The Camp Fire Girls at the Seashore; Or, Bessie King's Happiness

by Jane L. Stewart

  CHAPTER VI

  AN UNHAPPY ENDING

  There was a gasp of astonishment and dismay from the girls. Somehow allseemed to feel as if Eleanor's reproach were directed at them instead ofat the pale and angry Gladys, who stood, scarcely able to believe herears, looking at the Guardian. There had been no anger in Eleanor'svoice, only sorrow and distress.

  "Why, what do you mean, Miss Mercer?" Gladys gasped.

  "Exactly what I say, Gladys," said Eleanor, in the same level voice."You are not fit to be one of us unless you mean sincerely and earnestlyto keep the Law of the Fire. We are a sisterhood; no girl who is notonly willing, but eager, to become our sister, may join us."

  Slowly the meaning of her rejection seemed to sink into the mind ofGladys.

  "Do you mean that you're not going to let me join?" she asked in ashrill, high pitched voice that showed she was on the verge of givingway to an outbreak of hysterical anger.

  "For your own sake it is better that you should not join now, Gladys.Listen to me. I do not blame you greatly for this. I would rather haveyou act this way than be a hypocrite, pretending to believe in our lawwhen you do not."

  "Oh, I hate you! I hate the Camp Fire! I wouldn't join for anything inthe world, after this!"

  "There will be time to settle that when we are ready to let you join,Gladys," said Eleanor, a little sternness creeping into her voice, as ifshe was growing angry for the first time. "To join the Camp Fire is aprivilege. Remember this--no girl does the Camp Fire a favor by joiningit. The Camp Fire does not need any one girl, no matter how clever, orhow pretty, or how able she may be, as much as that girl needs the CampFire. The Camp Fire, as a whole, is a much greater, finer thing than anysingle member."

  Sobs of anger were choking Gladys when she tried to answer. She couldnot form intelligible words.

  Eleanor glanced at Mary Turner, and the Guardian of the new Camp Fire,on the hint, put her arm about Gladys.

  "I think you'd better go back to the camp now, dear," she said, verygently. "You and I will have a talk presently, when you feel better, andperhaps you will see that you are wrong."

  All the life and spirit seemed to have left the girls as Gladys, herhead bowed, the sound of her sobs still plainly to be heard, left thecircle of the firelight and made her lonely way over the beach towardthe tents of her own camp. For a few moments silence reigned. ThenEleanor spoke, coolly and steadily, although Mary Turner, who was closeto her, knew what an effort her seeming calm represented.

  "We have had a hard thing to do to-night," she said. "I know that noneof you will add to what Gladys has made herself suffer. She is in thewrong, but I think that very few of us will have any difficulty inremembering many times when we have been wrong, and have been sure thatwe were right. Gladys thinks now that we are all against her--that wewanted to humiliate her. We must make her understand that she is wrong.Remember, Wo-he-lo means love."

  She paused for a moment.

  "Wo-he-lo means love," she repeated. "And not love for those whom wecannot help loving. The love that is worth while is that we give tothose who repel us, who do not want our love. It is easy to love thosewho love us. But in time we can make Gladys love us by showing that wewant to love her and do what we can to make her happy. And now, since Ithink none of us feel like staying here, we will sing our good-nightsong and disperse."

  And the soft voices rose like a benediction, mingling in the lovelystrains of that most beautiful of all the Camp Fire songs.

  Silently, and without the usual glad talk that followed the ending of aCouncil Fire, the circle broke up, and the girls, in twos and threes,spread over the beach.

  "Walk over with me, won't you?" Marcia Bates begged Dolly and Bessie."Oh, I'm so ashamed! I never thought Gladys would act like that!"

  "It isn't your fault, Marcia," said Dolly. "Don't be silly about it.And, do you know, I'm not angry a bit! Just at first I thought I wasgoing to be furious. But--well, somehow I can't help admiring Gladys! Ilike her better than I ever did before, I really do believe!"

  "Oh, I do!" said Bessie, her eyes glowing. "Wasn't she splendid? Ofcourse, she's all wrong, but she had to be plucky to stand up there likethat, when she knew everyone was against her!"

  "But she had no right to insult all you girls, Bessie."

  "I don't believe she meant to insult us a bit," said Dolly. "I don'tthink she thought much about us. It's just that she has always beenbrought up to feel a certain way about things, and she couldn't changeall at once. A whole lot of girls, while they believed just what shedid, and hated the whole idea just as much, would never have dared tosay so, when they knew no one agreed with them."

  "Yes, it's just as Miss Eleanor said," said Bessie. "She's not ahypocrite, no matter what her other faults are. She's not afraid to sayjust what she thinks--and that's pretty fine, after all."

  "I wish she could hear you," said Marcia, indignantly. "Oh, it'ssplendid of you, but I can't feel that way, and there's no usepretending. I suppose the real reason I'm so angry is that I'm reallyvery fond of Gladys, and I hate to see her acting this way. She's makinga perfect fool of herself, I think."

  "But just think of how splendid it will be when she sees she is wrong,Marcia," said Bessie. "Because you want to remember if she's pluckyenough to hold out against all her friends this way she will be pluckyenough to own up when she sees the truth, too."

  "Yes, and she'll be a convert worth making, too," said Dolly. "There'sjust one thing I'm thinking of, Marcia. Will she stay here? Don't yousuppose she'll go home right away? I know I would. I wouldn't want tostay around this beach after what happened at the Council Fireto-night."

  They never heard Marcia's answer to that question, for in the darkness,Gladys herself, shaking with anger, rose and confronted them.

  "You bet I'm going to stay!" she declared, furiously. "And I'll get evenwith you, Dolly Ransom, and your nasty old Miss Mercer, and the wholecrew of you! Maybe you've been able to set all my friends againstme--I'm glad of it!"

  "No one is set against you, Gladys," said Marcia, gently.

  "Maybe you don't call it that, Marcia Bates, but I've got my own opinionof a lot of girls who call themselves my friends and side against me theway you've done!"

  "Why, Gladys, I haven't done a thing--"

  "That's just it, you sneak! Why, do you suppose I'd have let them treatyou as I was treated to-night? If it had happened to you, and I'd joinedbefore, I'd have got up and thrown their nasty old ring back at them! Idon't want their old ring! I've got much prettier ones of my own--gold,and set with sapphires and diamonds!"

  "I'm very glad you're going to stay, Gladys!" said Dolly. "I'm sorryI've been cross when I spoke to you lately two or three times, and Ihope you'll forgive me. And I think you'll see soon that we're not atall what you think we are in the Camp Fire."

  "Oh, you needn't talk that way to me, Dolly Ransom! You can pretend allyou like to be a saint, but I've known you too long to swallow all that!You've done just as many mean things as anyone else! And now you standaround and act as if you were ashamed to know me. Just you wait! I'llget even with you, and all the rest of your new friends, if it's thelast thing I ever do!"

  Bessie's hand reached out for Dolly's. She knew her chum well enough tounderstand that if Dolly controlled her temper now it would only be bythe exercise of the grimmest determination. Sure enough, Dolly's handwas trembling, and Bessie could almost feel the hot anger that wasswelling up in her. But Dolly mastered herself nobly.

  "You can't make me angry now, Gladys," said Dolly, finally. "You'reperfectly right; I've done things that are meaner than anything you didat Lake Dean. And I'm just as sorry for them now as you will be when youunderstand better."

  "Well, you needn't preach to me!" said Gladys, fiercely. "And you cangive up expecting me to run away. I'm not a coward, whatever else I maybe! And I'd never be able to hold up my head if I thought a lot ofcommon girls had frightened me into running away from this place. I'mgoing to stay here, and I'm going to have a good time, an
d you'd betterlook out for yourselves--that's all I can say! Maybe I know more aboutyou than you think."

  And then she turned on her heel and left them.

  "Whew!" said Marcia. "I don't see how you kept your temper, Dolly. Ifshe'd said half as much to me as she did to you, I never could havestood it, I can tell you! Whatever did she mean by what she said justthen about knowing more than we thought?"

  "I don't know," said Dolly, rather anxiously. "But look here, Marcia, Imight as well tell you now. There's likely to be a good deal ofexcitement here."

  "Yes," said Bessie, rather bitterly. "And it's all my fault--mine andZara's, that is."

  "I don't see what you can mean," said Marcia, mystified.

  "Well, it's quite a long story, but I really think you'd better know allabout it, Marcia," said Dolly.

  And so, with occasional help from Bessie herself, when Dolly forgotsomething, or when Bessie's ideas disagreed with hers, Dolly poured thestory of the adventures of Bessie and Zara since their flight fromHedgeville into Marcia's ears.

  "Why, I never heard of such a thing!" Marcia exclaimed, when the storywas told. "So that fire last night wasn't an accident at all?"

  "We're quite sure it wasn't, Marcia. And don't you think it looks as ifwe were right?"

  "It certainly does, and I think it's dreadful, Dolly--just dreadful. Oh,Bessie, I am so sorry for you!"

  She threw her arms about Bessie impulsively and kissed her, while Dolly,delighted, looked on.

  "Doesn't it make you love her more than ever?" she said. "And Bessie isso foolish about it sometimes. She seems to think that girls won't wantto have anything to do with her, because she hasn't had a home andparents like the rest of us--or like most of us."

  "That _is_ awfully silly, Bessie," said Marcia. "As if it was yourfault! People are going to like you for what you are, and for the wayyou behave--not on account of things that you really haven't a thing todo with. Sensible people, I mean. Of course, if they're like Gladys--butthen most people aren't, I think."

  "Of course they're not!" said Dolly, stoutly. "And, besides, I'm justsure that Bessie is going to find out about her father and mother someday. I don't believe Mr. Holmes would be taking all the trouble he hasabout her unless there were something very surprising about her historythat we don't know anything about. Do you, Marcia?"

  "Of course not! He's got something up his sleeve. Probably she isheiress to a fortune, or something like that, and he wants to get holdof it. He's a very rich man, isn't he, Dolly?"

  "Yes. You know he's the owner of a great big department store at home.And Bessie says that it can't be any question of money that makes him soanxious to get hold of her and of Zara, because he has so much already."

  "H'm! I guess people who have money like to make more, Dolly. I've heardmy father talk about that. He says they're never content, and that's onereason why so many men work themselves to death, simply because theyhaven't got sense enough to stop and rest when they have enough money tolive comfortably for the rest of their lives."

  "That's another thing I've told her. And she says that can't be thereason, but just the same she never suggests a better one to take itsplace."

  "Look here," said Marcia, thoughtfully. "If Mr. Holmes is spending somuch money, doesn't it cost a whole lot to stop him from doing what he'strying to do, whatever that is? I'm just thinking--my father has ever somuch, you know, and I know if I told him, he'd be glad to spend whateverwas needed--"

  Bessie flushed unhappily.

  "Oh, that's one thing that is worrying me terribly!" she cried. "I justknow that Miss Eleanor and Mr. Jamieson must have spent a terrible loton my affairs already, and I don't see how I'm ever going to pay themback! And if I ever mention it, Miss Eleanor gets almost angry, and saysI mustn't talk about it at all, even think of it."

  "Why, of course you mustn't. It would be awful to think that thosehorrid people were able to get hold of you and make you unhappy justbecause they had money and you didn't, Bessie."

  And Dolly echoed her exclamation. Naturally enough, Marcia, whoseparents were among the richest people in the state, thought little ofmoney, and Dolly, who had always had plenty, even though her family wasby no means as rich as Marcia's, felt the same way about the matter.Neither of them valued money particularly; but Bessie, because she hadlived ever since she could remember in a family where the pinch ofactual poverty was always felt, had a much truer appreciation of thevalue of money.

  She did not want to possess money, but she had a good deal of nativepride, and it worried her constantly to think that her good friends werespending money that she could see no prospect, however remote, ofrepaying.

  "I wish there was some way to keep me from having to take all the moneythey spend on me," she said, wistfully. "As soon as we get back to thecity, I'm going to find some work to do, so that I can support myself."

  She half expected Marcia to assail that idea, for it seemed to her that,nice as she was, she belonged, like Gladys Cooper, to the class thatlooked down on work and workers. But to her surprise, Marcia gave a cryof admiration.

  "It's splendid for you to feel that way, Bessie!" she said. "But, justthe same, I believe you'll have to wait until things are more settled.It would be so much easier for Mr. Holmes to get hold of you if you wereworking, you know."

  "She's going to come and stay with me just as long as she wants to,"said Dolly. "And, anyhow, I really believe things are going to besettled for her. Perhaps I've heard something, too!"