The Camp Fire Girls’
Larks and Pranks

OR
The House of the Open Door
By HILDEGARD G. FREY

AUTHOR OF
The Camp Fire Girls Series

A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers New York

THE
Camp Fire Girls Series

A Series of Stories for Camp Fire Girls Endorsed by the Officials of the Camp Fire Girls Organization

By HILDEGARD G. FREY

The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods or, The Winnebago’s Go Camping The Camp Fire Girls at School or, The Wohelo Weavers The Camp Fire Girls at Onoway House or, The Magic Garden The Camp Fire Girls Go Motoring or, Along the Road That Leads the Way The Camp Fire Girls’ Larks and Pranks or, The House of the Open Door The Camp Fire Girls on Ellen’s Isle or, the Trail of the Seven Cedars The Camp Fire Girls on the Open Road or, Glorify Work The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit or, Over The Top With the Winnebago’s The Camp Fire Girls Solve a Mystery or, The Christmas Adventures at Carver House The Camp Fire Girls at Camp Keewaydin or, Down Paddles

Copyright, 1917
By A. L. Burt Company

THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS’ LARKS AND PRANKS

SHE WAS NUMB FROM THE COLD AND VERY NEARLY ASLEEP WHEN THE CAPTAIN FOUND HER.
The Camp-Fire Girls’ Larks and Pranks. [Page 178.]

THE CAMP FIRE GIRLS’
LARKS AND PRANKS

CHAPTER I
THE HOUSE OF THE OPEN DOOR

It was the crisp chill of an early October evening; in the still air the dead leaves came rustling down with a soft sound like whispers, while the crickets chirped a cheery welcome from the waiting earth. Over the treetops a big yellow hunter’s moon was rising; its comical face grinning good-naturedly. It looked down on the dark outlines of a large barn standing in the shadow of a tall tree and the grin widened perceptibly. Evidently something was happening on earth.

A dark form stole softly up the long drive leading to the barn and paused before the door. Through the silence there rose the whistling wail of the whippoorwill, repeated three times, and ending abruptly in the squall of a catbird. From within the blackness of the barn came an echo of the whippoorwill’s call, followed by a much more cheerful note—the carol of the bluebird. Then a clear voice called from inside, “Who goes there?”

“A friend,” came the reply.

“Stand and give the countersign,” commanded the voice inside.

“Other Council Fires were here before,” responded the newcomer.

“Advance and give the Inner Password,” said the invisible sentinel.

The figure passed through the dark entrance and came to a halt just inside, crying, “Kolah Olowan!”

“Mount!” commanded the voice above, and the stranger lost no time in obeying the invitation. Scrambling up the ladder fastened to the wall which did duty as a staircase, she thrust aside the curtain at the top and stepped out into the lighted upper chamber.

Anyone seeing that dark and deserted looking building from the outside would never guess how bright and cheerful was that upper room within. A wood fire roared in a cobblestone fireplace, its gleam lighting up walls hung with leather skins and gay Indian blankets and festooned with sprays of bittersweet. Several more Indian blankets were spread out on the floor in lieu of rugs, while from the rafters were suspended woven baskets and pieces of pottery. Ranged around the sides of the chamber, where the sloping roof met the floor, were four beds, all different, and only one indicating that the dwellers in that secret lodge were civilized persons. The first was a neat cot bed with blankets tucked in smoothly all around, and a dust cover folded up at the foot; the second was an “Indian bed” made of pine branches, dried ferns and sweet grasses, piled several feet high and ingeniously confined by woven reeds and pliant twigs. The scent of the sweet grasses, mingled with the aromatic odor of the pine, filled the room with a dreamy fragrance that seemed like a charm to lure down the Sleep Manitou. The third was a pile of bearskins and the fourth was another kind of Indian bed, made of smooth round willow rods tied together with ropes and laid across two poles fastened into the wall.

No windows were visible, as these had been covered with skins. Except for the camp bed, the wide hearthstone and one other detail it might have been the lodge of some Indian Chief of olden time. That other detail was a green felt pennant stretched across the chimney above the stone shelf of the fireplace, bearing in clean-cut English letters the word WINNEBAGO. Most of our readers have probably guessed the truth before this—the Indian lodge we have been describing is the meeting place of the Winnebago Camp Fire Girls and the solitary visitor who uttered the plaintive cry of the whippoorwill with its grotesque ending in a cat call is none other than our old friend, Sahwah the Sunfish.

“O Nyoda, such larks!” cried Sahwah, skipping across the room and bestowing a hasty embrace on the sentinel guarding the fire, whom the reader has doubtless suspected of being Miss Kent, the Guardian of the Winnebago group.

Nyoda laughingly shook herself free and smoothed out the Ceremonial dress she held in her hand, which had become sadly crumpled during the process of Sahwah’s bear hug. “What mischief are you into this time?” she asked fondly, smiling down into Sahwah’s dancing eyes.

Sahwah went into a gale of giggles before she could explain. “You know Gladys was going to drive all of us girls down in the Glow-worm to-night,” she said, controlling her laughter with an effort, “and she telephoned Hinpoha while I was there to dinner that she was over at Mrs. Varden’s, the dressmaker’s, having a fit, and the Glow-worm was standing out in front of the house, so we should gather up the other girls and get into the car and wait for her to come out, to save her the time of going around after the girls, for her fit threatened to be a lengthy one. So Hinpoha started out after Medmangi and Nakwisi and I went back home after these apples, which I’d forgotten to take along to Hinpoha’s. When I got to the corner of the street along came Gladys in the Glow-worm and said she had an errand to do for her mother in a hurry and we had better come straight out here without her and she would come later. I hurried over to Mrs. Varden’s house to tell the girls, but when I got nearly there I saw a black car standing out in front and Hinpoha and Nakwisi and Medmangi sitting in it as cool as cucumbers, thinking they were in the Glow-worm. I recognized the car as belonging to that horribly bashful son of Mrs. Varden’s, and I couldn’t resist the temptation to let the girls sit in it until he came out. So I stole back up the street, keeping in the shadow of the trees so the girls wouldn’t see me, and came out here. Oh, won’t there be a situation though, when ‘Dolly’ Varden comes out and finds his nice bachelor car full of bold, bad girls!”

The picture was too much for Sahwah, and she rolled on the bed shrieking with laughter, in which Nyoda joined heartily. “I wonder how long it will be before they come,” said Sahwah, rising from the bed and wiping her eyes. “What shall we do to pass away the time?”

“If I were you,” advised Nyoda, “I would spend it searching a nice safe retreat to which you can fly when they come and find out you didn’t tell them.”

Hardly had she spoken the words when there floated up from below the familiar cry of the whippoorwill, followed successively by the long, eerie laugh of the loon, the blithe whistle of the quail and the song of the robin. “There they are!” exclaimed Sahwah in mock terror. “Where shall I hide? Oh, I have it, I’ll get inside of that pile of bearskins and listen while they tell their tale of woe to you and then I’ll hop out and laugh at them.” Quick as a flash she jumped into the bearskin bed and pulled the skins over her so that she was entirely concealed.

With a great deal of chattering and giggling the three arrivals were mounting the ladder. “Keep on going, Hinpoha!” exclaimed Nakwisi, “you’re stepping on my hand.”

“Keep on going yourself,” retorted Hinpoha, “you haven’t a pie in your hand.” Just at that moment her foot slipped and she clutched wildly at the ladder for support.

“There goes the pie!” shrieked someone, as it described a circle in the air and landed with a thud. Hinpoha wrung her hands in grief, for her mouth was already watering for that crisp pastry.

Medmangi walked over to view the remains. “It isn’t hurt a mite,” she said calmly, picking it up and dusting it off. “Fortunately it landed right side up in the tin.”

“O Nyoda,” cried Hinpoha, beaming once more now that the feast of pie was assured, “we had the most fun getting here! Gladys told us the Glow-worm was standing out in front of the Varden’s house and we should get in and wait for her, and we saw a car and got in. Pretty soon out came young Mr. Varden, got into the front seat without looking to the right or left and drove off. We thought of course he was driving Gladys’ car away and we all three shrieked at him at once. He pretty nearly dropped dead when he heard us, and stopped the car so suddenly we all flew out of the seat. But he was perfectly grand about it when we found out our mistake. He told us Gladys had gone home fifteen minutes before, but he would be perfectly delighted to drive us where we wanted to go. And so he brought us out,” she finished with a dramatic flourish, and sat down heavily on top of the bearskin bed where Sahwah lay hidden. Immediately there was an upheaval and a grotesque animal sprang from the bed, an animal which had the skin of a bear and two red stockinged legs which capered wildly about while their owner shrieked piercingly, “She sat on my breathing apparatus and I won’t be able to talk for a week!”

“You are talking, you goose,” said Hinpoha, calmly seating herself again after poking the bed to see if it were further inhabited.

“You missed it, Sahwah, by going home,” she continued. “Too bad you weren’t along to share the fun.”

Sahwah’s expression was funny to behold when she learned how the joke had turned out, for it was not on the girls after all, but on herself, for she had walked all the way to the lodge by herself. She looked rather silly as she caught Nyoda’s eye, but while Nyoda twinkled mischievously at her Sahwah knew that she would never give her away. But of course when Gladys arrived a few minutes later and heard the story, Sahwah’s part in it came out and she had to stand the gibes of the others because her joke had turned round on herself, until Nyoda called the beginning of the Ceremonial and peace was restored.

One name has been dropped from the Count Book of the Winnebagos since last we heard the roll called, and to another there is no reply, although it is always called. Early in the fall Chapa the Chipmunk moved to a distant city, and so for the first time the close circle of the Winnebagos was broken. Then shortly afterward Migwan went away to college and her departure caused a fresh bereavement. Though Migwan had been of such a very quiet nature, her influence had been widely felt, and the girls missed her more and more as the days went on. Hinpoha, especially, was almost inconsolable, for she and Migwan had always stood a little closer together than the rest of the girls. This was the first Ceremonial Meeting without the two and it seemed very strange indeed to omit Chapa’s name from the roll, and when Migwan’s name was called and was followed by silence, Hinpoha sniffed audibly and wiped her eyes.

“Sister, this is a very solemn occasion,” said Sahwah the irrepressible, in such a forced tone of sorrow that it was impossible not to laugh at her.

“That’s right,” said Nyoda. “It won’t do for us to pull long faces. We have vowed to ‘be happy’ you know. Think how much worse off Chapa is alone in a strange city. Come, be cheerful and tell what kind deeds you have seen done today. You begin, Sahwah.”

Sahwah took hold of her toes with her hands and tilted back and forth on the floor as she spoke. “Sally Jones did me a great service yesterday in composition class. You know Sally Jones—the one they call the Blunderbuss. Well, you know what a pig I am when it comes to writing composition. I never wrote one yet that I didn’t get a blot on. Last week when I handed mine in Miss Snively said that if there was a blot on my paper this week she would mark me zero for the month. So yesterday when we had to write one in class I took the utmost care and got it all done spotlessly and was just signing my name when Anna Green behind me tried to pick a thread off my collar and laid her fishy cold hand against my neck. I jumped and wriggled and the result was a beautiful blot on my composition. There wasn’t time to copy it over because it was almost the end of the hour, so I resigned myself to a nice fat cipher on my report card this month. Then Miss Snively sent Sally around to collect the papers and when she came to my desk she leaned across it in such an awkward way that she upset my inkwell all over my composition and my one small blot was completely hidden by the deluge. Miss Snively graciously requested me to do it over in rest hour, which I did, and handed it in in perfect shape. Upsetting that inkwell was the kindest thing anybody ever did for me.”

There was a moment of laughter at Sahwah’s tale of kindness and then quiet fell on the group again. “Tell us a story, Nyoda,” begged Hinpoha, breaking the silence, “we’re getting low in our minds again.”

“Yes, do,” begged the others.

Nyoda sat silent a moment staring thoughtfully into the fire. Her hands were clasped around her knees and the light shone on the diamond ring which now encircled the fourth finger of her left hand—the only thing which made the girls realize that their amazing adventures of the first week in September had been a reality and not a dream.

“In a village in eastern Hungary,” began Nyoda, “there lived a girl about your age. Her father was a very wealthy man, and lived on a great estate. Veronica—that was the girl’s name—was the only child, and had everything that her heart desired. The thing she loved to do the best was ride horse-back and she had a beautiful horse for her very own. She showed great talent on the violin and had the best masters. Veronica grew to be seventeen as happy as a girl could be, with an indulgent father and a beautiful, sweet mother. Then a dreadful thing happened. War was declared in the country and the village where they lived was taken by the enemy. Her father was killed, their home was burned and her mother died. Veronica, with the rest of the people in the village, ran away toward the mountains when the village burned. But Veronica became separated from her friends and fell, and could not get up again, for her leg was broken. She lay there a long time, and gave herself up for lost, when she heard a whinny beside her and there was her pet horse, who had been following her all the way. She managed to swing herself up on his back and he galloped away to the safety of the mountains. They found their way across the border into another country where some kind people took care of the orphan girl. The faithful horse fell after he had brought her to safety and hurt himself so badly that he had to be shot. The people who took care of Veronica sent her across the ocean to her aunt and uncle. So, sad and lonesome, she came to this country to be an American.”

Here Nyoda paused for breath, and Hinpoha burst out quickly, “Oh, how I wish this had happened in our time and that poor lonely girl had come to this city and we had met her and made her happy. Wouldn’t we be kind to her, though, if we had a chance?”

Nyoda proceeded quietly. “All this has happened in your time, and this lonesome girl has come to our city, and you are going to have a chance to be kind to her often.”

“Nyoda!” shrieked all the girls at once. “You mean she lives in our city, and you actually know her?” “Where does she live?” “When will we see her?” “What is her whole name?” “How old did you say she was?”

“Have mercy!” exclaimed Nyoda, putting her hands over her ears. “I can only answer ten questions at once. Veronica’s uncle is Mr. Lehar, the conductor of the Temple Theatre orchestra. I live next door to them, you know, and am well acquainted with Mrs. Lehar. She told me about Veronica some time ago and last week she went to New York to get her. I immediately asked her to allow her niece to join the Winnebago group, if you girls were willing to take her, that she might not be lonely here. Will you take her in, girls?”

“We certainly will!” cried Gladys and Hinpoha in a breath, and Sahwah sprang to her feet exclaiming vehemently, “Well, I guess so!”

“When is she coming?” they wanted to know next.

“I’ll bring her to the next meeting,” promised Nyoda, “and I want you girls to—”

What it was she wanted them to do they never found out, for just at that minute there was a terrific thump on the floor below followed by the hurried clatter of heavy footsteps, then the scraping of feet on the ladder, a great waving and billowing of the curtain at the top and then it was wrenched aside, and into the Council Chamber there burst the fattest boy they had ever seen. His great cheeks hung down over his collar; his eyes were nearly buried. His face was purple from violent exertion and he sat limply against the bearskin bed, panting heavily. The girls stared open-mouthed at the intruder. Before they had recovered sufficiently from their astonishment to utter a single word, the barn below was filled with the noise of many footsteps and the shouting of many voices, and the next minute the sacred Council Chamber of the Winnebagos was filled to overflowing with boys.

At the sight of the lighted chamber and the girls in Indian costumes the intruders stopped and stared in speechless surprise. Then with one accord seven hats were snatched from as many heads and seven voices exclaimed as one, “Beg pardon, we didn’t know anyone was here.”

It was so funny to hear them all saying the same thing at once that the Winnebagos could not help laughing aloud. The confusion of the boys was so painful that the girls actually felt sorry for them.

“There are only seven of you,” said Sahwah, as usual breaking the silence first. “I thought at first there were hundreds.”

Here one of the boys found his voice to speak. He was a tall boy with curly brown hair and nice eyes, and his face was suffused with blushes of embarrassment. “Sorry to disturb you girls,” he said soberly, but with a twinkle in his eye. “We were chasing him”—and he pointed to the fat boy still puffing away for dear life on the floor—“and we couldn’t see any light from the outside and we didn’t know anybody was up here and when Slim ran in we just followed him. We’ll go right away again, and let you go on with your meeting.”

Nyoda looked from one face to the other—nice refined boys they were, she decided, and it would do no hurt to show them courtesy. “You needn’t be in such a great hurry to go,” she said cordially. “You may at least stay until you have recovered your breath.” And she looked quizzically at the fat boy leaning against the bearskins who did not seem ever to be going to breathe again.

He tried to show his appreciation of her hospitality by getting up and making a bow, which threw him into such an advanced stage of breathlessness that he sank down again directly and had to be fanned. This caused another general laugh and the boys and girls rubbed elbows so closely trying to revive him that all feeling of embarrassment vanished and it suddenly seemed as if they were old friends, in spite of the fact that none of them knew the others’ names. Nyoda came to herself with a start.

“Excuse us, boys,” she said, “for not introducing ourselves. I am Miss Kent, Guardian of the Winnebago Camp Fire Girls, and these are the Winnebagos,” and she named them in order. “We were having a rather doleful time when you arrived. You broke up the spell of gloom and we are deeply grateful.”

The tall boy spoke again, this time smiling broadly. “We’re the ones who ought to apologize for not introducing ourselves,” he said in a pleasant voice, “since we have caused so much disturbance. We’re the Sandwich Club,” he continued, including all the boys in a sweeping gesture of his hand. “We go to Carnegie Mechanic. That’s Slim over there,” he said, pointing to the fat one, while all the girls laughed. “His real name’s Lewis Carlton, but it’s so long since anyone has called him that that he’s forgotten what it is himself. We chase him all over the country to reduce him, but sometimes he gives us the slip and hides and it takes us so long to find him that in the meantime he gains more than he lost while we were chasing him.”

The girls fairly shouted at this and Slim doubled up a cushion-like fist and declared in a choking voice that if the fellows didn’t leave him in peace he’d sit down on them some day and that would be the end of them. The tall boy who was doing the introducing smiled sweetly at Slim and went on with the introductions.

“This one,” he said, indicating an extremely thin, hungry-looking, gaunt-featured lad with sombre brown eyes and a grave mouth, “is Bill Pitt. ‘Bottomless Pitt,’ we call him, because it’s impossible to fill him up. You girls have heard of the Sheep Eaters?” he asked suddenly, looking from one to the other.

“Yes,” chorused the Winnebagos, not wishing to appear ignorant, but not sure whether the Sheep Eaters were beasts of prey or persons overfond of mutton.

“Well,” continued the spokesman, pointing to the “Bottomless Pitt,” “he’s a Pie Eater, he is. He eats ’em whole.”

Hinpoha’s glance strayed nervously to the shelf where the apple pie stood awaiting the end of the Ceremonial Meeting. The tall boy’s eyes followed here and his teeth showed in a wide smile, as he seemed to read her thoughts. Hinpoha blushed fiery red and dropped her eyes. But he looked away again immediately and did not increase her embarrassment.

“This,” he said, drawing forward a spidery little fellow with red hair and freckles all over his face, “is Munson K. McKee, called for short, Monkey, and those,” indicating the other three, “are Dan Porter, Peter Jenkins and Harry Raymond. We seven boys have always gone together, so we decided to form a club, and we all like sandwiches so well that we named ourselves the Sandwich Club. There, now you know all about us.”

“But you haven’t told us your name,” said the Winnebagos, who were beginning to like the spokesman very much, and were anxiously waiting to hear him introduce himself.

“Haven’t I?” he asked. “That’s right, I haven’t. My name,” he said solemnly, but with that suggestion of a twinkle in his eye again, “is Cicero St. John—and the fellows don’t call me Cissy for short.” Here the corners of his mouth twitched as at some humorous memory.

“You bet they don’t call him Cissy!” put in the Bottomless Pitt.

Hinpoha’s eyes met Gladys’ in comical dismay. How could anyone in their right senses name a boy—an American boy—Cicero! The St. John part sounded very fine, but that awful Cicero!

“How do you keep them from calling you—Cissy?” ventured Sahwah.

“He licked the tar out of them!” spoke up the Monkey. “And he dumped one fellow overboard out in the lake when he tried it. Everybody calls him ‘Cap’ now, because he’s captain of the football team.”

“Indeed,” murmured the Winnebagos, looking at Cicero St. John with fresh interest and great respect, for all the world loves a football player.

And then the boys wanted to know all about the Winnebagos, and thought their symbolic names and “queer duds” even funnier than the girls had considered theirs. But they all voiced their unqualified approval of the Camp Fire Girls when they heard that the Ceremonial Meeting was to be topped off with a feast of apple pie, doughnuts and cider, and did not need to be asked more than once to stay, and share the feast.

“Say, this is a peach of a meeting place,” said the Captain with his mouth full. “How did you happen to get it, and whoever thought of putting a fireplace upstairs in a barn?”

“We got it as the result of a sort of wager,” explained Hinpoha. “Gladys’ father promised that if we could go on an automobile trip all by ourselves without once telegraphing to him for aid he would build us a Lodge to hold our meetings in, and we did and so he did.”

“‘So they did, and he did, and the bears did,’” quoted Nyoda teasingly.

Hinpoha laughed and went on. “He owned this empty barn out here in the field and he turned it over to us. But we just had to have a fireplace or it wouldn’t have been a regular Camp Fire Lodge, so he built this splendid chimney. We have named the Lodge ‘The House of the Open Door,’ or the ‘Open Door Lodge,’ to signify hospitality. Mr. Evans wanted to build a fine stairway, too, but we wouldn’t have it. It’s lots more fun to climb the ladder.”

“Why don’t you use the ground floor?” asked Slim, who could never see the sense of exerting one’s self needlessly.

“It’s much cosier up here,” replied Hinpoha. “We have these adorable peaks and gables to hang things on. Besides, we wanted to leave the big floor downstairs clear for dancing.”

“Dancing? Do you dance?” cried the boys, pricking up their ears.

“We surely do,” replied the girls. “Would you like to come down and try?”

Down the ladder they went in a hurry, Slim being pushed from above and pulled from below, and landing on the floor in his usual breathless state. A few lanterns were hung around the walls and the big door opened wide to let in the bright rays of the full moon and the place was nearly as light as day. Nyoda played her banjo and the twelve pairs of feet shuffled merrily to the lively strains. As there were only five girls, Slim and Peter Jenkins were left without partners and consoled themselves by dancing together. Peter came just to Slim’s shoulder and weighed ninety-five pounds against Slim’s two hundred and thirty, and the result was so ludicrous that the rest could hardly dance for laughing. It was like a monkey dancing with an elephant. Slim took mincing little steps and looked down at his partner with a simpering, languishing expression, while Peter strained heroically to encircle his fair one’s waist with his arm. Rocking back and forth in exaggerated rhythm, Slim tripped over a board and fell with a great crash, pinning his gallant partner under him. The rest flew to the rescue and propped Peter up against the wall, fanning him vigorously.

“He’ll recover,” pronounced the Captain, after a thorough going over of his bones, “but he’ll never be the same again.”

“All is over between us,” said Slim, wringing his hands in mock despair. “Miss Kent, won’t you dance with me?”

“It’s time we were going home,” said Nyoda calmly. “Come, girls.”

“Go home!” echoed the Captain. “I thought you lived here.”

“But how about all the beds upstairs?” asked the Captain.

“Oh,” explained Nyoda, “we all constructed different kinds of beds to win honors, and left them there in case we might want to stay some time.”

“It’s a pretty fine clubhouse, I’ll say,” remarked the Bottomless Pitt in a tone of envy. “I wish we Sandwiches had one like it. We have no place to call our own.”

Hinpoha’s thoughts leaped to the Fire Song, the words of which hung beside the fireplace up above:

“Whose house is bare and dark and cold,

Whose house is cold,

This is his own.”

She spoke impulsively. “Oh, Nyoda, couldn’t we let them use the ground floor to hold their meeting in?”

A cheer burst from the seven boys’ lips. “Hooray! May we, Miss Kent?”

Nyoda was silent and looked at the boys with a troubled expression, and her glance as it rested on Hinpoha held a reproof. There was an awkward silence. Then the Captain spoke up.

“I understand what you mean, Miss Kent,” he said simply and straightforwardly. “You don’t know anything about us and of course you wouldn’t want to share your club house with us on such short acquaintance. We wouldn’t think much of you if you did. It was all right of course for you to ask us to stay and dance with the girls this one evening when you were here with us, but that doesn’t mean that you’re willing to adopt us. But we like you girls first rate, and want to know you better if you will let us. You can go to any of the teachers at Carnegie Mechanic and find out all you want to know about us. Pitt’s father is Math teacher there and my father is Dr. Cicero St. John. It was simply great of you to offer to let us come here and hold our meetings, and if you’ll still keep the offer open after you have investigated us to your satisfaction we’ll be mighty grateful and will promise not to bother you upstairs.”

The boy’s face was so open and manly that it was impossible not to believe in him then and there. Nyoda smiled into his earnest face. “All right, Captain,” she said, “we’ll agree to put you on probation, and if you stand the test we’ll consider the matter of sharing the Open Door Lodge.”

The Captain smiled back at her and held out his hand. “You’re a peach and I like you,” he said emphatically, and the two were sworn friends from that moment on.

CHAPTER II
VERONICA

At four o’clock one afternoon some few days later Hinpoha and Sahwah, breathless from hurrying, ran up the steps of the house where Nyoda lived and rang the bell. The other Winnebagos were already assembled when they entered, and Nyoda was not there.

“Where’s Nyoda?” demanded Sahwah.

“Sh, she’s gone over to get—her,” answered Gladys, smoothing out the folds of her pretty new pleated dress with one hand and tucking in a stray lock with the other.

“What did you say ‘sh’ for?” demanded Sahwah curiously. “There’s no one sleeping, is there?”

“I don’t know why I said it,” answered Gladys, rumpling up the hair she had just tidied, “I’m so excited about meeting Veronica that I don’t know what I’m doing. I just can’t sit still.” And she jumped up from her chair and began to pace nervously up and down the room.

“Doesn’t it remind you of the time we stood on the dock at Loon Lake and waited for Gladys to make her first appearance?” said Hinpoha to Sahwah. “Don’t you remember how we wondered what she would be like and you and Migwah nearly fought over whose affinity she was going to be?”

“Did you really, girls?” said Gladys, pausing in her walk. “And was I as nice as you hoped I’d be?”

Footsteps on the porch saved Hinpoha from having to reply and Gladys hurried to her chair and seated herself properly. A moment later Nyoda entered the room with a young girl beside her whom she led into the center of the group.

“Girls,” she said, with one hand on the stranger’s shoulder, “this is our new member, Veronica Lehar.”

All eyes centered on the newcomer. She was a small, slender girl with short curly black hair, olive complexion, bright red lips and a straight, finely modeled nose. She wore a dark red velvet dress which suited her complexion wonderfully, and fell in soft folds about her lithe form. She was as straight as an arrow and as graceful as a deer. From the crown of her finely poised head to her little fur-topped boots she was an aristocrat. The simple Winnebagos were abashed before her. Never had they met such a high-born little lady. There was an air about her which they could never acquire if they lived a hundred years. They felt like peasants in the presence of a queen. But they forgot her aristocratic air when they looked into her eyes. Large and dark and velvety as a pansy, but so sad it almost broke your heart to look into them. All the sympathy which the girls had worked up for her since hearing her story came back in a rush and they surrounded her with cordial greetings and expressions of welcome. Veronica held her violin, which she had brought over with her, under one arm while she shook hands politely with all the girls. She answered all their pretty speeches in a friendly manner, but she never once smiled, and her eyes had a look as if her thoughts were not there in the room at all, but back in the far country across the ocean. Although she had an accent she spoke a beautiful English, in fact, she used far better language than the majority of American schoolgirls, and more than once the girls felt embarrassed when they had forgotten themselves so far as to utter a slang phrase.

Conversation soon languished, for Veronica did not seem inclined to talk, so Nyoda started the girls singing camp songs to amuse her, and led the talk around to the Winnebagos’ doings which she was now to take part in. Of course the new lodge was the main topic of conversation with the Winnebagos and they waxed so enthusiastic over its splendors that Veronica exclaimed with some show of warmth, “Oh, I must see it soon!” Then she added, “Tell me what I must do to become a Camp Fire Girl like yourselves.”

“You must have a symbolic name,” answered Gladys eagerly, anxious to be the one to explain things to Veronica, “and a Ceremonial dress, and learn the songs, and know the Camp Fire Girls’ Desire, and the Winnebago passwords and oh, lots of delightful things.”

“What are they, the Winnebago passwords, and what are they for?” asked Veronica.

“Well,” answered Gladys, “you know what a password is, don’t you? Well, we have passwords to admit us into the Lodge on Ceremonial night. But before I tell you about the passwords I must tell you about the signal calls, for they come first in order. You see, the general signal of the Winnebagos is the call of the whippoorwill, like this”—and she illustrated her words with a clear call. “You repeat that three times and at the end of it you must give your own individual bird call. We all have different ones. Mine is the robin, like this. Nyoda’s is the bluebird; Hinpoha’s the loon; Medmangi’s is the owl; Nakwisi’s the meadowlark and Sahwah’s the catbird.”

“Whatever made you take such a hideous screech for your call, Sahwah?” interrupted Hinpoha. “There are lots of nicer bird calls than that of the catbird.”

“I don’t care, I wanted the catbird,” returned Sahwah. “It suits my individuality, as my dear friend, Miss Snively, would say. I am the ‘cat that walks by himself and all places are alike to me!’”

“Be a catbird as much as you like,” said Gladys pacifically, “as long as you don’t eat us poor bird-birds. But to go back to the passwords. You see, Nyoda is Guardian of the Fire, and she always goes up to the Lodge room first on Ceremonial night. If any of us get there ahead of her we have to stay out until she comes. Then we announce our coming by giving the call of the whippoorwill and she knows one of the Winnebagos is below; and she knows which one it is by the individual bird call. So she calls out ‘Who goes there?’ and we answer ‘A friend.’ When she says, ‘Stand and give the countersign,’ we have to say, ‘Other Council Fires were here before.’”

“What does that mean, ‘Other Council Fires were here before?’” asked Veronica.

The girls looked at one another. “What does it mean?” asked Gladys.

“I don’t know,” said Sahwah.

“I don’t know,” said Hinpoha.

“You insisted on our having it, Sahwah,” said Gladys. “Why did you choose it if you didn’t know what it meant?”

“Oh,” explained Sahwah lightly, “I saw it written over the door of one of the historical buildings at the Exposition, and it sounded as if it might mean something grand, so I chose it. You girls were all delighted with it, so that’s proof it’s a good catch-word.”

“It is a good countersign,” said Nyoda, “although I confess I can’t tell wherein the charm lies.”

“Well, to proceed,” said Gladys, “after you have given the countersign you will be asked to give the Inner Pass Word, and then you must say ‘Kolah Olowan.’ That means ‘Song Friend.’ You know we pride ourselves on being a singing group, that is, we have a great many songs that we sing together, and I think our dearest friends are those we sing with. So we Winnebagos call each other ‘Song Friends,’ or friends bound together by the power of our familiar songs. That’s why we chose bird notes for our personal symbols. The birds are the original Song Friends. What bird are you going to choose for your own, Veronica?”

Veronica’s sad eyes stared thoughtfully into the fire for a moment. Then they filled with a smouldering light. “I shall be the gull that flies over the sea,” she said in a low voice, “because some day I am going to fly over the sea to my dear home.”

“We were all nearly ready to cry when she said that,” wrote Gladys to Migwan, “only Nyoda popped up then and asked Hinpoha and Sahwah to sing ‘The Owl and the Pussycat,’ and they climbed on the sofa for the beautiful pea-green boat—you know what a beautiful pea-green it is—and for a small guitar Nyoda gave Sahwah a little pasteboard fiddle that produced three notes when you turned a crank, and the whole thing was so ridiculous that we laughed until our sides ached.”

After the Owl and the Pussycat had sung themselves over the back of the sofa and down on the floor with a thump Nyoda made tea in her new electric teapot and passed platefuls of thin sandwiches, and Sahwah upset her cup into her lap demonstrating how perfectly she could balance it on her knee and had to stand before the fire to dry her skirt.

“You brought your violin along; won’t you play for us?” asked Nyoda of Veronica when the excitement over Sahwah’s mishap had subsided.

In graceful compliance with Nyoda’s request, and without waiting to be urged, Veronica took her violin from its case, settled it under her chin with a movement that was a caress, and drew the bow across the strings. With the first note teacups and sandwiches were forgotten and the girls sat in a spellbound circle, while Sahwah stopped mopping her skirt with her handkerchief and the wet spot dried and scorched unheeded. Such a witching melody as rose from the strings—now light as a fairy dancing on a bubble, now hurrying like the brook over its pebbles, now sighing like the wind in a rose tree, now slow and stately like the curtseying of a grande dame in the movements of a court dance. When it came to an end the girls sat breathless, too dazed to applaud.

“Play some more!” begged Gladys in a whisper. It seemed like a desecration to talk.

Veronica played on, now fast, now slow, now sad and now gay, and finally whirled into a wild gypsy dance that set the blood tingling in her hearers’ veins as the swift measures followed on each other’s heels, until they could see in their mind’s eye the leaping figures of the dancers in their bright costumes. Faster, faster, flashed the bow on the magic strings and Veronica’s whole soul was in her eyes as she played the familiar strains of her homeland. Her lips parted in a flashing smile and one foot tapped the carpet in time to the music.

Suddenly a string snapped with a discordant crash. Veronica came to herself with a start. The light left her eyes and she stood staring into the fire with a sad, bitter expression.

CHAPTER III
AN UNINVITED GUEST

Rain fell in torrents on the roof of the hospitable House of the Open Door, and the wind howled dismally around its friendly gables. Inside the “lofty loft” of the Winnebagos the fire shone brightly on the hearth and the rafters rang with merriment. Sahwah had a new hobby, and was riding it to death. This was a Hawaiian guitar, known as a “ukelele,” from which she was producing a series of hair-raising noises.

“Sounds like a cat in its last agony,” remarked Hinpoha.

“Well, that just suits me,” replied Sahwah, undisturbed, drawing a long shivering wail from the strings. “I am the cat that walks by himself——”

“And all racket is alike to you,” finished Hinpoha. “Who’s getting supper tonight, Nyoda? I’m nearly starving.”

“I appointed Gladys and Veronica,” answered Nyoda. “The combination of blonde and brunette ought to produce something pretty good.”

Gladys promptly laid down the bit of leather in which she was cutting a pattern and moved toward the “kitchen end” of the Lodge. “Come on, Veronica,” she said, “let’s make a carload of scones for these hungry wolves.”

Veronica looked up at her without moving. On her face was an expression of surprise; almost amazement. “What, I cook?” she asked scornfully. “That is for servants to do!”

Then it was the Winnebagos’ turn to look amazed. Sahwah dropped her instrument on the floor with a clatter, and the rest sat silent, not knowing what to say to Veronica. Nyoda bridged over the embarrassing situation as best she could. “I’ll be cook tonight,” she said quietly. As she moved about helping Gladys she thought and thought how this new problem must be met. “It’s the fault of her training,” she told herself, “and she really isn’t a snob at heart. She’ll be all right when she has been with the girls awhile and watched them. It won’t do to insist on her doing the things she considers beneath her. She must be made to want to do them first. But we’ll make a real Winnebago of her in time!” And her eyes strayed thoughtfully over to the corner of the hearth where Veronica sat, a little apart from the rest, her brooding eyes on the fire, her sensitive lip twisting into involuntary shivers of disgust when Sahwah produced a particularly ear-splitting yowl.

“Hear and attend and listen, everybody,” said Nyoda when the buttered scones had been reduced to crumbs. “I have been doing some important research work lately and am now ready to present the result of my investigations.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Hinpoha curiously.

“Two weeks ago tonight,” continued Nyoda, “our meeting was broken up by a band of young braves bearing the appetizing title of ‘The Sandwich Club,’ who implored us to let them come and play with us in our Lodge and be lodgers—kindly overlook the pun; it was quite unintentional—providing we weighed them in the balance and found them not wanting.”

“Is there any scale on which ‘Slim’ would be found wanting?” giggled Sahwah,

“I have spent the last two weeks obtaining information,” resumed Nyoda, “which I am happy to report is of a highly satisfactory nature. So, all things considered, and in spite of the informality of the request, I humbly recommend that the aforesaid braves be allowed to lodge in the bottom half of our Lodge at any and all times they may so desire. I might add that I have already obtained the consent of our Bountiful Benefactor, Gladys’ papa. All in favor of letting in the Sandwich Club say ‘Aye.’”

There was a perfect shout of “Ayes,” followed by a ringing cheer.

“When are they going to take possession?” Sahwah wanted to know.

“I’m to tell them tomorrow what your decision was,” replied Nyoda. “It being Saturday, I suppose they will be down in a body to fix up according to their own ideas.”

“What will the interior of a Sandwich Club look like, I wonder?” said Gladys.

“Hark, what was that noise?” asked Nyoda abruptly. The girls listened intently. From the lower floor of the barn there came a thumping noise, followed by a subdued crash.

“Somebody’s in the barn,” said Hinpoha in a frightened whisper.

The sound came again, thump, thump, and a noise as of a box being shoved aside. “It’s a burglar!” said Sahwah, and Nakwisi gave a frightened squeak which Sahwah stifled with a sofa cushion.

“There’s nothing in here to steal,” said Nyoda. “Perhaps it’s a tramp.” Again came the noise from below. Leaving the curtain drawn over the opening, Nyoda went to the top of the ladder and called down, “Who’s there?” There was no answer but another thump. “We have a gun,” said Nyoda coolly, taking Sahwah’s little rifle down from the wall, “and if you put one foot on the ladder I’ll shoot.” Still no answer.

“I’m going down to investigate,” said Nyoda. “This is growing uncanny.”

“Don’t go down,” begged the girls, clinging to her, “something dreadful will happen to you.”

“If you go I’m going with you,” declared Sahwah when Nyoda appeared determined to rush into the jaws of danger. Nyoda threw aside the curtain and flashed her bug light on the floor below. Nothing was visible within the radius of the light, but over in the far corner where the old horse stall was something was moving and thumping about and a sound like a groan came from the darkness.

“Somebody’s hurt,” said Nyoda, hastening down the ladder. “Bring a lantern with you, Sahwah.”

Together they moved toward the corner while the girls above crowded around the opening and watched in breathless suspense. The light revealed a small donkey lying on the floor of the stall. He was kicking out with his hind feet against the partition wall and it was this sound that had frightened the girls above. At Sahwah’s shout the others came hurrying down to behold the find. The donkey made no effort to rise and looked at the faces around him with an imploring look in his eyes as if to say, “Help me, I’m in trouble.”

“What’s the matter, old chap?” asked Nyoda, kneeling down beside him. The donkey answered with a distressed bray that was more like a groan and pawed the air with his front feet, which seemed to be fastened together in some manner. Nyoda turned the lantern around so the light fell directly on him and then they saw what the matter was. A length of barbed wire had become tangled around his front legs, binding them together, and his frantic efforts to get it off had resulted in its becoming deeply imbedded in the flesh, lacerating it badly. The girls shuddered when they saw it and drew back.

“This won’t do, girls,” said Nyoda firmly; “we’ve got to get that wire off the poor animal’s leg. Medmangi, have you the nerve to do it? I’m afraid I can’t.”

“His hind legs would have to be tied together first, so he can’t kick,” said Medmangi. The girls looked at each other and all drew back. All but Veronica. She came forward quietly and took the rope which the others were afraid to use and skilfully slipped a noose over the tiny heels and fastened them down to a ring in the floor.

“I have done it before, when a horse was sick,” she explained in response to the girls’ expressions of amazement at the neat performance. The girls’ liking for her, which had suffered a sudden chill at the cooking episode, warmed again, and they were inclined to overlook that now that she had stepped so neatly into the breach when they were helpless.

Then Medmangi, the Medicine Man Girl who was going to be a doctor, and had no horror of surgery, bent calmly to her task while the others held the lantern for her. Quickly and skilfully she worked, removing the cruel points as gently as possible. Then she washed the wounds with an antiseptic solution from the First Aid Cabinet upstairs and bound them up with clean bandages. Then Veronica took the rope from the donkey’s hind legs and he struggled to his feet, plainly delighted to find his front legs in working order again in spite of the pain. He looked at the girls with a dog-like devotion in his intelligent eyes and when Medmangi patted him soothingly he laid his head on her shoulder affectionately. “My first lover—a donkey!” she said laughingly.

“Poor little mule,” said Hinpoha, stroking him from the other side. “He knew the right place to come to all right. ‘Whose house is bare and dark and cold, whose house is cold, this is his own,’” she quoted dramatically. “We certainly have succeeded in creating the right atmosphere of hospitality if even a lonely donkey can feel it and come straight to our ‘Open Portals!’”

“Now that he has come,” said Nyoda, rather puzzled, “the question is what to do with him. If he goes wandering off again he’ll have those bandages off in no time—he probably will anyhow—and his legs will get so sore he will have to be shot. He undoubtedly belongs to somebody—very likely some children’s pet—and I think we had better keep him right here in the barn until we find the owner. The boys will have to postpone their taking possession in favor of the other donkey if his presence interferes with their activities.” Here the “other donkey” leaned against the wall in such a pathetic attitude, as if his weight were too much for his sore legs, that if they had had any intentions of turning him out into the rain they would have speedily relented.

“It’s a good thing this old stall is still here,” said Gladys. “There isn’t any straw, but there is a box of excelsior and we can spread that out and cover it with a blanket and make him a soft bed. We can give him water tonight and bring food in the morning.”

“And I’ll telephone the Sandwiches about him,” said Nyoda, “so if they are coming over tomorrow they won’t turn him out.”

But that telephone message was unnecessary, for at that moment a number of dark figures appeared in the doorway and after a moment of hesitation, entered.

“Why, here are the Sandwiches,” exclaimed Nyoda cordially, advancing with extended hand. “We were just talking about you. Speaking of angels—you know the rest.”

“We were just going by,” said the Captain (it was likely that they were “just going by” that out of the way place in the rain!) “and saw your light now you’ve left the windows uncovered, and thought we’d just step in and inquire our fate. We just couldn’t wait until tomorrow,” he finished in a boyish outburst. “Is it going to be the Open Door for us?”

“Bless you, yes,” said Nyoda, smiling reassuringly at this manly lad who was already her favorite, “there wasn’t a dissenting vote in the jury box. We——” but the remainder of her sentence was drowned in an ear-splitting cheer that was decidedly less musical than the Winnebago cheers, but none the less hearty.

“Pedigrees satisfactory, and all that?” inquired the Captain.

“Perfect,” answered Nyoda with twinkling eyes. “I’ve dug up more facts about you than you know yourselves. So,” she added demurely, “if you’re still minded to ‘know us better,’ as you flatteringly remarked on the occasion of our first meeting, why, we’re perfectly willing to be known.

“But you can’t take immediate possession of your club room because we’ve rented it temporarily to another don—another fellow,” she said mischievously, turning the light of the lantern away from the stall where the donkey was. The boys’ eager faces fell a trifle.

“Of course,” they answered politely, “that’s your privilege.”

“He’s a very nice chap,” pursued Nyoda, with a warning glance at the girls behind her, who were stuffing their handkerchiefs into their mouths in an effort not to laugh.

“Yes,” assented the boys without enthusiasm.

“Is it anyone we know?” asked the Captain politely, trying to make conversation after a moment of silence.

“Maybe you do know him,” answered Nyoda. “He’s here tonight. Would you like to meet him?”

She led the way to the stall and turned the light on the donkey. There was a moment of surprised silence, followed by a perfect explosion of laughter. “Where’d you get the donkey with the trousers on?” squeaked Slim in his high thin voice. In the dim light of the lantern the bandages on the donkey’s front legs looked like a pair of trousers. Then the girls, after their laugh was out, explained about the visitor who had come to them from out of the vast, and the Sandwiches declared that they did not in the least mind sharing their club room with a needy donkey, and offered to relieve the girls of the entire care of him, besides trying to find the owner.

They were as good as their word about taking care of him, but the weeks slipped by and no amount of advertising produced anything in the shape of an owner.

“We’ll have to adopt him,” the Winnebagos decided. “A Camp Fire Donkey sounds thrilling to me,” said Sahwah. “Think of all the fun we’ll have with him. As long as the boys don’t mind, we can keep him right here in the stall.”

“What shall we name him?” asked Gladys.

“Call him ‘Wohelo,’” advised Hinpoha. “It was the spirit of Wohelo that led him to us. From now on he’ll be a symbolic donkey.”

“But where do we come in on this?” inquired the Captain. “We take care of him and he lives in our house.”

“That’s right,” said Hinpoha. “Then let’s call him ‘Sandwich-Wohelo,’ contracted to ‘Sandhelo.’” And “Sandhelo” he was until the end of the chapter. His sore legs became very stiff until they were healed and he hobbled painfully when he walked at all, which was very seldom. But the scratches healed at last and the day came when Medmangi took off the bandages for good, and led him around the barn for exercise.

Then an amazing thing happened. Sahwah was upstairs in the Lodge, amusing herself with a mouth organ she had just discovered in the depths of her bed. But she had no sooner blown half a dozen notes when Sandhelo jerked up his head, pulling the bridle out of Medmangi’s hands, and rose up on his hind legs. Then he walked on his hind legs over to a box, climbed up on it and sat there with his feet in the air, like a dog sitting up. Medmangi screamed and brought the Winnebagos flying from all directions, to behold the marvel in open-mouthed astonishment.

“He’s a trick mule!” shouted Sahwah, tumbling down the ladder in her excitement and never stopping to pick herself up. “Now I know where he came from. He was with that dog and pony show that was in town a few weeks ago. He must have strayed from the show and got left behind. Hats off to the newest member of the Winnebago group! We certainly do have a way of attracting all the best talent in town to our ranks!”

CHAPTER IV
A SANDEBAGO CIRCUS

Just how it started nobody ever knew—it may have been Sandhelo’s turning out to be a trick mule, or it may have been because Slim was fat and would make such a beautiful clown, besides being fine for a sideshow—but before they knew it the Winnebagos and the Sandwich Club were hard at work getting up a circus. The Sandwiches had taken possession of their half of the Open Door Lodge and had converted it into a gymnasium. They had built it on purpose to reduce Slim, they carefully explained to their friends, and regularly put him through a course of exercises strenuous enough to reduce a hippopotamus to an antelope in three weeks, but at the end of that time he had gained just five pounds, so the Sandwiches declared their efforts to be love’s labor lost and left him in peace.

Sandhelo was becoming a well-known and conspicuous figure in the streets. Hitched to an old pony cart of Gladys’, with bells jingling around his neck and ribbons flying from his harness, he never failed to attract a crowd of children. He had all the vagaries of the artistic temperament, some of which caused his drivers no little inconvenience. For one thing, he would not go at all unless he heard music, and it was no small accomplishment to drive with one hand and play a mouth organ with the other if you happened to be alone in the cart. And then, if he happened to pass anything unusual in the street he had a way of sitting back on his haunches and holding up his front feet and looking at them. As he invariably sat down unexpectedly, the cart would go on and bump into him and the shock would throw the driver from her seat, besides making a great mess of the harness. Several times he had done this in the middle of a busy crossing and held up traffic in both directions, while motormen fumed and policemen threatened, and Sahwah (it usually was Sahwah, because she drove him more than the others) played her sweetest on the mouth organ in an effort to make him go on. Nothing would make him move until his curiosity was satisfied and then he would dash off like an arrow from the bow for half a block, after which he would slow down and look over his shoulder to see how his driver was getting on. There was always such a look of anxious solicitude in his eye on these occasions that it was impossible to be angry with him and he continued to exercise his temperament without reproof.

After half a dozen of these free shows Sahwah declared that such an ability to draw a crowd was worth money, and they had better give a real show and charge admissions.

The big space in front of the Open Door Lodge was an ideal place for the ring. Seating arrangements for the audience gave them some anxiety at first.

“We ought to have a grand stand,” said the Captain, who had been chosen Ringmaster.

“Well, we can’t build one,” said the Bottomless Pit. “The audience will have to stand through the performance, and that’ll be a grand stand, all right.”

“Innovation in circuses,” said Nyoda. “Have the audience stand and the circus sit down. Like the picture of the bride standing while the groom sprawls at ease in the photographer’s gilt chair.”

“I think I can get a lot of chairs from a man who rents them out,” said the Captain. “He lets people have them for nothing if it’s a charitable enterprise.”

“Do you call a circus a charitable enterprise?” asked Nyoda.

“Well, ours will be,” said the Captain. “We’re doing it to make money so we can buy the new apparatus for the gym, which will surely make Slim thin, and that surely is charity.”

Upstairs in the Lodge the six Winnebagos were all seated on the bearskin bed having a lively argument as to who should drive Slim in the Chair-iot Race. The Chair-iot Race was a grand inspiration of Sahwah’s, who was keen on features in the circus line. Once, on a rummage, through Gladys’ attic, they had found six horsehair covered chairs furnished with excellent china castors, which caused the chairs to roll with enchanting speed. Sahwah now thought of the chairs and conceived the brilliant idea of harnessing a Sandwich to each one, seat a Winnebago in the chair, and race six abreast down the long cement walk from the barn to the road. The idea was hailed with delight until the Winnebagos began comparing the merits of the prospective steeds, and nobody wanted to be the one to drive Slim and go lumbering along like an ice-wagon in the rear of the others.

“It’s too bad the Captain had to be Ringmaster and can’t take part in the show,” sighed Hinpoha. “Then there’d be enough without Slim.”

“We wouldn’t dare leave him out, anyway,” said Gladys. “It would hurt his feelings. So we’ll just have to draw lots for him, and whoever gets him will have to make the best of it, that’s all.” So they drew slips of paper from a hat and Hinpoha drew Slim, just as she had feared right along. Sahwah drew the Monkey, which suited her down to the ground, for he was a famous sprinter, and she lost no time getting the girls to ask the boys whose names they had drawn in that secret ballot upstairs to be their steeds in the race. Slim’s face lighted up with such a delighted smile when Hinpoha apparently chose him for her own that her heart smote her when she thought how this choice had been thrust upon her. Slim was already beginning to learn the bitter truth that nobody loves a fat man. Nyoda and the Captain plotted the circus parade and it was a triumph of ingenuity. The advance bills which they scattered broadcast among their friends announced that the parade would embrace “Five ferocious animals from the Other Side of Nowhere, these animals being respectively The Camelk, The Crabbit, The Alligatortoise, The Kangarooster, and The Salmonkey.

Other numbers on the program were as follows:

Ivan Awfulitch, world’s greatest magician; royal entertainer to the King of Spain. Was banished to Siberia; escaped and swam to America; has now opened up a complete line of magic. One day only.

Mr. Skygack, from Mars, in a special song feature entitled the Mars-y-lays.

La Zingara, the bareback rider.

Sandhelo, the famous trick mule. As intelligent as two men and a school teacher.

Mr. Avoirdupois Slim, fattest man on earth. Will sit on a toothpick.

Mr. E. Lastic, Inja rubber man.

Archibald Dimples the better baby.

Chair-iot Race. Feat never attemped before on any stage.

Monkey, the Aerial Gymnast, in the sensational dupe-the-dupes.

Twenty Other Great Features

ALL CHILDREN WILL GET A FREE RIDE ON SANDELHO,
THE FAMOUS TRICK MULE, AFTER
THE PERFORMANCE

Bottomless Pitt owned a little hand-printing press and printed wonderful tickets to be sold at five cents apiece, which Gladys declared were worth the money as souvenirs, with the circus thrown in extra.

“What are you making, a circus tent?” asked Gladys, dropping into the Lodge, where Nyoda sat stitching together great lengths of red and white striped material.

“No; only a clown suit for Slim,” laughed Nyoda. “Gracious, how much it does take!”

“It reminds me of the riddle: ‘If it takes thirty yards of cloth to make a shirtwaist for an elephant, etc.,’” said Gladys. “Poor Slim! You would have died to see him practice his clown stunt with Sandhelo. You know the boys built him a tiny red cart with two big wheels, and when he sat down in it, it tilted way over backward and the shafts stuck up in the air and pulled poor little Sandhelo right up off his feet, and there he dangled, pawing for dear life. But, whatever are you making, Hinpoha?” she finished, examining the thing which Hinpoha was working on and which resembled nothing in the universe.

“This is Peter’s costume,” answered Hinpoha; “he’s the hind leg of the Kangarooster, you know. By the way, Nyoda, has a Kangarooster one hump or two?”

“None at all,” answered Nyoda hastily. “The humps are on the ‘Cam’ part of the Camelk. That reminds me, have we something to stuff the humps with?”

“Take excelsior,” advised Gladys. “Dear me, who’s screeching like that downstairs?”

They all crowded down the ladder at the sound of a lusty yell from below and found Sahwah hanging head downward from a heavy hook in the wall. She had improved a moment’s leisure to climb up to the top of the window with a spray of bittersweet to see how it would look, and in descending had caught her skirt on the hook and lost her footing. The skirt tore through until the stout serge hem was reached and that offered successful resistance, and Sahwah hung, as Nyoda remarked, like a lamb on the spit.

“I got an idea hanging upside down,” were the first words she gasped as they restored her to the perpendicular and revived her with peanuts.

“It’s the only way you ever would get an idea,” said Hinpoha.

“Is that so?” returned Sahwah, with spirit “Who thought up the Chair-iot Race, I’d like to know?”

“Stop bickering and tell us your idea,” said Nyoda.

“Why, it’s this,” said Sahwah. “Sell hot cocoa with marshmallows in it after the show. Everybody’ll be cold sitting around. We can make almost as much money that way as with the circus.”

“A lake of hot cocoa with an island of marshmallows in it is my dream of heaven,” said Hinpoha, clasping her hands in ecstasy. “Sahwah, you’re a genius. I yield the palm to you without a struggle. You have a ‘head in your mind,’ as absent-minded old Fuzzytop used to say. There’s nothing in the whole world that’ll separate a nickel from its owner like a cup of hot cocoa with a marshmallow floating in it on a cold day.”

“Another innovation,” said Nyoda. “We’ll have that instead of circus lemonade. See to getting the supplies, will you, Sahwah dear? I have so many details to look after now that I simply cannot be responsible for another thing, or my head will burst and out will come everything that’s safely packed in now. Come in, Captain. What’s on your mind?”

“Slim,” said the Captain, with a look of comical despair, as he sat down among the girls. “I’m afraid he won’t do for a Better Baby. He’s smashed three perambulators and a high chair and we can’t get any more. And the biggest size white dress we could buy in the store won’t go half-way around him.”

Nyoda knitted her brows. “We simply have to have a Better Baby,” she affirmed. “It’s one of the best features. We’ll drape cheesecloth around him for a dress and he can play on a quilt on the floor—I mean the ground—instead of being taken for a ride by his nurse in a perambulator.”

“Poor Slim!” said Hinpoha. “How many more things are going to be wished on him? I’m afraid his ‘gall will be divided into three parts,’ too!”

“That would have been a very clever thing for you to say,” remarked the Captain, “if it had been original, but it wasn’t. They spring that over at our school, too. Slim isn’t doing any more than the rest of us at that. Only he’s so conspicuous that everything he does seems like a lot more than it really is.”

“How are the tickets going?” asked Sahwah.

“We’ve sold over a hundred,” announced the Captain with pride. “We’re famous people, we are.”

“Speak for yourself,” said Sahwah. “It isn’t we who are the attraction, though—it’s Sandhelo. I rode him through the streets and sold nearly fifty tickets to the children that followed us. They’re all attracted by the promise of a free ride after the show.”

“It’ll probably take all evening to give them the ride, and we’ll never get to that jubilation spread we’re going to have after the show, but we have to make our word good,” said Nyoda.

“Put them on four at once and we’ll get done somehow,” said Sahwah.

Hinpoha laid down her sewing and stretched her arms above her head. “I never knew circuses were such a pile of work,” she sighed.

“‘Wohelo means work,’

So dig like a Turk,”

chanted Sahwah.

“I move we all go to the ‘movies’ tonight and see ‘If I Were King,’” continued Hinpoha.

“Can’t,” said Nyoda briefly, checking up on her fingers the things she still had to do. “I still have to evolve a tail for the Salmonkey and a frontispiece for the Camelk, make four banners, rehearse the living statuary, make a bonnet for the Better Baby, teach the Crabbit how to hop and crawl at the same time and make a costume for the bareback rider.”

“I’d come and help you,” said Sahwah, “but we’re going to have a test in Latin tomorrow and I have to cram tonight. I’ll just have time to practice with the band.”

“A test in time saves nine,” murmured Hinpoha. “What are the Sandwiches doing now?”

“Erecting the flying trapeze,” answered Sahwah, looking out of the window. “Captain is hanging by his eyebrow to the top of a pole and Bottomless Pitt is standing below, waiting to catch him when he falls.”

The Captain caught her eye, as she leaned over the sill and shouted:

“All right below,

O Wohelo,

Now please go mix some pancake dough!”

“All right,” called Sahwah cheerily. “You’ll soon smell something doughing!”

Nyoda and Gladys went home on an errand, and Hinpoha, worn out with her arduous labors with the needle, stretched out on the bearskin bed and fell sound asleep in the warmth of the fire. Sahwah puttered about collecting the ingredients for flapjacks to make a treat for the boys, who had worked like Trojans ever since school was out. The wood in the fireplace had burned down to lovely glowing embers, and she laid the toaster on top of them to act as a rest for the frying-pan. The Captain, tying ropes into the branches of the big tree just outside of the window, looked in and admired the scene. Hinpoha, with her marvellous red curls falling around her face in the light of the fire, looked like a sleeping princess in a fairy tale, and Sahwah, holding her dish of batter in one hand and skilfully putting grease into the pan with the other, was a cheery little housewife indeed. Through the half-open window he could hear her singing “A Warrior Bold.”

A moment he looked in, filled with whole-souled admiration for these many-sided girls who were his new friends, and then without warning something happened inside. The panful of sizzling fat suddenly burst into a sheet of flame that left the confines of the fireplace and seemed to leap all around Sahwah. A burning spark shot out and fell into a pile of cheesecloth lying on the floor at the far side of the room, and it blazed up instantly, the flames enveloping the sleeping Hinpoha. It took less than a moment for the Captain to spring down from the tree, run into the barn and up the ladder. But it was too late for him to do anything. In the twinkling of an eye Sahwah had seized the burning cheesecloth and flung it into the fireplace, thrown a bearskin rug over Hinpoha and now stood calmly pouring sand from a bucket on top of the burning fat in the pan. And all the while she was doing it she had never stopped singing! The Captain stood still in his amazement and listened idly to the words:

“So what care I, though death be nigh?

I’ll live for love or die——”

A hoarse sound made her turn around and she saw the Captain standing beside her with face pale as ashes. The dreadful sight he had seen from the tree when the room seemed filled with flame was still in his mind.

“How did you manage to keep so cool and do everything so quickly?” he asked in amazement.

Sahwah laughed at his expression of astonishment. “That’s not the first fire I’ve put out,” she said calmly. “We always keep both water and sand on hand whenever we have an open fire, to prevent serious accidents. Having the cheesecloth go up at the same time rather complicated matters, but I got it into the fireplace without any trouble. I don’t know what made the fat in the pan take fire; it’s never done that before up here. But don’t worry; I’ll get your flapjacks made, all right.”

The Captain looked at her with more admiration than ever. “Most girls would have been in a faint by that time, and have had to be doused with smelling salts,” he told the Sandwiches later, “instead of coolly promising you your flapjacks anyway and apologizing for the delay!”

“Your hands are burned!” he exclaimed in concern, as he saw Sahwah looking ruefully at her blackened fingers. “Let me do something for them.”

“Nothing serious,” said Sahwah, turning them down so he could not see the blistered palms.

“They are, too!” persisted the Captain. “Have you any oil handy?”

“In the First Aid box over there,” said Sahwah. “It’s in that bottle labeled A Burned Child Dreads the Fire.”

The Captain returned with cotton and gauze and the oil and proceeded to bandage the scorched hands that had been so quick to avert disaster.

“Won’t Hinpoha be furious when she wakes up and finds her costume that she worked so hard on all burned up?” she said, as he wound the bandages under her direction. “I hated to throw it into the fire, but it had to be done.”

“She’d better not be furious,” returned the Captain. “She’s got you to thank that she didn’t burn up herself. She had a close call that time, and if you hadn’t snatched that burning rag off her and covered her with a rug I’d hate to think what would have happened. I tell you it’s great to be able to do the right thing at the right time. A lot of people talk about what they would do in an emergency, but very few of them ever do it.”

“Well,” returned Sahwah coolly, holding up her hands and inspecting the bandages with a critical eye, “there is an emergency before us right now. Suppose you stop talking and get busy and fry those pancakes for the boys. They’re dying of starvation outside.”

The Captain started, blushed and looked at her keenly to see if she were making fun of him, and then fell to work without a word finishing Sahwah’s interrupted labor.

CHAPTER V
THE ARRIVAL OF KATHERINE

Preparations were completed and the day for the presentation of the greatest show on earth had arrived. It was crisply cool, but clear and sunshiny, as the last Saturday in beloved October should be; and not too cold to sit still and witness an out-of-doors performance. Tickets had sold with such gratifying readiness that a second edition had been necessary, and the Committee on Seating Arrangements was nearly in despair over providing enough seats.

“It’s no use,” declared Bottomless Pitt, “we’ve done the best we could and half of them will still have to stand. It’ll be a case of ‘first come, first served.’”

Sahwah and Hinpoha, their arms filled with bundles of “props,” which they had spent the morning in collecting, sank wearily down at a table in the “Neapolitan” soda dispensary and ordered their favorite sundaes. “Now, are you perfectly sure we have everything?” asked Hinpoha, between spoonfuls.

“There’s the Better Baby’s rattle,” recounted Sahwah, identifying her parcels by feeling of them, “the Magician’s natural hair a foot long, the china eggs he finds in the lady’s handbag, the bareback rider’s spangles, and—O Hinpoha!” she cried in dismay, dropping her spoon on the tile floor with a great clatter, “we forgot the red, white and blue cockade for Sandhelo. I’ll have to go back to Nelson’s and get it. Dear me, it’s eleven o’clock now and we still have to go out home and dress. And the marshmallows have to be bought yet; that’s another thing I promised Nyoda I’d see about. Won’t you please get them, Hinpoha, while I run up to Nelson’s? There’s a dear. Get them at Raymond’s—theirs are the freshest; and then you had better go right on home without waiting for me. It will take me a little longer, but I’ll hurry as fast as I can. And please tell Nyoda that I didn’t forget the marshmallows this time; I just turned the responsibility over to you.” And Sahwah gathered up her bundles and retraced her steps toward the big up-town store, while Hinpoha took her way to Raymond’s. Five pounds of marshmallows make a pretty big box, and Hinpoha had several other parcels to carry. She had them all laid out on the counter with an eye to tying some of them together to facilitate transportation when a voice suddenly called out: “Dorothy! Dorothy Bradford!” She turned and saw Miss Parker, one of the teachers at Washington High, at the other end of the counter. “Come and meet my cousin,” said Miss Parker, and brought forward a young girl she had with her. “This is Katherine Adams,” said Miss Parker. “Katherine, I would like you to meet one of my pupils, Dorothy Bradford.”

Hinpoha acknowledged the introduction cordially, but it was all she could do to suppress a smile at Katherine’s appearance. She was an extremely tall, lanky girl, narrow chested and stoop shouldered, with scanty straw-colored hair drawn into a tight knot at the back of her neck, and pale, near-sighted eyes peering through glasses. She wore a long drab-colored coat, cut as severely plain as a man’s, and a narrow-brimmed felt sailor hat. She wore no gloves and her hands were large and bony. Her shoes—Hinpoha looked twice in her astonishment to make sure—yes, there was no mistake, the shoes she had on were not mates! One was a cloth-top button and the other a heavy laced walking boot. Miss Parker followed Hinpoha’s surprised glance and looked distressed. But Katherine was not at all disconcerted when she discovered the discrepancy in her footgear.

“That’s what you get for interrupting me in the middle of my dressing,” she said coolly. “Now, I’ve forgotten which pair I intended to wear.” She had an odd, husky voice, that made everything she said sound funny.

Miss Parker seemed rather anxious that her cousin should make a good impression on Hinpoha. Katherine was from Spencer, Arkansas, she explained, and had gone as far in school as she could out there and had now come east to stay with her cousin and take the last year in high school. Hinpoha promised to introduce her around to the girls in the class, with her eyes on the clock all the while and her mind on the performance she should be helping to prepare that minute instead of standing there talking.

“Won’t you come to our circus this afternoon?” she said politely, fishing among the small “props” in her handbag. “Here’s a ticket. It’s going to be in the big field at the corner of May and ——th streets. Come into the barn if you come and I’ll introduce you to some of my friends.”

Miss Parker and her caricature of a cousin finally departed, and Hinpoha hastily gathered up her bundles. Something about the package of marshmallows struck her as unfamiliar, and she examined it in consternation. It certainly was not her package, though like it in shape. Somebody had taken hers by mistake. She looked around the store and was just in time to see her box being carried out the front door under the arm of a woman. Hinpoha gathered her packages into her arms hit and miss and rushed after her. But impeded as she was she got stuck in the revolving door and was delayed a full minute before she escaped to the sidewalk. She was just in time to see the object of her pursuit board a car at the corner. Before Hinpoha could reach the corner the car had started. Hinpoha stamped her foot with vexation, mostly directed toward Miss Parker and her freak cousin for taking her attention away from her belongings. Then she considered. The car the woman had boarded must make a loop and come out a block below and it would be possible to catch it there. Hinpoha puffed along the sidewalk at a great rate, worming her way through the Saturday noon crowds and colliding with people right and left. She reached the corner just as the car did and made a mad dash over the pavement, dodging in among wagons and automobiles at dire peril of life and limb. She scrambled aboard and landed sprawling on the back platform, while her bundles scattered over the floor in every direction. Breathless and embarrassed, she gathered them up and entered the car just in time to see the lady carrying her box of marshmallows get out of the front door. Hinpoha made a wild dash for the rear exit, but the door was closed and the car already in motion. She rang the bell frantically, at the same time following the woman with her eyes to see in which direction she went. The car finally released her two blocks up street, and then began the mad chase back again. Poor Hinpoha was never built for speed; her breath gave out and she developed an agonizing pain in her side. Her bundles weighed her down and her hat flopped into her eyes. Chugging along thus she ran smartly into someone and again her packages covered the sidewalk.

“Oh, excuse me!” she gasped, struggling to get her hat back on her head. “I couldn’t see where I was going. Why, Captain——” For it was none other than he with whom she had collided.

“Pretty well loaded down, aren’t you?” said the Captain, stooping to pick up the litter on the sidewalk.

“Never mind them,” said Hinpoha hastily, “go after her.”

“Go after her?” repeated the Captain in a tone of bewilderment.

Hinpoha pointed speechlessly up the street and then with a mighty effort regained a speck of her breath and panted “Lady—blue coat—plush collar—our marshmallows—left this—Raymond’s—go get them,” and, shoving the stranger’s package into his hands, she indicated with waving arms that he was to pursue the lady in question and regain the club’s property. The Captain started off obediently, though her explanation was not yet clear in his mind, but the truth flashed over him when he presently overtook a lady that fitted the description just turning into the door of Raymond’s store with a large package under her arm, and he soon made his errand known and recovered the marshmallows. She was just in the act of returning them to Raymond’s, having discovered her mistake.

Hinpoha was out in front when the Captain emerged from the store, and she surrendered her bundles to him gratefully, saying with a breathless sigh, “Boys are useful to have around once in a while, after all.”

“Only once in a while?” asked the Captain.

“Well, maybe twice in a while, then,” said Hinpoha graciously.

Hinpoha arrived on the scene of action so late that there was no time to press her for explanations; she was summarily hustled out of her street clothes and into her orchestra costume. The audience was arriving in crowds and the Sandwiches, who were detailed as ticket takers, had much to do to keep legions of small boys from climbing the fence and seeing the show without the formality of buying a ticket.

The Grand Parade, “including every single member of the entire show,” was scheduled to start promptly at two. The parade was necessarily held in sections, as all hands were needed for each section. The clock in a neighboring steeple had not finished chiming the hour when there was an unearthly blare of trumpets and crashing of drums, and the band issued from the entrance of the Open Door Lodge. Nyoda led the band and made a stunning drum major in a fur hat a foot high, made out of a muff. The members of the band were dressed as Spanish troubadours in costumes of blinding scarlet, with their instruments hung around their neck by ribbons. They marched around the ring at a lively pace, playing the music of a popular football song, which made the audience cheer wildly, for it was largely composed of students from the two great rival schools, Washington High and Carnegie Mechanic. In the wake of the troubadours stumbled an enormously fat clown in a suit half red and half white, blowing up a rubber bladder, which emitted a plaintive squawk. Loud applause greeted every move the clown made and when he accidentally stumbled into a hole and measured his length on the ground the small boys shrieked in ecstasy.

The band made a stately and melodious exit in the House of the Open Door and once inside broke ranks in haste to prepare for the second section of the parade—the procession of the animals. This was a much more complicated matter than the band had been, but it had been so well rehearsed that the crowd, who were being amused by the antics of the clown, had not time to grow impatient before they were ready. Shrieks of delight went up at the appearance of the five ferocious animals from Nowhere—The Camelk, The Crabbit, The Alligatortoise, The Kangarooster and The Salmonkey, and they had to go around the ring five times before being allowed to retire. The parade being such an unqualified success, it is needless to say that the circus proper went even better. The actors had all worked themselves up into the right mood for it.