Camp Fire Girls at the Seash.o.r.e.
by Jane L. Stewart.
CHAPTER I.
FROM THE ASHES.
The sun rose over Plum Beach to shine down on a scene of confusion and wreckage that might have caused girls less determined and courageous than those who belonged to the Manasquan Camp Fire of the Camp Fire Girls of America to feel that there was only one thing to do--pack up and move away. But, though the camp itself was in ruins, there were no signs of discouragement among the girls themselves. Merry laughter vied with the sound of the waves, and the confusion among the girls was more apparent than real.
"Have you got everything sorted, Margery--the things that are completely ruined and those that are worth saving?" asked Eleanor Mercer, the Guardian of the Camp Fire.
"Yes, and there"s more here that we can save and still use than anyone would have dreamed just after we got the fire put out," replied Margery Burton, one of the older girls, who was a Fire-Maker. In the Camp Fire there are three ranks--the Wood-Gatherers, to which all girls belong when they join; the Fire-Makers, next in order, and, finally, the Torch-Bearers, of which Manasquan Camp Fire had none. These rank next to the Guardian in a Camp Fire, and, as a rule, there is only one in each Camp Fire. She is a sort of a.s.sistant to the Guardian, and, as the name of the rank implies, she is supposed to hand on the light of what the Camp Fire has given her, by becoming a Guardian of a new Camp Fire as soon as she is qualified.
"What"s next?" cried Bessie King, who had been working with some of the other girls in sorting out the things which could be used, despite the damage done by the fire that had almost wiped out the camp during the night.
"Why, we"ll start a fire of our own!" said Eleanor. "There"s no sort of use in keeping any of this rubbish, and the best way to get rid of it is just to burn it. All hands to work now, piling it up and seeing that there is a good draught underneath, so that it will burn up. We can get rid of ashes easily, but half-burned things are a nuisance."
"Where are we going to sleep to-night?" asked Dolly Ransom, ruefully surveying the places where the tents had stood. Only two remained, which were used for sleeping quarters by some of the girls.
"I"m more bothered about what we"re going to eat," said Eleanor, with a laugh. "Do you realize that we"ve been so excited that we haven"t had any breakfast? I should think you"d be starved, Dolly. You"ve had a busier morning than the rest of us, even."
"I am hungry, when I"m reminded of it," said Dolly, with a comical gesture. "Whatever are we going to do, Miss Eleanor?"
"I"m just teasing you, Dolly," said Eleanor. "Mr. Salters came over from Green Cove in his boat, when he saw the fire, to see if he couldn"t help in some way, and he"s gone in to Bay City. He"ll be out pretty soon with a load of provisions, and as many other things as he can stuff into the Sally S."
"Then we"re really going to stay here?" said Bessie King.
"We certainly are!" said Eleanor, her eyes flashing. "I don"t see why we should let a little thing like this fire drive us away! We are going to stay here, and, what"s more, we"re going to have just as good a time as we planned to have when we came here--if not a better one!"
"Good!" cried half a dozen of the girls together.
Soon all the rubbish was collected, and a fire had been built. And, while Margery Burton applied a light to it, the girls formed a circle about it, and danced around, singing the while the most popular of Camp Fire songs, Wo-he-lo.
"That"s like burning all the unpleasant things that have happened to us, isn"t it?" said Eleanor. "We just toss them into the flames, and--they"re gone! What"s left is clean and good and useful, and we will make all the better use of it for having lost what is burning now."
"Isn"t it strange, Miss Eleanor," said Bessie King, "that this should have happened to us so soon after the fire that burned up the Pratt"s farm?"
"Yes, it is," replied Eleanor. "And there"s a lesson in it for us, just as there was for them in their fire. We didn"t expect to find them in such trouble when we started to walk there, but we were able to help them, and to show them that there was a way of rising from the ruin of their home, and being happier and more prosperous than they had been before."
"We"re going to do that, too," said Dolly, with spirit. "I felt terrible when I first saw the place in the light, after the fire was all out, but it looks different already."
"Mr. Salters will be here soon," said Eleanor. "And now there"s nothing more to do until he comes. We"ll have a fine meal--and if you"re half as hungry as I am you"ll be glad of that--and we"ll spend the afternoon in getting the place to rights. But just now the best thing for all of us to do is to rest."
"I"ll be glad to do that," said Dolly Ransom, as she linked her arm with Bessie"s and drew her away. "I am pretty tired."
"I should think you would be, Dolly. I haven"t had a chance to thank you yet for what you did for me."
"Oh, nonsense, Bessie!" said Dolly, flushing. "You"d have done it for me, wouldn"t you? I"m only just as glad as I can be that I was able to do anything to get you away from Mr. Holmes--you and Zara."
"Zara"s gone to pieces completely, Dolly. She was terribly frightened--more than I was, I think, and yet I don"t see how that can be, because I was as frightened as I think anyone could have been."
"I never saw them get hold of you at all, Bessie. How did it happen?"
"Well, that"s pretty hard to say, Bessie. You know, after we found out that that yacht was here just to watch us, I was nervous, and so were you."
"I think we had reason to be nervous, don"t you?"
"I should say so! Well, anyhow, as soon as I saw that the tents were on fire, I was sure that the men on the yacht had had something to do with it. But, of course, there wasn"t anything to do but try as hard I could to help put out the fire, and it was so exciting that I didn"t think about any other danger until I saw a man from the boat that had come ash.o.r.e pick Zara up and start to carry her out to it."
"They pretended to be helping us with the fire, and they really did help, Bessie. I guess we wouldn"t have saved any of the tents at all if it hadn"t been for them."
"Oh, I saw what they were doing! When I saw the man pick Zara up, though, I knew right away what their plan was. And I was just going to scream when another man got hold of me, and he kept me from shouting, and carried me off to the yacht in the boat. Zara had fainted, and they kept us down below in a cabin and said they were going to take us along the coast until we came to the coast of the state Zara and I were in when we met you girls first."
"We guessed that, Bessie. That was one of the things we were all worrying about when we came here--that they might try to carry you two off that way. I don"t see how it can be that you"re all right as long as you"re in this state, and in danger as soon as you go back to the one you came from."
"Well, you see, Zara and I really did run away, I suppose. Zara"s father is in prison, so they said she had to have a guardian, and I left the Hoovers. So that old Farmer Weeks--you know about him, don"t you?--is our guardian in that state, and he"s got an order from the judge near Hedgeville putting us in his care until we are twenty-one."
"But that order"s no good in this state?"
"No, because here Miss Mercer is our guardian. But if they can get us into that other state, no matter how, they can hold us."
"Oh, I see! And, of course, Miss Eleanor understood right away. When we told the men who had helped us with the fire that you were missing, they said they were afraid you must have been caught in the fire, but Miss Eleanor said she was sure you were on the yacht. And they just laughed."
"I heard that big man, Jeff, talking to her when she went aboard the yacht."
"Yes. They wouldn"t let her look for you, and he threatened to put her off if she didn"t come ash.o.r.e. You heard that, didn"t you?"
"Oh, yes! Zara and I could hear everything she said when she was in the cabin on the yacht. But we couldn"t let her know where we were."
"Well, just as soon as she could get to a telephone, Miss Eleanor called up Bay City, and asked them to send policemen or some sort of officers who could search the yacht. But we were terribly afraid that they would sail away before those men could get here, and then, you see, we couldn"t have done a thing. There wouldn"t have been any way of catching them."
"And they"d have done it, too, if it hadn"t been for you, Dolly! I don"t see how you ever thought of it, and how you were brave enough to do what you did when you did think of it."
"Oh, pshaw, Bessie--it was easy! I knew enough about yachts to understand that if their screw was twisted up with rope it wouldn"t turn, and that would keep them there for a little while, anyhow. And they never seemed to think of that possibility at all. So I swam out there, and, of course, I could dive and stay down for a few seconds at a time. It was easier, because I had something to hold on to."
"It was mighty clever, and mighty plucky of you, too, Dolly."
"There was only one thing I regretted, Bessie. I wish I"d been able to hear what they said when they found out they couldn"t get away!"
"I wish you"d been there, too, Dolly," said Bessie, laughing. "They were perfectly furious, and everyone on board blamed everyone else. It took them quite a while to find out what was the matter, and then even after they found out, it meant a long delay before they could clear the screw and get moving."
"I never was so glad of anything in my life, Bessie, as when we saw the men from Bay City coming while that yacht was still here! We kept watching it all the time, of course, and we saw them send the sailor over to dive down and find out what was wrong. Then we could see him going down and coming up, time after time, and it seemed as if he would get it done in time."
"It must have been exciting, Dolly."
"I guess it was just as exciting for you, wasn"t it? But it would have been dreadful if, after having held them so long, it hadn"t been quite long enough."
"Well, it was long enough, Dolly, thanks to you! I hate to think of where I would be now if you hadn"t managed it so cleverly."
"What will they do to those men on the yacht, do you suppose?"
"I don"t know. Miss Eleanor wants to prove that it was Mr. Holmes who got them to do it, I think. But that won"t be decided until her cousin, Mr. Jamieson, the lawyer, comes. He"ll know what we"d better do, and I"m sure Miss Eleanor will leave it to him to decide."
"I tell you one thing, Bessie. This sort of persecution of you and Zara has got to be stopped. I really do believe they"ve gone too far this time. Of course, if they had got you away, they"d have been all right, because in that other state where you two came from what they did was all right. But they got caught at it. I certainly do hope that Mr. Jamieson will be able to find some way to stop them."
"I"m glad we"re going to stay here, aren"t you, Dolly? Do you know, I really feel that we"ll be safer here now than if we went somewhere else? They"ve tried their best to get at us here, and they couldn"t manage it. Perhaps now they"ll think that we"ll be on our guard too much, and leave us alone."
"I hope so, Bessie. But look here, there were two girls on guard last night, and what good did it do us?"
"You don"t think they were asleep, do you, Dolly?"
"No, I"m sure they weren"t. But they just didn"t have a chance to do anything. What happened was this. Margery and Mary were sitting back to back, so that one could watch the yacht and the other the path that leads up to the spring on top of the bluff, where those two men we had seen were sitting."
"That was a good idea, Dolly."
"First rate, but those people were too clever. They didn"t row ash.o.r.e in a boat--not here, at least. And no one came down the path, until later, anyhow. The first thing that made Margery think there was anything wrong was when she smelt smoke and then, a second later, the big living tent was all ablaze."
"It might have been an accident, Dolly, I suppose--"
"Oh, yes, it might have been, but it wasn"t! They were here too soon, and it fitted in too well with their plans. Miss Eleanor thinks she knows how they started the fire."
"But how could they have done that, if there were none of them here on the beach, Dolly?"
"She says that if they were on the bluff, above the tents, they could very easily have thrown down bombs that would smoulder, and soon set the canvas on fire. And there was a high wind last night, and it wouldn"t have taken long, once a spark had touched the canvas, for everything to blaze up. They couldn"t have picked a much better night."
"I don"t suppose that can be proved, though, Dolly."
"I"m afraid not. That"s what Miss Eleanor says, too. She says you can often be so sure of a thing yourself that it seems that it must have happened, without being able to prove it to someone else. That"s where they are so clever, and that"s what makes them so dangerous. They can hide their tracks splendidly."
"I don"t see why men who can do such things couldn"t keep straight, and really make more money honestly than they can by being crooked."
"It does seem strange, doesn"t it, Bessie? Oh, look, there"s the Sally S. with our breakfast--and there"s another boat coming in. I wonder if Mr. Jamieson can be here already?"
In a moment his voice proved that it was possible, and a few minutes later, while the girls were helping Captain Salters to unload the stores he had brought with him, Eleanor was greeting her attorney from Bay City.
CHAPTER II.
A NEW ALLY.
"I guess you haven"t met Billy Trenwith properly yet, Eleanor," said Charlie Jamieson, smiling.
"Maybe not," said Eleanor, returning the smile, "but I regard him as a friend already, Charlie. He was splendid this morning. If he hadn"t understood so quickly, and acted at once, the way he did, I don"t know what would have happened."
"I"m afraid I didn"t really understand at all, Miss Mercer," said Trenwith, a good looking young fellow, with light brown hair and grey blue eyes, that, although mild and pleasant enough now, had been as cold as steel when Bessie had seen him on the yacht. "But I could understand readily enough that you were in trouble, and I knew that Charlie"s cousin wouldn"t appeal to me unless there was a good reason. So I didn"t feel that I was taking many chances in doing what you wished."
"I"m afraid you took more chances than you know about, Billy," said Charlie, gravely. "You"re in politics, aren"t you? And you have ambitions for more of a job than you"ve got now?"
"Oh, yes, I"m in politics, after a fashion," admitted Trenwith. "But I guess I could manage to keep alive if I never got another political office. I had a bit of a practice before I became district attorney, and I think I could build it up again."
"Well, I hope this isn"t going to make any difference, Billy. But it"s only fair for you to know the sort of game you"re running into. I don"t want to feel that you"re going ahead to help us without understanding the situation just as it is."
"You talk as if this might be a pretty complicated bit of business, Charlie. Suppose you loosen up and tell me about it. Then I may be able to figure better on how I can help you."
"That"s just what I"m going to do, old man. I want you to meet two of cousin"s protegees here--Bessie King and Zara, the mysterious. If we knew more about Zara and her affairs this wouldn"t be such a Chinese puzzle. But here goes! Ask me all the questions you like. And you girls--if I go wrong, stop me.
"In the first place, Miss Mercer here took a party of her Camp Fire Girls, these same ones that you can see there so busy about getting breakfast, over the state line, and they went to a camp on a lake a little way from a village called Hedgeville."
"I know the place," nodded Trenwith. "Never been there, but I know where it is."
"Well, one morning they discovered these two--Bessie and Zara. And they"d had a strange experience. They were running away!"
"Bad business, as a rule," commented Trenwith. "But I suppose there was a good reason?"
"You bet there was, old chap! Bessie had lived for a good many years with an old farmer called Hoover and his wife. They had a son, too, a worthless young scamp named Jake, lazy and ready for any sort of mischief that turned up."
"Is she related to them in any way, Charlie?"
"Not a bit of it! When she was a little bit of a kid her parents left her there as a boarder, and they were supposed to send money to pay for her keep until they came back to get her. For a while they did, but then the money stopped coming."
"But they kept her on, just the same?"
"Yes, as a sort of unpaid servant. She did all the work she could manage, and she didn"t have a very good time. Zara, here, has a father. How long ago did Zara and her father come to Hedgeville, Bessie?"
"They"d been there about two years when we--we had to run away, Mr. Jamieson. They came from some foreign country, you know."
"Yes. And the people around Hedgeville couldn"t make much out about them, so they decided, of course, being unable to understand them, that there must be something wrong about Zara"s dad. No real reason at all, except that he only spoke a little English, and liked to keep his business to himself."
Trenwith laughed.
"I know," he said. "I see a lot of that sort of thing."
"Well, the day before the two of them ran away--or the day before they found the girls, rather--there"d been a fine shindy at the Hoovers. Zara went over to see Bessie, and Jake Hoover locked her in a tool shed. Then he managed, without meaning to do it, to set the tool shed afire, and said he was going to say that Bessie had done it."
"Fine young pup, he must be!"
"Yes--worth knowing! Anyhow, Bessie had only too good reason to know that his mother would believe him and take his word, no matter what she and Zara said. So, being scared, she just ran. I don"t blame her; I"d have done the same thing myself. You and I both know that knowing he"s innocent doesn"t keep a man who is unjustly accused from being afraid."