note of
sadness in her subdued voice. "If only I had such a chance before
--before--"

"No regrets. Remember all our trials bring compensations. For
instance, if you had not made the mistake of leaving home that
night, you would never, perhaps, have met the Cosgroves," and she
smiled happily in an attempt to cheer the drooping spirits of the
girl sitting opposite, who had not touched her cake or even sipped
her tea.

"Yet I did not do it. My mistake was not the--the real clue," Rose
managed to say, her hold on useful English betraying its uncertain
foundation. "It was your mother's good nature, not my mistake,"
she clarified.

"I'll accept the honors. Drink your tea and take your cake. It is
not much of a compliment to turn aside from the cake I gave up the
home lecture this afternoon to bake for you two. Marty is gone out
of town on business, and won't be back for three days, and our big
officer wants pie, and scorns cake. So you see it is the plain
duty of you two to eat this," and Mrs. Cosgrove helped herself to
a real sample of the iced pyramid.

"I cannot help thinking of that girl who ran off with the crippled
children's money," Molly reverted to the earlier conversation. "I
don't believe she was a girl scout at all," she declared
emphatically.

"But the paper said she was," Rose spoke, fearing her voice would
shake her into a full confession of her own conspiracy to shield
Tessie.

"Oh, no, it did not state she was a scout," Molly corrected, "the
paragraph read she claimed to be. There is a great difference."

"Well, it is very queer our own good officer," meaning Jim
Cosgrove, "never found trace of that girl. She must have covered
her tracks in some unusual way," declared Mrs. Cosgrove, "for Jim
is not one to be easily fooled. So Rose, if you are not going out
I am sure you will be glad to help with the tea things. Molly, I
pressed your waist when I had the irons for Marty's neckties, so I
treated you as well."

"Momsey, you are perfect in your plans. Never use an iron for one
without applying it to the other. And I will be joyous in my fresh
blouse. Rose, please put a tag on my piece of cake, I'll enjoy
that end when I come in. I have only a little time to get ready
now, as I must make out a programme for our preliminary drill.
I'll tell you all about it, Rose. Take a walk when you finish
helping mother. You don't get any too much air, you know," and
Molly hummed her newest waltz song as she capered around in
preparation for the evening's activities. Molly was always jolly,
if not singing she would be "chirping" as her brother Martin
termed the queer sort of lispy whistle she indulged in, and even
while dressing, it was a practice of hers to vary the operations
with home-made jazz.

During all this Rose was making up her mind to go straight out in
the big world and find Tessie Wartliz. She did not know just how
she would set about it, but her mind was made up on the one
important point, namely, that the finding must be undertaken and
at once. Rose could no longer stand the misery of secrecy
concerning the lost scout pin. Every headline in a paper glared
out at her as if threatening to expose her guilty knowledge. Every
letter she received through the busy little post-office sent a
frightened chill over her delicate form, and now she felt certain
her benefactors, the Cosgrove family, must know she had heard from
the runaway girl, and they were too generous to ask a single
question concerning the matter. They trusted her, and she must
deceive them!

"I will have to say that mother has sent for me," she decided
after a bitter hour alone in her room, "and when I find Tessie----"

She paused. She was baffled! What would she do if she did find
Tessie?




CHAPTER XII

TESSIE


Again our scene shifts, and, as in the screen play, that
retrospective distant picture brings one back to an earlier
vision, so from the distance we now see the runaway, Tessie.

Step by step, along the dark, uncertain road of offences which in
themselves were trivial, but which brought such dire results upon
the erring girl as to make her all but an outcast, Tessie, after
the first foolish blunder, found herself confronted with a seeming
necessity for keeping up the false role she had almost unwittingly
assumed. The girl was not wicked. Her untrained and unrestrained
tongue was her worst enemy, and it very often belied her honest,
generous heart.

In inducing Dagmar to leave home she actually believed she was
assisting a friend--her intention was to better that friend's
circumstances, but the methods! How could she know that right
could not result from deliberate wrong! That doctrine had never
been made a part of such education as she had the opportunity of
acquiring. True, the girl learned right from wrong, also her
religion was very clear on the point, but she could not then
believe it was wrong to fly from the horrors of mill drudgery,
made unbearable by the more intimate environment of a miserable
home.

So Tessie Wartliz was suffering from an inherited disease commonly
called "Greed." Her parents were greedy for money, and she was
greedy for good times. She wanted much of anything she enjoyed,
and had little care how that abnormal amount was obtained.

The fatal night she and Dagmar (now our own Rose Dixon) landed so
suddenly in Franklin, where the jitney dropped them almost into
the arms of Officer Cosgrove, Tessie, as we will remember,
escaped, and carried with her the pocketbook she had been carrying
for her companion, and in that little soiled purse was the much-
prized, lost and found, scout badge of merit.

Tessie at first thought little or nothing of the trinket. As she
had scoffed at its purpose, when Rose respected it, so she brushed
it aside as of no importance when she emptied the pitiful pittance
of her forsaken companion into her own pocketbook, when forced to
use the funds or beg from strangers.

On the step of the last jitney that rumbled through Franklin
making no stops, and being entirely unoccupied by passengers,
Tessie managed to hide as the car slowed up at a turn, and later
she crawled inside, when the sleepy driver, his day and night work
finished, allowed the motor to "take its head" as we might say to
a horse-drawn vehicle. Her heart almost ceased beating when the
officer who commanded the line between the two villages, stopped
Frank and demanded to know if he carried any passengers.

"Three empty dinner pails that came out full of supper," the
driver called back, and Tessie actually under the seat, felt free
to breathe again and keep watch for some turn where a kindly house
light might gleam out to save her from a dreaded night, under a
tree or behind some rugged, wild world shelter.

Just as Frank, the driver, slowed down, preparatory to turning for
the big shed, under which the modern carry-all would be laid up
until daylight next morning, Tessie decided she would ask this
rustic to assist her. Believing that most men, especially those
not too old, were apt to be kind-hearted or maybe "softhearted,"
she climbed from her hiding place, and timidly tapped Frank on his
astonished shoulder.

"Gosh!" he exclaimed, "where'd you come from?"

"I lost my way!" she answered not altogether untruthfully. "Can
you help me? Where do you live?"

"Say," Frank challenged, "you look pretty near big enough to talk
to traffic cops. How'd you get in this boat, anyhow?"

His voice was not friendly. That anyone should have climbed into
the "Ark" without signalling him was evidently opposed to his
sense of humor. Tessie did not reply as glibly as she had intended
to. Instead she threw herself on his mercy, as actors might say in
melodrama.

"Honest I did get lost. I'm on my way to the Woolston mills, and I
missed so many trains, and caught so many jitneys I lost count.
Then, when I saw you come along I was so glad I almost--well, I
just flopped. I was dog-tired. First I hailed you, but you were
dozing I guess, then I was scared to death you would jolt by and
leave me, so I had to climb on."

"Oh," replied Frank, not altogether convinced, but evidently on
the way to conviction. "I did fall off a little, I'm out since
four A.M. Now, young lady, what's your idea of fixin' for the
night? My old lady, meaning a first-rate little mother, is awful
strict about girls ridin' in this bus not accompanied by their
parents, and I don't see my way clear to tote you home at this
unearthly hour. I see by--the make-up" (with an inclusive glance
over the now thoroughly frightened Tessie) "that you are a mill
girl, and I know they are takin' on new hands at Woolston's, so
that sounds natural, but findin' you like this in the Ark--even
mother might think that a little bit stretched."

"Well, tell me the name of some one out this way, and I can say
I'm goin' there, and you can fix it by objectin' to takin' me.
Say, you didn't know when I got on how far I wanted to go."

"Some cute little fixer, you are," Frank admitted, and this was
the story Tessie clung to when Frank Apgar brought the girl into
his mother's house a few minutes later.

Thus began her adventure weeks ago. Each day and every night
adding new and more serious complications to the seemingly
innocent quest for a broader life than could be lived in the mill
end of Flosston, Tessie was compelled to add falsehood to
fabrication, to bear out her original story, and save herself from
being "picked up" and forcibly returned to her parents.

She knew the Franklin officer would trace her easily if she went
by frequented ways, so instead of looking for work in a mill she
sought and obtained employment in a family of rather influential
suburbanites. The scarcity of domestic help assisted her in this
enterprise, and being really skilled in handling machinery and
materials, it was not difficult for her to follow orders, and
assist a cook who was overjoyed to have help of any sort in the
big country residence.

But the little human butterfly had tried her wings, and she very
quickly found life at Appleton too tame for her liking. Directly
upon receiving pay for her first two weeks of service, Tessie (her
assumed name meant nothing to her or to us) said good-bye to
Rebecca the cook, and taking no chances with members of the family
who were "interested in her," she left Appleton and journeyed
forth again.

She had now acquired a new accomplishment. She could serve as
waitress or second girl, and this advantage almost assured her of
success in any sort of well-built community.

But it would be tame, slow, as Tessie figured it out, and only a
big city could possibly satisfy her ambition "to be somebody."

Then came the temptation which resulted so disastrously.

Out in Elmhurst, her next stop, a troop of girl scouts was
drilling when she stepped off the train. New clothes and a better
appearance, the result of that first pay at housework, had
converted the mill girl into quite an attractive young lady, and
as she waited at the pretty little square, watching the girl
scouts drill, something like envy possessed her.

Why did they always seem so settled, so prosperous and satisfied!
What was there in a mere society that could do all that for any
girl?

This question she asked almost audibly, for her lips moved and her
face betrayed a puzzled and aggressive look of defiance.

It was always that way with Tessie. She fought first and
investigated later. This unfortunate characteristic was
responsible for much of her perversity. She set herself against
conditions instead of trying to overcome them.

Never had her unhappy self felt more aggressive than now, as she
watched those girl scouts drill, every peal of laughter they sent
over the velvet green seemed to hiss at her, and every graceful
valiant maneuver of wig-wagging or physical drill added deeper
envy to her smoldering jealousy.

"That's the kind of thing Dagmar likes," she told herself. "Pity
some movie man couldn't get that picture. It would go fine at a
Sunday School mixup."

This last was another thrust at organized authority, but the
thought of Dagmar recalled the scout badge.

"Humph!" she scoffed. "Guess I could fool them if I wanted to.
I'll bet none of them has this grand marshall headlight!"

Her hand was on the little bag wherein lay that badge. Its pin was
entangled in threads of torn handkerchiefs, and its pretty clover
leaf was enameled with caked face powder and candy dust.

For a few moments she considered slipping her hand in the bag and
quickly pinning the badge on her pretty rose-colored sweater. Then
she could walk over to the drilling troop, and introduce herself
as a visiting scout, sure to be made welcome in Elmhurst.

"But they might catch me on their sign language," she decided.
"Guess I better wait until I get on to some of their deaf and dumb
stuff."

So for the moment she was saved, but the temptation was too
alluring to be easily vanquished. It was certain to return, and
that in an hour when seeming necessity offered a more urgent
excuse for its fulfillment. The scout badge in hands unconsecrated
was like a holy thing surrounded by evil--it would maintain its
own pure character unsullied, but evil mocked it--and the good,
like a frightened little fairy, hid itself deep in girl-scout
idealism, waiting for rescue.

Tessie was restive and unhappy. She had failed to gain by all her
risks and daring adventure. Not only had she lost her place, but
she had likewise lost her companions, and while unwilling to admit
it the girl felt keenly the separation from Dagmar.

"All the same," she declared, taking a last look at the girls in
their brown uniforms on the green square, "I'll be one of them
some day. They don't have to be too particular about girls they
are supposed to help. I'll give them a good chance to help little
old Tessie," and with that prophetic statement, more important to
her than the unhappy girl had any way of guessing, Tessie tried
for one more "place" to earn a little more money, that she might
eventually make her way toward a big city.




CHAPTER XIII

BROKEN FAITH


Following the directions given in her little printed slip cut from
the "Help Wanted" column in the Leader, Tessie had no trouble in
finding the place offered in such glowing terms. Every sort of
inducement was held out in the printed lines, for obtaining help
was a problem affording the most original methods of advertising,
and each month wages seemed to climb another round in the ladder
of higher salaries. The term "wages" went by the boards when the
fifty-dollar-a-month notch was knocked in prosperity's payroll.

The position, it was not the old time "situation," demanded little
of the applicant in the way of reference, and Tessie, already wise
in her new craft-knew well a telephone call from Mrs. Elmwood to
Mrs. Appleton would be sufficient guarantee of her honesty. She
had been strictly honest even to the point of picking up a few
scattered dimes, ostensibly dropped accidently, but really set
down as "bait" to test her honesty. She was also very wise for so
inexperienced a girl.

So with affirmative smiles the erstwhile employer engaged the
nice-looking, bright-looking young girl, whose olive skin and dark
eyes made her pretty, if a bit foreign and rather saucy.

"If Dagmar could see me now!" she mocked, patting the lace
butterfly cap on her neat hair and smoothing the lace sample of an
apron in the most approved screen world style. "This dress must
have been made for me, it fits so well," she commented, twirling
around in front of the modern mirror furnished in the second
maid's room, "and this house suits me very well," with a glance at
the fine fixings all about her. "Now for the china and silver.
I'll bet I'll surprise this shebang with my knowledge of right and
left, and my juggling with the forks and spoons. A new place is
all right while it's new, but it gets old awful quick after--well,
after pay day."

The black dress was stylishly short and gave Tessie a very chic
appearance, in fact although she was seventeen years she looked
much younger in the uniform, and she knew it.

Inevitably among the members of that household were two young
girls from the scout troop she had seen drilling that afternoon,
and quite as inevitably the table talk was entirely of the drill
and other scout activities.

It was all so simple after that. There in the sisters' rooms were
scout manuals, and these little blue books gave Tessie all the
information she needed. Each day while arranging the rooms she was
able to learn a lesson, and just when her statement was sure to
make the best effect she treated the girls to a story of her "girl
scout work." It was just like real fiction to Tessie, while Marcia
and Phillis Osborne could hardly believe their pretty puff-hidden
ears that they should have right in their own home a real girl
scout who had won a merit badge! Tessie positively declined to
discuss the "brave deed" she had consummated to obtain that badge,
also she refused just as positively to take any part in the scout
work of Elmhurst. It was delectable to have the girls beg her to
come to drill, and assure her no one need know she was employed as
a waitress.

But Tessie "adored the pose" as she learned to think herself, and
she had no idea of being caught in the official net of a scout
meeting, where all sorts of questions might be asked, the answers
to which could not even be hinted at in a scout manual.

Alma Benitz was the name she chose that night when Frank Apgar
escorted her from his "ark" to his mother's hospitality, and that
means of identification was serving her beautifully in the home of
Mrs. J. Bennington Osborne, Terrace End, Elmhurst.

It was all perfectly thrilling and Tessie felt each day she
mingled her "better days' smile" with a sob or a grin, for the
benefit of her sympathetic spectators, she would have given a
week's pay to have Dagmar seen the "hit" she was making.

"They'll be giving me French lessons if I don't watch out," she
told her looking-glass one night, and the confidential mirror
noticed the new girl actually sounded her "gs." Tessie was an apt
pupil, but brains more than hands need training to execute exact
science of "putting things over" all the time.

Also a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and the
weakest link in this adventurer's chain was the fact that she had
no means of communicating with her own folks or Dagmar, and
receiving any reply from them. She knew her own father too well to
risk letting him know anything of her whereabouts, and her two
letters to Dagmar could not be answered for lack of address. Now
Tessie had new clothes, and she would soon have more money--if
only she could get hold of Dagmar, and start off again on that
trip to the big city.

"Maybe the poor kid's in jail," she reflected. "She's just the
kind to get sent up to one of those dumps where they train girls!
Train them!" she repeated mockingly. "Swell training a girl gets
behind bars!

"But it would cost twenty-five dollars for both of us, and I'll
never live through earning that here," she followed. This general
summing up of the situation took place in her room, the night
before her first "afternoon off" and suppose--just suppose she
took a bunch of those scout tickets, and went out to the next town
and sold them! She might use that money to send to Dagmar and
replace it with her next week's pay!

So there was the temptation.

And she did not realize its dangers.

Nothing had ever been easier. Everyone wanted tickets for the
Violet Shut-in Benefit and every ticket brought fifty cents to the
attractive girl wearing the scout badge of merit.

"I call this luck, the kind that grows on bushes," she was
thinking, as in that strange town she hurried from door to door
with the violet bits of pasteboard that were printed to bring
cheer to the Shut Ins.

"Of course I'll replace this at once," she also decided. "I
wouldn't really touch a cent of this, even for one day, only I
must get Daggie out of her trouble wherever she is. It isn't fair
to leave her all alone to face the music."

Then came the thought of the possible joy she might experience if
she could but surprise Phyllis and Marcia with the sale of all
their tickets!

Still another consideration. Each girl was obliged to sell in a
certain territory and she was covering enough ground for the whole
troop.

"I guess I'm out of luck," she decided, "but this isn't so bad. I
believe I'd make a hit as a first rate book agent. Maybe I'll try
that next."

It was important that all her ground should be covered before the
public school would be dismissed, hence she quickened her steps,
and she had but two more tickets to dispose of when the rumbling
of a jitney attracted her attention.

It was Frank Apgar on the high front seat of his Ark.

"Without thought of danger, and only the prospect of a pleasant
chat with someone she knew, Tessie hailed Frank and climbed to the
seat beside him.

"Oh, I'm so glad to see you, Frank! How's the good old lady who
saved my life? I'll always remember her as my guardian angel. And
boy, those flap-jacks!"

"Mother's fine and she always asks if I see you. Now I'll have a
report to make," and he stared so at Tessie she felt
uncomfortable.

"What are you looking at?" she asked, her tone of voice condoning
the rudeness of her words.

"I'm just thinkin' you look a lot like some one I've been asked to
watch for. Did you light in from Flosston the night you crawled on
this Ark without botherin' the gong or brakes?"

For a single second Tessie felt her fright would betray her. Then
recovering her poise, with the keen necessity so obvious, she
laughed a merry laugh empty in ring, but full enough in volume.

"Flosston!" she repeated. "Say, when I get enough money I'm going
on an excursion there. I've always had a feeling it must be the
original rest cure. But say, Frank, if you want to know more than
I can tell you about my history, I have a little book with all the
facts in, and even a few baby pictures, I'd like to show you. I
have a swell place living out down in Como (opposite direction to
the Elmhurst address) and if you tell me what time you're due here
tomorrow I'll fetch along my illustrated pedigree!"

"Say, Sis, do you think you're funny, or is it some disease you've
got?"

"No, really, Frank, I'm not fooling. I have an album with my name
and all that in it, and when I come out for an airing to-morrow
I'll just bring it along."

How glad she was she had hidden the scout badge and the two unsold
tickets! The velvet bag rather heavy with silver, the proceeds of
ticket sales, Tessie handled carefully to avoid jingling.

Here was real danger! If Frank should decide she was the girl from
Flosston--runaway Tessie Wartliz!

"Well, all the same," Frank added, turning on the gas after a
slow-down for an old lady with a small boy and a large bundle, "I
have some regard for a girl who wants to cut loose and make good.
Can't see why a boy always gets away with it, and a girl is
slammed behind the shutters if she happens to disagree with the
opinions of the town council on the sort of toothbrush best for
grown girls! Now, Alma, I promised Jim Cosgrove I'd keep a
lookout, and sure thing you do tally with his illustrated funny
page he's been handin' out every trip I made since that stowaway
ride. I'm durned glad I didn't mention the stowaway. He'd be apt
to tear the gears apart to make sure you're not distributed in the
lubricating oil. He is sure set on findin' the girl who gave him
the slip. Can't stand a little thing like that against his golden
record."

Tessie determined to slip off the car at the next side street, and
make a detour to hide the route she must take to return to the
Osborne home.

"Well, so long, Frank. Here's where I detrain. Maybe I'll see you
to-morrow. Give my love to your mother, and I hope you find the
runaway girl," and she waved a merry good-bye that seemed to burn
the tips of the fingers she shook it from. Tessie was frightened,
she was panic stricken! The whole situation was becoming more and
more dangerous! She was using an assumed name, she had run away
from home, she had deceived the girl scouts, had sold their
tickets and--oh, what would she do now if Frank should tell that
officer!

Just in time to don her black dress and white cap, Tessie reached
the Osborne home. She was so nervous the silver rattled and the
china clicked, but the color in her cheeks was ascribed to the
"long walk" she had taken "away out Pembroke way."

During dinner Marcia and Phyllis talked continuously about the
benefit, and made all their plans for ticket selling. It would be
a notable benefit.

Later that evening Mrs. Osborne paid Tessie her first week's wages
and complimented her on her "splendid service." She was a woman
imbued with the wisdom of a keen appreciation of values, and she
knew well the value of encouragement to a young girl like Tessie,
but the latter was very miserable, and could scarcely hide the
fact.

Now why did the ghost of a small mistake have to haunt her just
when everything looked so rosy?

If only her mother and father could be counted on for a reasonable
understanding of the whole matter, but the loss of their
daughter's wages for so long would surely enrage the avaricious
father and anger the unreasonable mother. Not much hope crept into
poor Tessie's heart as late that night she packed her little bag,
and with many misgivings, overcome only by the strongest
resolutions to pay back the money, did she put the ticket proceeds
beside her week's wages in the well-worn purse.

The scout badge fairly begged her to reconsider. Its little wreath
and clover emblem, the meaning of which Tessie had learned from
Marcia's manual, mutely pleaded the cause of honor, and urged her
to sacrifice instead of deceit.

But Tessie was frightened and untrained, so that the new
reverence, with which she folded that badge in her best ironed
handkerchief, was not yet strong enough to call louder than the
voice of mockery which hissed of dangers and threatened disgrace.

It was very early next morning that the dew on the hedge was
shocked by a passing form making a rude getaway through the
hawthorne blossoms, and not even the gardener saw the girl who
jumped across the little creek instead of passing over the rustic
bridge.

"Something has happened to that girl," insisted Mrs. Osborne. "I
am not often mistaken, and I know she is not a common thief.
Marcia and Phyllis, you may refund the ticket money privately, and
I will consult with father about following up the child." This was
the verdict in the Osborne home upon the complex discovery of
stolen tickets and missing maid; but in spite of the mother's
warning, some one must have trusted some one else with the story,
for a brief account was used in the LEADER that night.

So this was the story that surprised the Girl Scouts of Flosston
and shocked Rose Dixon.

Surely the strings of our mythical May-pole are winding in a
circle of promise and surprise, for Tessie is gone and Rose is
going!

Coincidently, out in Flosston our own little girl scouts, Cleo,
Grace and Madaline, are worrying their pretty little heads over
the mystery of the woodsman who wrote the queer letter.

Would they risk writing and awaiting a reply from the hiding place
in the dark little cave of the hollow stone?




CHAPTER XIV

WOODLAND MAGIC


"Oh come on, girls! Don't bother waiting for the big girls.
They're going to drill. I can't wait to see the letter, Cleo. Did
you get Hal Crane? And will he surely take it for us?"

It was Grace who, dragging Cleo and attempting to lasso Madaline
with her book strap, besought her friends to hide away from their
companions that they might read the wonderful letter, and then
dispatch it to its post box under the stone in the River Bend
Woods.

"I'm so excited," Grace confessed. "I honestly do feel, girls,
something wonderful will come from our woodman mystery. His letter
proves he is nice."

"So you have given up the tramp idea, Grace," Cleo smilingly
remarked. "I'm glad of that. I didn't just fancy writing my best
stationery letters to some hobo."

"I'm perfectly sure he is a nice clean man," declared Grace, "for
there wasn't a smudge on that little note, and I have noticed
since that the paper is a fine quality. Oh, I am perfectly sure he
is a very nice young man," and the bright-eyed, pink-cheeked girl
laughed at her own deductions.

"But Mrs. Johnston's wash?" Madaline reminded her. "What about
that?"

"Why, perhaps he didn't steal that at all. He might even have
rescued the bag from a real tramp," replied the resourceful Grace.

"Hal is going to meet us at three-thirty down at the stone wall,"
injected Cleo, "and if you girls want to see this letter before he
flies off with it you had best come along. Of course he is coming
on his bicycle."

"Oh, yes, let's hear it," pleaded Grace. "I'm sure it's splendid.
I never could have answered that note myself."

Cleo accepted the compliment and the three little second-grade
scouts hurried along in the direction of the young willows, behind
which an ancient stone wall gave historic prestige to the now
modern Flosston.

Nimbly they sprang the wall and quickly they devoured the letter.
It read, from the hands of Grace, as follows:

"DEAR WOODSMAN: We girl scouts of True Tred Troop have decided to
answer your letter. Perhaps you need friends. If you do, could we
help you? Our rules oblige us to assist all fellow beings in
distress. Are you in need of help? You see, we not only can assist
others, but in doing so we earn promotion. When one of us tied you
up she thought it was brave to do so, but now we feel that may
have been a mistake."

Grace paused. She did not like the idea of admitting a mistake
even thus remotely.

"Couldn't we leave that out?" she asked Cleo.

"Why, no, how could we apologize and expect to make friends with
him if we didn't try to fix that tieing-up business?" Cleo
inquired.

"Oh, all right. I like the letter, Cleo. I was only wondering if
we couldn't forget that. I'll read the rest. Where was I? Oh, yes,
now listen!" and she continued:

"If there is any way we can help you or if you know any girls who
would like to join our troop, please leave another letter in this
same place.

"Very truly, THREE GIRLS OF TRUE TRED."

There was no time to discuss the last few paragraphs, for Hal
Crane was now seen flying along the macadam road.

"Be sure he knows just where to go," Cleo warned Grace, who had
sealed the letter and now stood waiting the courier.

"What's the idea, anyhow?" demanded Hal. "Isn't the post-office
good enough for your troop?"

"Oh, you see, Hal," Grace explained, "maybe our friend can't leave
the woods."

"Got something the matter that makes him hide out there, and you
don't mind exposing me to it?" Hal was laughing good-naturedly. He
evidently was just as keen on the adventure as were the girls.

"Now, you have promised to keep our secret, you know, Hal, and we
are sure we will find out something awfully interesting if he
answers this letter."

"Suppose he gobbles me up?" returned the big boy, thrusting out
his right arm expectantly.

"Oh, you know you have scoured and scouted these woods lots of
times, and I suppose you know every squirrel by name," Madaline
said. "But go on, Hal, and we'll wait here for you till you come
back. There may be another letter under the stone," and her cheeks
fairly burned in anticipation.

"Well, so long! Take a good look at me, girls. Your cave man may
turn me into a monkey or some other forest creature," and waving
his free hand, Hal Crane sped off like the modern boy-scout
courier he was.

"Nothing could possibly happen to him, do you think?" Grace asked
just a little anxiously. The memory of her own thrilling
experience in those woods had grown to something like a big black
shadow that dragged from her the bag supposed to contain Mrs.
Johnston's wash. And Grace also recalled the mysterious note
pointed out the fact that the writer still held on to the historic
piece of rope Grace had left around the figure at the tree, and,
just suppose the man should take revenge on Hal!

"Oh, goosey!" Cleo replied to her expressed fear. "Don't you
suppose a boy scout like Hal can take care of himself! Why, when
the men went out hunting for little Angelo Botana, Hal was the
very bravest of all. He even waded in the swamp knee deep when the
men couldn't manage the big drag nets. Why, Hal is as strong as
any man," Cleo valiantly insisted.

It was not now a simple matter for the scout girls to occupy their
time while awaiting the return of the messenger, even walking the
stone wall, and jumping the breaks, usually a popular pastime,
seemed flat and uninteresting now to them.

"Let's hunt four-leaf clovers," suggested Madaline, "and we will
give any we find to Captain Clark as a new pledge, like our own
clover-leaf badge."

"But ours are three-leaf, not four," Cleo reminded her. "Suppose
we hunt the oddest, the prettiest, and the biggest number of
varieties? See these lovely variegated ones. They come with the
pink blossoms. We might mount a whole display of leaves on one of
brother's butterfly glasses. I think it would do for a nature
study, also."

"Oh, yes, that's a perfectly splendid idea," applauded Grace. "I
haven't added a single discovery to my list this whole week."

So absorbed did they become in this newly invented task no one
noticed a wheel-chair being driven along the pleasant country
footpath. In the chair was a little girl about the age of the
scouts--perhaps fourteen years. Her pretty face betrayed not the
slightest hint of the infirmity which compelled her to recline in
that chair, in fact her cheeks were as pink as the much-lauded
color Grace was so often complimented upon, but which to herself
seemed rudely healthy.

Directly in line with the three scouts who were crawling through
the grass, hunting clovers, the nurse propelling the chair drew
her little passenger to the roadside and stopped.

All the girls hunched up on their knees like human "bunnies" and
the little girl in the wheel chair laughed outright.

Cleo stared her surprise.

"Oh, please excuse me for laughing," spoke the child, "but you
look too cunning--just like--like colored animals," she faltered.

Cleo smiled her forgiveness, while at that moment Madaline shouted
the find of the first four-leaf clover.

"And such a lovely big fat one!" she qualified, now skipping over
the tall grasses quite kangaroo fashion.

"A four-leaf clover!" exclaimed the girl in the wheel chair as her
nurse moved on.

"Oh, why didn't we show it to her!" lamented Cleo. "She can't walk
to pick them!"

"But she didn't tell us who she was," objected Grace.

"I don't care. I'm just going to run after her and give her this
four-leaf clover," declared the warm-hearted Madaline. "I think we
were awfully stiff and snippy," and without waiting for approval
she hurried after the disappearing chair, just as it turned into
the avenue.

"Would you like this!" offered Madaline, almost breathless as she
overtook the two strangers.

"Oh, I should love it!" exclaimed the little girl, the sincerity
in her voice and expression vouching for the truth of her simple
words.

Madaline wanted to say something else, but feared to touch on the
delicate subject of the little girl's infirmity. So she merely
smiled, and said she could find plenty more, and that she was a
girl scout doing a little nature work.

"Oh, a girl scout!" exclaimed the little invalid, her eyes fairly
blazing enthusiasm.

"Yes," replied Madaline, edging away. "We have a lot of fun being
scouts. Good-bye!" and she ran off without affording herself a
chance to say anything else.

"Did she take it!" asked Grace unnecessarily.

"Yes, and she just loved it. But I couldn't think what to say, and
I said we had fun in being scouts, when I saw she couldn't move
for any kind of fun. Wasn't that awful?" wailed Madaline.

"No," the practical Cleo assured her embarrassed companion. "It is
always well to speak of scout work. Perhaps she will take an
interest in it now. But look! Here comes Hal. Oh, I wonder what
news he has!"

The girl in the wheel chair was quickly forgotten with the
approach of the boy.

"Oh, he has a letter! See how he wags his head!" exclaimed Grace.

"Yep, I got one!" the boy called, now near enough to make himself
heard. "Do I hear the good news?" he inquired, handing over the
yellow envelope.

"It's for me!" Grace insisted, making sure of the prize.

"It's addressed to the 'Scout Bandit'" announced Hal. "I don't
know that I would stand for that, Grace," but the girl, nervously
attempting to open the yellow envelope, paid no attention to the
insinuation. "Thank you so much, Hal," Cleo had the politeness to
express. "Come on over to the bridge, and maybe we will tell you
what's in the letter."

"No, thank you," he refused. "I'm due at a baseball practice and
late now. So long, girls. Hope you make your points, whatever they
are, by all that woodland stuff," and with commendable disregard
for possible thrills, Hal turned his wheel in the direction of the
ball field.

Now what girl could possibly have resisted the chance of sharing
the woodland secret? Yet, being a boy, Hal ignored the offer and
happily raced off to his belated ball practice.

"We can all squat down in this patch of grass," suggested
Madaline, who, as yet, had not even glimpsed the envelope Grace
had passed on to Cleo. "Do let's read it!" she begged impatiently.

"All right!" and Grace did squat down beside the others on the
little patch of grass that hung over the deep gutter. "Now
listen!" (Needless admonition.)

"'Little Bandits,'" she began, "'if you find this I will know you
are going to play our game. First I must tell you I have to keep
my identity secret for some time yet. My reason for doing so is a
worthy one, which I will some day make clear to you. But I am not
a lazy tramp, nor a wild woodsman in the ordinary sense, so, if
you will keep faith, we can play a wonderful game.'"

Grace paused and breathed audibly.

"There!" she exclaimed. "I knew he would be nice."

"After you decided not to have him a horrid old tramp," teased
Madaline.

"Oh, read it, Grace," Cleo insisted. "What does he want us to
do?"

She resumed reading the rather broad sheet that might have been
called typewriter paper, if the girls had been familiar with its
style.

"Let me see. Oh, yes. 'Will you do something for me?'" she
continued reading. "'If you have any little book of your rules and
plans, and if you will leave one in the hollow stone for me, some
day I will repay you for your confidence.

"'Your victim, "'THE MAN BY THE TREE.'"

"Oh, what can he want a scout book for?" eagerly asked Grace,
folding the letter.

"We couldn't give it, without permission--unless, it would be too
bad to give away our secret to get permission," pouted Grace.

"We might get permission without telling all about it," suggested
Cleo adroitly. "We could say we wanted to influence a stranger,
and besides, anyone can buy a manual in the stores."

"Of course," decided Madaline, happy that the secret would not be
spoiled. "Perhaps he wants--"

"To be a scout!" roared Grace in one of her gales of laughter.
"Wouldn't it be too funny if he were to fall in love with Captain
Clark!"

"And marry her!" topped off Cleo.

"Then your noble deed, Grace, would be noble indeed," added
Madaline.

"I guess Miss Clark can marry whom she pleases. She's very
pretty."

"And her dad is rich too, so I don't believe we can solve our
mystery that way," finished Cleo, and none of the three had quite
decided just how she would like to end it when the five o'clock
bell from the "Home" out Clinton way chimed a warning hour.

"So late!" exclaimed Grace, "and I have to practice before tea."

"And I have to help mother, for Martha's out," added Madaline.

"Let's run," suggested Cleo, and those who happened to see the
trio scampering along never could have guessed they guarded so
carefully the mystery of the woodsman's letter.




CHAPTER XV

VENTURE TROOP


The girls of Franklin Mills were finally organized and began work
just as Molly Cosgrove had planned. Venture Troop immediately
became a band of active, enthusiastic and withal capable girls,
bringing to the scout movement a new vigor and promise, the result
of individual self-discipline and the indispensible power of
personal responsibility.

It must be understood here that girls employed in factories may
lack social education, but they are always more self-reliant, more
capable of handling emergencies and difficulties, and more surely
skilled in precision and mechanical accuracy than are the girls of
same age situated in the more fortunate walks of life, the
difference in comparison being always in favor of normal
conditions, and general education, because of the balance and
mental ability acquired through our modern schools and progressive
methods.

But the mill girl is never an inferior, and in the exact science
of skill, she can easily and at any time outdistance the most
brilliant high-school graduate, for skill is her education, and
she handles, and fingers, and computes sometimes many thousands of
delicate threads, or intricate bits of metal, the slightest fumble
of which might throw out of gear a powerful machine. This is
applied mathematics, is it not? She uses no pencil nor paper, but
counts by allowing one line to overlap another at every five
hundred cards, done in some fine print work, and when ten five
hundred cards show that almost invisible margin, she knows she has
pasted five thousand!

Thus we may realize at the outset that the Venture Troop of
Franklin Scouts comprises a formidable array of certain talent,
and this must be respected, while education in broader lines is
recorded through our little story.

Rose now felt her responsibility with a thrill of delight. Even
her anxiety concerning Tessie was allayed in this newly found
service. It was no longer a question of one girl, but the matter
of many; nor would Rose attempt to desert her post as patrol
leader, when the young, eager, enthusiastic members of that troop
looked to her for a leadership expected from one who so thoroughly
understood their characters.

Lieutenant Cosgrove, now Captain of the Venture Troop, had
impressed upon the girl her duties in leading, gently but firmly,
along the scout lines, which had been modified to fit in
reasonably with the scheme of Americanization.

While it was perfectly true that the parents of Rose would welcome
her in the Connecticut town, they had not urged her to leave
Franklin, in fact a late letter hinted labor conditions around the
Brodix family were not as yet all satisfactorily adjusted, but
Dagmar (Rose) "could come if she wanted to," her brother had
written. This meant it would be wise for her not to go just yet.

Leaving the meeting room that evening after the organization, and
in company with a number of her patrol, Rose quite forgot Tessie,
and the stigma of publicity concerning that ticket money, and the
possible unlawful use of the lost merit badge.

Buzzing like bees, asking volumes of questions, and pouring out
enough suggestions to furnish programmes for troops rather than
planning for a single patrol, the girls surrounded Rose with such
confidence as to almost sweep the little blonde off her feet.
Perhaps her intimacy with Captain Cosgrove placed her in this
preferred class, at any rate as a patrol leader Rose found herself
both popular and influential.

Mary Furniss insisted on planning a hike for the following
Saturday afternoon. Dora Silber believed a long trolley ride would
be more enjoyable, while Mona Markovitz urged the formation of a
girls' ball team to rival the players of Branchville.

"It's just like having our own union," remarked Jennie Dupre, a
pretty little Canadian, "only we are sure to be safe from picket
duty in the scouts."

"We're not either," corrected Marie Engelka. "We may have to
patrol in case of any local trouble. Wouldn't we look swell in our
uniforms?" and she marched on ahead with arm thrust bolt upright
in lieu of a gun, while Dora Silber sounded the tattoo of a drum
on Mona Markowitz's new straw sailor hat. Mona was short and had
to stand the consequences.

"And all the brave things we have to do! Say, Rose, what did you
do to get by all those tests?" demanded Erica Jentz.

"Oh, I just studied," faltered Rose, "and then I did without
things to send money to the folks. I don't like to talk about
sacrifices, but I am only trying to show you what you can do to
make good," she finished rather lamely. There was one brave act
Rose longed to accomplish, but just then the chances for its
undertaking seemed remote.

"Our folks better watch out," cautioned Mary Furniss, "I'm to
learn bed-making, and I have to leave home at six-thirty. That
means an early dumping for sister Jane, who goes to English
School. We always used to call her Jennie, but now she's Jane,"
and Mary mocked the plain American title with a shrill rising
inflection.

"Wasn't it funny how we all laughed on the question of earning
fifty cents," remarked Jeanette. "Looked as if we thought earning
money was a big joke."

"No, that wasn't it, Jean," corrected Dora. "It was making it
fifty cents. Why, that wouldn't tip the 'chink' who irons our
shirtwaists," and the original laugh was encored.

"Are your folks all gone from Flosston, Rose?" Mary Furniss
inquired, just as the little procession was about to break ranks
for respective individual "barracks."

"Oh, yes. Father got good work in Connecticut, and I may go soon,"
replied Rose frankly.

"You've got a swell boardin' house," commented Nora Noon, the one
Irish girl in the new patrol, "and I heard some one say Mrs.
Cosgrove was going to start a big lunch-counter for us girls. They
call it a cafeteria. Can you picture little Nora sittin' up
against anything like that for her corned beef and cabbage!" and
the joke epidemic went the usual rounds.

"If anyone could make a lunch counter go, it surely ought to be
Mrs. Cosgrove," affirmed Erica Jentz, "for she just keeps her tea-
pot going all the time, and my mother says she never lets her cake
run out for fear some one would come in between meals."

"Well, it's a sure thing if they come in at meals, they need cake,
and if they come in between meals they would be glad to have cake,
so it seems to me on that plan Mrs. Cosgrove must need a home
bakery," analyzed Dora Silber. "But I'll say, girls, a cafeteria,
whatever it is, would be lots better than a lunch-box, and I hope
we get it. So long, scouts. Here's where I turn in. Rose, I'll be
ready for drill any time you say, if I'm not eatin' or sleepin'.
Don't worry about the other 'dooties' of life. S'long, girls!
Olive-oil, Jean! That's French for good-bye, isn't it?" and while
Jean insisted au revoir was no relation to the term used, the
girls paired off, and left Rose with Nora to finish her two more
blocks to the Cosgrove cottage.

"I think it will be great for all of us," Nora conceded. "You
know, Rose, they're all a jolly lot, but they don't have a great
deal of fun. They can laugh at almost anything, but that's because
they're so healthy and good natured. I often lend them books.
Father has a lot of them, and I do believe our club will be just
the thing for all of us," and the girl called Irish, but who was
really a solid little American, emphasized her statement by
kicking over the only loose stone in the well-tended driveway that
bordered the "big house" at Oak Corners.

"Yes, I think it will be fine," agreed Rose. "But I hope I will be
able to--to be a wise leader," she qualified.

"That's why Captain Cosgrove selected you," said Nora. "We are to
be self-governing, and every member must be a business girl.
That's better than being just mill girls," Nora declared. "But
it's lots nicer to have a leader who just knows all about us. It
will give the girls more courage and all that! Don't you worry
about being wise enough. If there is anything to be learned you
can count on a double quick education from us, Rosie. Good-night.
Tell Mrs. Cosgrove we can smell the doughnuts all ready!" and Nora
skipped off in the direction of a gentle light that shone from the
reading lamp of Thomas Noon, one time caretaker of a famous Celtic
estate, but now plain worker as gateman in Franklin Silk Mills.

Alone for the few moments occupied in reaching the Cosgrove's
home, Rose turned the problem of Tessie over and over in her
troubled mind. She felt keenly the need of confidence, but could
not bring herself to tell this story now to Molly Cosgrove.

"How could I make her understand why I delayed all this time?" she
reflected. "No, I must wait for another letter. Perhaps I'll get
one to-morrow. Anyhow our new troop is just fine, and I mean to be
a real patrol leader," decided the girl, imbued with the same
enthusiasm that seemed to permeate the entire girl-scout movement.

Have you ever been called upon to lead others?

Do you know the joy of using your own personal power in a well-
organized and carefully directed plan?

If so, you may share the enthusiasm of Rose Dixon, the young
patrol leader of Venture Troop of Girl Scouts.

Back once more with her own congenial companions, she almost
wished she had not so altered her name. True, Rose Dixon was not
far removed from Dagmar Rosika Brodix. Rose was Rosika, and Dixon
from the last syllable of Brodix with the usual suffix "on" did
not really seem so far from the original, and in the sensational
days, when the two towns were stirred up with the gossip of the
runaway girls, the change seemed the only plan, but now Rose felt
a shadow of deceit in the use of the American name.

"At the same time," she decided finally, "lots of people change to
more simple-sounding names, and it was better to start out without
that mistake following me. I suppose Tessie has changed her name
as often as she does her sleeping places. Poor girl! I do wish she
could come back and get a start such as I have."

And another girl in another town was thinking just that in another
way.




CHAPTER XVI

MORE MYSTERIES


"I know what we'll do," decided Grace as the three young scouts
discussed the secret correspondence with the man o' the woods. "We
must tell Margaret Slowden. She knows best and Margy wonders what
we are whispering about all the time."

"Yes," promptly agreed Madaline. "I think that is the best plan.
Margaret said the other day we were acting as if we had a troop of
our own instead of being True Treds."

"We would be perfectly safe in telling Margaret," Cleo followed.
"And she can help us best because she has already received a merit
badge."

"And lost it," added Grace.

"Received another," amended Madaline.

"I feel a little timid about all the woodsy part," admitted Cleo,
"because we haven't any way of finding out about our cave man
except spying on him, and that would be so risky it would demerit
instead of meriting us. You know we all had to promise to be
prudent," she finished.

"But we won't tell the twins," Grace restricted, "that would spoil
the whole secret."

So it was arranged that Margaret Slowden should be admitted to the
inner circle, and after school that afternoon the marvelous story
was told.

Margaret finally gasped. She swallowed something like a tiny bug
with the intake. The girls were all squatted in the little tepee
made from the school-house shutters, and Margaret always chewed
clovers and sweet grass. After a coughing fit she was able to hear
the remainder of the weird story of Grace and her man o' the
woods.

"And why couldn't you see him?" demanded Margaret.

"Why!" exclaimed the indignant Grace. "Do you think you would be
able to take notes on appearances with a coil of rope in one hand
and a big slip knot ready to work off in the other, when you had
to run around a tree without waking the man!"

"But what did he look like?" demanded the inquisitor.

"All I could see was feet--no, it was shoes--and a hat pulled
down."

"All movie men have their hats pulled down," interrupted Margaret.
"Maybe some one was working a camera on the other side of a tree."

"You're just horrid, Margaret," Grace pouted, "and I won't tell
you another word about it!"

"Why, Grace, I'm not teasing! You know, all big things like that
turn out to be movie stunts--making the pictures, you know.
Although, of course, your mystery may be real. But what are you
going to do about it?"

"We planned to send the scout book just as, he asked, and then
wait, also as he asked, until something happens we don't know
what. Then we expect he will reveal his identity," and this last
clause had a very dignified tone to the girlish ears.

"That seems perfectly all right," Margaret rendered her verdict,
"and none of our rules in any way could oppose that. The only
thing is, we girls would be obliged to shun the woods because we
are ordered, you know, to avoid unnecessary danger, and cave men
are supposed to be very wild and woozy."

Details were all finally arranged, and Hal Crane was to pay one
more trip to the woods, there to deposit the small blue book of
scout data in the big hollow of the charmed rock.

"Suppose he turns out to be some great man who might give us a new
park or something like that," ventured Madaline rather hazily,
"then we would all come in for honors, wouldn't we?"

"I would rather come in for the park," Cleo inserted. "We need a
few more if we are going to do much drilling this summer."

"That man might be a writer, camping out there, who wants
material," speculated Margaret. "You know, the River Bend Wood is
considered very romantic. An artist painted the falls once."

"Too snaky for camping, though," objected Cleo. "Well, at any
rate, girls, we have got to practice wig-wagging this afternoon,
so let's wiggle along. Have you heard all about the Venture Troop,
of Franklin? That awfully pretty little blonde girl, who was at
our meeting one night, you know, is a patrol leader, and they have
wonderful things planned."

"I heard something the other day that gave me the creeps,"
confessed Margaret. "I wasn't going to say anything about it, but
since you all have mysteries, I might as well share mine."

"Oh, what's it about? Scout stuff?" demanded Grace, her cheeks
toning up to the excitement key.

"Yes, of course. You all remember the night I lost my precious
badge? Well, that was the same night two girls ran away from
Flosston. Mother offered all sorts of rewards for the return of my
badge, for I did prize it so," and the brown eyes glinted topaz
gleams at the memory.

"Oh, yes. We called it your D. S. C. because you got it for
guarding the cloakroom the night your brother received his
decoration," recalled Cleo.

"Yes, and it was very strange in this town, where every one knew
all about it, that I never heard from it since," went on Margaret
with a show of considerable importance. "Now here is my mystery.
One day last week I received an anonymous letter, just two lines
long. It said, 'Don't give up. You will get your badge back some
day soon.' Now, why, do you suppose, anyone who has it is holding
it?"

"Maybe some of the boys just playing a joke," suggested Grace.

"Oh, no, the boys wouldn't wait all this time for their joke;
besides, there's no fun in that," analyzed Margaret. "Please don't
say anything about it, girls, but since you told me your secret, I
thought I ought to tell you mine. There come the other girls. Come
on for the wig-wagging. I just love to stand up on the library
steps and wave. Hope Captain Clark gives me that place," and the
quartette were off to join forces with others of the True Treds,
with their signal flags of red and white.

It was usual to have spectators on wig-wagging practice days, and
this afternoon an unusual number seemed to take time to stop and
notice the picturesque scouts. The troop girls had worn their
uniforms, to school that afternoon, so as to be ready for an early
start, and in the glorious sunshine, striking in golden rays
through the deep green elms for which the village was noted, the
troop girls, with their signal flags, made an attractive picture.

Captain Clark stood far off on a mound of green, waving her
"questions," and each girl answered the code as the messages were
relayed and transmitted. The younger girls were promptly
qualifying, and it was very evident the coming tests for higher
degrees would find our especial little friends ready to advance.

Coming down from the terraces where they had been stationed, Grace
and Cleo observed a handsome limousine drawn up to the curb where
the occupants could have viewed the wig-wagging to advantage.

"Oh, there's that lovely girl that was in the wheel-chair!"
exclaimed Madaline.

"I believe she would speak to us if she were near enough,"
commented Cleo.

"What a stunning car!" added Madaline. "What a pity the little
girl cannot walk."

"That's about the way generally," finished Cleo vaguely. "But run!
There go Margaret and Winnie McKay," and the bright-eyed, pink-
cheeked child, so eagerly watching the girl scouts through the
open window of the big gray car, was soon forgotten in the more
urgent demands of the wig-wag report.

The lesson had been noted "Satisfactory" and Captain Clark had
good reason to be proud of her True Treds.




CHAPTER XVII

JACQUELINE


The words of Frank Apgar still rang in the frightened ears of
Tessie, when she stole away from the Osborne place, so very early
the following morning. Now her continued failures were assuming
discouraging proportions indeed, and she knew the result of
"borrowing" that ticket money. She could never hope for a good
word of recommendation from Mrs. Osborne, and without it she could
not obtain employment. To seek work in the mills now would be
equivalent to throwing herself on the mercy of the public, for she
knew perfectly well every mill had been notified to watch for her.

To her obsessed mind her faults were now serious beyond belief--
she had actually stolen money! What at first seemed a mere matter
of "borrowing" until she could work one more little week to pay it
back, had suddenly become a crime impossible to atone.

Desperately she tramped through the long country roads, tugging
her bag, using it often as a stool to rest on. No one noticed the
girl--maids often left employment in Elmhurst and journeyed out to
the trolley line just as she was doing.

Childish laughter and the capering of a very white toy poodle dog
attracted Tessie's attention, as she stopped in front of the
entrance to a very handsome estate. Through the iron rails of a
very high fence could be seen the girl responsible for the silvery
laughter. She was seated in a small wheel-chair, and at her feet
lay a young man lounging on the velvet grass, that was cropped so
close the blades looked like a woven tapestry of magic green.

"Now, Jack," Tessie heard the young man say, "I will do all the
things thou badest me, but please don't ask a fellow to climb
trees. I'm too big for the limbs, and I should hate to break the
pretty branches. Necks don't count, of course." His voice was so
jolly Tessie listened behind the iron post of the open gateway.

"Well, all right, Prince Charming. I won't ask you to climb the
tree, but Jerry--I can hardly wait. Oh, isn't it too wonderful?"
and the pretty little girl clapped her hands quite like any
ordinary youngster.

Here was Tessie's chance. These were a different sort of people
and perhaps they would take her on without any reference!

Acting on the moment's impulse, she picked her bag up and entered
the gate. The young man sat bolt upright and seemed inclined to
laugh.

"Oh, wherever did you come from?" asked the girl in the chair. "We
were just telling fairy stories," and she smiled as if Tessie had
been a sequence to the tale.

"I'm looking for work," spoke Tessie bravely, "and this seemed
such a big place, do you know if they need any extra help?"

The child shot a volley of meaning glances at the young man.
Anyone could have interpreted the code as signifying interest and
pleasure.

"We would have to consult the housekeeper," the young man answered
quickly. He gave his head a defiant toss, contradicting the joy
expressed by his sister.

"Oh, but perhaps--" faltered the girl. "Gerald, don't you think
maybe you and I might manage to take this nice girl to work? I'd
just love to have a very young person to talk to when I can't have
you," and the big blue eyes rolled oceans of appeal into the face
of the handsome brother.

"Jack, you know I'm your slave," he answered. "But even I cannot
always manage Mrs. Bennet. But we can ask her," smiling at Tessie.
"Come along!" He sprang to his position at the wheel-chair. "Mrs.
Bennet should be glad enough to grant any favor on so perfect a
morning."

"Then don't forget our plans, Jerry," the sister cautioned
mysteriously. "If it all works out as I am dreaming, brother, oh,
what a glorious time we will have! Come on"--to Tessie--"I'm just
going to make Mrs. Bennet take you on. She's awfully particular,
but since I haven't been able to walk I just impose on brother
Gerald. And he has been so kind," patting the hand resting round
her chair, "and couldn't you and I have good times together? What
shall I call you?" she asked naively.

"Stacia Wertz," replied Tessie, assuming another name to cover her
knowledge of the Osborne situation.

"That's from Anastasia, isn't it?"

"Now, Jacqueline," spoke the brother, "I have to run in town early
this morning, so if we are going to storm the Bennet we had best
mass for the attack. Suppose we sit here," as they reached a
rustic bench, "and prepare our story."

A half-hour later, in spite of all protests from the particular
Mrs. Bennet, who as housekeeper for Gerald Douglass and his young
sister Jacqueline, had good reason to value her reputation, Tessie
(now Stacia) was engaged. Her especial duties were to be with
Jacqueline, and Mrs. Bennet deplored to Mr. Gerald the fact that
this young girl brought no reference.

"But she is so young, Margaret," he had replied. "I am sure we can
supervise. And you know, Jack has been taking a lot of my time
lately. Yet the doctor says her ultimate cure depends on her
cheerful frame of mind, and she is getting along so beautifully.
He expects to try the strength of her limbs in ten days more."

It was this arrangement that won the day for Tessie, and once more
the black clouds of anxiety rolled away to disclose a rift of new
interest, and a gleam of new-found joy. No one could touch the
life of Jacqueline Douglass without sharing its delight. The
child, temporarily disabled through an acute ailment, had been
enjoying every delight her handsome big brother could procure for
her, and even in this almost unbelievable paradise "Jack" remained
unspoiled, and her active brain was still capable of inventing new
wonders.

The home was nothing short of paradise to Tessie. Even the lovely
Osborne home seemed unimportant compared with Glenmoor, the
country estate of wealthy Gerald Douglass and his pet sister.

The house was of stone and brick, its trimmings beautifully
grained oak and its decorations, all in mellow golds and browns,
were as soft yet as varied as the tones of the early chestnut
burr. Jacqueline was a russet blonde, just gold enough in her hair
to deepen the glints, and with the blue eyes and that incomparable
complexion so often associated with "red gold hair," it seemed to
Tessie nature had been very partial indeed in bestowing her gifts
when Jacqueline Douglass was fashioned.

It was the second day of her service at Glenmore that Tessie
overheard her young mistress use the name "Marcia" when calling
over the telephone.

"Marcia! Might it be Marcia Osborne!" Tessie almost gasped. Then
when she heard further a "good-bye, and Jacqueline hoped they
would all have a lovely trip west," Tessie breathed freely. Yes,
the Osbornes had planned a trip west, and no doubt they were
going. This seemed to Tessie rare good luck. Marcia, Phillis and
Mrs. Osborne were surely off for their trip.

"Now I'm going to write Dagmar," decided Tessie--"poor little kid!
I feel like a quitter to have left her alone all this time. I
wonder if I couldn't go out there and look for her? Everything
seems to be blown over, and even mother and father might be glad
to see me."

With a girl's unqualified impulse, Tessie quickly wrote an
effectionate letter to her mother and sealed in it a five-dollar
bill. This would surely prepare the way. Then she wrote a second
letter, this one to Dagmar, care of the Flosston post-office, and
as the mail for Rose Dixon and Dagmar Brodix was promptly mailed
to Mrs. Cosgrove at Franklin, Tessie planned better than she knew
in hoping thus to reach her abandoned companion. Her letters
finished, Tessie (for the time Stacia) slipped down the palatial
hall to the door of Jacqueline's sunset room, to inquire if the
young mistress needed any attention. It was one of those prolonged
days in early summer when night seems unable to break in on the
soft, pelucent shadows of sunset meeting twilight. Tessie found
Jacqueline sitting in her Sleepy Hollow chair, the shaded green
robes tossed about giving the picture such tones as a pastel might
embody.

"Oh, do come in, Stacia," called Jacqueline. "I am just reading
this girl scout manual and can't understand these signal tests.
Did you ever see one of these manuals?" and again Tessie was
confronted with the persistent little blue book which had so
conspicuously affected her life.

"I have something you would just love!" exclaimed Tessie, taking
impulse from Jacqueline's enthusiasm. "I--that is, a friend of
mine found it. It's a merit medal," she had declared almost before
she realized what she was about.

"Oh, a real merit badge?" asked Jacqueline. "Not really a genuine
badge of merit? Those are all registered and can only be used by
the original owners."

"I'll show you," agreed Tessie, and now there was no turning back.
The girl, too helpless to share in scout activities, was examining
and fondling that merit badge a moment later, and seeing her
delight, Tessie felt amply repaid for her generosity.

"I'll tell you!" decided the child, pinning the little wreathed
clover leaf on her silk negligee, "I'll keep it carefully, and
every day you and I can make our scout pledges. Then, when I know
you long enough to be awfully sure you understand it, I am going
to let you into a wonderful secret. Won't that be splendid?" and
her blue eyes begged confidence from the brown eyes, as both girls
thrilled with scout magic.

"Oh, yes, I would love to know your secret," Tessie felt obliged
to reply, "and maybe some day we will find the girl who lost the
badge."

This ended the transfer of the much-prized emblem, and in giving
its story Tessie succeeded in covering the detail of locality by
vaguely stating "a girl friend found it and gave it to her." So
Jacqueline had no means of knowing of its connection with the Girl
Scouts of True Tred Troop.

That night Tessie felt a peculiar relief. It was as if some great
burden had been lifted from her. To give to dear Jacqueline
anything worthy of her was in itself a thing worth doing, and to
make good use of the badge was also an important consideration.

"I never had any luck since I carried that around with me!" she
decided, but that was a false statement. There never is, nor never
was any question of "luck." The real fact of the matter was simply
that Tessie, while in possession of the little badge, was
continually reminded of its purpose, and the ideals it stood for,
so that in her rather reckless career the emblem confronted her
with constant mute appeal.

Meanwhile, Jacqueline refused the urgent demands of her nurse that
she retire.

"No, nursie dear. Do be lovely to me tonight," she pleaded, "and
let me wait for Jerry. I have the most glorious news for him."

"If all of this nonsense does you good, Jacqueline, I am sure I
shall not oppose it," replied the nurse. "But personally, it is
beyond my experience. There is Mr. Gerald now. Just ring when you
want me."

So Jacqueline was left to tell the handsome big brother about her
wonderful acquisition.

The merit badge of True Tred Troop!




CHAPTER XVIII

DAISIES AND DANGERS


In the week following Tessie made a number of acquaintances about
Glenmoor, not the least among such being Frank Pierson, the grocer
boy, and glad to see a young girl on the big estate, Frank
promptly asked Tessie to take a ride out in the country with him
some afternoon, and quite as promptly, Tessie accepted the
invitation.

"I have to deliver out Flosston way tomorrow," said Frank. "What
do you say to coming along?"

"Flosston!" repeated Tessie. She hesitated. Would she risk taking
a look at the town in the mill end of which were still located the
deserted members of her family?

"What's the matter? Don't you want to go?" pressed Frank, as she
withheld her reply.

"Oh, yes, of course I'll go," Tessie answered then, and having
said she would go, the question of caution seemed to have solved
itself. After all, the grocer would have no business in the
factory district, and it would be so good to see the familiar
places again. Since her coming to Jacqueline's everything seemed
so much brighter, her old fears of capture and perhaps detention
in a corrective institution, had almost disappeared, and the
prospect of a country ride with Frank Pierson afforded pleasant
speculation indeed.

"You may bring me a big bunch of daisies," Jacqueline told her, in
granting permission for the afternoon out. "Since you came I have
almost lost Jerry. But then, he was so very good, I am sure he
should have been given a vacation."

The little grocery wagon did not have to delay for its passenger
when next afternoon Prank, with a clean blouse and his cap at
exactly the right tilt, called to deliver goods and "collect"
Tessie.

Starting out along the broad avenue, Gyp, the brown horse,
jauntily drew the light yellow wagon, holding his head up quite as
proudly as any flashy cob that passed with the fancy equipage in
turn-out for the lovely afternoon driving. Presently, from the
fashionable thoroughfare Frank turned into the "Old Road," that
wended along railroad and river lines out Flosston way.

"You can drive here," he conceded, handing the reins to Tessie. "I
don't have to make another stop for half a mile."

"I used to drive long ago, when I was a little girl with
pigtails," she answered, taking the lines. "Gyp is gentle, isn't
he?"

"Yep, mostly he is. But he scares up, once in a while. Doesn't
like an umbrella shot up under his nose, and I've seen him dance
at a postal card flaring up with the wind."

Entering Flosston, Tessie felt more emotion than she expected to
experience. That last night in the town, when she and Dagmar
waited at the station; their dispute over the road they should
take; the finding of the badge, and the return of the girl scouts
in search of it: all this surged over her like a cloud, covering
the bright sunshine that danced through the trees. Frank evidently
observed her preoccupation, for he made frantic efforts to be
especially entertaining.

Once, when the post-office clerk emerged from the drug-store,
Tessie pulled her hat down until the pin at back tugged viciously
in her coil of black hair. That clerk might recognize her, and her
folks surely called for mail occasionally. But the clerk never
raised his head, as Gyp sauntered along, and it was a relief to
make sure that her new and different outfit was a complete
disguise. No one would now recognize her as Tessie Wartliz, of
Fluffdown Mills.

"I have to get Miss Douglass some daisies. See that lovely field
over there! Could we stop long enough for me to gather a bunch?"
she asked Frank presently.

"Sure thing!" replied the boy merrily. "I only have to turn in a
few more boxes, and then my time's my own. Sometimes I take my
sister Bessie when I come out here, and once mother came. But she
wanted to knit. Can you beat that: knitting on a grocery wagon?"

"Oh, folks who like it knit in their sleep, I guess," replied
Tessie, giving the reins to Frank that he might turn safely into
the field over the rough little hill at the roadside.

"And say," went on Frank, "I put a chair in back for ma, and rode
along the avenue as innocent as a lamb. Of course I was whistling
and can you guess what happened?"

"Mother went out the back way?" asked Tessie.

"Surest thing you know. I looks back, and there went ma and her
cane-seat chair, doing a regular cake-walk, along the boulevard.
Oh, man! What she didn't say to me!" and Frank shouted a laugh
that made Gyp jump clear over the last hillock.

"Best to sit on stationary seats when one goes grocery riding,"
commented Tessie. "Now I'll pick daisies, and you can whistle all
you like."

"But I'm goin' to pick," insisted Frank. "I'll race you," and with
the boy's proverbial love of sport, even picking daisies became a
novel game.

It took but a short time to fill arms with the plentiful white
blossoms, tacked on their green stems with gold buttons, and
presently Tessie was ready to embark again, after Frank had
deposited both bunches of daisies in an empty box back of the
seat.

Out on the road once more, Tessie caught sight of a girl she knew
well. It was Nettie Paine, who sold spools of crochet cotton in
the little fancy shop, and how glad Tessie would be to stop and
buy a few spools just now! She could make such a pretty camisole
top--but--no, it would be foolish to take such a risk. So she
reluctantly turned her head away from the fancy-goods store.

"Now, just one more stop!" Frank announced. "I have to buy some
things at the stationers. You hold Gyp in, Stacia. We're quite
near the track, and he doesn't love the Limited Express."

But Stacia (or Tessie) allowed the reins to lay loosely in her lap
as she watched a girl scout in uniform approach. She was alone and
tramped with a sure tread that might have marked her a True Tred
had Tessie any knowledge of the troop's name. "Those girls are
everywhere," she told herself, and then fell to day dreams of girl
scout possibilities.

Buried in thought, Tessie forgot Frank's warning to look out for
the express, until a shrill whistle rent the air and Gyp sprang
forward, almost tossing the girl from her seat on the wagon.

Frantically she yelled at the little horse to "Whoa!" But on he
dashed, and the gates were down directly ahead!

Realizing her danger and leaning forward in her panic of fear,
something happened to the rein, for she felt it fall, and even the
power of pulling on Gyp's head was now lost.

And the express could be seen rounding the curve!

Prayers rose to Tessie's lips while terror gripped her heart.

Moments were like hours, yet time had no proportion in the fear of
death that seemed almost certain.

Then just as the frightened little animal shied clear of a
telegraph pole, and with head high in the air seemed to make a
final dash, he was suddenly pulled back. The jolt threw Tessie
against the side curtain.

The little girl scout--she whom Tessie had noticed but a few
minutes before, was now hanging on the reins!

But Gyp was dragging her on. Would she, too, be killed? If some
man would only come to their rescue!

Then everything seemed to whirl before Tessie's distorted vision.
Things "got black and went out." Next, she felt herself tumble
back in the box of daisies.

But Gyp had stopped! The girl scout had pulled him up somehow, and
now Frank was there talking, and shouting, and praising the girl
who had saved Tessie's life.

"And she wouldn't even give her name," he was calling to Tessie.
"Some narrow escape, I'll say. Why, that express no more than shot
by when you touched the gates. If you hadn't looked so dead, I
might have got that girl's name, but she's in one of those
cottages by now. Well, we'll beat it for home," and he turned
cautiously into the broader roadway. "Gyp, you'll go on a light
diet for this, see if you don't!"

But all the joy of her lovely ride was erased in the perilous
experience. And again the influence of the girl scouts forced its
way into her uncertain life. Truly the little heroes in that
modest uniform deserved such merit badges as the one so lately
given to Jacqueline Douglass.

But it would not be wise to recount to the invalid child anything
of this wild adventure. This Tessie felt instinctively.
Nevertheless, when that night Jacqueline was placed in her dining
chair, and while chatting with her brother she proudly displayed
the clover leaf pin in a new little velvet case, Tessie wondered
what could have been the original feat of heroism for which this
badge had been bestowed.

"And the girl who saved my life deserves the highest award," she
reflected, "although no one will ever know, I suppose. She risked
her own life in the attempt." Such was Tessie's decision, while
that little scout was congratulating herself on having really
saved a life "without anyone knowing who did it." She had HER
secret now and it was delightful to cuddle so securely in her
happy little heart.




CHAPTER XIX

THE FLYING SQUADRON


"Oh, Grace, what do you think?" Thus asked Madaline without hint
or warning.

"Think? This is no time for thinking," answered Grace, who was
busying herself with a complicated system of cords. "I'm trying to
puzzle out the best way to demonstrate a sheep-shank knot," and
she kept on with her endeavor, flipping the cord ends this way and
that, while Madaline, all impatience, looked down at her chum.

"Trying to tie a sheep-shank!" gasped the Bearer of tidings, as
she presently proved herself to be. "Why, the very idea! You
passed that test long ago--you're no tenderfoot!"

"I know it, but Captain Clark said she was going to ask me to show
a new group of candidates some knots, and I thought I'd practice a
bit."

"Practice!" repeated Madaline, "well, to use your own words, this
is no time to practice. Oh, Grace! I can hardly tell you!"

"Don't tell me it's anything bad!" exclaimed the manipulator of
the knots. "Has anything happened? Is Cleo or Margaret--"

"No, no! It isn't anything like that. Cleo and Margaret are all
right, and they'll be here in a little while. I ran on ahead to
tell you, and Captain Clark is coming, too, with them."

"Well, of all things!" Grace burst out, laying aside the strings.
"Something simply must have happened. Do you mean to say the
delegation is waiting on me, to inform me that I have been picked
out for some signal honor, ahem!" and she rose, bowing
elaborately.

"We have all been picked out for signal honor!" bubbled Madaline.
"You aren't the only one. Put up that knot business. You can show
the tenderfeet when you get back."

"Oh, are we going away?" asked Grace. "Mystery piled on mystery.
Do tell me!"

"I thought I'd get you anxious," laughed Madaline. "Well, it's
just this, and it's simply glorious! We're going camping!"

"Camping? Who? When? Where? What, and all the rest of it?" and she
fired the questions in a well-aimed volley at her friend.

"Just we four and the Captain, of course," resumed Madaline,
seating herself on a mossy log beside Grace, who had selected this
seat in the woods as a silent seclusion, there to evolve a scheme
for imparting primary knowledge of Girl Scout work, to a group of
younger members who had lately joined.

"We called at your house to tell you," continued Madaline, "but
your mother said you were over here in the woods, so we came to
find you--all four of us. I just ran on ahead--I couldn't wait for
the others."

"I'm so glad you did," said Grace, warmly. "But how does it come
that we four are picked out from all the troop?"

"Well, I fancy it's because we sort of out-did ourselves in the
tests, and helped to get such, a satisfactory report. Captain
Clark said she wanted to reward us in some way, and the
opportunity came, so she pounced on it, or seized it or grasped
it--you know--whatever you properly should do to an opportunity."

"Grasped is the word, I believe," Grace decided. "But what is the
opportunity?"

"To go camping," retorted Madaline.

"Friends of Captain Clark have offered her the use of their
perfectly gorgeous camp in Allbright Woods. It's a place none of
us has ever visited, and well just have scrumptious times. We're
to spend the week-end here--just Captain Clark and we four. She
asked some of the other girls, but they couldn't make it. Now drop
all this knotty business, be joyous, hurry, and get ready. They'll
be here in a minute. Isn't that good news?"

"The best ever," assented Grace, and then, as she gathered up her
strings, there appeared, coming through the grove of trees,
Captain Clark, Margaret and Cleo.

"Whoo-oo!" came the gleeful greeting, and hands fluttered as if
conveying, in wig-wag talk, the joyous message.

"Did she tell you, Grace?" cooed Cleo.

"Wasn't that what I sprinted on ahead for?" demanded Madaline.

"And do say you can go!" begged Margaret.

"Is it really so, Captain?" asked Grace, a bit timidly, as if she
feared to trust the good news. "Are we going camping?"

"As if a true Girl Scout ever joked!" mocked Madaline.

"Well, I know you of old, before you became a G. S.," retorted
Grace.

"Yes, my dear, we are really to spend a week-end in the woods if
you can manage it," replied Captain Clark. "Some generous friends
of mine, who have been unexpectedly called away from their place
for a time, have offered to let me use it. And I could think of no
better way of rewarding you four for your faithful work, than to
give you this opportunity. I am sorry more could not manage to go,
but it could not be arranged. So, Grace, if you will come back
with us, and see if your folks will not object, we shall begin our
preparations at once."

"Oh, they won't object--not when I talk to them!" declared the
girl, in a tone that made the others laugh. "But how do we go; by
train!"

"No, we are going in an auto, and all you need to take will be
your personal belongings. The camp is stocked with food, and there
is even a cook and a caretaker, a colored man and his wife."

"Say, this is camping de luxe!" exclaimed Cleo. "Wouldn't it be
more fun to rough it?"

"It will be rough enough," asserted the Captain. "We shall be
allowed to cook for ourselves if we choose, but the helpers are
there in case of emergency."

"In case the eggs refuse to scramble," murmured Margaret.

"Something like that, yes," assented Captain Clark.

As had been expected and hoped, there was no objection raised at
the home of Grace, and two days later found the happy four, under
the guidance of Captain Clark, on their way to Camp Nomoko, in the
Allbright Woods. It was the best reward that could have been
devised for the girls, and they expressed genuine sorrow at the
fate of others of True Tred who must be left behind for one reason
or another. But the girls of the troop were not to be exactly
desolate during the days their more fortunate friends were
camping--Flosston in itself offered many happy opportunities.

"Are the Allbright Woods very wild?" asked Grace, as the auto left
the main road and began the trip along a less frequented highway,
the day following the inception of the plan.

"Wild enough, I fancy you'll find," said the Captain. "My friends
think it an ideal outdoor place in many respects. I hope you will
like it."

"Don't worry, please, we shall," declared Margaret.

Each girl took along a small suitcase, filled with such belongings
as she thought she would need. These, of course, included their
complete scout uniforms, while they wore dresses of plain but
serviceable material, which would almost serve the purpose of
their khaki outfits, in case they were obliged, for any reason, to
lay those aside in camp. It was decided two outfits were
necessary, and the uniforms packed easiest.

Captain Clark's friends had even sent their car for the girls to
make the trip to Nomoko, so there was really little for the
quartette to do except pack up and start. As Cleo had remarked it
was almost camping de luxe.

The journey, though enjoyable, was almost lost in the real joy of
camping anticipation.

"Here we are!" announced the Captain, after a ride of about four
hours in the car, during which time no worse mishap occurred than
a blowout, and for this the chauffeur was ready with an already
inflated "spare," so little time was lost in replacing the tire.

"Does he stay with us--at camp, I mean?" asked Cleo in a whisper,
pointing to the driver, as the car swung into a rough wood road.

"No, he is to go back to his own duties as soon as he leaves us at
Nomoko," answered Captain Clark in a low voice. "But he will bring
us home Tuesday, when my friends return to their tents."

"And will we be left all alone in the camp, without means of
getting out of the woods if we want to go?" asked Margaret.

"Well, I believe there is a branch railroad line about ten miles
away," said Captain Clark, "and if we have to--"

"We can walk, of course!" interrupted Cleo. "That's a mere sprint.
A ten-mile hike is a trifle."

"Did you say triffle or truffle?" asked Grace.

"Truffles don't grow here, nothing but mushrooms and toadstools,"
broke in Margaret. "All Girl Scouts ought to know that!" "Thanks
for the information," retorted Grace. "Oh, what a perfectly
scrumptious place!" she exclaimed as, after some rather severe
jolting and swaying from side to side, the auto came to a stop in
the depths of a grove of trees, amid which were pitched several
tents and a slab-sided shack; from the stovepipe of the shack
smoke drifted, and with it emanated the most appetizing odors.

"This is Nomoko," said Captain Clarke, as she nodded a greeting to
the colored caretaker and his wife, the latter appearing in the
door of the shack, with a red bandanna handkerchief tied around
her kinky head. "I have been here before."

"Are you all right?" asked Zeb, the colored man. "No accidents or
nothin'?"

"Nothing at all, Zeb, I'm glad to say," was the Captain's answer.
"We are here right side up with care. And will you tell Mrs.
Nelson that for me," she went on to the chauffeur who, with the
help of Zeb, was lifting out the baggage and valises.

"I will; yes'm," was the reply. "I am to bring them back here
Tuesday morning, and get you. I hope you enjoy your stay."

"Thank you, I know we shall," and the Captain's words found echo
in the hearts of the girls.

"Let's go fishing! I see a stream that ought to have fish in!"
cried Cleo.

"Let's get our uniforms on and go for a hike. I've never been in
these woods before!" cried Margaret.

"Let's see if we can find any specimens--fossils or the like,"
came from Cleo, who had lately developed a collecting fever.

"Let's eat!" declaimed Grace. "I'm starved!"

"I think the last suggestion is best," decided Captain Clark. "We
can soon change into our uniforms, and after a meal, which I judge
should be called dinner instead of lunch, we may take a walk, or
fish, or hike, or fossilize, as you then elect."

"De dinnah am 'mos' ready," announced Alameda, the colored cook.

"Oh, where have I heard them joyous words before?" cried Cleo,
pretending to faint into Margaret's arms.

"I golly! Dem suah am lively li'l gals! Dey suah am!" declared
Zeb, as he went off to get a fresh pail of water at the spring.

Soon the jolly little party, having the really well-appointed camp
to themselves, sat down to a wild-wood meal. To say they enjoyed
it is putting it mildly--far too mildly; they were "transported
with joy," Grace insisted.

"I declare! It's a shame to stay here any longer!" announced Cleo
finally, although the joy had not been entirely consumed.

"Do you mean you're ashamed of eating so much?" asked Grace.

"No, but it's a pity to waste this glorious day in, just staying
around camp. Let's go down to the brook, river or whatever it is."

"And may we fish?" asked Margaret.

"I think so. I'll ask Zeb if there are some rods that may be
trusted to amateurs," replied the Captain.

There were, as it developed, and presently equipped with all that
was needed for the sport, the little party set off through the
woods, following a direction Zeb gave them to locate the best
fishing place.

It was no new experience for the quartette, led by the Captain, to
hike through the woods, but something really new awaited them this
time, as they soon discovered to their sorrow.

Cleo was in the lead and, after plunging through a rather thick
growth of underbrush, she suddenly uttered a cry.

"What is it--a snake?" asked Margaret, who followed.

"If it is, don't get excited," warned the Captain, who heard the
exclamation. "There are absolutely no poisonous snakes in this
vicinity, and any other kind is more frightened of you than you
can possibly be of him, girls," she insisted.

"It isn't snakes!" cried Cleo. "I almost wish it were. Oh, aren't
they horrible! Run, girls, run back, or you'll be eaten up!" and
she beat such a hasty retreat, meanwhile wildly flinging her arms
up and around her head, that she collided with Margaret, and
nearly toppled her into a sassafras bush.

"Oh, I feel 'em, too!" Margaret cried. "Oh, what pests!"

"What in the world is the matter?" demanded Grace, from the rear.
"If we're ever going to fish let's get to the water."

"I'm never going to fish if I have to fight such things as these!"
cried Cleo. "Back! Back to the tents!"

"What is it?" cried Captain Clark. "Are you girls fooling?"

But a moment later, as she felt herself attacked on hands and
face, she realized what it was.

"The flying squadron!" she exclaimed. "We must retreat, girls, and
get ammunition. I forgot about these."

"The flying squadron? What does she mean?" murmured Cleo, to whom
knowledge had not yet come.




CHAPTER XX

CLEO'S EXPERIMENT


Only a moment or two longer were necessary to acquaint Cleo with
the cause of the precipitate retreat not only of her three chums,
but Captain Clark as well.

"Go on, Cleo! Turn around and hurry back to camp," directed the
Captain. "We must get the citronella bottle."

"I doubt if that will be of any use," said Margaret, beating
herself frantically on the face with her hands. "These are
terrible--worse than mosquitoes."

"Oh, it's bugs, is it?" asked Cleo. "Ouch! I should say it was!
What are they?" she cried, as she felt stinging pains on her hands
and face.

"Not bugs, merely black flies," declared Captain Clark. "I did not
know there were any in these woods this year, but this must be a
sudden and unexpected visitation of them. My friends said nothing
about the pests. We simply can't go on if they are to oppose us."

So back they went to camp, the pesky black flies buzzing all
around them, biting whenever they got the chance, and that was
frequently enough--too much so the girls voted.

"Dat ar citron stuff ain't gwine goin' do much good, ef dey is de
real black flies," asserted Zeb, when he heard the story.

"What is good, then?" asked Margaret. "A smudge," promptly
answered Cleo. "Don't you know what it says in our hand book? If
citronella won't work, try a smudge, and make it of green cedar
branches."

"Good memory in a good cause," said Captain Clark, rubbing her
smarting areas. "But any sort of smoke will drive them away. A
brisk breeze is the best disperser of flying squadrons, though,
whether they be of mosquitoes or black flies. That beats even a
smudge, and is much more pleasant."

"Yes, I don't care to look like a ham or a flitch of bacon,"
murmured Grace. "Oh, how they sting!"

"Better put some witch hazel on," advised Zeb. "Dat's whut we uses
heah in camp fo' all kinds of bites, 'ceptin' bee stings, and den
ammonia's de only t'ing."

"Don't tell me there are bees here, too!" gasped Margaret.

"Oh, dey don't bodder you much," chuckled Zeb, as he brought out
what Cleo described, later, as the germs of a drug store.

There were several bottles, one--containing oil of citronella, and
another witch hazel. This last was applied to the girls' wounds
first, and did relieve, in a measure, the sting of the bites of
the black flies. Then a film of citronella was spread over hands
and faces, and a bottle of the pungent mixture was carried along
as the Girl Scouts took the trail again, since it was voted that a
fish of their own taking must be served for supper.

"It would never do to go back from camp and tell the other girls
we didn't catch anything," declared Grace, and the others readily
agreed.

The black flies had not followed them back to camp, perhaps
because the tents were in the open, where the breeze could sweep
around them. But, in spite of the citronella, the party was again
attacked by the "flying squadron" as they started for the fishing
place.

"It's no use! We can't make it. No sense being all bitten up for a
few fish!" declared Madaline, as she made use of the bottle of oil
Captain Clark handed her. "They seem to like it!"

And, really, the black flies did. Mosquitoes are not quite so fond
of this oily extract of an Indian plant, and if the user does not
object to the odor, he can keep himself pretty well protected from
the mosquitoes by frequent applications of the stuff.

Black flies, however, are not always affected by it, and a smudge
is then the only answer to the problem.

"But maybe Zeb can tell us a place to fish where there aren't so
many of the pests," said Captain Clark, as they turned back. "It
is simply impossible to go on this way."

Zeb and his wife listened to the stories of the Scouts with
sympathy, and Zeb declared that while the place he had selected
for them was the best fishing spot, another might be tried, which
was more in the open, subject to the grateful sweep of breezes,
and, in that case, not so likely to be infested with the pests.
The clouds of bites they seemed to greet the girls with, had been
nothing short of an air raid, or bombardment.

"Well, let's try it," suggested Cleo. "I don't care as long as I
catch one fish, and maybe the new place will be fortified."

"I wishes yo' luck!" murmured Zeb.

So they set off this time in another direction, which led them to
a clearing, and there, to their delight, they found no black
flies. There were a few mosquitoes, but the citronella took care
of them, or, rather drove them off, and soon the lines were in the
water, with the bobs floating about.

For the True Treds were not yet in the scientific fishing class,
and a cork float was voted the best means of telling when one
might have a bite. It seemed the girls were scarcely settled when
the signal came.

"I've got one!" suddenly cried Cleo, and she did manage to land,
flapping on the grass back of her, a good-sized chub.

"Oh, you're perfectly wonderful!" cried Grace. "However did you do
it?"

"My hypnotic eye!" laughed Cleo, as she proceeded, not without
some difficulty, to unhook her fish, string it through the gills
and put it on a string in a quiet pool to keep fresh. "You can all
do it, if you just make goo-oy eyes at them," she joked, casting
out again.

It would be going too far to say that they all made catches at
once, for Madaline and Captain Clark were out of luck, but the
others each caught two, and the Captain declared this would
suffice for all.

"There is no use catching more of anything than you actually
need," she declared, bribing her girls to leave the fascinating
sport.

"And may I cook one of my fish just as I please?" asked Cleo, when
they were on their homeward way.

"Why, yes, I suppose so, if Alameda does not object," Captain
Clark answered. "But what is your way, Cleo, dear? If you intend
to fry it in deep olive oil, I'm afraid--"

"Oh, nothing as elaborate as that," was the laughing reply. "It's
just an experiment I want to try. And yet it isn't exactly an
experiment, either, for I read how to do it in a camping book.
It's baked fish in a mud ball."

"A mud ball!" cried Grace. "That doesn't sound very enticing!"

"Well, it isn't exactly mud, but clean clay," Cleo explained. "And
before you plaster the clay around the fish, you cover him with
green leaves from the sassafras bush, or some spice leaves. It
sounds awfully good, and I think it will look quite artistic."

"Much better than it did at first," agreed Margaret, laughing.
"Fancy muddy fish!"

And when camp was reached, much to the amusement, and the unspoken
indignation of Alameda, Cleo was allowed to try her experiment.
Zeb cleaned the fish for her--that was all she asked. Then Cleo
dug a hole in the soft earth and built in it a fire.

"What I'm going to do," Cleo explained, "is to put a lump of
butter inside the whole, cleaned fish. Then I wrap him in leaves
and outside of that I put a ball of wet clay. Then I put the fish,
clay and all down in the fire, cover it with embers and let it
bake."

"A sort of fish-ball," commented Madaline.

"Well, you'll see," said Cleo.

She completed her arrangements, though it was rather messy work,
especially the clay covering, but finally she finished and the
lump of "mud," as Alameda called it, was put to bake in the fire
hole, hot ashes and embers being piled on top.

"Dat's de craziest notion whut I eber hearn tell on," grumbled
Alameda to Zeb. "I'se gwine cook do odder fish in mah own style."

"I guess mebby as how yo' better had," he agreed.

Preparations for the evening meal went on, while Captain Clark and
her True Treds tidied themselves after the fishing excursion. Cleo
was ready first and took a little run down to where her fire
smouldered in the pit.

"How do you tell when it's done?" asked Grace, joining her. "You
can't stick a straw in through that clay as you stick a splint in
a cake."

"No," admitted Cleo, "but I guess it must be ready now. The book
says it doesn't take more than an hour before the fish is baked to
a turn, whatever that is."

The four girls stood about the fire hole, wondering how Cleo's
experiment would succeed. Captain Clark joined them. She was just
going to suggest that perhaps the process was completed, when
suddenly there was a loud explosion in the hole.

Up in the air flew blazing and half-burned sticks, ashes and
portions of a clay ball, mingled with something white, in flakes.

"Look out!" cried Margaret. But there was no need. All the girls
ducked for cover.

"What--what was it?" asked Grace, when the shower of ashes and
embers was over, without any casualties.

"I rather think that was the completion of Cleo's experiment,"
said Captain Clark. "The clay ball exploded, girls."

There was no question about that. Steam, generated inside the mass
of wet mud Cleo had plastered about the fish had caused the ball
to burst, and it scattered into a hundred fragments, blowing the
fish to flakes that were scattered about the surrounding trees and
bushes.

"Oh, dear!" sighed Cleo. "I just remember now, I should have made
a little hole to let the steam out. Oh, my lovely fish!"

"Never mind," consoled Captain Clark. "You have learned
something."

"Yes," sighed Cleo.

"An' hit's a mighty good t'ing I saved de rest ob de fish t' cook
in mah own way," murmured Alameda, as she served supper a little
later.

And then, amid laughter at Cleo's experiment, they all sat down in
the dining tent, and as they ate, evening settled down over camp.

To say that their stay at Nomoko was a delight to the girls is
putting it very faintly indeed. They hiked and fished and finally
Cleo succeeded in baking a specimen in a clay ball and it was
voted most excellent, and credited to her scout record as "home
cooking in the woods."

The weather remained delightful, so that the week-end dashed by
almost as a single day, so replete was the time with woodland
joys.

Tuesday morning came, all too soon, and it was with genuine regret
that they pulled up stakes to the extent of pecking grips for the
home trip.

"Seems to me," almost grumbled Madaline, "a few days in the woods
just about make me want a whole month. Think of going back to
Flosston after just learning how to hunt, fish, chase flies--"

"And blow up dug-outs!" assisted Captain Clark. "Well, we really
have learned a lot and had a good time, besides, you have each
proved valiant to the extent of not being afraid of anything in
the woods by day or by night, and that was well worth the trip."

"Please don't give us a bad mark on the black fly contest,"
pleaded Cleo. "Because you know, in the end, we did conquer them."

The Captain nodded a smiling assent.

In a few minutes they were on their way, making speed time back to
Flosston, where the jolly week-enders were soon again plunged into
home scouting, just about where they had left off.

That they knew nothing of Jacqueline and Margaret's badge did not
signify any lull in their interest of the new troop members among
the mill girls, and the fact that Tessie, alone and unknown, was
struggling with Scout influence for weal, not for woe, did not
deter the little girls of True Tred from unconsciously winding
their capering steps in her direction. We left Jacqueline
rejoicing over her merit badge and Tessie pondering on her
increasing perplexities.




CHAPTER XXI

FORGING AHEAD


Venture troop over in Franklin was making such rapid strides in
good scouting that Captain Clark, of True Tred, had reason to warn
her troop members to look to their laurels. The advantage of
having only one afternoon each week, Saturday, free, rather than
being able to plan for any afternoon, seemed to have a stimulating
effect, resulting in highly concentrated effort.

Realizing the advantage this movement was bringing to their
employees, the directors of the Franklin mills had at last
listened to the importunities of Molly Cosgrove, their welfare
worker, and the establishment of a cafeteria for the girls'
lunchtime was now assured.

And Mrs. Cosgrove was going to direct it!

"Now I'll tell you, Molly," insisted this very popular and good-
natured lady. "I'll need some one to handle the cash register, and
why can't I have Rose for that neat little piece of work? She's
not rugged enough for work in a factory, and you know how
splendidly she has turned out. When we first took that child in,
without any training and nothing but the inheritance of an
honorable disposition, I had my own fears. But I tell you, after
all, to be born with character is a wonderful start."

"Indeed it is, Mother," and Molly laughed outright at the well-
aimed compliment that sprang back and hit the mother "square in
the eyes." With her arm thrown around her mother's neck, Molly
admitted her own inheritance in that line had been guaranteed.
"It's going to be a wonderful thing for the girls," went on their
captain. "The Americanization plan of the scouts is admitted the
best we have yet tried out. You should see how eagerly they study
now, and how well filled the night classes are! And slang has
already been checked up as foolish. Really, Madre mia, I almost
fear for our own fortunate American-born classes when I see those
of foreign extraction making such progress."

"It is splendid, but after all, daughter, we know America best.
How are you making out with the plans of bringing the Brodix
family back? I will be glad for Rose's sake when they can be all
together again."

"Our superintendent, Mr. Potter, has made inquiries about the
standing of both father and son, and they have excellent records,"
replied Molly. "We hope, of course, the mother won't have to go
into the factory again."

"And Rose found that little cottage she was so in love with will
be all fixed up by next month. I'll tell you, daughter, your dad
will have to hustle to beat you and me, I'm thinking," and with
pardonable pride the mother, who had often been termed "Chief of
Franklin police," went on with the mending of socks and thrifty
patching of fresh clean undergarments.

"I am convinced now the child is cured of her worries," added
Molly. "For a time I fancied she was unhappy with us, but now,
since she expects her folks back, I almost have to hold her in
from buying new furniture and fancy fixings. She is so enthused
with the idea of having a real home."

"That's her Americanization sprouting," replied the mother, "but
you haven't said what you thought of the plan of making her my
cashier."

"Just the thing, of course. I thought you understood that. I'll
speak to Miss Nellson to-morrow. To-night we have our first tests.
I am anxious to learn how my Venture Troop makes out. Rose has
been a faithful little leader."

So it was that broad, generous daylight was breaking in on the
anxieties Rose had been suffering from, and almost all her real
worries were being dispelled--all but the fear that Tessie might
be found guilty of taking that ticket money!

Also the memory of the lost badge never ceased to torment the girl
who had so unfortunately handed it over to Tessie with her own
modest purse on that eventful night when they both turned away
from the much-despised millend of Flosston. It was Rose who gave
Margaret Slowden the bunch of roses, we remember, on the occasion
of the second presentation of the badge of merit, and it was Rose
who wrote that anonymous note to Margaret only a few weeks ago.

Returning from a very dull day at her work, with some cheer at the
prospect of an evening at Scout Headquarters, Rose was delighted
to receive two letters at the post-office. One was from her
brother, who wrote in a happy strain, replying to his sister's
inquiries concerning the family's return to Pennsylvania. Both he
and his father had been offered their old places back in the
Flosston mills, as the labor union had adjusted its difficulties,
he wrote, but a better offer had been made from the Franklin
mills, and this they had decided to accept. So the Brodix family
would not only return, but would take up their places under
improved conditions.

"And we will have the dear little old house with all the vines and
flowers! Won't mother and father love it!" thought Rose. Two of
the girls passing at that moment guessed correctly when they
remarked: "Good news in that letter. Sure thing!" for Rose was so
occupied with her mail she never noticed the friends passing.

The second letter was from Tessie, as we may have surmised, for it
was written two evenings earlier, posted on the day in the evening
and therefore had that evening arrived in Franklin. With some
anxiety Rose tore open the envelope, and was surprised to see how
good quality of the paper upon which the letter was written. A
faint scent of perfume added to the pleasant effect, and for a
moment Rose was almost bewildered at the change in Tessie's form
of correspondence. Could she have seen the circumstances under
which the note was written, however her puzzle would have been
solved, for the maid's room in the home of Jacqueline Douglass was
fitted up with correct stationery for its occupant.

Scanning quickly through the brief note, Rose read that Tessie "had
a wonderful place" and if only she knew how Dagmar (Rose) was
getting along there would be hardly anything left to worry about.

"I have written to mother," the note continued, and Rose marvelled
at the choice of English, "and some day very soon I am going
straight back to Flosston. But there is one big thing I have to do
first." (She did not hint it was the refunding of that scout money
she must attend to.) "Then, dear old chum, I am coming to have the
dandiest reunion with you, you have ever dreamed of! As you see, I
have learned a lot of new words--so maybe you won't understand me.
Better borrow some one's dictionary and be ready for your swell
old pal--Tessie."

"Oh, what a lovely surprise!" Rose could not help exclaiming. "Now
I can tell Molly," and only the fact that Molly Cosgrove had gone
out early to get ready for tests prevented Rose from immediately
putting that resolution into effect.

"But I won't tell Mrs. Cosgrove first," she decided. "It seems
more upright to confide in my scout captain."

"You look as if some one had left you a lot of money, Rose," Mrs.
Cosgrove joked, as the girl fairly danced around, preparing for
her evening at headquarters. "Good news from home, I guess."

"Yes, splendid!" exclaimed Rose. "The folks are all coming back
and they have promised not to bring any of the old furniture
except the brasses. You know, father's brass candlesticks and
flagon are as precious to us as family silver plate is to
Americans."

"Oh, I know. Molly is always trying to get a samovar. But your
folks, not being Russian, do not use that sort of teapot."

"No, ours is much simpler, but of course I think it is prettier.
Well, you know how much I thank you, Mrs. Cosgrove. This house has
been like--like a boarding-school to me!" Rose exclaimed, her
voice heavy with sincerity.

"That's a fine idea!" and Mrs. Cosgrove laughed heartily. "I never
thought of this being a girls' seminary, but if I wasn't so busy
with my cafeteria I might take up the question," she concluded. It
was not yet time to inform Rose she was to be made cashier of the
girls' lunchroom, so that good news was for the moment withheld.

But somehow joy permeated the whole atmosphere, and even at the
tests Rose's cheeks fairly burned with suppressed excitement.




CHAPTER XXII

THE WHIRLING MAY-POLE


"Oh, isn't it too mean!" deplored Grace, talking to her chums,
Cleo and Madaline, after succeeding in diverting the troublesome
brother Benny over to his ballfield. "Hal Crane drove out on his
wheel to the woods, as he promised, you know, and not a letter,
nor a line, nor a scrap was there," and she dropped her dimpled
chin down on her soft white dimity collar, until the top of her
curly head slanted like a toboggan hill.

"That isn't what worries me most," interposed Madaline. "It is the
fact--the solemn fact," and she rolled her round eyes as if
expecting a mote to sail out on a tear--"that not one of our troop
has done anything big enough to win the B. C."

"How do you know?" queried Cleo mysteriously. "We don't each of us
know what every single member of the troop has done, do we?" "Oh,
but we would be sure to hear of anything big enough to win the
Bronze Cross," Grace assisted Madaline's argument. "And the True
Treds are all so brave and such a fine set of girls! Land knows, I
tried hard enough with tieing my man to the tree!" and she
indulged in one of her unpredicted gales, "and now to think even
he has deserted us!"

"He may--have had to go off for supplies or something," suggested
Cleo. "We can hardly expect a cave man to be always so punctual.
But isn't it lovely about our new member?"

"Yes," answered Grace. "Captain Clark told us last evening every
single one passed her tests! Daddy says the mill owners are simply
delighted with the change in the employees. You see, the men and
boys always had organizations to cheer them along, but the girls
and women were not treated like human beings." Grace was usually
strong for her own rights and she had developed considerable
individuality competing with Benny.

"Here's Margaret. I suppose she expected some--wonderful news,
too. Really, girls," gloomed Madaline, "I fear our cave man has
deserted us."

Margaret came blithely along, her tam-o'shanter being a little
late in seasonable style, but so becoming that the detail was
forgotten in the entire effect.

"Heard the news?" she inquired indifferently. Her indifference
indicated real importance, always.

"What news?" chorused the trio.

"We're going on a picnic!"

"Where?" encored the chorus.

"Out to River Bend," replied Margaret, making herself picturesque
on a tree stump. The conference was being held in a shady lane
directly back of the home of Cleo Harris.

"River Bend!" a unanimous exclamation from the others.

"Certainly, why not?"

"Because that's our secret place," protested Grace, the first to
come out in solo, "Why couldn't some other place have been
chosen?"

"Ask Captain Clark," replied Margaret, with tantalizing exactness,
"and of course she won't tell you. You don't suppose one little
hollow rock, or even one big wood-man comprises all the natural
beauty of River Bend? Think of the canoes out there now! And we
may even have a ride in them!"

"That's so, of course," agreed Grace. "The Bend is a lovely pine
picnic grove. Who's going?"

"All True Treds. We are going to make it Saturday afternoon so as
to include the entire troop" (the term mill girl was studiously
avoided), "and besides," continued Margaret, glorying in the
importance of her post, "we may have the Venture Troop of Franklin
with that pretty little leader, Rose Dixon. All the girls rave
about her."

"We never knew how pretty those other girls were until we got a
close-up view. That's a movie term, of course, but it fits," Cleo
analyzed. "We poor mere Americans can never hope to compete with
the girls of foreign parents in the way of eyes. Did you ever see
such big, deep, dark eyes as Olga Neilson carries around?" and
Cleo exercised her own blue-gray orbs in emulation.

"One lovely thing about our picnic," commented Grace, "we will all
wear uniform and look so alike. We will have to depend on our eyes
for especial distinction, and as Benny would say, 'I see our
finish!' At any rate, since we can't get any more mail from the
woods, I guess it's a good idea to go out there and explore again.
Perhaps we'll discover the secret of the stone man. Don't you
remember, our history tells us the first records were made in
crude carvings on stone? Maybe he's the original stone-cutter!"
and the laugh that answered did credit to the joke.

Meanwhile preparations for the picnic were being made in a number
of localities, and the strings of this story's may-pole are again
encircling a broad territory!

Keen with anticipation, Rose and her constituents were trying
their uniforms on this the night previous to the "June Walk," and
if there had been any doubt concerning the popularity of the scout
movement, it must have been dispelled when Venture Troop drilled
that Friday night.

Molly Cosgrove was proud of her troop. Never had Americanization
seemed so definite in its results. The mothers of many of the
girls attended the drill, and it was held in the Public School
auditorium to accommodate all the numbers. The foreign women in
their queer garb formed a most picturesque background for the
uniformed troop, and viewing the scene from the gallery, one might
have fancied it the picture of some European reconstruction field,
with the battalion of uniformed girls led by Captain Molly
Cosgrove "on patrol."

Nora Noon made opportunity to whisper in the pink ears of Rose
Dixon the fact that "awards and badges" were going to be conferred
on "some of the girls" next day, and Rose felt a suspicion of
anxiety at the news.

Had she done anything worthy of award? Was there not always that
unhappy memory of the merit badge found in Flosston, and so
unfortunately lost again? She was relieved now that an attempt, at
least, had been made to acquaint Molly Cosgrove with some few of
the facts regarding the disappearance of Tessie Wartliz, but Molly
hadn't seemed the least bit surprised, rather she laughed the
subject off, as if Rose were making a mountain out of a mole hill.
So no mention was made of the Merit Badge.

But now with Nora's news the matter assumed a different aspect.
Rose had done her best to develop her patrol, and what if the
leaders should offer recognition for this? How awful it would be
to have to refuse and confess!

"Break ranks!" rang out the clear voice of the captain, and the
call aroused Rose to the situation demanding attention.

Everyone buzzed and chattered, the recreation hour to-night fairly
threatened a stampede in jollity, and suppressing the insistent
apprehension, Rose joined the merrymakers.

Another circle of "our may-pole" now swings out to the home of
Jacqueline Douglass. Here preparations are being made for the most
mysterious event, and even Tessie cannot guess the sequel. The
nurse has warned Tessie to "keep Miss Jack as quiet as she can,"
but to follow her instructions rather than oppose her. Mr. Gerald
has imparted the same orders, and both chauffeurs have been busy
all day, carrying mysterious bundles to the big cars, then dashing
off towards town with them.

The epochal Saturday morning had now blazed its trail on the June
calendar in a perfect day. Jacqueline received her indispensable
attention from Mrs. Bennet and the nurse with a show of
impatience.

"Be sure, Stacia (Tessie), my small chair is all ready for the
car--the collapsible one, I mean. We must leave for our wonder
trip directly after lunch," she cautioned Tessie.

Mr. Gerald Douglass was rambling about, keeping step to his own
extemporaneous whistle. He tapped at the door of his sister's
dressing room and poked his handsome head in.

"All ready, Sis! Remember your catalogue of promises! You wouldn't
have poor Jerry courtmartialed by old Doc Blair, would you? And
you know, Jack, I am taking an awful lot of responsibility in
this!"

"Don't you worry one little bit, brother mine," replied the girl
whose soft light hair was receiving its last touch from skilled
hands. "I'll be so good you won't know me, and I feel so
splendidly well. When did that old doctor say I could stand up?"

"Very soon, but not just to-day. All right, Jack. I'll be on hand.
Any orders?" and he imitated the honorable butler in pose and
manner, his thumbs just touching the seams of his trousers and his
head thrust back as if complying with the savage demands of a
high-priced dentist.

"The car at two," ordered Jacqueline, and with a "well butlered
bow" Gerald took himself off.

"You are not to wear your black dress--no uniform to-day, Stacia,"
Jacqueline told Tessie. "Put on the nicest summer dress you own,
that one with the pink flowers. You are to be my companion to-day
--and I hope you have a lovely time."

"I'm sure I shall," replied Tessie respectfully, but the whole
proceedings were becoming so mysterious she wondered if the plan
really did involve Fairyland.

"You look as if you wanted to say something. What is it, Stacia?"
asked Jacqueline.

"Oh, I couldn't bother you with it now," replied Tessie, but an
envelope in her hand spoke more intelligently.

"No bother at all. I have lots of time. What is it, Stacia?"

"I overheard you say, Miss Jacqueline, that you were treasurer of
the Violet Shut Ins, and I have some ticket money belonging to
their last benefit. Could I give it to you?" asked Tessie.

"Why, of course you could. Isn't that lovely!" taking her envelope
from Tessie's trembling hands. "I always knew we would hear from
those lost tickets, and now my accounts are all perfectly
straight. Won't Cousin Marcia be pleased!"

"Cousin Marcia!" Tessie could not help repeating, as she all but
stumbled from the room in her confusion.

To be rid of that nightmare. To have made complete amends for that
ticket money!

Now she could face the world! Now she could go back to Flosston
and find Dagmar Brodix!




CHAPTER XXIII

RAINBOW'S END


It was a gala day in Flosston. True Tred Troop and Venture Troop
Girl Scouts seemed to comprise a veritable army, as the girls in
their brown uniforms congregated and scattered, then scattered and
congregated, in that way girls have of imitating the "inimitable"
bee.

Long before the hour set for assembly on the green, knots and
groups gathered there, and when finally Captain Clark and Captain
Cosgrove appeared (we prefer to call each her separate captain),
both True Treds and Venture troops were ready and eager to start
for River Bend Woods.

Grace, Cleo, Madaline and Margaret had managed to "fall in" in one
line, so that the march out was unspoiled by difficulties in
conversation, which would have followed any other formation.

"If only--if only--" faltered Grace; then she laughed rather
sheepishly.

"But we may see him," surmised Cleo.

"Any man or beast in that woods will come out of his lair when we
get there!" predicted Margaret.

"Oh, what a lovely showing! Just look back!" exclaimed Madaline,
"and how finely the boy scouts drum and fife. Will they eat all
our picnic stuff, do you suppose?"

"Surely Hal Crane is entitled to some," replied Grace, "and
there's Benny. He helped me before we got Hal. I shall have to
share with him, of course."

"We're starting!" cautioned Cleo. "Look out for your feet. Don't
let our line get out of step!"

"The boys aren't going all the way out," said Grace presently. "I
just heard a girl say they are only going to escort us to the city
line."

"Then we won't have to feed them," Madaline remarked, her words
being discounted by the joking tone of her voice.

It was an imposing spectacle, and all Flosston seemed to
appreciate the occasion, for windows were jammed with faces, doors
were blocked with figures, and even low roofs were spotted with
waving, shouting energetic youths. Not since a wartime parade had
there been so much excitement, and only a word from the
superintendent to the engineer of Fluffdown mills prevented the
latter from blowing the big whistle.

"It might make it look too much like a labor parade," the
superintendant decided.

Crossing the line from the borough into the county, the escort of
boy scouts switched off to Oakleigh, where they were to take up
their own special activities, the principal feature of the
afternoon being a ball game with the Marvels.

From this point it was but a short distance to hike to River Bend
Woods, and nearing the noted territory the four scout girls
experienced a sort of thrill. Grace felt something must happen to
clear the mystery of her cave correspondent, and the other girls
sincerely hoped something would happen.

Just before entering the pine grove the two captains, Clark and
Cosgrove, halted their troops and issued instructions.

No girl was to leave the ranks, no girl was to make any advance,
and no girl was to disobey the slightest order until the call for
break ranks would be sounded.

These orders were given with precision which indicated some very
particular program, and served to "thrill" the quartette with new
expectations.

"Some one else is having a picnic!" whispered Grace. "I see a lot
of bright things through the trees!"

"Hush!" cautioned Margaret, for the patrol leaders were inspecting
each line.

"Now, girls!" called Captain Clark. "When I blow the whistle you
are to follow your leaders, and rush forward. No one is to push,
or crowd, but to advance in a solid line, battle formation. Then
when I blow three whistles, halt instantly!"

The ground was quite clear at this entrance to the woods, and at
the command a grand rush forward was so cleverly executed it
seemed the line scarcely lost step making the dash.

Then the whistle sounded three times and behold!

"Oh! oh! oh!"

The woods rang with the cries!

What a sight! A woodland play or Fairyland let loose!

Quickly as astonished eyes could separate the view into its
component parts, Grace realized the stage was set on her hollow
rock!

Then Madaline recognized the Queen seated on her throne was none
other than the little girl to whom she had given her four-leaf
clover!

While the next moment a figure came from behind the big tree, the
tree Grace had tied her victim to, and this was surely the very
same man! His suit was that exact brownish mixture--and sure
enough he was waving the very piece of rope Grace had tied him
with.

It was all glorious, beautiful! The fairy queen was seated on the
rock--the throne simply lost in flowers. She wore a robe that
sparkled with something like spangled crystals, and she held in
her hand a golden wand.

Seated at the foot of the rock was a girl dressed simply and
representing the Wayfarer.

And now we have guessed these characters are none other than
Jacqueline and Tessie!

"What a perfectly beautiful picture!" On every lip and tongue were
such exclamations, when suddenly from the "victim at the tree" a
weird sort of whistle music, made on the most artistically shaped
instrument, like the pipes of Pan, sounded through the woodland.

"Oh!" was all Grace could articulate, and with its ejaculation had
pinched Cleo's arm into a promising "black and blue!"

After the piper had played his tune Captain Clark gave the signal
for the troops to be seated, then she stepped forward and stood on
a stone by the side of the Queen's throne.

"This is the end of the rainbow!" began the captain, "and I am
sure we are satisfied now that all Fairyland is not limited to
books. I want to introduce Miss Jacqueline Douglass," indicating
the queen, "and her brother, Mr. Gerald Douglass," pointing to
"Pan." "Last spring we took a hike to this wood and one of our
members tried to do a humane service by making a capture!"

(Grace felt her cheeks would ignite, but Cleo was trying to
reassure her.)

"It is not always what we do, but it is always what we try to do,"
went on Captain Clark, "and Grace Philow tried to capture a tramp.
In the attempt she made fast a staunch friend, for Mr. Douglass
now stands as our ally, rather than our victim!"

A shrill blast on his pipes signified "Pan's" agreement, and the
troops applauded until the echo came back from the other side of
the river.

"I heard the bandit say she was after Mrs. Johnston's wash," Pan
declared, with Captain Clark's permission, "and she gave me a
merry chase after my 'gob bag.' Little sister Jack and I had been
spending an afternoon in the woods, and while she went out to the
road in her chair I was to lug the bag. You really are an expert
little highwayman, Bandit!" he finished, addressing Grace, who
stood right at the end of the line.

"And now I shall ask a word from our queen," announced Captain
Clark.

Jacqueline smiled and the girls could not help but exclaim how
pretty she was.

"You see I have been unable to walk since last winter," spoke the
queen, "and when brother Gerald told me about the woodland girls,
I begged him to play out the game, and you see he did. He wrote
the letters, and hid them in this rock, then the girls sent the
scout I wanted, and oh, it has been altogether so wonderful! We
will have to have a real rally to tell you all about it, for the
doctors say I will be all right again very soon."

Cheers greeted this news and Jacqueline waved her wand in
appreciation.

During all this Tessie was not the one least surprised. In fact,
she was so astonished she could no longer keep her place on the
rock, and she now whispered to Jacqueline she would like to speak
to a friend in the troop.

At almost the same time Rose had discovered Tessie, and she, too,
stepped aside when the girl left the rock, and the next moment the
two girls were clasped in each other's arms.

"Dagmar!"

"Tessie!"

Girls looking on knew nothing of the story of this reunion, but it
was plain the captains were in the secret, and they did not call
the stranger and the patrol leader back to their places. The
emotion these girls were experiencing surely deserved
consideration, and so they were left almost to themselves, a
little distance from the troops.

"And now we have some True Tred awards to make," again announced
the captain. "Venture Troop will make theirs later."

"To Cleo Harris goes the first Bronze Cross awarded our troop!"

There was a shout, cheers, then questions!

"Not only did she save a human life by stopping a runaway horse a
few feet from a railway crossing, down the tracks of which was
dashing an express, but she thought she had entirely succeeded in
hiding her identity. She did not want the world to know of her
deed, but we have discovered it!"

Then, completely dumfounded, Cleo was urged forward, and she acted
as she felt, like a girl in a dream, when Captain Clark pinned on
her blouse the highest award, the Bronze Cross hanging from its
bright red ribbon.

She had won the first B. C.!

Scarcely had the confusion subsided when Grace was called up to
receive the merit badge for "successfully spreading scout
influence and bringing joy into the life of a disabled child."

Jacqueline had insisted mention be made of the "joy" the woods
play had brought to her. So the award was made in that way.

Madaline was admiring Cleo's cross when she heard her name called.
Captain Clark announced: "A tiny four-leaf clover picked and
bestowed in love as a nature gift is not too small to be
recognized, and when Madaline Mower hurried after the wheel-chair
of this little queen she touched a secret spring. An honor badge'
must mark the result," and the much-astonished Madaline also
received an award from the queen.

"And who in this troop lost a merit badge?" joyously asked the
queen, as soon as her words could be heard through the growing
excitement.

"Oh, I did!" almost shouted Margaret Slowden, rushing forward
without waiting to be called.

There was the much-prized merit badge! The one originally bestowed
upon her on such an auspicious occasion.

When Captain Clark again pinned it on Margaret's breast it seemed
like a blessing that had grown greater by reason of its loss. And
how delighted the girls were! It was a clear case of "No questions
asked."

Over on a little moss-covered tree stump Tessie and Rose alone
knew the complete story of that lost badge, and only their eyes
attempted to give an expression to the details.

The call to "fall in ranks" was not sounded for a full hour later,
for such a picnic as these girls enjoyed had never been heard of
in River Bend Woods.

All the wealth and generosity of Gerald Douglass seemed poured out
in his sister's woody banquet; and as we have guessed he was by no
means a stranger to the attractive Captain Clark. In fact, the way
these two worked to "lay out the spread" caused even the
experienced Captain Cosgrove to raise an inquisitorial finger.

And now our mythical May-pole has swung around until its pretty
ends all entwine the staff like a monument of mirth.

Rose and Tessie were reunited and nothing but the insistance of
Jacqueline that Stacia (this name now became permanent, as did the
brief title Dagmar had chosen) stay with her, kept the two
companions even temporarily separated by the short distance of two
intervening villages.

As Stacia was assisting the queen back to earth, and thence to her
big limousine late that afternoon, she overheard Jacqueline
telling Captain Cosgrove about the completion of her accounts for
the Shut In Benefit.

"Cousin Marcia Osborne went to the coast a week ago," Jacqueline
said, "and she told me before she went she knew the returns would
be made all right in time. So when Stacia handed me the envelope
the other day I wrote her immediately that it was all settled by
now."

Then Pan blew a reveille on his pipes and the troops left the
woods, so we must leave them, to meet again in the next volume of
the Scouts, to be called "The Girl Scouts at Bellair: or, Maid
Mary's Awakening."

THE END







End of Project Gutenberg's The Girl Scout Pioneers, by Lillian C Garis

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