A Campfire Girl's Test of Friendship Part 18

"I don't know," said the Guardian, a shade of doubt darkening her eyes.

"You know, Margery"--she spoke in a low tone--"that seems to depend partly on things we can't really control. There seems to me to be something really quite desperate about the way Mr. Holmes and his friends are going for Bessie and Zara.

"Maybe they will make trouble for us here. It is rather isolated, you know, and I can't help remembering that we're on the coast, and that a few miles away the coast is that of Bessie's state--the state she mustn't be in."

"That's so," said Margery, gravely. "You mean that if they managed to get hold of Bessie or Zara, and took them out to sea and then landed them in that state they'd be able to hold them there?"

"It worries me, Margery. The trouble is, you see, that once they're in that state, it doesn't matter how they were taken there, but they can be held. If Zara's father gets free, why, he would be able to get her back, I suppose. Mr. Jamieson says so. But there's no one with a better right to Bessie, so far as we know. I'm really more worried about her than about Zara."

"We'll all be careful," promised Margery, with fire in her eye. "And I guess they'll have to be pretty smart to find any way of getting her away from us. I'll talk to the girls, and I'll try to be watching myself all the time."

"I'm hungry," announced Dolly. "Just as hungry as a bear! Can't we have supper pretty soon, Miss Eleanor?"

"Supper?" scoffed Miss Eleanor. "Why, we haven't had our dinner yet! But we'll have that just as soon as it's cooked. I've just been waiting for someone to say they were hungry. Dolly, you're elected cook. Since you're the hungry one, you can cook the dinner."

"I certainly will! I'll get it all the sooner that way. May I pick out who's to help me, Miss Eleanor?"

"That's the rule. You certainly can."

"Then I pick out all the girls," announced Dolly. "Every one of you--and no shirking, mind!"

She laughed merrily, and in a moment she had set every girl to some task. Even Margery obeyed her orders cheerfully, for the rule was there, and, even though Dolly had twisted it a bit, it was recognized as a good joke. Moreover, everyone was hungry and wanted the meal to be ready as soon as possible.

"There's good water at the top of that path," said Eleanor, pointing to a path that led up a bluff that backed against the tents. "I think maybe we'll build a wooden pipe-line to bring the water right down here, but for to-day we'll have to carry it from the spring there."

"Is there driftwood here for a camp fire, do you suppose, the way there was last year, Miss Eleanor?" asked one of the other girls. "I'll never forget the lovely fires we had then!"

"There's lots of it, I'm afraid," said Eleanor, gravely.

"Why are you 'afraid'?" asked Bessie, wonderingly.

"Because all the driftwood, or most of it, comes from wrecked ships, Bessie. This beach looks calm and peaceful now, but in the winter, when the great northeast storms blow, this is a terrible coast, and lots and lots of ships are wrecked. Men are drowned very often, too."

"Oh, I never thought of that!"

"Still, some of the wood is just lost from lumber schooners that are loaded too heavily," said Eleanor. "And it certainly does make a beautiful fire, all red and green and blue, and oh, all sorts of colors and shades you never even dreamed of! We'll have a ceremonial camp fire while we're here, and it is certainly true that there is no fire half so beautiful as that we get when we use the wood that the sea casts up."

"Don't they often find lots of other things beside wood along the coast after a great storm, Miss Eleanor?"

"Yes, indeed! There are people who make their living that way. Wreckers, they call them, you know. Of course, it isn't as common to find really valuable things now as it was in the old days."

"Why not? I thought more things were carried at sea than ever," said Dolly.

"There aren't so many wrecks, Dolly, for one thing. And then, in the old days, before steam, and the great big ships they have now, even the most valuable cargoes were carried in wooden ships that were at the mercy of these great storms."

"Oh, and now they send those things in the big ships that are safer, I suppose?"

"Yes. You very seldom hear of an Atlantic liner being wrecked, you know.

It does happen once in a great while, of course, but they are much more likely to reach the port they sail for than the old wooden ships. In the old days many and many a ship sailed that was never heard of, but you could count the ships that have done that in the last few years on the fingers of one hand."

"But there was a frightful wreck not so very long ago, wasn't there? The t.i.tanic?"

"Yes. That was the most terrible disaster since men have gone to sea at all. You see, she was so much bigger, and could carry so many more people than the old ships, that, when she did go down, it was naturally much worse. But the wreckers never made any profit out of her. She went down in the middle of the ocean, and no one will ever see her again."

"Couldn't divers go down after her?"

"No. She was too deep for that. Divers can only go down a certain distance, because, below that, the pressure is too great, and they wouldn't live."

"Stop talking and attend to your dinner, Dolly," said Margery, suddenly.

"You pretended you were hungry, and now you're so busy talking that you're forgetting about the rest of us. We're hungry, too. Just remember that!"

"I can talk and work at the same time," said Dolly. "Is everything ready? Because, if it is, so is dinner. Come on, girls! The clams first.

I've cooked it--I'm not going to put it on the table, too."

"No, we ought to be glad to get any work out of her at all," laughed Margery, as she carried the steaming, savory clams to the table. "I suppose every time we want her to do some work the rest of the time we're here, she'll tell us about this dinner."

"I won't have to," boasted Dolly. "You'll all remember it. All I'm afraid of is that you won't be satisfied with the way anyone else cooks after this. I've let myself out this time!"

It _was_ a good dinner--a better dinner than anyone had thought Dolly could cook. But, despite her jesting ways, Dolly was a close observer, and she had not watched Margery, a real genius in the art of cooking, in vain. Everyone enjoyed it, and, when they had eaten all they could, Dolly lay back in the sand with Bessie.

"Well, wasn't I right? Don't you love this place?" she asked.

"I certainly think I do," said Bessie. "It's so peaceful and quiet. I didn't believe any place could be as calm as the mountains, but I really think this is."

"I love to hear the surf outside, too," said Dolly. "It's as if it were singing a lullaby. I think the surf, and the sighing of the wind in the trees is the best music there is."

"Those noises were the real beginning of music, Dolly," said Eleanor.

"Did you know that? The very first music that was ever written was an attempt to imitate those songs of nature."

After the dishes were washed and put away, everyone sat on the beach, watching the sky darken. First one star and then another came out, and the scene was one of idyllic beauty. And then, as if to complete it, a yacht appeared, small, but beautiful and graceful, steaming toward them.

Its sides were lighted, and from its deck came the music of a violin, beautifully played.

"Oh, how lovely that is!" said Eleanor. "Why, look! I do believe it is going to anchor!"

And, sure enough, the noise of the anchor chains came over the water.

CHAPTER XIII

THE MYSTERIOUS YACHT

But, beautiful as the yacht undoubtedly was, the sight of it and the sound of the slipping anchor chains brought a look of perplexity and even of distress to Eleanor's eyes.

"That's very curious," she said, thoughtfully. "There are no cottages or bungalows near here. Those people can't be coming here just for a visit, or they would take another anchorage. And it's a strange thing for them to choose this cove if they are just cruising along the coast."

"There weren't any yachts here last year when we were camping," said Margery. "But it is a lovely spot, and it's public land along here, isn't it?"