"Ulyth Stanton, what are you doing with that book?" said a voice from behind her desk.

Beside her stood Helen Cooper and Stephanie Radford, the former hugely indignant, the latter with a non-committal expression. Ulyth started so violently that the bottle of Indian ink overturned and spread itself out in three streams.

"Oh Jemima!" shrieked Ulyth in consternation.

"Now you've done it!" exclaimed Helen angrily. "Ink all over the page. What a disgraceful mess! For goodness' sake stop; you're making it worse. Give it to me."

Ulyth, who was frantically mopping up the black streams with her pocket handkerchief, surrendered the book to the outraged librarian. Nemesis had indeed descended upon her guilty head.

"You knew perfectly well that you weren't allowed to take it to-day," scolded Helen. "You sneaked into the library and got it while I was out."

"Someone else has been sneaking too," thought Ulyth, with a glance at Stephanie's face. "I fancy I know who turned informer." Then aloud she said: "I'm fearfully sorry. I'll buy a new copy of the book."

"I don't believe you can; it's one Mrs. Arnold gave to the school, and is published in America. I'll try sponging it with salts of lemon, but I'm afraid nothing will take out the stain. I thought better of you, Ulyth Stanton. One doesn't expect such things from V B. You'll borrow no more books till the end of the month. Do you understand?"

Ulyth responded with what meekness she could muster. She admitted that the monitress had reason for wrath, and that she had really no excuse worthy of urging in extenuation of her crime. It was hard to be debarred the use of the library for more than a fortnight, but, Helen, she knew, would enforce that discipline rigidly. The unfortunate motto-cards had come in for the bulk of the ink, and were completely spoilt. Ulyth carried the ruins to Lizzie's bedroom and pleaded peccavi.

"Well, I suppose it can't be helped. I've done my three cards with pictures of flowers, and the rest of the calendar will have to be plain," said Lizzie. "You were rather an idiot, Ulyth."

"I know. I'd have asked Helen for the book if she'd been anywhere near, and I meant to tell her afterwards that I'd taken it."

"Didn't you explain that to her?"

"No. It didn't come well when she'd just caught me."

"You let her think the worst of you."

"It couldn't be helped. I'm sure Stephanie hunted her up and told her."

"Stephanie doesn't like you."

"No, because I champion Rona, and Stephanie can't bear her."

"There's nothing so much wrong with the poor old Cuckoo now; she's wonderfully inoffensive."

"Yes, but she's not aristocratic. Stephie rubs that in to her continually. She calls her 'a daughter of the people'."

"Stephanie Radford can be uncommonly snobbish sometimes."

Stephanie from the very first had resented Rona's presence at The Woodlands, and since the practical joke which the latter had played upon her she had disliked her heartily. She lost no opportunity of showing her contempt, and of trying to make Rona seem of small account. She revived an ancient tradition of the school which made it a breach of etiquette for girls to go into other form-rooms than their own, thus banishing Rona from V B, where she had often been brought in by Ulyth or good-natured Addie to share the fun that went on. If obliged to take Rona's hand in figure-dancing, she would only give the extreme tips of her fingers, and if forced on any occasion to sit next to her, she would draw away her skirts as if she feared contamination.

"The Woodlands isn't what it used to be," she would assure a select circle of listeners. "When my eldest sister was here there were the Courtenays and the Derringtons and the Vernons and quite a number of girls of really good family. Miss Bowes would never have dreamt then of taking a girl she knew nothing about; she was so particular whom she received."

"The poor old Cuckoo has her points," volunteered Addie. "I'm afraid most of us aren't 'county'!"

"All schools are more mixed than they used to be," admitted Stephanie candidly; "but I'd draw the line at specimens straight from the backwoods."

Few of the girls really liked Stephanie, nevertheless her opinions carried weight. A school-mate who dresses well, talks continually of highborn friends, and "gives herself airs" can nearly always command a certain following among the more unthinking of her comrades, and such girls as Beth Broadway, Alice and Merle Denham, and Mary Acton were easily impressed by Stephanie's attitude of superiority, and ready to follow her lead on a question of caste. It gave them a kind of reflected credit to belong to Stephanie's circle, and they liked to pride themselves upon their exclusiveness.

Though Rona was many thousand miles away from her home, she evidently did not forget her New Zealand friends, and looked out anxiously for the thin foreign letters which arrived from time to time. She never showed them to anybody, and spoke little of old associations, but a word would slip out here and there to reveal that she cared more than she would give her schoolfellows to suppose. One afternoon, shortly before the New Zealand mail was expected, Rona was working in her portion of the garden, when Mary Acton brought her a message.

"Some visitors to see you. They're waiting in the practising-room," announced Mary.

"Visitors to see me!" exclaimed Rona, throwing down her rake. "Whoever can they be?"

"I'm sure I don't know," replied Mary stolidly. "They asked for Miss Mitchell, so I suppose that's you. There isn't anyone else in the school named Mitchell."

"It must be me!"

Rona's eyes were wide with excitement. Visitors for herself! It was such an utter surprise. For one moment a wild idea flashed across her mind. Her face suddenly hardened.

"What are they like? Do you know them?" she gasped.

"Not from Adam, or rather Eve. They're just two very ordinary-looking females."

Much agitated, Rona flew into the house to wash her hands, slip off her gardening-apron, and change her shoes. When this very hasty toilet was completed, she walked to the practising-room and entered nervously. Two ladies were sitting near the piano, with their backs to the window. They were not fashionably dressed, but perhaps they were cold, for both wore their large coat collars turned up. Their felt hats had wide floppy brims. One carried a guide to North Wales, and the other held an open motor-map in her hand, as if she had been studying the route.

"Miss Mitchell? How d'you do?" said the taller of the two as Rona entered. "I dare say you'll be surprised to see us, and you won't know who we are. I'm Mrs. Grant, and this is my cousin, Miss Smith. We live in New Zealand, and know some of your friends there. We're visiting England at present, and as we found ourselves motoring through North Wales, we thought we would call and see you."

"It's very good of you," faltered Rona. "Which friends of mine do you know?"

"The Higsons. They sent you all kinds of messages."

"Oh! How are they? Do tell me about them!"

Rona's cheeks were flushed and her lips quivering.

"Pamela has grown, of course. Connie and Minnie have had measles. Billy had a fall from his horse and sprained his ankle badly, but he's all right again now."

"And Jake?"

"Spends most of his time with the Johnson girls."

"Who are they? I never heard of them."

"They came after you left."

"To which farm?"

"Oh, not very far away, I believe!"

"I wonder Pamela didn't tell me all that in her letter. Which farm can it possibly be? Surely not Heathlands?"

"I believe that was the name."

"Then have the Marstons gone?"

"Yes, to the North Island."

"Oh! I'm very sorry. Why didn't they write to me? Did you hear any other news, please?"

"Pamela told me something about your home."

A shadow crossed Rona's face.

"Is it—is it Mrs. Barker?" she asked nervously.

"Yes, it's about her."

"What has she been doing?"

"Getting married again."

"Oh! Oh! Who would have her?"

"Your father."

"No!" shrieked Rona, her eyes ablaze. "It can't be! That dreadful, drinking woman! Oh, I can't—I won't believe it!"

"She's your stepmother now, whether you like it or not."

"Daddy! Daddy! It can't be! How could you? You knew she drank!"

"He's drinking himself—like a fish."

"No! My daddy?"

Rona, a moment ago furious, had turned white as a ghost. She put out a trembling hand and clutched the piano blindly; then, with a pitiful, broken cry, she fell, half-fainting, half-sobbing, on to the floor. At that moment Ulyth, with her music-case, entered the room.

"What's the matter? Rona! Rona, dear! Are you ill? Who are these—people?"

She might well ask, for the behaviour of the two strangers was most unprecedented. They were leaning on each other's shoulders and roaring with laughter. One of them suddenly threw up her hat, and turned down her collar, revealing the familiar features of Stephanie Radford.

"Done you brown!" she exploded. "Paid you back in your own coin for your precious Eau de Venus sell! I'm even with you now, Rona Mitchell! Come along, Beth." And the pair disappeared, guffawing.

Rona picked herself up shakily, and subsided on to a chair, with her face in her hands.

"It's not true then?" she quavered.

"What isn't true?"

"They told me Dad had married Mrs. Barker, and that he was—drinking!"

"Stephanie told you that?"

"Yes. Oh, I'm queer still!"

"Rona, darling, of course it's nothing but a black, wicked lie. Don't cry so. There isn't a word of truth about it. They were only ragging you. Oh, don't take it so hard! I'll settle with Stephanie for this."

Half an hour afterwards a very grim, determined Ulyth, supported by Lizzie Lonsdale, sought out the masqueraders and spoke her mind.

"She ragged me, so why shouldn't I turn the tables on her? It's nothing to make such a hullabaloo about!" yapped Stephanie.

"But it is. The trick she played on you was only fun after all. Yours was the cruellest thing you could think of to hurt and wound her. You may pride yourself on your family, Stephanie Radford, but I'm sure the very commonest person would have had nicer feelings than to do this. I can never think the same of you and Beth again."

"Oh, of course you take up the cudgels for your precious Cuckoo!" snapped Stephanie. "Don't make such an absurd fuss. I shall do what I like, without you setting yourself up to lecture me. So there! If you don't like it, you may lump it."

"Not a very aristocratic form of expression for a scion of the Radfords of Stoke Radford!" commented Lizzie, as she and Ulyth stalked away.



CHAPTER XII

Sentry Duty

The spring term wore slowly on. March winds came and went, taking the sweet violets with them, but leaving golden Lent lilies and a wealth of primroses as a legacy to April. The larch forest above Porth Powys was a tangle of green tassels, the hedgerows were starry with blackthorn, and the Pyrus japonica over the dining-room windows was a mass of rosy blossom. Spring was always a delightful season at The Woodlands; with the longer days came rambles and greater freedom. Popular opinion ran high in extolling country life, and any girl who ventured to prefer town pleasures found herself entirely in the minority.

Rona had several invitations for the Easter holidays, one from Mrs. Stanton among the number; but Miss Bowes, thinking it better for Ulyth to have a rest from her room-mate's presence, decided in favour of Winnie Fowler. Ulyth could not help feeling a sense of relief that the matter was thus settled. Rona was very little trouble to her now—indeed, she rather liked her company; but she would be glad to have her mother to herself for the few short weeks.

"I wouldn't for the world have tried to stop her coming, Motherkins," she wrote home; "but Miss Bowes said most emphatically that she must go to the Fowlers. I'm sure they'll give her a good time, and—well, I admit it will be a rest to me. Just at present I don't want to share you. Now you know the whole of your horrid daughter! Lizzie asked me if I would spend part of the holidays with her, but I managed to make an excuse. I felt I couldn't spare a single precious day away from you. I have so much to talk about and tell you. Am I greedy? But what's the use of having one's own lovely mother if she isn't just one's ownest sometimes? I tell you things I wouldn't tell anyone else on earth. I don't think all the girls feel quite the same; but then their mothers can't possibly be like mine! She's the one in a thousand! I'm sitting up late in my bedroom to write this, and I shall have to report myself to Miss Lodge to-morrow; but I felt I must write."

After the Easter holidays everybody returned to The Woodlands prepared to make the most of the coming term. With the longer evenings more time was allowed out-of-doors, and the glade by the stream became a kind of summer parlour. Those girls who had some slight skill in carpentry constructed rustic benches and tables from the boughs blown down by last autumn's storms, and those who preferred nature untouched by art had their favourite seats in snug corners among the bushes or on the stones by the water-side. With the first burst of warm weather bathing was allowed, and every morning detachments of figures in mackintoshes and tennis-shoes might be seen wending their way towards the large pool to indulge in the exhilarating delight of a dip in clear, flowing water, followed by a brisk run round the glade. These pre-breakfast expeditions were immensely appreciated; the girls willingly got up earlier for the purpose, and anyone who manifested a disposition to remain in bed was denounced as a "slacker".

One day, towards the end of May, when some of the members of V B were sitting with their fancywork on the short grass under an oak-tree, Addie Knighton came from the house and joined them. There was beaming satisfaction in Addie's twinkling grey eyes; she rubbed her hands ostentatiously, and chuckled audibly.

"What's to do, Addie, old girl? You're looking very smug," said Lizzie.

"Aha! Wouldn't you like to know? What'll you give me if I tell you now?"

"Never buy pigs in pokes. It mayn't be important at all," volunteered Merle.

"Oh, indeed! Isn't it? Just wait till you hear."

"It's nothing but one of your sells," yawned Gertrude Oliver, moving so as to rest her back more comfortably against Ulyth.

"Mrs. Arnold doesn't generally spring sells upon us."

Ulyth jumped up so suddenly that Gertrude collapsed with a squeal of protest.

"Mrs. Arnold here and I never knew! Where is she?"

"Don't excite yourself. She's gone by now. She only stayed ten minutes, to see Miss Bowes, but it was ten minutes to some purpose. Do you know what she's actually proposed?"

Addie's listeners were as eager now as they had been languid before.

"Go ahead, can't you?" urged Lizzie.

"Well, the whole school's to go camping for three days."

This indeed was news!

"Stunning!"

"Spiffing!"

"Ripping!"

"Scrumptious!" burst in a chorus from the elated four.

"Details, please," added Ulyth. "When and where, and how, and why?"

"Is it a Camp-fire business?" asked Lizzie.

"Of course it is or Mrs. Arnold wouldn't be getting it up. It's happened this way. The Llangarmon and Elwyn Bay detachments of Boy Scouts are to camp at Llyn Gwynedd for ten days early in June. Mr. Arnold has the arranging of it all. And Mrs. Arnold suggested that the tents might just as easily be hired a few days sooner, and we could use them before the boys came. It's such a splendid opportunity. It would be too expensive to have everything sent down on purpose just for us, but when they're there we can hire the camp for very little extra. It's the carriage and erecting that cost so much. Miss Bowes, I believe, hummed and ha-ed a little, but Teddie just tumbled to the idea and persuaded the Rainbow to clinch it."

"Good old Teddie! I believe it's the tragedy of her life that she can't live altogether in the open air. She adores Red Cross Work."

"The teachers are all to come to camp; they're as excited as you please about it. It was Miss Lodge who told me that Mrs. Arnold was here, and I rushed down the drive and caught her just for a second."

This indeed was an event in the annals of the school. Never since the Camp-fire League was started had its members found any opportunity of sampling life under canvas. They had practised a little camp cookery down by the stream, but their experiments had not gone much farther than frying eggs and bacon or roasting potatoes in hot ashes, and they were yearning to try their hands at gipsies' stews and gallipot soups. With Mrs. Arnold for leader they expected a three days' elysium. Even Miss Teddington, they knew, would rise to the occasion and play trumps. Llyn Gwynedd was a small lonely lake about six miles away, in the heart of the mountains beyond Penllwyd and Glyder Garmon. It was reached from The Woodlands by a track across the moors, but it communicated by high road with Capelcefn station, so that tents, camp-furniture, and provisions could be sent up by a motor-lorry. The ground was hired from a local farmer, who undertook to supply milk, butter, and eggs to the best of his ability, and to bring meat and fresh vegetables from Capelcefn as required. To cater for a whole school up in the wilds is a task from which many Principals would shrink, and Miss Bowes might be forgiven if she had at first demurred at the suggestion. But, with Mr. Arnold's practical experience to help her, she gave her orders and embarked (not without a few tremors) upon the proceeding.

"If the mountain air makes you so hungry you eat up two days' provisions in one, it means you'll have to fast on the third day," she assured the girls. "I'm sending up what I hope will be sufficient. It's like victualling a regiment. Of course we shan't go at all if it's wet."

Mr. Arnold, who very kindly volunteered to see that the camp was properly set up and in thorough working order before the school took possession, superintended the erection of the tents and reported that all was in apple-pie condition and only waiting for its battalion. On 2nd June, therefore, a very jolly procession started off from The Woodlands. In navy skirts and sports coats, tricolor ties, straw hats, and decorated with numerous badges and small flags, the girls felt like a regiment of female Territorials. Each carried her kit on her back in a home-made knapsack containing her few personal necessities, and knife, spoon, fork, and enamelled tin mug. A band of tin whistles and mouth organs led the way, playing a valiant attempt at "Caller Herrin'". The teachers also were prepared for business. Miss Teddington, who had done climbs in Switzerland, came in orthodox costume with nailed boots and a jaunty Tyrolean hat with a piece of edelweiss stuck in the front. Miss Lodge wore a full-length leather coat and felt hat in which she looked ready to defy a waterspout or a tornado. Miss Moseley, who owned to an ever-present terror of bulls, grasped an iron-spiked walking-stick, and Miss Davis had a First Aid wallet slung across her back. In the girls' opinion Miss Bowes shirked abominably. Instead of venturing on the six-mile walk she had caught the morning train to Capelcefn, and was going to hire a car at the Royal Hotel and drive up to the lake with the provisions. Mrs. Arnold, who, with her husband, had taken rooms at the farm for a few days, was already on the spot, and would be ready to receive the travellers when they arrived.

On the whole it was a glorious morning, though a few ill-omened clouds lingered like a night-cap round Penllwyd. Larks were singing, cuckoos calling, bluebells made the woods seem a reflection of the sky, and the gorse was ablaze on the common. The walk was collar-work at first, up, up, up, climbing a steep track between loose-built, fern-covered walls, taking a short cut over the slope that formed the spur of Cwm Dinas, and scaling the rocky little precipice of Maenceirion. Some who had started at a great rate and with much enthusiasm began to slacken speed, and to realize the wisdom of Miss Teddington's advice and try the slow-going, steady pace she had learned from Swiss guides.

"You can't keep it up if you begin with such a spurt," she assured them. "Alpine climbing has to be like the tortoise—slow and sure."

Once on the plateau beyond Cwm Dinas progress was easier. It was still uphill, but the slope was gentler. They were on the open moors now, following a path, little more than a sheep track, that led under the crag of Glyder Garmon. Except for an occasional tiny whitewashed farm they were far from human habitations, and the only signs of life were the small agile Welsh sheep, the half-wild ponies that grazed on these uplands during the summer months, and a pair of carrion crows that wheeled away, croaking hoarsely at the sight of intruders. On and on over what seemed an interminable reach of coarse grass and whinberry-bushes, jumping tiny brooks, and skirting round sometimes to avoid bogs, for much of the ground was spongy, and though its surface of sphagnum moss looked inviting, it was treacherous in the extreme. At last they had rounded the corner of Glyder Garmon, and there, far away to the right, like a sheet of silver, Llyn Gwynedd lay gleaming in the distance.

The sight of their destination, even though it was two miles away, cheered up those weaker spirits that were beginning to lag, especially as something white on the south side, when examined through Miss Teddington's field-glasses, proved to be the tents. Three-quarters of an hour's brisk walking brought them to the lake, and in ten minutes more they were announcing their approach to the camp in a succession of wild hoorays.

Mr. and Mrs. Arnold were waiting to do the honours, and, parading in their very best style, the League marched in and took possession.

By the time they had been two hours at Llyn Gwynedd all the girls felt like old, well-seasoned campers. Mrs. Arnold was no novice, and at once assumed her post as leader and captain in command. Miss Bowes, Miss Teddington, and the other teachers were assigned tents of honour, and every member of the League was placed on definite duty. Some were cooks, some water-carriers, some scullions, and some sentries, according to their qualifications and the rank they held in the League.

The field hired for the camping-ground had been carefully chosen. It was on the far side of the lake, away from the road, sheltered on the north and east by mountain ridges, and with a shelving beach of fine silvery sand where the waves lapped in gentle little ripples. A narrow brook, leaping from the heights above, passed through the centre and gave a quite uncontaminated water supply. All around rose peaks which had not been visible at The Woodlands, the rough, splintered crest of Craig Mawr, the smoother summit of Pencastell, and the almost inaccessible precipice of Carnedd Powys. It was glorious to sit by the lake and feel that they were not obliged to return to school before dark, but could stay and watch the sun set behind Pencastell and the gloaming creep quietly on. Of course everybody wanted to explore the immediate vicinity, and little bands, each in charge of a Torch-bearer, were allowed to skirt round the lake within sight of the camp. Each girl had her League whistle, and knew the signals which meant "Meal-time", "Danger", and "Return instantly to camp". These had been rehearsed in the glade at The Woodlands, and formed part of the examination of every candidate.

Ulyth, as a Torch-bearer, was able to head a party, and started off in quest of bog myrtle along the bank, returning with great armfuls of the delicious-smelling aromatic shrub to cast into the fire during the evening "stunt".

The gathering of the League that night was a memorable occasion. The ceremonies were observed with strictest formality, and as visitors were present a special welcome song was sung in their honour. The scene was immensely picturesque and romantic: the red sun setting between Craig Mawr and Pencastell threw a last glow on the lake, the blazing fire lighted up the camp and the rows of eager faces, and behind all was the background of the eternal hills.

Rona, having successfully passed through her probation, was admitted as a Wood-gatherer and awarded the white badge of service. Several younger girls also received initiation into membership. With the League ceremonial, songs, stories, and cocoa-making, the evening passed very swiftly away. At nine o'clock everybody was expected to turn in. A night under canvas was a new experience. The stretcher-beds and the clean blankets looked inviting. Strict military discipline was observed in the camp, and sentries were told off on duty. In as perfect order as a regiment the girls went to their tents. Ulyth was sharing quarters with Addie, Lizzie, and Gertrude. She tucked herself up in her blankets, as she had been taught at camp drill, and then lay quietly for a long, long time, watching the patch of sky through the tent door.

She seemed only to have been asleep for about an hour, when the patrol touched her on the shoulder. Instantly she sprang up, broad awake.

"Relieve sentry at west guard," was the order, and the patrol passed on.

It was too dark to see her watch, but Ulyth knew it must be nearly one o'clock. She hastily donned the warm garments ordered to be worn by sentries, and hurried away to relieve Helen Cooper. Her post was at the west end of the camp, where the field merged into a rushy swamp before it rose into the hill that led towards the farm.

"The password is 'Louvain'," said Helen, retiring, not at all sorry to seek the comfort of her bed. "One leg of the camp-stool is most rickety, so I warn you not to lean too hard on it. Good night."

Left alone, Ulyth sat down with extreme caution on the deficient camp-stool and surveyed the situation. There were clouds across a waning moon, and it was fairly dark. She could see the outlines of the tents in black masses behind her; in front the field lay dim and shadowy, with a mist creeping from the water. Up above, to her right, against an indigo sky, the Great Bear was standing almost on its head, with its tail in the air. One of the tests of a Torch-bearer was a knowledge of the stars, and Ulyth had learnt how to tell the time by the position of this particular constellation. She made a rapid calculation now, reckoning from the day of the month, and was glad to find it came out correctly. Cassiopeia's white arms were hidden by the mountains, but the Milky Way shimmered in the east, and overhead Arcturus blazed as he had done in the days when the patriarch Job recorded his brilliance. To the extreme north a patch of light lay behind Penllwyd, where the sun, at this season hardly dipping far out of sight, worked his course round to the east again. How quiet it was! The silence was almost oppressive. The gentle lap of the tiny waves on the lake was not equal to the rush of the stream at The Woodlands. Not even a night-bird called. The camp was absolutely still and slumbering.

Ulyth rose and paced about for a while. It was too cold to sit still long. She must only use the camp-stool when she needed a rest.

"Sentries ought to be allowed chocolates," she murmured, "or hot peppermints, just to keep up their spirits. Ugh! How weird and eerie it all is! There isn't a sound anywhere. It's not an enlivening performance to keep watch, I must say."

She stopped, suddenly on the alert. What was that noise in the darkness to her left? She distinctly heard a rustle among the gorse-bushes, and thought something moved in the deep shadow.

"Halt! Who goes there?" she challenged.

There was no reply, but the rustle sounded again, this time nearer to the camp. She listened with every sense strained to the uttermost. Something or someone was slinking in from the field and creeping cautiously towards the tents; of that she was nearly certain. Wild ideas of thieving tramps flooded her brain. A louder sound confirmed her suspicions. She could hear it quite distinctly in the direction of the kitchen. Her duty was plain. She blew her whistle promptly; it was answered by those of the three other sentries, from the north, east, and south quarters, and immediately torches began to flash, and voices to ask the cause of alarm. The guard was roused, and began an instant tour of inspection.

"Something crept past me, straight towards the centre of the camp," Ulyth reported.

The lights flashed away in the direction of the kitchen. The girls were on their mettle, and meant business. Whoever the intruder was, he should be run to earth and made to give an account of himself. They felt perfectly capable of taking him prisoner and binding his hands behind him with a rope. Indeed, they thought they should hugely enjoy doing so, particularly if he turned out to be a burglar. Numbers give courage, and a very martial spirit was in the air.

"If he's hiding in one of the tents we'll drag him out by the legs!" proclaimed Marjorie Earnshaw fiercely.

Everybody was sure it must be a "he". The news spread through the camp like lightning, and it was even rumoured that he wore a coat and top-boots. Miss Teddington herself had emerged, and was waving a lantern as a searchlight.

"This way," blustered Marjorie, heading for the kitchen quarter. "The sneaking cur! We'll have him!"

"Why aren't we allowed bayonets?" lamented Ruth White.

"Oh, I hear a noise! There's something there really," urged Kathleen Simpson, with a most unsoldierly squeal. "Oh, I say! Here he comes!"

There was a sudden scratch and scramble, and from out the larder rushed a dark object on four legs, with a white something in its mouth. Helen made a valiant dash at it, but it dodged her, and flew like the wind away between the tents and off somewhere over the fields in the direction of the farm. The guard with one accord burst out laughing.

"A thieving Welsh sheep-dog raiding the larder!" exclaimed Catherine.

"It's stolen a whole leg of mutton, the brute!" wailed Doris, who belonged to the Commissariat Department. "I didn't think it could have reached that. It must have jumped high. It doesn't deserve its prize."

"No wonder it wouldn't answer when I challenged it," observed Ulyth.

"Well, I'm glad it's no worse than a dog," said Miss Teddington. "We must take steps to-morrow to make the larder safer, or we shall be troubled again."

"We'll place a guard over it," replied Catherine promptly. "Jessie Morrison, you are on sentry duty at once to watch the larder. Maggie Orton will relieve you at three."



CHAPTER XIII

Under Canvas

After the scare in the small hours, everyone settled down again to slumber. Nevertheless the girls woke with the birds. Many of them had registered a solemn vow the night before that they would watch the sun rise, and each was pledged to arouse the others at all costs; so at the first hint of dawn heads began to pop out of tents, and the camp was astir. Addie Knighton, still half-dazed with sleep, was led firmly by Gertrude Oliver to the edge of the lake and forced to wash her face.

"You'll thank me when you're really awake," purred Gertie, ignoring her victim's protests. "It's only what I promised you faithfully last night. You told me to duck you in, if nothing else would do it."

"Oh, I'm awake now! I am truly. You needn't be afraid I'll go back to bed," bleated Addie, afraid her friend might proceed to extremities. "Hadn't you better haul up Alice next?"

"I left Chrissie doing that. She's going round the tents with a wet sponge. Look! Isn't that worth getting up to see?"

The grey of the sky had flushed into carnation pink, and up from behind the wall of the mountains rose the great ball of the sun, red at first through a veil of mist, but shining out golden as he cleared the cloud-bank. Everything was waking up. A peewit called by the water's edge, a cock crew from the farm-yard, and a dog barked lustily.

"Our thief of the night complaining of an attack of indigestion, I hope," said Ulyth, joining Addie and Gertie at the lake-side. "How much can a dog eat without feeling ill?"

"We had a collie that consumed three rabbits once," laughed Addie. "We didn't ask it how it felt afterwards. It got a good thrashing, I remember."

"We'll keep a stick handy to-night, in case of any more raids. Who's on breakfast duty? I'm getting wildly hungry. I hope the bacon hasn't disappeared with the mutton."

Although the three days' sojourn under canvas was in a sense a holiday, it was conducted in a very business-like spirit and with rigid discipline. All the daily duties were performed zealously by bands of servers, who polished tins, peeled potatoes, washed plates, or cleaned shoes, as the case might be. The League was putting to a practical proof the seven rules of the Camp-fire Law. Beauty was all around them, and knowledge to be had for the asking. They proved themselves trustworthy by their service, and glorified work in the doing of the camp tasks. Health was drawn with every breath of mountain air, and, judging from their faces, the seventh rule, "Be happy", seemed almost superfluous. Everyone looked radiant, even Mary Acton, who was a champion grumbler, and generally ready to complain of crumpled rose-leaves. After breakfast and service duty came drill, a more than usually formal affair, for Mr. Arnold himself reviewed them. He had great experience with the Boy Scouts, so the girls were anxious to do the utmost credit to their beloved Guardian of the Fire. The Ambulance Corps gave a demonstration of First Aid; another detachment took down and re-erected a tent; the juniors showed their abilities in knot-tying, and the seniors in signalling. Their inspector declared himself perfectly satisfied, and commended certain members for special proficiency.

"I shall tell the boys' battalions how well you can do," he declared. "It will put them on their mettle. They won't want to be beaten by a ladies' school."

When the display was over, all dispersed for a ramble round the lake while the dinner stewed; only the cooks on duty remained, carefully watching their pots. Ulyth, Rona, Lizzie, and Gertrude wandered past the farm and up the hill-side to the head of a crag, whence they had a glorious view down over the sheet of water below.

"Llyn Gwynedd looks so cheerful and innocent now, one wouldn't believe it could ever be treacherous and do dreadful things," remarked Gertrude.

"What things?" asked Ulyth.

"Why, I believe someone was drowned just down there a great many years ago. I heard Catherine saying so last night, so I suppose it's true."

"It's perfectly true, and I can tell you who it was," answered Lizzie. "It was the eldest son of Lord Glyncraig. He was fishing here, and the boat got upset. It was the most dreadful tragedy. He was such a fine, promising young fellow, and had only been married quite a short time. He was the heir, too, which made it worse."

"But there are other sons, aren't there?" asked Ulyth.

"Yes, but he was the flower of the family. The rest are no good. The second son, the present heir, is a helpless invalid, the third is in a sanatorium for consumption, and the fourth was the proverbial prodigal, and disappeared. If Lord Glyncraig knows where he is, nobody else does."

"Hadn't the one who was drowned any children?"

"Only a girl. The second and third aren't married."

"Then will the estate have to go to the prodigal in the end?"

"I suppose so, if he's alive, and turns up to claim it."

"Peers have their troubles as much as commoners," commented Ulyth. "I've never heard this before. I'm sorry for Lord Glyncraig. Plas Cafn is too good to go to a prodigal."

"Yet prodigals sometimes turn out better than elder brothers, if we accept the parable," remarked Rona, throwing stones into the water as viciously as if she were aiming at an enemy.

"Don't!" said Ulyth. "You'll disturb the trout, and Mrs. Arnold wants to fish this afternoon. Rona, do stop! Let's go down to the edge again, and try and find some bog bean. You'll get a proficiency badge if you can show twenty specimens of wild flowers and name them. Yes, I won mine last year, and so did Lizzie."

"I'd rather win a proficiency badge for shooting," grunted Rona. "Why can't Teddie let us get up a ladies' rifle corps?"

"Only wish she would, just! It would be prime," agreed the others.

Dinner was ready by twelve o'clock—not at all too early for a company that had breakfasted at seven. Despite the purloining of the leg of mutton there was enough to go round, and everybody decided that the cooks deserved proficiency badges. The servers also did their work promptly, and removed plates and dishes with the maximum of speed and the minimum of clatter. By half-past one everything was washed up and polished, and the kitchen department in apple-pie order.

"I'm afraid we may have rain," said Miss Teddington, looking anxiously at the sky, which was now completely overcast with clouds.

"One often gets a shower among the mountains when the valley escapes," commented Mrs. Arnold. "I don't think it will be much this afternoon, if there's rain at all. The patrols know what to do if it begins. This grey sky will be good for fishing."

Mrs. Arnold was an enthusiastic angler, and had brought her fishing-tackle with her to camp. She intended that afternoon to hire a boat from the farm and see if she could beguile some of the wily trout from the lake.

"I'll take four girls with me," she announced: "two to row, one to steer, and one to help with the landing-net."

Needless to say, she could have had dozens of volunteers, but her choice fell on Kathleen Simpson, Ruth White, Gladys Broughton, and Evie Isherwood, who, highly elated, went off to unmoor the boat. Then, Ruth and Kathleen rowing, and Gladys steering, they made gently down the lake towards the west end, where the stream flowed out.

Pretty Mrs. Arnold looked particularly charming in a blue-and-white boating-costume, with a little blue fisherman's cap perched on her fair hair. It was the fashion for the girls to adore her, and she certainly had four whole-hearted admirers with her that afternoon, ready to be at her beck and call, and to perform any service she wished. They followed her instructions to the letter, and watched her line and reel with tense eagerness.

"I hope we may catch some salmon trout," said Mrs. Arnold; "they're much more delicate than the ordinary ones. If we've luck we may get enough at any rate to give Miss Bowes and Miss Teddington a dish for supper. Row gently along there, I saw a fish jump; if it's hungry it may fancy my fly. Good biz! there's a bite. I'll have to play him gently; he feels a strong fellow. Are you ready, Evie, with the landing-net?"

It was frightfully exciting as Mrs. Arnold wound her reel, and the prey came within reach. Was he really hooked, or would he break away at the last moment and disappoint them?

"We've got him! We've got him! Quick, Evie! Oh, I say! Isn't he splendid?"

A silvery-grey, gleaming, glittering object was leaping in the landing-net at the bottom of the boat.

"Oh, what luck!" yelled Evie.

"He must be a patriarch!" cried the rowers.

"I can't see him. Oh, do let me look!" squealed Gladys, forgetting everything in her eagerness. "Ruth, you're in the way. I must look."

And up she sprang, trying to push past Ruth and Kathleen.

"Sit still!" shouted Mrs. Arnold frantically, but the mischief was done.

It all happened in two seconds. No one quite knew how, though Ruth declared afterwards that in trying to scramble past her Gladys stepped on the gunwale. Over toppled the boat, and almost before its occupants knew their danger they were struggling in the water. The girls could swim a little—a very little. Kathleen, gasping and spluttering, struggled valiantly towards the bank; Evie, with a certain instinct of self-preservation, turned on her back, and managed to keep herself afloat somehow. Ruth and Gladys clutched the upturned boat and, clung there screaming. Mrs. Arnold was in even more desperate straits. She could not swim, and she had fallen too wide of the boat to be able to grasp it. The few patrols left in charge of the camp stood for a moment paralysed, then tore along the side of the lake towards the scene of the accident. But someone else was quicker. Rona, hunting for botany specimens, had been watching the fishing from the bank close by. There was a rush, a splash, a swift little figure wildly ploughing a path through the lake, beating the water with short, impatient strokes.

"I won't clutch you," cried Mrs. Arnold, pluckily keeping her presence of mind. "I believe I can manage to float."

She lay still as Rona put a hand under her shoulder and towed her towards the shore, so still that she neither stirred nor spoke when Doris and Catherine, who had reached the spot, helped to drag her from the water.

"Oh, she's drowned!" shrieked Doris.

"No, no! Lay her down flat. She's opening her eyes."

Marion Harper and Madge Johnson, both tolerable swimmers, were plunging to help Evie; Kathleen was already struggling ashore. "Wait till we can come for you!" shouted Rona to Ruth and Gladys; "don't let go the boat."

Evie was pulled ashore first, not much the worse. Rona had trouble with Gladys, who had waxed hysterical, but with Marion's help she landed her safely and went back for Ruth. By this time the danger-signal, blown lustily from several League whistles, brought all who were anywhere within reach rushing to the rendezvous. Mrs. Arnold, with wet golden hair clinging round her white face, leaned against Catherine's shoulder, while Doris rubbed her hands.

"I'm glad my husband's gone to Capel Garmon to-day. Please let me tell him myself," were her first words. "It was good little Rona who saved me," she added, smiling faintly at Miss Bowes, who was down on her knees beside her on the grass.

"I wish I'd done it. I wish I'd done it. Oh, how I envy you, Rona!" cried Ulyth, regarding her friend with wide shining eyes of admiration.

Miss Teddington, pale but very self-controlled, had taken command of the situation. Eight people were thoroughly wet through and bedraggled, and must be hurried to camp and dried, and given hot drinks as speedily as possible. The rescuers needed cosseting as much as the rescued. Madge and Marion were shivering and trembling, and Rona, now the excitement of her sudden dash was over, looked more shaky than she would allow.

"We must tuck them up in blankets," said Miss Teddington. "First Aid Corps on duty, please! The difficulty is going to be how to get their clothes properly dried in a place like this."

Mrs. Arnold, with Miss Bowes to look after her, went to the farm to seek fresh garments. As for the girls, there was nothing for it but to go to bed for an hour or two, while a band of servers lighted a good fire, wrung the water from the drenched articles of clothing, and held them to the blaze. Blankets were commandeered freely from other beds, and piled round the seven heroines, who, propped up with pillows, each had a kind of reception as she sipped her hot cocoa.

"We all of us forgot about the boat," said Rona suddenly. "It's drifting upside down, and the oars are anywhere."

"Never mind. David Lewis will get it somehow, I suppose. It will drift towards the bank, and he'll wade for it."

"Where did you learn to swim like that, Rona?"

"In the lake at home. We had one nearly as big as this close to our farm."

"The Cuckoo's turned up trumps," murmured Alice Denham. "I didn't know she was capable of it."

"Then it only shows how extremely stupid and unobservant you are," snapped Ulyth.

The servers declared afterwards that drying clothes round a bonfire was the most exciting duty they had ever performed. Gusts of wind blew the flames in sudden puffs, necessitating quick snatching away of garments in the danger zone. Shoes were the most difficult of all, and needed copious greasing to prevent their growing stiff.

"I wonder if the Ancient Britons went through this performance?" said Winnie Fowler. "Did they have to hold their skin garments round camp-fires? Thank goodness, we've got these things dry at last! We're only in the nick of time. Here comes the rain."

It was a melancholy truth. The Welsh mountains have a perverse habit of attracting clouds, even in June; the sky, which had been overcast since midday, was now inky dark, and great drops began to fall. It was a calamity, but one for which everybody was fully prepared. The patrols rushed round the camp loosening ropes, lest the swelling hemp should draw the pegs from the ground, and took a last tour of inspection to see that no bed was in contact with the canvas.

"If you even touch the inside of the tent with your hand you'll bring the water through," urged Catherine in solemn warning; "so, for your own sakes, you'd best be careful. You don't want to spend the night in a puddle."

It was a new experience to sit inside tents while the storm howled outside. Rain up at Llyn Gwynedd was no mere summer shower, but a driving deluge. Servers in waterproofs scuttled round with cans of hot tea and baskets of bread and butter, and the girls had a picnic meal sitting on their beds. One tent blew over altogether, and its distressed occupants, crawling from under the flapping ruin, were received as refugees by their immediate neighbours. Fortunately the storm, though severe, was short. By seven o'clock it had expended its fury, and passed away down the valley towards Craigwen, leaving blue sky and the promise of a sunset behind. Glad to emerge from their cramped quarters, the girls came out and compared experiences. There was plenty to be done. The fallen tent had to be erected, and various cans and utensils which had been left outside must be collected and wiped before they had time to rust.

"This is the prose of camp-life," said Catherine, picking the gravy-strainer out of a puddle and rinsing it in the lake. "I hope we shall get the poetry to-morrow again."

"Oh, it's lovely fun when it rains!" twittered some of the younger ones.

Mr. Arnold came down from the farm to inquire rather anxiously how the camp was faring after the storm, and particularly to have news of the girls who had been in the lake. He had left Mrs. Arnold in bed, still rather upset with the shock of the accident.

"I feel responsible for bringing you all here," he said to Miss Teddington. "I shan't be easy in my mind now till the whole crew's safe back at The Woodlands."

"We've taken no harm," Miss Teddington assured him. "The girls kept dry, and they're as jolly as possible; indeed, I think most of them thoroughly enjoyed the rain."

Llyn Gwynedd, after showing what it could do in the way of storms, provided fine weather for the next day. The ground soon dried, and camp-life continued in full swing. Mrs. Arnold, herself again after a night's rest, took the morning drill, and led a ramble up the slope of Glyder Garmon in the afternoon. She was the heart and soul of the "stunt" that evening.

The girls, at any rate, were sorry to say good-bye to the lake on Friday morning, whatever their elders might feel on the subject.

"I hope the Boy Scouts will have as ripping a time as we've had," was the general verdict when, having left the camp in perfect order, the procession set out to tramp down to Aberglyn.

"Barring total immersions in the lake, please," said Mr. Arnold, as he returned the parting salute.

"But that was an opportunity," urged Ulyth. "I wish it had come my way. Rona, Madge, and Marion will all get special bravery medals at next quarterly meeting. I've no luck!"



CHAPTER XIV

Susannah Maude

The girls at The Woodlands, while they contributed to various charities, had one special and particular object of interest. For several years they had supported a little girl at an orphanage. She was called their orphan, and twice a year they received accounts of her progress. They sent her a Christmas present annually, and her neat little letter of thanks was handed round for everybody to read. Poor Susannah Maude was the daughter of very disreputable parents; she had been rescued from a travelling caravan at the age of ten, and the authorities at the Alexandra Home had done their best to obliterate her past life from her memory. When she reached school-leaving age the question of her future career loomed on the horizon. After considerable correspondence with the matron, Miss Bowes had at length decided to have the girl at The Woodlands, and try the experiment of training her as a kitchen-maid. So in February Susannah Maude had arrived, small and undersized, with a sharp little face and beady, black eyes, and a habit of sniffing as if she had a perpetual cold.

"Not a bit like the blue-eyed, flaxen-haired orphan of fiction," decided the girls, rather disappointed at the sight of their protegee.

Perhaps the cook was disappointed too. At any rate, many complaints of smashed dishes, imperfect wiping, and inadequate sweeping of corners reached Miss Bowes, who urged patience, harangued the culprit, and shook her head, half laughing and half sighing, over the domestic catastrophes. Though strictly confined to the kitchen regions, the orphan took the deepest interest in the young ladies of the school. Her keen eyes would peer out of windows, and her head bob round doors in continual efforts to gain some idea of their mode of life. A chance word from one of them wreathed her in smiles. She was a funny, odd little object with her short squat figure and round bullet head, and thin little legs appearing underneath her official white apron. Her official name was Susan, but every girl in the school called her Susannah Maude. At the instigation of Miss Bowes her patrons took the furthering of her education in hand, and each in turn bestowed half an hour a day in hearing her read history, geography, or some other suitable subject. A little bewildered among so many fresh teachers, the small maid nevertheless made what efforts she could, and read loud and lustily, even if she did not altogether digest the matter she was supposed to be studying.

"I believe she reads the words without taking in a scrap of the sense," laughed Ulyth, when her turn as instructress was over. "She was gazing at my dress, or my watch, or my handkerchief whenever she could spare an eye from her book. She thinks them of far more importance than Henry VIII."

"So she does," agreed Lizzie. "I tried to get her interested yesterday in the number of his wives—I thought the Bluebeard aspect of it might move her—but she only said: 'What does it matter when they're all dead?' I felt so blank that I couldn't say any more."

Nobody quite remembered whose idea it was that their orphan should be invited to the Camp-fire meetings. Somebody in a soft-hearted moment suggested it, and Mrs. Arnold replied: "Oh yes, poor little soul! Bring her, by all means." So Susannah Maude had come, and once there she apparently regarded herself as a member of the League, and turned up on every available occasion. How much she understood of the proceedings or of the scope of the society nobody could fathom. She sat, during the meetings, bolt upright, with folded arms, as if she were in school, her bright, beady eyes fixed unblinkingly upon Mrs. Arnold, whom she seemed to regard as a species of priestess in charge of occult mysteries.

"Would I be struck dumb if I told what goes on here?" she asked Ulyth one day; and, although she was assured that no such act of vengeance on the part of Providence would overtake her, she nevertheless preserved a secrecy worthy of a Freemason, and would drop no hint in the kitchen as to the nature of the ceremonies she witnessed.

One or two points evidently made a great impression upon her. During the spring months Nature lore was very much to the fore, and the members qualified for candidateship to the various grades by exhibiting their knowledge of the ways and habits of birds. Notes of observations were read aloud at the meetings, particulars recorded of nests that had been built in the school grounds, with data as to the number of days in which eggs were hatched and the young ones fledged. It was an unwritten law at The Woodlands never to disturb the birds. The girls were not allowed to take any eggs from the nests, and were taught not to frighten a sitting bird or to interfere with the fledge-lings. After several years of such consideration The Woodlands had become a kind of bird sanctuary, where the little songsters appeared to know they were free from molestation. That the fruit in the garden suffered rather a heavy toll was true; but, as Miss Bowes remarked: "One can't have everything. We must remember how many insects they clear away, and not grudge them a few currants and gooseberries. They pay us by their lovely songs in the spring."

Ulyth was a great devotee of Nature study, and had the supreme satisfaction of being the first to discover that a pair of long-tailed tits were building in a gorse-bush down the paddock. She was immensely excited, for they were rather rare birds in that district, and generally nested much higher up on the hills. This was indeed the only instance on record of their having selected The Woodlands for their domestic operations. As she had made the discovery, it was her particular privilege to take the observations, and every day she would go very quietly and cautiously and seat herself near the spot to note the doings of the shy little architects. It was a subject of intense interest to watch the globular nest grow, and then to ascertain, when the parents were out of the way, that eggs had actually been laid in it. Ulyth was so afraid of disturbing the tits that she conducted her daily observations alone, fearing lest even Lizzie's presence might frighten them. "When there are two of us we can't help talking, and an unusual sound scares them worse than anything," she decided.

One morning she started for her daily expedition to the paddock. The little hen had been sitting long enough to make Ulyth think the eggs must surely be hatched, and that probably the parents were both already busy catering for their progeny. She crept noiselessly round the corner to the hollow where the bushes were situated. Then she gave a gasp and a cry of horror. On the ground, quite close to the nest, knelt Susannah Maude, busily occupied in smearing some sticky white substance over the lower boughs and shoots of the gorse-bushes. She looked round with a beaming face as Ulyth approached. Her beady eyes twinkled with self-congratulation.

"Susannah! What are you doing, you young imp of mischief?" exclaimed Ulyth in an agony.

"Catching your birds for you, Miss," responded the orphan, a thrill of pride in her voice. "It's bird-lime, this is, and it'll soon stick 'em, you'll see. I knows all about it, for my father was a bird-catcher, and I often went with him when I was a kid. I'd a job to get the lime, I can tell you, but Bobby Jones brought me some from Llangarmon."

She looked at Ulyth with a smile, as if waiting for the praise that she deemed due to her efforts. Utterly aghast, Ulyth stammered:

"But, Susannah Maude, we—we don't want the birds caught."

The orphan appeared puzzled. A shade crossed her sharp little face.

"Not want to catch 'em? What's the use of 'em, then? Dad caught 'em and sold 'em."

Ulyth had to keep a strong curb over her temper. After all, how could this ignorant child know what she had never been taught? Miss Bowes might well preach patience and forbearance.

"It's very cruel to snare the birds with lime at any time, especially now, when they have young ones who would starve without them," she explained with what calm she could muster. "Promise me that you will never try to do such a thing again, and never interfere with any of the nests. Mrs. Arnold will be most grieved to hear of this."

The orphan's black eyes filled with tears.

"Will she mind? I thought she'd like 'em to keep in a cage as pets. I'd do anything in the world to please her."

"Then leave the birds alone, if you want to please her. Run now to the house and fetch me a basin full of hot water and a cloth. I must wipe all this horrible stuff off the bushes. Bring a knife, too, for I shall have to cut away some of the branches and burn them. I hope the tits won't desert."

Ulyth was late for school that morning, but the offence was condoned by Miss Teddington when she heard the reason.

"I hope you washed every scrap of the lime off?" she asked anxiously.

"I didn't leave it while there was enough to catch even a bumble-bee. The birds are back. They came directly I'd gone a dozen yards away."

"That shows the young ones are hatched. I hope Susan won't direct her energies into any other natural-history experiments."

"We shall be sorry we brought her to the Camp-fire if she does. She means well, but the worst of her is that you never can calculate in the least what she may do next. She's a problem."

* * * * *

During the summer term the Camp-fire Guild had many informal meetings by the stream. The girls were often allowed to take tea there, a permission which they highly appreciated. Mrs. Arnold had lent them a small camp-oven, in which they could bake cakes, and many culinary efforts resulted from the acquisition. On Saturday afternoon Gertrude Oliver and Addie Knighton were on the cooking-list as special scouts, and, having mixed some currant-buns, placed them carefully in the oven. They were in charge of the camp-fire and responsible for the preparation of the tea, to which that day all the mistresses were to be specially invited. The rest of the school were in the playing-field practising flag-signalling under the joint superintendence of Mrs. Arnold and Miss Teddington.

"It's a nuisance we can't leave the cakes," sighed Addie. "I did so want to see them send that message about the aeroplane."

"They're baking all right," said Gertrude. "We can't make them any quicker by looking at them. Couldn't we just run to the top of the gravel-pit and watch for a few minutes? There's Susannah Maude; she'd keep an eye on them. Hello! Susan!"

The orphan, in virtue of being a hanger-on of the Camp-fire, was wandering about by the stream in the wake of the proceedings. She came running up eagerly at Gertrude's call.

"I'll mind 'em for you, Miss. I've watched Cook dozens of times. I'll look after the kettle too. You leave it to me."

"I hope it won't be a case of King Alfred and the cakes."

Susan grinned comprehension.

"Standard V Historical Reader. Not me!" she chuckled. "I always thought the woman was a silly to trust a man to turn the cakes."

"Well, mind you show up better. You might as well put the milk-can in the stream to keep cool. We don't want it curdled, and I'm certain there's thunder about."

Addie and Gertie were sure they were not absent long. They just stood and watched a few messages being sent, then ran back promptly to their duties.

Susannah Maude was in the very act of trying to lift the big camp-kettle from its trivet.

"Hold hard there!" screamed Addie, running to the rescue. "You can't move that alone. Susan! Stop!" It was too late, however. The small busybody had managed to stir the kettle, but, her youthful arms being quite unequal to sustaining its weight, she let it drop, retreating with a wild Indian yell of alarm. The stream of boiling water fortunately escaped her, but nearly put out the fire. When the steam and dust had subsided, the rueful scouts picked up the empty kettle gingerly, as it was hot.

"We shall have to build up the fire again," lamented Gertrude. "Oh, Addie, the cakes!"

She might well exclaim. In a row among the ashes were the soaked, dust-covered remains of the precious currant-buns.

"I took 'em out of the oven because they were done," explained Susan hastily, justifying herself. "I thought you shouldn't blame me for letting 'em burn, anyhow; and I put 'em down there on some dock-leaves to keep hot. I couldn't tell the kettle would fall on 'em."

"They're done for," sighed Addie. "There isn't one fit to eat. Help us to fill the kettle again as soon as you can, and fetch some more sticks and gorse, you black-eyed Susan!"

"Where's the milk-can?" asked Gertrude uneasily.

"I put it in the stream as you told me," replied the orphan rather sulkily, indicating with a nod the location.

Decidedly anxious as to its safety, the girls ran to the water-side. They always put the can in a particular little sheltered corner fenced in by a few stones. Susannah had helped them to place it there many times, and had even named the spot "the dairy". They looked in vain. The milk was certainly not there now.

"What in the name of thunder have you done with the can, you wretched imp?" shouted Addie, thoroughly angry.

"You said it ought to keep very cool, so I threw it into the deep pool. 'Tain't my fault," retorted Susannah, who had a temper as well as her benefactresses.

"I've half a mind to throw you after it!" raged Gertie, her fingers twitching to shake the luckless orphan.

Perhaps Susannah's experienced eye gauged the extent of her wrath, and decided that for once she had gone too far. She did not wait to proffer any more explanations, but turned and fled back towards the house, resuming her neglected pan-scouring in the scullery with a zeal that astonished the cook.

Addie and Gertie replenished the camp-fire and refilled the kettle; but the cakes were hopeless, and the milk was beyond recall. Doris Deane, the champion swimmer of the school, dived for the can next morning and brought it up empty; the lid was never recovered, probably having been washed into a hole.

The Guild sat down that afternoon rather disconsolately to milkless tea. Addie had begged a small jugful from the kitchen, enough for their guests, the mistresses, but it was impossible to replace the big two-gallon can at a moment's notice.

"I begin to wish the school had never supported an orphan at the 'Alexandra Home for Destitute Children'," sighed Gertie, eating plain bread and butter, and thinking regretfully of her spoilt cakes. "I vote next term we ask to give up collecting for it, and keep a monkey at the Zoo instead. We could send it nuts and biscuits at Christmas."

"And currant-buns?" giggled Beth Broadway.

"You are about the most unfeeling wretch I ever came across!" snapped Gertrude.



CHAPTER XV

A Point of Honour

"Lizzie," announced Ulyth, sitting down on a stump in the glade, and speaking slowly and emphatically, "The Woodlands isn't what it used to be."

"So Stephanie was saying the other day," agreed Lizzie, taking a seat on the stump by the side of her friend. "She thinks it's a different place altogether."

"It is; though not exactly from Stephie's point of view. I don't care the least scrap that there are no Vernons or Courtenays or Derringtons here now. Stephie can lament them if she likes. I never knew them, so I can't regret them. There's one thing I can't help noticing, though—the tone has been going down."

"Do you think it has?" replied Lizzie thoughtfully. "Merle and Alice and Mary are rather silly, certainly, but there's not much harm in them."

"I don't mean our form; it's the juniors. I've noticed it continually lately."

"Now you come to speak of it, so have I. I don't quite know what it is, but there's a something."

"There's a very decided something. It's come on quite lately, but it's there. They're not behaving nicely at all. They've slacked all round, and do nothing but snigger among themselves over jokes they won't tell."

"They're welcome to their own jokes as far as I'm concerned, the young idiots!"

"Yes, if it's only just fun; but I'm afraid it's something more than that—something they're ashamed of and really want to hide. I've seen such shuffling and queer business going on when any of the monitresses came in sight."

"Have you said anything to Catherine or Helen?"

"No, and I don't want to. It's very unfortunate, but they've really got no tact. Catherine's so high-handed, and Helen's nearly as bad. They snap the girls up for the least trifle. The result is the juniors have got it into their tiresome young heads that monitresses are a species of teacher. They weren't intended to be that at all. A monitress is just one of ourselves, only with authority that we all allow. She ought to be jolly with everybody."

"Um! You can hardly call Catherine jolly with the kids."

"That's just it. They resent it; they've gone their own way lately, and it's been decidedly downhill. I'm persuaded they're playing some deep and surreptitious game at present. I wish I knew what it was."

"Can't Rona tell you?"

"I wouldn't pump Rona for the world. It's most frightfully difficult for her, a junior, to be room-mate with a senior. Her form always suspect her of giving them away to the Upper School. Rona's had a hard enough struggle to get any footing at all at The Woodlands, and I don't want to make it any harder for her. If she once gets the reputation of 'tell-tale' she's done for. Since Stephanie made that fuss about juniors coming into senior rooms I mayn't ask her into V B; so if she's ostracized by her own form too she'll be neither fish, flesh, fowl, nor good red herring. No; however I find out it mustn't be through Rona."

"Yes, I quite see your point. Now you speak of it, I believe those juniors are up to something. There's a prodigious amount of whispering and sniggering among them. 'What's the joke?' I said to Tootie Phillips yesterday, and she flared out in the most truculent manner: 'That's our own business, thank you!'"

"Tootie has been making herself most objectionable lately. She wants sitting upon."

"Catherine will do that, never fear."

"No doubt, but it doesn't bring us any nearer finding out what those juniors are after."

"They vanish mysteriously after tea sometimes. I vote we watch them, and next time it happens we'll stalk them."

"Right-O! But not a word to anybody else, or it might get about and put them on their guard."

"Trust me! I wouldn't even flicker an eyelid."

Now that Ulyth and Lizzie had compared notes on the subject of the juniors, they became more convinced than ever of the fact that something surreptitious was going on. Nods, hints, words which apparently bore a hidden meaning, nudges, and signs were the order of the day. All friendly advances on the part of seniors were repelled, the younger girls keeping strictly to themselves. This was the more marked as there had never been any very great division at The Woodlands between Upper and Lower School, the whole of the little community sharing in most of the general interests.

After tea there was a short interval before evening preparation began, and during the summer term this was spent, if possible, out-of-doors by everybody. One afternoon, only a few days after the conversation just recorded, the girls had filed as usual from the dining-hall, and were racing off for tennis, basket-ball, or a run by the stream. As Ulyth, down on her knees in the darkest part of the hall cupboard, groped for her mislaid tennis-shoes, two members of IV B came in for a moment to fetch balls. They were in a hurry and they evidently did not perceive her presence.

"Did you get the tip?" Irene Scott asked Ethel Jephson under her breath. "By the lower pool immediately."

"All serene! Tootie told me herself."

"Pass it on then; though I think most know."

As they ran down the passage, Ulyth, relinquishing her hunt for the missing shoes, rose to her feet.

"There's one here who didn't know," she chuckled. "This is a most important piece of information. Immediately, by the lower pool, is it? Well, I must go and find Lizzie. What are those precious juniors up to, I wonder?"

Lizzie was taking her racket for a game of tennis, but she readily gave up her place to Merle Denham at a hint from Ulyth.

"I told you they vanished after tea," she said, as the two girls sauntered into the glen. "We'll track them this time. Don't on any account look as if you were going anywhere. Sit down here and give them a few minutes' grace, in case stragglers come up. They probably won't begin punctually. I'll time it by my watch."

When five minutes had elapsed there was not a solitary junior to be seen in the glade, and Ulyth and Lizzie, deeming themselves safe, set out in the direction of the lower pool.

This was a part of the stream at the very verge of the grounds belonging to The Woodlands; indeed, the greater portion of it lay in the land of a neighbouring farmer, and to reach its pebbly bank meant a scramble round some palings and under a projecting piece of rock.

Ulyth and Lizzie were too wary to follow the juniors by this path, but scaled the palings at another point, and under cover of a thick copse of gorse-bushes approached the pool from the side that lay in the farmer's field. By most careful scouting they found a spot on the bank where they could see and hear without being seen.

Below them, seated on the rocks by the edge of the water, were practically almost the whole of the Lower School. They cuddled close, with their arms round each other, and to judge from their repressed giggles they appeared to be enjoying themselves. Tootie Phillips, a long-legged, excitable girl of thirteen, mounted upon a boulder, was addressing them with much fervour. Ulyth and Lizzie missed the beginning of her remarks, but when they came within earshot they realized that she was in the midst of a vigorous harangue against the seniors.

"Are we to be trodden down just because we're a little younger than they are?" urged Tootie. "Why should they lord it over us, I should like to know? They were juniors themselves only a year or two ago. I tell you the worm will turn."

"It's turned pretty considerably," guffawed Cissie Newall.

"It knows which side its bread's buttered," cackled Irene Scott.

"Buttered! You mean sugared, don't you?"

At this sally the whole party broke into a shout of laughter.

"Good for you, Ciss!"

"Sugared! Ra—ther!"

"Shut up, you sillies! Someone will hear us," commanded Tootie. "I was saying before, we're not going to be sat upon, either by teachers or monitresses or seniors. We'll take our own way."

"A sugary way," chirped Ethel Jephson.

The girls hinnied again. There was evidently something underlying the joke.

"When perfectly ridiculous rules are made, that never ought to have been made," continued Tootie, "then we've a right to take the law into our own hands and do as we please."

"Our pocket money's our own," grumbled a discontented spirit from the back.

"Of course it is, and we ought to be able to do what we like with it."

"And so are our brooches, if we want to——"

"Sh—sh!"

"Shut up, stupid!"

"Well, we all know."

"No need to blare it out, if we do."

"I wasn't blaring."

"Violet Robertson, remember your oath," commanded Tootie. "If you let a word of—we know what—leak out, you're sent to Coventry for the rest of the term. Yes. Not a single one of us will speak one single word to you. Not even your own room-mates. So there!"

"Well, you needn't make such a precious fuss. I'm sure I wasn't letting out secrets," retorted Violet sulkily. "But I think there ought to be some rate of value. My brooch was a far better one than Mollie's."

"Right you are, my hearty, and I'm going to speak about it. We mustn't let ourselves be done, even by—you know who!"

"And she's sharp."

"She's getting too sharp. We must stop it, even if we have to break off for a whole week."

"No, no!"

"Oh, not that anyhow!"

"Well, look here, if you're such sillies, you deserve——"

But at this most interesting point the loud clanging of the preparation-bell put a stop to any further argument. With one accord the girls jumped up, and fled back as fast as they could run in the direction of the school. Ulyth and Lizzie, at the risk of being late for evening call-over, gave the conspirators time to get well away before they ventured to follow.

"What's the meaning of all this?" queried Lizzie, as they scouted cautiously through the glade.

"I can't imagine. They're evidently doing something they oughtn't to, the young wretches! But they're keeping it very dark."

"We shall have to watch them."

"We must indeed," sighed Ulyth. "Lizzie, I loathe eavesdropping and anything that savours of underhand work, but what are we to do? Something is going wrong among the juniors, and for the sake of the school we've got to put it right if we possibly can. It's no use asking them their sweet secret, for they wouldn't tell us; and I'm afraid setting the monitresses on the track would only make things worse. If we can find out what they're doing, then we shall know our ground. I'm a Torch-bearer and you're a Fire-maker, and we must appeal to them to keep their Camp-fire vows. But we can't do that till we've some idea of which rule they're breaking. How can we say to them: 'I strongly suspect you're not being trustworthy'? We've got to prove our words."

"Prove them we will. We'll dodge about till we catch them in the act," agreed Lizzie.

To both the girls it was uncongenial though necessary work. As seniors and League officers they felt they owed a duty to the school, but that it would be far wiser to appeal privately to the juniors' sense of honour, and win them back to straight paths of their own free will, than to carry the matter to head-quarters. For the present, patience and tact must be their watchwords.

Several days went by, and nothing particular occurred. Either the younger girls were on their guard or they had suspended their activities. On Friday evening, however, as Ulyth was coming along the passage from practising, she accidentally cannonaded into half a dozen members of IV B who were standing near the boot cupboard. She evidently surprised them, for one and all they hastily popped their hands into their pockets. It was promptly done, but not so quickly as to prevent Ulyth from seeing that they were eating something.

"It's all right," gasped Bertha Halliwell, with apparent unconcern, in reply to Ulyth's apologies. "You nearly upset me, but I'm not fractured."

"I wish you'd take care, though," grumbled Etta Jessop, surreptitiously wiping a decidedly sticky mouth; "no one likes being tumbled over."

Ulyth passed on thoughtfully. What had they all been munching, and where did they get it from? Private supplies of cakes and sweets were utterly forbidden at The Woodlands. Their prohibition was one of the strictest rules of the school, to break which would be to incur a very severe penalty from Miss Teddington. Was this the explanation of Tootie's rather enigmatical remarks down by the stream?

"If that's their precious secret, and they're just being greedy, I'm too disgusted with them for words!" commented Lizzie, when informed of the discovery.

Saturday and Monday passed with quite exemplary behaviour on the part of the juniors. The keenest vigilance could discover nothing. But on Tuesday Lizzie came across another clue. She had been monitress for the afternoon in the drawing-class, and after the girls had left she stayed behind to put away various articles that had been used and to tidy the room.

As she worked along the desks where IV B had been sitting, collecting stray pencils and pieces of india-rubber, she noticed a book lying on the floor and picked it up. It was a French grammar, with "Etta Jessop" written on the fly-leaf and had evidently been accidentally dropped. She turned over the pages idly. In the middle was a scrap of paper torn from an exercise-book, and on this was scribbled: "Where will she be to-night?" while in a different hand, underneath, as if in answer to the question, were the words: "Side gate at 8. Pass, 'John Barleycorn'."

This was most important. It was the first, indeed the only definite, information they had to go upon. Lizzie replaced the slip of paper and laid the book on the floor just where she had found it. Etta would no doubt soon discover her loss, and come back to fetch it. In the meantime this very valuable piece of news must be communicated to Ulyth.

The chums talked the matter over earnestly.

"Something's happening at the side gate at eight o'clock, and they've got a password; that's clear," said Lizzie.

"Then I think it's our plain duty to go and investigate," returned Ulyth. "If the worst comes to the worst we could report ourselves, and tell Teddie why we went. She'd understand."

"I hope it won't need that," fluttered Lizzie nervously.

The girls were not allowed out of the house after preparation, so any excursions into the garden were distinctly against the rules.

Feeling very culpable at thus breaking the law of the school, Ulyth and Lizzie crept quietly from the cloak-room door soon after eight had struck. It was not yet dark, but the sun had sunk behind the hills, and the garden was in deep shadow. They passed the tennis-courts and the rose parterre, and ran down the steps into the herbarium. Just at the outskirts of the shrubbery a small figure was skulking among the bushes. At the sound of footsteps it gave a low, peculiar whistle, then advanced slightly from the shadow and stood at attention, as if in mute challenge of the new-comers. Irene Scott, for it was she, was evidently on sentry duty. No one with a knowledge of camp-life could mistake her attitude.

"We'll bluff it off," whispered Ulyth, and, taking Lizzie's arm, she marched quietly past, murmuring: "John Barleycorn".

The effect of the password was electrical. Irene looked immensely astonished. She had certainly not expected such knowledge on the part of seniors.

"Are you in it too? Oh, goody!" she gasped; then very softly she called: "All's well!" and, turning, dived back among the bushes.

Lizzie and Ulyth pushed on towards the side gate. It was open, and inside, under the shelter of a big laurel, stood a woman with a basket. She was a gipsy-looking person, with long ear-rings, and she wore a red-and-yellow handkerchief tied round her neck. As the girls approached she uncovered her basket with a knowing smile.

"I've brought plenty to-night, Missies," she said ingratiatingly. "Cheesecakes and vanilla sandwiches and coco-nut drops and cream wafers. What'll you please to have?"

"Are you selling them?" asked Ulyth in much amazement.

The woman glanced at her keenly.

"I've not seen you two before," she remarked. "Yes, dearie, I'm selling them. They're wholesome cakes, and won't do you any harm. Try these cream wafers."

"No, thanks! We don't want anything," stammered Lizzie.

"If you've spent all your money," persisted the hawker, "I'm always open to take a trinket instead. There's a young lady been here just now, and gave me this in place of a sixpence," showing a small brooch pinned into her bodice. "Of course such things aren't worth much to me, but I'd do it to oblige you."

At the sight of the little brooch Ulyth flushed hotly.

"We're not allowed to buy cakes and tarts," she replied. "I'm sure Miss Bowes doesn't know that you come here to sell things. It's not your fault, of course, but please don't come again. It's breaking the rules of the school."

The woman covered up her basket in an instant.

"All right, Missie, all right," she said suavely. "I don't want to press things on you. That's not my way. You won't catch me at this gate again, I promise you. Good night!" and, slipping out into the lane, she was gone directly.

Ulyth shut the door and bolted it.

"She mayn't come to this particular spot again," said Lizzie, "but she'll find some other meeting-place, the cunning old thing. I could see it in her eye. So this is their grand secret! What a remarkably honourable and creditable one!"

"It's worse than I thought," groaned Ulyth. "They must have been going on with this business for some time, Lizzie. Do you know, that brooch was Rona's. I recognized it at once. It's one she brought from New Zealand, with a Maori device on it."

"I thought better of Rona."

"So did I. She's improved so much I didn't think she'd slip back in this way."

"I believe Tootie Phillips is the ring-leader."

"There's no doubt of it. From all we've seen, the juniors have got a systematic traffic with this woman, and post scouts to keep watch while she's about. You heard Irene call: 'All's well!'"

"They'll be feasting in their bedroom to-night."

"Rona won't dare, surely. Lizzie, I shouldn't have thought much of it if they'd done it once just for a lark. We're all human, and juniors will be juniors. But when it gets systematic, and they begin to sell their brooches, that's a different matter."

"What are you going to do? Tackle the kids and tell them we've found out, and they've got to stop it?"

"Will they really stop it just at our bidding? Or will it only put them on their guard and make them carry the thing on with more caution?"

"Then give a hint to the monitresses?"

"I wonder if we ought. I wish Catherine and Helen were different."

"Well, what do you suggest?"

"There's only one other way. Mrs. Arnold is coming to The Woodlands on Friday afternoon. Suppose we wait, catch her alone, and tell her all about it. She's our 'Guardian of the Fire', and we ought to be able to ask her things when we're in difficulties. She doesn't belong to the school, so it isn't like telling a teacher or a monitress. We know we can trust her absolutely."

"Right-O! But it seems a long time to have to wait."

"It can't be helped," said Ulyth, as they hurried back through the garden.

She had decided, as she thought, for the best, though, as the result proved, she had chosen a most unfortunate course.



CHAPTER XVI

Amateur Conjuring

Ulyth went to her bedroom that evening in much agitation of mind. She was torn by conflicting impulses. At one moment she longed to tax Rona frankly with a breach of school rules, air the whole subject, and state her most emphatic opinion upon it. If Rona alone had been concerned in the matter she would have done so without hesitation, but the knowledge of the number of girls who were involved made her pause.

"I might do more harm than good," she reflected. "After the way Tootie has been inciting them to take sides against the seniors, they'd be up in arms at the least hint. It will be worse if they know they're discovered, and yet go on in an even more underhand fashion."

Ulyth's abstraction was so marked that her room-mate could not fail to notice it.

"What's the matter with you to-night?" she asked. "I've never seen you so glum before. Have you been getting into a row with Teddie?"

"I'm all right. One can't always be talking, I suppose," returned Ulyth rather huffily. "Some people go on like a perpetual gramophone."

"Meaning Corona Margarita Mitchell, I suppose? As you like, O Queen! I'll shut up if my babble offends the royal ears. There! Don't look so tragic. I don't want to make myself a nuisance. But all the same it's depressing to see you looking like a mixture of Hamlet and Ophelia and Iphigenia and—and—Don Quixote. Was he tragic too? I forget."

"Hardly," said Ulyth, smiling in spite of herself.

"Well, I get mixed up among history and literature, can't always remember which is real and which is make-up. It's a fact. I put down Portia as history in my exercise yesterday, and said the story of the Spanish Armada was told by Chaucer. Now you're laughing, and you look more like Ulyth Stanton. Sit down on this bed. There! Open your mouth and shut your eyes, and see what the king will send you!"

Rona was fumbling in her drawer as she spoke. She turned round, seized her friend boisterously and forced her on to the bed, then, holding a hand over her eyes, crammed a chocolate almond into her mouth.

"Rona! What are you doing?" protested Ulyth, shaking herself free. "Where did you get this chocolate?"

Rona pulled a face expressive of mingled secrecy, delight, and triumph.

"Rats!" she chuckled enigmatically. "Little girls shouldn't ask questions."

"But I want to know."

"That's not sporty! Take the goods the gods send you, and don't ask 'em what tree they picked them from."

"But, Rona——"

"Are you two girls still out of bed and talking?" said an indignant voice, as Miss Lodge opened the door and glared reproval. "Make haste. I give you three minutes, and if you're not ready by then I shall report you. Not another word! I'm astonished at you, Ulyth, for breaking the silence rule."

"I didn't hear the half-past nine bell," replied Ulyth, abashed.

"Then it's your business to hear it. It's loud enough. Everybody else on the landing is in bed."

Miss Lodge put out the light and walked away, with a final warning against further conversation. Rona was asleep in a few minutes, breathing calmly and peacefully as was her wont, but Ulyth lay awake for a long time watching a shadow on the wall cast from the beech-tree outside. Where had Rona got her chocolates? The answer was perfectly plain. With the little brooch for evidence there could be no mistake.

"She's not so bad as the others, because I really don't think she quite realizes even yet what school honour means. But Tootie and her scouts know. There's no excuse for them. Well, only two days now, and Mrs. Arnold will be here. What a tower of strength she is! I can tell her everything. Friday will very soon come now, thank goodness!"

But those two days were to bring events of their own, events quite unprecedented in the school, and unexpected by everybody. How they affected Ulyth and Rona will be related farther on in our story; but meantime, for a true understanding of their significance, we must pause to consider a certain feature of the life at The Woodlands. When Miss Teddington had joined partnership with Miss Bowes she had added many new ideas to the plan of education which had formerly been pursued.

She was determined that the school should not be dubbed "old-fashioned", and by all means in her power she kept it abreast of the times. So well did she succeed that the girls were apt to complain that their second Principal was a crank on education, and fond of trying every fresh experiment she could get hold of. The various enterprises added an atmosphere of novelty, however, and prevented the daily life from degenerating into a dull routine. No one ever knew what scheme Miss Teddington might suggest next; and even if each course was not pursued for very long, it did its work at the time, and was a factor in the general plan. All kinds and varieties of health exercises had had their day at The Woodlands—poles, dumb-bells, clubs, had been in turn discarded for deep breathing or for swimming motions. Slow minuets or lively tarantellas were danced, according to the fashion of the moment, and had the virtue of teaching stately dignity as well as poetry of motion. It was rumoured sometimes that Miss Teddington, with her eye on the past, contemplated a revival of backboards, stocks, and chest-expanders; but those instruments of torture, fortunately, never made their appearance, much to the relief of the intended victims, who had viewed their advent with apprehension.