CHAPTER V.
GIRLS COURAGEOUS.
"What's the matter, girls? You look as if you had the weight of theworld on your shoulders."
Miss Ladd spoke these words lightly as if to pass judgment on theconference as entirely too serious for a Christmas holiday occasion.Marion and Helen did not respond in tones of joviality, as might havebeen expected. They met her jocular reproach with expressions of suchserious portent that the Guardian of the Fire could no longer lookupon it as calling for words of levity.
"What's the matter, girls?" she repeated more seriously. "You lookworried."
"Sit down, Miss Ladd, and read these letters I received last night,"said Marion without any change of tone or manner. "They will explainthe whole thing. We were just about to call you aside and lay ourtrouble before you."
"Trouble," Miss Ladd repeated deprecatingly, "I hope it isn't as badas that."
She drew an upholstered armchair close to the girls and began at onceto examine the letters that Marion handed to her. Marion and Helenwatched her closely as she read, but the Guardian of Flamingo Fireindicated her strength of character by a stern immobility ofcountenance until she had finished both letters. Then she looked atMarion steadily and said inquiringly:
"I suppose you have no idea who wrote these letters?"
"Not the slightest," replied the girl addressed, "unless the shorterone was written and mailed by some of the Boy Scouts at Spring Lake.Helen thinks it was, and I am inclined to believe with her that itdoesn't make much difference to us who wrote it. The other letter isthe one we are most interested in."
"I agree with you thoroughly," said Miss Ladd energetically. "And wehave got to do something to prevent him from carrying out his threat."
"Ought we to inform the other girls now?" asked Marion with a sense ofgrowing courage, for she felt that in the Camp Fire's Guardian she hadfound elements of wise counsel extending even beyond that youngwoman's experience.
"Why, yes," Miss Ladd replied. "I see no reason for delay. I'd rathertell them now than just before or after we get to Hollyhill. If wetell them now they'll have a couple of hours in which to stiffen theircourage. There are eleven girls besides you two. Suppose you call themhere in three lots in succession, four, four, and three, and we'lltell them quietly what has occurred and give them a little lecture asto how they should meet this crisis."
"All right," said Marion, rising. "I'll bring the first four and youget your lecture ready."
"It's ready already," said the guardian reassuringly. "It is so simplethat I have no need of preparation."
"I'm afraid I need some drill in the best means and methods of readingcharacter," Marion told herself as she walked back to the rear of thecar. "I was really afraid to take the matter up with Helen or MissLadd for fear lest they recommend something foolish. Now it appearsthat each of them has a very clever head on her shoulders. Maybe I'llfind the other girls possessed of just as good qualities. If I do,this day will have brought forth an important revelation to me, thatthe average girl, after all, is a pretty level-headed sort of person.Well, here's hoping for the best."
Marion selected the four girls farthest in front and asked them toapproach the forward end of the car. They did so with some appearanceof apprehension, for by this time all the girls had begun to suspectthat something unusual was doing. This appeared to be evident also tothe half-dozen other passengers in the car, whose curious attentionnaturally was directed toward the forward group of girls.
All of the girls received the information relative to the anonymousletters so calmly that Marion felt just a little bit foolish becauseof her groundless misjudgment of them. After the last group had readthe letters and discussed the situation with the trio of informants,she spoke thus to them:
"Girls, you are real heroines, or have in you the stuff that makesheroines, and that is about the same thing. You take this as calmly asif it were an ordinary every-day affair in the movies. I'm proud ofyou."
"We ought to be wearing Carnegie medals, oughtn't we, girls?" saidJulietta Hyde, blinking comically. "We can throttle anything from ablack-hand agent to a ghost."
"No, you ought to be wearing honor pins, for things well done," MissLadd corrected. "We'll leave the Carnegie medals for those who haven'tany Camp Fire scheme of honors. But really, girls, you have allconducted yourselves admirably in this affair. We will hope it won'tresult in anything very serious, but meanwhile we must take properprecautions."
"Shall we have to give up our vacation at Hollyhill on account ofthis?" asked Katherine Crane almost as dejectedly as if she were beingsentenced to prison for violating a Connecticut blue law.
"That is up to you girls and the conditions that develop," answeredMiss Ladd. "As soon as we get to Hollyhill we will take the matter upwith the proper authorities and try to determine what the outlook is."
"My father will get busy as soon as he hears about this," said Marion."I think we can leave everything to his management. He will probablyadvise us to give up the idea of doing anything for the strikers'families and have as good a time as we can entertaining ourselves athome."
"Oh, I hope not!" Katherine exclaimed, and the manner in which shespoke indicated how much she had set her heart on the work they hadplanned to do.
"It would be too bad to give it up," Marion said earnestly, "for Iunderstand some of those people are greatly in need of assistance.There is not only much hunger and privation among them, butconsiderable sickness among the children. We can't do a whole lot intwo weeks, but we can do something, and our training as Camp FireGirls and in our nursing classes fits us to be of much assistance tothem. It is a shame that they should take an attitude so hostile totheir own interests."
"They probably don't understand your father or they wouldn't bestriking now," said Miss Ladd.
"I'm sure they wouldn't," Marion testified vigorously. "I've oftenheard father say he'd like to do more for the men and their familiesbut conditions tied his hands. Many of the miners are good fellows,but they get mistaken ideas in their heads and it's impossible foranybody whom they once put under suspicion to convince them that theyare in the wrong."
"Do you know, girls," interposed Violet Munday enthusiastically; "Ibelieve we are going to get a lot out of this vacation experience,whatever happens. I'm interested in what Marion tells us about theminers. Let's make a study of coal mining, hold up everybody we canfor information and watch our chance to help the poor families andtheir sick children whenever we can without doing anything foolhardy."
"That's a good idea," said Miss Ladd. "We'll keep that in mind and ifMarion's father's advice is favorable, we'll take it up."
The train arrived at Hollyhill shortly after 2 p.m. Mr. Stanlock'stouring car and two taxicabs were waiting at the station to convey thegirls to Marion's home. The run to the spacious, half-rustic Stanlockresidence at the northeast edge of the city occupied about fifteenminutes, and was without notable incident.
The cars passed through a massive iron gateway, up a windinggravel-bedded drive, and stopped near a white pillared pergolaconnected with the large colonial house by a vine-covered walk runningup to a porticoed side entrance.
Mrs. Stanlock met them at the door and the travelers were speedilyaccommodated with the usual journey-end attentions. Marion theninquired for her father, but Mr. Stanlock had gone to his office earlyin the day and would not return until dinnertime. So the girl hostessdecided that she must let the problem uppermost in her mind restunsettled a few hours longer.
Evening came, but still Mr. Stanlock did not appear. Wondering at hisdelay, Mrs. Stanlock called up his office, but learned that he hadleft an hour and a half before, supposedly for home.
"How did he leave?" Mrs. Stanlock inquired nervously.
"In his automobile," was the answer.
That being the case, he ought to have been home more than an hour ago.His office was in the city and he could easily make the run in fifteenminutes.
Thoroughly alarmed, Mrs. Stanlock called up the police, sta
ted thecircumstances and asked that a search be made for her husband.
Two hours more elapsed and the whole neighborhood was alarmed. Thenews spread rapidly and was communicated by phone to most of Mr.Stanlock's friends and acquaintances throughout the city. The searchwas growing in scope and sensation. Treachery was suspected, a tragedywas feared.
Then suddenly and calmly, Mr. Stanlock reappeared at home, driving themachine himself. He had a thrilling story to tell of his experiences.
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