The Girl Scouts at Camp Comalong Part 7

The girl leaning over the spring must have heard the steps, for she jumped up quickly and s.n.a.t.c.hed her hat from the big stone.

"h.e.l.lo!" called out Grace cheerily. "Did you come down to our camp exercises?"

The brown felt hat was pulled down very suddenly and firmly on the black hair, and for an instant the face under it flashed defiance. The next, a frank smile brought the answer.

"I did not exactly come to them, but I heard from the hill. It seemed--very nice."

"Oh, it was. I'm sorry you didn't come," pressed Grace. "Let us introduce ourselves." She waved her pail nervously. "This is Cleo and I'm Grace of the Bobolinks. You may call us the Bobbies if you will."

Peg smiled again and scratched her heavy shoes quite like an embarra.s.sed youth might do. She hesitated quite a while before answering:

"And I'm Peg--you may, if you will" (she pleasantly imitated the voice Grace had used), "just call me Peg," she finished rather shyly.

It was such an agreeable surprise to find her approachable.

Immediately both Scouts fell to talking of their camp prospects, and very naturally asked Peg to call.

"We know you are the original Scout of these hills," Grace complimented, "and I hope you don't mind our trespa.s.sing."

"Oh, no," replied Peg, but the voice was a little guarded. "The hills are big enough for us all," she added, "and I don't think you could have found a prettier spot. You can see clear across the lake from your front door," and she smiled at the cla.s.sification.

But she did not reply to the invitation. Both girls noticed the omission.

Cleo dipped her pail in the spring pool and brought it out filled. She wanted to rinse the new tin, although Corene had boiled it before bringing it out to camp, but to rinse it would cool it, and now Cleo looked about for a spot to throw the waste water.

"Toss it over this way," suggested Peg, who was moving away. "There's a water-cress bed here. Don't forget to try them when you want a salad," and before the Scouts could thank her she was racing over the next hill and waving good-bye.

"So we met Peg!" said Cleo, her pail of water spilling over her new sneaks.

"And she's a dear," announced Grace emphatically.

Then they carried a newly dipped pail of fresh spring water back to camp, for their first supper under the tamarack trees.

CHAPTER VII

THE LOVING BANDIT

When the girls went down to the lake with Mackey that evening, they were, somehow, a source of curiosity to those friends not members of the charmed circle of Scouts. To be away from home, living in a tent out in the woods, while even the Boy Scouts had to go back to their family cottage at night, seemed highly exciting. But the Bobbies were now a unit, and under the capable direction of Miss Mackin they started immediately to do things as they are done by units, and not by individuals.

"We will go for a sail this evening," planned the director. "I see you have all pa.s.sed in the swimming tests and therefore are permitted to go in canoes."

"Oh, yes," Corene replied; "swimming is our chiefest joy, and canoeing on this lake, what we have had of it, is simply ideal."

"I am sure folks will be curious about us for a while at least,"

continued Miss Mackin, "so I have asked Camp Norm to let us take the big canoe this evening, the one we teachers practice in, you know."

"The big green Pedagogue!" exclaimed Cleo. "Oh, how splendid! I have just longed for a ride in the war canoe," and she hurried to do her part in clearing away the supper things.

"Cleo," interfered Corene aside, so that Mackey would not overhear, "you know there is a real Scout way of doing dishes, and----"

"All right, Corey; but let's do them any way to-night, so that they get done," replied the little girl in the big gingham ap.r.o.n. "I just want to get down to the lake and out on the water before the sunset fades. Daddy and all the folks will be there----"

"Show-off!" taunted Madaline, the baby of the patrol. "Cleo thinks that canoe-riding is next best to horseback riding," and she made a juggler's pa.s.s to catch the plate that slipped through her dish-towel.

A half-hour later the Bobolink girls were down at the dock, the center of an admiring party which included some Camp Fire Girls, some girls from the Hikers Club, besides the usual scattering of summer girls, all piling on compliments for the day's achievement in the opening of Camp Comalong. Miss Mackin wore her regular uniform, which she had with her, fortunately, and all together the patrol made a very creditable showing, as they took their places in the war canoe.

After some instructions from Miss Mackin, who, among other things, insisted upon "good form rather than speed," they pulled out gracefully, the "Down Paddle" start having been executed by the eight doubles as precisely as if done by a simple stroke.

And wonder of wonders! There was a moving-picture man on sh.o.r.e, grinding his machine as if each grind depended on speed and not upon form, for only in a sudden burst of strong sunset light did the camera operator hope to get a picture of the Girl Scouts on Lake Hocomo.

"In the movies!" breathed Julia, dipping her paddle with such awe as might have been occasioned had some perfume stream sprung up through the many springs beneath the water's surface. It was sweet, indeed, to be pictured thus, and not a Bobbie among them but felt a little tinge of pride when the boys shouted after them:

"You'll be in the movies, girls!"

"Queer how much more important we are to-day than we were yesterday,"

remarked Cleo a.n.a.lytically.

"Because yesterday we were girls, while to-day we are Scouts,"

explained Mackey. "That's the value of team play, you know. Now we will paddle in to the Point, and see that we make a perfect landing.

That's one thing we have to learn in good canoeing."

Dip after dip took them gracefully down the lake to where the Point landing jutted out among all sorts of craft, the motor-boating being easily as common at the lakeside as is the "motor-caring" at any inland parkside.

"I hope we don't jam them," whispered Grace to Cleo, who was her canoe partner.

"If we have to jam anyone, I hope it's that 'streak'--you know, Grace, that queer bug-boat those girls from the hotel always ride in."

"Why?" asked Grace, leaning closer.

"Because they're snippy and call us 'candy kids,'" replied Cleo. "It seems to me they look more like candy themselves, with their taffy hair and peppermint-striped bathing-suits."

Grace silently agreed, and soon all the paddlers bent their interest and energy on making a perfect landing.

At the director's signal they stopped paddling some little distance out, then steered past the flock of motor boats into the side of the dock, where as pretty a landing was made as the big Pedagogue ever had to her credit.

Miss Mackin and Corene sprang ash.o.r.e first, and held the boat while the others quickly and alertly followed.

Again they were the center of an admiring throng, and again the Bobbies felt suffused with a pardonable pride. They were really the first group of Girl Scouts to be seen about the lake, and it was not surprising that they should attract some attention.

Some provisions for the next day were purchased, as the Point was the center of supplies for the colonists, then, after a half hour spent in recreation about the pier, the party embarked again and paddled back toward the camp landing.

The evening "had ripened" as Louise expressed it, and a calm mellowness seemed to settle over everything about the water and its sh.o.r.es.

"Let us try a song," suggested Miss Mackin. "Who can lead?"