The Meadow-Brook Girls by the Sea; Or, The Loss of The Lonesome Bar

by Janet Aldridge

  CHAPTER XIV

  A VISITOR WHO WAS WELCOME

  "Wake up, girls. Put on your bathing suits and jump in." Miss Eltingalready was dressed in her blue bathing costume, her hair tucked underher red rubber bathing cap. "We have just time for a swim beforebreakfast. I see the smoke curling up from the campfire already."

  "I don't want to thwim; I want to thleep," protested Tommy.

  "Get a move, darlin', unless you want to be thrown in," interjectedJane, who was hurrying into her bathing suit. "Margery, don't tempt ustoo far, or we will throw you in, too."

  "I am sleepy, too," declared Harriet, sitting up and rubbing her eyes."I can't imagine what makes me feel so stupid this morning." Then,remembering, she became silent.

  "If you would go to bed with the children and get your regular night'srest, you wouldn't be so sleepy in the morning," Jane answered withapparent indifference. Harriet regarded Jane with inquiring eyes. "Iwonder if Jane really suspects that I was out of the cabin in thenight, or whether it was one of her incidental remarks?" shereflected. "I'll find out before the day is ended."

  "Am I right, darlin'?" persisted Jane, with a tantalizing smile.

  "Right about what?"

  "Being up late?"

  "I agree with you," replied Harriet frankly, looking her questionerstraight in the eyes. "I am losing altogether too much sleep of late."

  "We didn't lothe any thleep latht night," added Tommy.

  "You certainly did not, my dear; nor did Margery nor any of the othersunless it were Crazy Jane," declared Harriet with a mischievous glanceat Jane McCarthy, who refused to be disturbed by it or to be trappedinto any sort of an admission.

  "Girls, girls, aren't you coming in?" Miss Elting rose dripping fromthe bay and peered into the cabin. "Come in or you'll be too late."

  "At once, Miss Elting," called Harriet. "It has taken me some littletime to get awake. I am awake now. Here I come." She ran out of thecabin and sprang into the water with a shout and a splash, strikingout for the opposite side, nearly a quarter of a mile away. She hadreached the middle of the bay before the guardian caught sight of herand called to her to return. The Meadow-Brook girl did so, though ithad been her intention to swim all the way across the bay and back.

  In the meantime the other girls had begun their swim. Jane wassplashing about in deep water, Hazel doing likewise, while Margery wasswimming in water barely up to her neck. Tommy, on the other hand,appeared to be afraid to venture out. Every time a ripple would breakabout her knees she would scream and run back out of the way.

  "'Fraid cat!" jeered Margery. "'Fraid to come in where the water isdeep."

  "Yeth, I am," admitted Tommy.

  "I told you so, I told you so," shouted Buster. "I always said she wasa 'fraid cat, and now she has shown you that I am right."

  "Who is a 'fraid cat?" demanded Miss Elting, pulling herself up on thebeach with her hands.

  "I am," answered Tommy, speaking for herself.

  "Who says you are?"

  "Buthter."

  "Margery, I am ashamed of you. You have evidently forgotten that Graceshowed how little she was afraid when she was lost at sea the othernight," chided the guardian.

  "Yeth, I'm a 'fraid cat. But I'd rather be a 'fraid cat than a fatcat!" declared the little, lisping girl with an earnestness that madethem all smile. Harriet came swinging in with long, steady strokes,the last one landing her on the sand with the greater part of her bodyout of the shallow water.

  "Why wouldn't you let me go across, Miss Elting?" she asked.

  "You would be late for breakfast."

  "Oh! I thought you feared I might drown," answered Harrietwhimsically.

  "Once is enough," answered Jane. "There goes the fish horn. Hurry,girls! We are going to be late."

  "The fithh horn? Are we going to have fithh for breakfatht?"questioned Tommy.

  "Never mind what, girls. Tuck up your blankets and get busy. Remember,you must braid your hair before going to breakfast. I don't like tosee you at meals with your hair down; you girls are too old for that."

  "Yes, Miss Elting," answered Harriet.

  "I gueth I'll cut my hair off. It ith too much trouble to fix it everymorning," decided Grace. "But, Mith Elting, couldn't I fix it thenight before and thleep in it?"

  "Certainly not! How can you suggest such a thing?"

  Tommy twisted her face out of shape and blinked solemnly at Margery,whose chin was in the air. They were all hurrying now, for theirmorning bath had given them keen appetites. Miss Elting was first tobe ready, then Harriet, but they waited until their companions weredressed and ready to go.

  "The Indian lope to the breakfast tent," announced Miss Elting."Forward, go!"

  The girls started off at an easy though not particularly gracefullope, the guardian and the Torch Bearer setting the pace for the rest.They arrived at the cook tent with faces flushed and eyes sparkling,with a few moments to spare before the moment for marching in arrived.The Chief Guardian smiled approvingly.

  "Sleeping out on the bay appears to agree with you girls," she said."I have no need to ask if you slept well."

  "Harriet is the restless one," answered Jane.

  Harriet flushed in spite of her self-control; but no specialsignificance was attached to Jane's remark, for it was seldom that shewas taken seriously.

  Harriet, after recovering from her momentary confusion, chuckled andlaughed, very much amused over what had made no impression at all onher companions.

  "I shall ask some of our craftswomen here to build beds for thecabin," announced the Chief Guardian, as they were sitting down.

  "It is not necessary," replied Miss Elting. "Our girls prefer thebough beds, which they will build during the day."

  "And what will our new Torch Bearer do to amuse herself after theregular duties of the day are done?" questioned Mrs. Livingston. "Willshe take her group for a swim in the Atlantic?"

  "Yeth, Harriet and mythelf are going to try to thwim acroth thithafternoon," Grace informed them.

  "Swim across the Atlantic? Mercy me!" answered Mrs. Livingstonlaughingly. "That would indeed be an achievement."

  "I beg your pardon, but I didn't thay 'acroth the othean'; I meant tothwim acroth the pond down in the cove yonder. Harriet could thwimacroth the othean if she withhed to, though," added Tommy.

  "You surely have a loyal champion, Miss Burrell," called one of theguardians from the far end of the table. "Still, we have not heardwhat you are going to do to-day. I am quite sure it will be somethingworth while?"

  "I have about made up my mind to go out in search of buried treasure,"answered Harriet, with mock gravity. They laughed heartily at this.Jane regarded her narrowly.

  "I wonder what Harriet has in her little head now?" she said under herbreath.

  "Why, what do you mean?" asked the Chief Guardian. "Buried treasurealong this little strip of coast? Perhaps, however, you may mean outon the Shoal Islands."

  "No, Mrs. Livingston. Right here in Camp Wau-Wau there is buriedtreasure. I don't know whether it is worth anything or not, but thereis a buried treasure here."

  The girls uttered exclamations of amazement, for they saw that theirnew Torch Bearer was in earnest, that she meant every word she haduttered about the treasure.

  "Now, isn't that perfectly remarkable?" breathed Margery.

  "Oh, do tell us about it?" cried the girls.

  "Not a word more," answered Harriet. "I give you leave to find it,though, if you can. Some of you clever trailers see if you can pick upthe trail and follow it to its end. At the end you will find theburied treasure, unless it has been taken away within a few hours,which I very much doubt. Now, that is all I am going to tell you aboutit."

  "Do you really mean that, Harriet?" questioned Grace.

  Harriet nodded.

  "Why don't you get it yourthelf, then?"

  "I may one of these days if the girls fail to find it. I wish to seeif they are good trailers. But we are forgetting to eat breakfast.Just now I am more
in need of breakfast than of buried treasure."

  "Yes, girls, please eat your breakfast. We must put the camp to rightsas soon as we finish, for I have an idea that we may have visitorsbefore the day is done," urged Mrs. Livingston.

  The Wau-Wau girls were too much excited over Harriet's words to beparticularly interested in the subject of visitors just then, so theyhurried their breakfast, discussing the new Torch Bearer's veiledsuggestions, eager to have done with the morning meal and the morningwork that they might try to solve this delightful mystery. Harriet waswell satisfied with the excitement she had stirred, though having doneso would rather bar her from carrying out certain plans that she hadhad in mind ever since the previous night.

  Later in the morning, however, under pretext of wishing to get pineboughs for her bed, she, with Tommy, strolled off into the woods, butbeyond locating the spot where she had lain when the man stumbled overher in the darkness she made no progress toward solving the mystery.Not the slightest trace of the box did she discover. Of course,Harriet did not hope to find the mysterious box standing in plainsight, but she could not imagine what they had done with it in sobrief a time. She did not dare make much of a point of searchingabout, observing that Tommy was regarding her keenly during themorning stroll.

  With her belt hatchet Harriet selected and cut such boughs as shedesired and placed them in a pile, afterward to be carried out to thecabin on the Lonesome Bar. Later on they were assisted by the otherMeadow-Brook Girls. They covered the floor of the cabin with thefragrant green boughs until Tommy declared that it made her "thleepy"just to smell it. In the meantime, those of their companions who werenot engaged with camp duties were strolling about along the beach nearthe camp, discussing what Harriet had told them at breakfast thatmorning. It was all right to tell them to pick up the trail, but whattrail was it, and how were they to find it? Even the guardians werenot beyond curiosity in the matter, and they, too, when they thoughtthemselves unobserved, might have been seen looking eagerly about forthe "trail." All this amused Harriet Burrell very much.

  With her group, Harriet was at the cabin arranging the boughs, whenthey were summoned to camp by three blasts of the fish horn used forthe various signals employed by Camp Wau-Wau. Something had happenedin camp.

  "Thomebody hath found it!" cried Tommy, shooting a quick glance ofinquiry at Harriet Burrell. The latter flushed, then burst outlaughing after a look toward the miniature forest of spindling pines.

  "I hope they have. But I may tell you, my dear Tommy, that theyhaven't found either the trail or my buried treasure."

  "You must know pretty well where it is," said Miss Elting, eyeingHarriet steadily for a few seconds. "Come, we must not delay answeringthat summons."

  They did not delay. The Meadow-Brook Girls responded promptly, makinga run for it in good order.

  "There's a motor car," shouted Jane, when they came in sight of thecamp. "O darlin's, maybe it is a new car Daddy has sent down for me totake the place of the one that is drowned."

  Jane leaped on ahead of her companions, intent upon reaching the camp.Harriet sprinted up beside her, almost as much excited as was CrazyJane herself.

  The two girls easily outdistanced their companions in a very fewmoments. It was a race between them to see who should first reach thecamp. Harriet fell behind slightly as her quick eyes made out a figuresitting in front of the Chief Guardian's tent. The figure was that ofa man and he was conversing with Mrs. Livingston.

  Jane uttered a sudden shrill cry. She, too, had discovered the visitorand recognized him.

  "It's Daddy. It's my dear old Daddy!" she screamed, and, forgetful ofthe lectures she had received on comporting herself with dignity andrestraint, Crazy Jane threw herself--hurled herself, in fact--into thearms of Contractor McCarthy. Now, a camp chair is never any toosubstantial. The one on which Mr. McCarthy was sitting was noexception to the rule. It collapsed under the force of Crazy Jane'sprojectile-like force. Mr. McCarthy, in attempting to save himselffrom going down with it, lurched sideways. In doing so he bumpedheavily against the Chief Guardian, and with a sharp little cry fromthe latter, the three went down in a confused heap.