Chapter IV: Part 4

"He gave his Son for us, too," she added softly.

*CHAPTER XIV*

*HILL-TOP*

"Picnics," explained Peggy, with a conviction born of experience, "are just as much fun in the winter as they are in the summer, 'specially when they are at Hill-top!"

For the four days following Christmas snow had fallen steadily. Each moment of the holiday time had been filled with out-of-door fun: now Mrs. Lee had suggested that--as a sort of climax--the Eagle Patrol have a picnic at Hill-top!

Pat had never heard of a picnic in the middle of the winter!

But Peggy's enthusiasm was contagious! Hilltop--Pat had never been there--was a very old farmhouse ten miles from the city, back in the hills near Camp Wichita, where Captain Ricky took her girls in the summer-time. It belonged to an old man and his wife who had been friends of Mrs. Lee's father. During the winter months they preferred to move into a more sheltered cottage nearer the barns. The house--a short walk from the lake on which the young people skated in the winter and canoed in the summer--had great square rooms and many of them, warmed by fire-places like caverns that consumed whole logs at a time. Often Mrs. Lee, who found real recreation in such little excursions with her young people--had taken the girls and boys there for week-end picnics!

"Mother says we may stay three whole days this time! We can skate and coast and have all kinds of fun! Garrett has a new bob that he made and he says he'll bet anything it can beat all the others."

"Do the boys go, too?" broke in Pat.

"Oh, yes, mother likes to have them go! They help a lot, you see, and she says it wouldn't be nearly as much fun if they weren't along. Jim Archer and Bob Slocum and Ted Scott and maybe Wynne Meade will go--and Garrett! They're _sort_ of fun!" for Peggy read disappointment in Pat's face.

"_I_ think boys are a nuisance!"

Sheila came promptly to the defense. "Perhaps--sometimes! But brothers are nice!"

Pat's experience had been limited to the bashful young brothers, miserable with too much scrubbing and stiff collars, who had occasionally visited the other girls at school.

Peggy thought it a decided waste of time to be bothering over such a point when there was so much to plan and do! So, with a conviction intended to end the discussion, she said: "Well, they carry the logs and the water and go out and open the house and I guess we'll find them mighty useful!"

And, indeed, Pat _was_ to find one of the boys more than useful before the picnic was over!

A few hours' well-organized activity put everything in readiness for the house-party. Garrett Lee appointed himself chief of the commissary and flew tirelessly between his home and the grocery store until he had assembled enough cans of soup, bacon, weiners and other eatables peculiar to scouts' appetites to feed a regiment! Sheila and Mrs. Lee, after a brief consultation, added to the equipment many little necessities that Garrett in his masculine ignorance had overlooked. Two of the other girls collected the necessary kitchen utensils and a simple first-aid kit. Loaded down with all these and with extra blankets and the bobs, the boys and Mrs. Lee went on out to Hill-top a day in advance to open the house and prepare it for the others.

Pat, inspired by the activities of the others and not having been pressed into troop service, busied herself by packing and repacking almost every garment that she and Renee possessed!

"Patsy, dear, you _won't_ need all those things," Aunt Pen had laughed, pointing to the bulging suitcase.

Pat admitted this. "Well, it's fun packing 'em and I just had to do something," she confessed.

The next day eight merry girls boarded the funny little train that puffed off slowly toward the hills. To Renee the picnic was the most exciting of adventures! She had seen little snow--never in her life anything like the great piles, snowy white, through which the train was snorting its way! She had never had on a pair of skates in her life, nor had she ever coasted down a hill! And as Peggy told of Garrett's new bob, "Madcap," and its lightning speed, she shivered with an ecstasy of fear and wondered--if they made her ride on it--what it would feel like to fly over the snow and whether she might not just die outright of terror!

The boys, in rollicking spirits and muffled to the tips of their noses, met them at the station; together they trudged back through the snow to the farmhouse. Logs were crackling merrily in the big fireplaces and a table had been spread ready for an early supper. The girls fell to unpacking the equipment and spreading their blankets over the funny old beds and the cots which had been brought up from the nearby camp. Sheila, who had been appointed officer-in-charge, promptly, in accordance with the custom of scout outings, posted in a conspicuous place, the "standing rules."

"Oh, they're the kind of rules any good scout'll keep," Peggy exclaimed to Pat, who was regarding the slip of paper in amazement with a look on her face that said plainly "this is the funniest picnic I ever knew!" "Come on and find the others!"

For supper they ate many baked potatoes and weiners and hot biscuits, which Mrs. Lee had mixed and baked by magic--"just to have a nice beginning!" At the table the boys announced the schedule for the skating and coasting races which they had planned for the next day and fell to arguing with friendly violence over the speed of their different bobs! Garrett then insisted that the four who had grabbed the last of the biscuits should make up the Kitchen Police, whose duty it would be to clear away the supper dishes! And to the accompaniment of a mighty rattle of china plates and cups the others gathered around the blazing fire and sang.

Pat and Renee slept together in a huge four-posted bed. Gradually the big house had grown very quiet. "Isn't it fun?" Pat giggled into Renee's ear. "I've never been in the country in the winter-time before! And doesn't it feel _queer_ sleeping without sheets?" Then she sighed. "I wish I could skate well!" She was thinking of the races planned for the morrow. Renee was apprehensive, too. "Do you suppose they'll make me go down on one of those dreadful bobs?" and she shuddered at the very thought!

Poor Pat, her pride--cropping up now and then--was her besetting sin! And the next morning, when she should have been gloriously happy, it mastered her! She _hated_ the races, because she was always lagging along in the rear! She declared to herself that the boys were silly, tiresome stupids, because they made _such_ a fuss when Peggy beat them all in a race down the lake and back! Finally, disgusted, she took off the hateful skates and joined Renee near the bank.

"I think they're _stupid_," she grumbled, digging her heel into the ice and not explaining whether she meant the boys, or the skates or the races!

The coasting in the afternoon comforted her a little! Jim Archer let her steer his "Gypsy!" They beat Garrett's "Madcap" and Pat secretly rejoiced at Garrett's chagrin!

Renee, from the top of the long hill, had watched the flight of the bobs with trembling fascination.

"Come along on Madcap," Garrett had called out. The three girls on it waved entreatingly to her. She had not the courage to refuse! White with terror she slipped in between Garrett and Peggy. The others shouted wildly as the bob began to move slowly down the hill but poor Renee's breath caught in her throat. As it went faster and faster she hid her face against Garrett's wooly back.

"Hang on!" cried Peggy behind her. Renee was certain they were flying! But just as she felt she _must_ die with terror a wild "hurrah" went up, she opened her eyes--they were sliding over the ice at the bottom of the hill and the Madcap had won!

And to Renee's utter amazement she wanted to go down again--_right away_!

Afterwards Garrett let her steer the bob, and although they ended in a snowdrift and were almost buried in the soft snow, it did not in any way dampen her enthusiasm over the new sport she had learned!

"Oh, it was _wonderful_!" she exclaimed to Pat as they walked with the others toward Hill-top. "I thought I'd be so frightened and I wasn't!"

"Jim Archer's bob is much the best," Pat answered in such a disagreeable voice that Renee looked at her in hurt astonishment! How _could_ there be enough difference in two bobs to make Pat speak to her in that tone!

However, hot oyster soup and pancakes scattered for a time the little cloud that threatened and through the meal Pat's voice was as merry as the merriest. After supper, leaving the Kitchen Police to their sad lot, the others again donned caps, sweaters and mittens and fell to building in front of the old farmhouse door two great snow forts, between which, in the morning, a mighty battle would be waged!

And Jim Archer, one of the self-appointed generals, asked Pat--before he asked any of the others--to be on his side!

This was balm to Pat's hurt vanity. Perhaps she couldn't skate as well as the others, but she guessed Jim Archer knew she could throw a snowball as straight and as hard as any boy! Anyway, Garrett Lee was too conceited! So that night, as she slept cuddled down in the big four-posted bed, she dreamed that she stood alone on the frosty breastwork of the fort she had helped build and by an onslaught of snowballs, thrown with unerring aim, drove Garrett Lee and his army to complete and ignominious surrender!

Poor Pat--the next day was to bring to her pride a sad fall!

*CHAPTER XV*

*PAT'S PRIDE AND ITS FALL*

The next morning a bright sun peeped up over the hills touching field and lake, trees and house-tops with a frost of diamonds. At an early hour hungry boys and girls were demanding their breakfast "quick" and were hurling orders over the banister at the sleepy Kitchen Police, toiling below.

The snow-ball fight ended in a complete rout of Garrett's army, which put Pat in high spirits, and, although it had not been quite like her dream of the night before, Jim Archer _had_ said to her, to her secret joy:

"Say, you throw as good as a boy!"

The remainder of the morning was spent playing hockey and coasting; the boys allowing the girls to race the bobs down the hill. Renee, quite by herself, steered the beautiful Madcap twice to victory! Perhaps never in her life had she felt so keenly alive or so happy! She stood looking over the little lake and the surrounding hills and drawing in long breaths of the frosty air. Its keenness made her cheeks and fingertips tingle, put a ringing note in the youthful voices around her and an added brightness into happy eyes!

"Let's all just skate this afternoon--no races or anything like that!" declared Peggy at luncheon and the suggestion met with instant approval.

"Oh, _don't_ you wish we were just coming? Did you ever know days to go by so fast?" lamented one of the others.

"This hasn't gone by yet! To-night we're going to toast marshmallows!" put in Bob Slocum.

"And have a good sing! We always end a picnic that way!" explained Peggy to Pat.

"And breakfast bright and early to-morrow, so that we will be all packed in time for the----"

"Lightning mail train!" Garrett added to his mother's injunction.

Mrs. Lee was never happier than when she was with her "boys and girls!" She loved each and every one of them as though they had all been hers from babyhood. She watched them now as they trooped away toward the lake, skates jingling over their arms. Something within her quivered with pardonable pride as her eyes rested for a moment on Garrett's manly young figure striding on ahead of the others. And when Peggy's voice, always boyishly loud, reached her ears as she shouted back to one of the other girls, her mother shook her head and laughed: "Oh, Peggy child, what a tomboy!"

For Pat the skating was much more fun, now, when there were no races! More accustomed to her skates she managed to get over the ice in better and easier fashion than she had on the day before. She was pleasantly conscious, too, that she made a rather pretty picture in her scarlet sweater and tam-o'-shanter--several of the girls had declared that they were going to immediately make red tams.

"Let's have a turn, Pat!" and Garrett Lee extended two warmly mittened hands in genial invitation. So Pat linked her arms with his and together they flew over the glittering stretch. With her balance supported by Garrett's strong grasp she skated easily; as they sped along down the length of the lake the wind whipped her breath and sent the blood bounding through her veins!

At the end of the lake they stopped "to take in air," as Garrett put it.

"Let's skate down there," cried Pat, pointing to the Inlet just beyond. There a narrow gorge, cutting deeply through the hillsides, let into the lake. Garrett knew that, because of its steep banks, its changing depths of water and strong eddies, the ice there was very unsafe.

"Oh, no, it's dangerous there! We never go into the Inlet, even in the summer! That's a rule!"

Poor Pat--she fancied Garrett was treating her like a little child! So she answered with a toss of her head:

"I haven't bothered to read the rules! I'm not afraid--if you are!" and she turned toward the Inlet.

"Pat--don't! It _isn't_ safe--honest!"

The more earnest and concerned Garrett grew the more headstrong Pat! She started toward the Inlet, calling over her shoulder: "Oh, you're just a 'fraidy-cat'!"

Garrett watched her for a moment. There was no doubting her intention! He started after her and at the mouth of the Inlet overtook her.

"Pat," he begged, "mother'll be angry! I tell you it's one of the rules!"

But Pat simply shrugged her shoulders.

"_Dare_ you to come with me, little boy!" she laughed teasingly. The Inlet, its banks rising steeply on each side, filled with dancing shadows made by the sun through the bare branches meeting overhead, looked very inviting! Thrilled with a sense of adventure, Pat skated with short strokes into the narrow opening.

Garrett had no choice but to follow her! Deeply alarmed, he again begged her to turn back! Now she pretended not to hear him!

But in a few moments she suddenly screamed and wildly waved her arms! At a bend in the narrow gorge the ice had cracked under her weight!

"Garrett!" she cried, turning.

"_Go on! Keep moving!_" he shouted. But Pat, terror-stricken, stood still, stretching out her arms imploringly. Garrett reached her just as the ice with a sharp crackle broke into pieces, dropping them both into the water.

Its iciness for a moment stunned Pat. Then she slowly realized that Garrett was supporting her with one arm and begging her to cling to the thin edge of the ice, to which he was holding with his other hand. His steady voice gave her courage! She tried to say something but her teeth only chattered together.

"We'll get out all right!" Garrett said, hopefully. "Hold on as lightly as you can!"

"Oh, don't let go of me--don't let go of me!" implored Pat, wanting to cry.

"I won't! Keep up your nerve!" And Garrett strengthened his hold under Pat's arm. He looked about him. From a tree growing out of the bank stretched a bare limb just a little way out of reach.

"We'll work along slowly until you can reach that branch! Take it easy, Pat!"

He began moving his grasp on the edge of the ice, slowly, cautiously, for sometimes it cracked, sending terror to Pat's soul! She recalled hearing someone tell how very deep the water was in the Inlet! And it was _so_ black and cold!

"Come on! We'll make it!" he called out cheerily. They drew nearer and nearer the branch; soon Pat could reach it.

"Now let go of the ice and grab it! I'll hold you!"

"Oh no, no!" implored Pat, clinging tighter.

"You've _got_ to, Pat! It's our only chance!" Summoning all the strength he had in his fine young body he lifted her as he spoke! The effort made great veins swell on his forehead. With a gasp of terror she caught and clung with both arms to the branch.

"Get your legs around it, too," directed Garrett. "Now work yourself along! _Hurry_, Pat!"

Stung into effort Pat with feverish haste did as he told her. Securing her hold on the branch by locking her strong legs about it she gradually swung around until she was astride it. Then it was but a moment's work to edge along to the bank. Grasping the strong roots of the undergrowth she pulled herself to the top. She wanted dreadfully then to throw herself down upon the ground and cry, but a sharp noise below made her turn suddenly.

Garrett had attempted to lift himself upon the branch. Strained by Pat's weight, under his it snapped off, dropping him back into the water.

"Garrett!" screamed Pat. In agony she watched for his head to reappear at the surface of the water. As he came up he again caught the edge of the ice, but his face was gray and drawn as though by sharp pain and his breath came and went in short gasps. She called him vainly over and over but he could not seem to muster enough strength to answer! She fancied, in her terror, that his fingers were slipping in their hold of the ice.

It was _her_ turn to direct!

"Garrett, move down! See, the tree's across the ice! Maybe it'll hold! Oh, Garrett, _try_!"

With a slow, cramped movement he worked along the edge of the rapidly enlarging hole until he could grasp the broken branch which stretched now across the dark water, one end firmly held in a crack of the ice where it had buckled near the bank. Strengthened by desperation, Garrett managed to crawl along it until he reached the bank. As, numbed by exposure, he struggled to lift himself up the steep side of the gorge, clinging for support, as Pat had done, to roots and branches, repeatedly slipping back, it seemed to Pat as though he could not make it! At last her own frantic hands dragged him over the top to safety, only to have him drop in an unconscious heap at her feet!

All Pat knew was that whatever she had to do she must do quickly! Loosening the straps of her skates she threw them from her! Then she attempted to lift him. He was too heavy--she could not stagger a step with his weight in her arms. So as gently as she could she dragged him over the soft snow to a higher point of open ground from which she could see the lake and the skaters and the farmhouse!

"Girls! Girls! Jim!" she called frantically. They could not hear--only the echo of her own voice answered.

"What _will_ I do?" she cried. She tore off her bright tam-o'-shanter and waved it high in the air! Suddenly she saw one of the girls detach herself! from a group of skaters and wave back!

An inspiration seized Pat! The semaphore code she had learned! Oh, could she remember it quickly enough? And poor Garrett himself had taught her! Snatching off her sweater she waved that in one hand and her tam in the other and slowly signaled:

"Accident--bring bobs--blankets--quick!"

It seemed to Pat as though they would _never_ answer! She waved her message again--more slowly! Then one of the boys waved back: "Coming."

_Now_ Pat began to cry--tears that left cold streaks on her own cheeks and splashed in a warm shower on Garrett's face as she knelt over him. He slowly opened his eyes and whispered, "All right, Pat?" Then, as though very tired, he closed them again and lapsed back into unconsciousness.

There was no more merriment at Hill-top! The boys brought Garrett, wrapped in blankets, on one of the bobs to the door of the farmhouse where his mother, warned of the accident, awaited him. No one would let poor Pat tell her story--there was too much to be done! While Mrs. Lee and Sheila cared for Garrett, the girls gave Pat a hot bath and a vigorous rub and put her to bed. And Jim Archer flew to the nearest telephone to summon a doctor and nurse from the city.

Garrett was very, very ill! Weakened by the exposure and strain he quickly developed pneumonia. The doctor would not let him be moved, he must remain at Hill-top! Mrs. Lee, brave with all her anxiety, begged the boys and girls to go back to the city quietly, not to worry, but to hope for Garrett's quick recovery! Sheila and Jim Archer she kept with her to help her. At the earliest possible moment came Mr. Lee with a trained nurse.

Pat, none the worse for her icy bath of the day before, lingered behind the others and miserably begged for a parting word with Mrs. Lee.

"It was _all_ my fault," she whispered, bursting into tears. "I called him a fraidy-cat and went on, just so's he'd follow----"

Though Mrs. Lee took the girl in her arms, her face was very grave. But she guessed the suffering in Pat's heart, so she spoke kindly.

"Child, I am glad he _didn't_ leave you! You must help us fight for him now and--well, he just _must_ get well!" For a moment she could not keep her own tears back; then she resolutely wiped them away as much as to say, "_this_ isn't fighting!"

Anxious days followed. Every morning and every evening Jim Archer telephoned to the Everett home from Hill-top a report of Garrett's condition. Sometimes there would be a word of encouragement--then he would be a degree worse! Pat, pale as a ghost, scarcely speaking to anyone, trembling at every sound, in spite of all Aunt Pen's and Renee's efforts, refused to be cheered or comforted! She spent almost all her time in the Eyrie with the door locked.

"I'm downright worried!" Aunt Pen said to Pat's father, who fortunately had returned in the midst of the trouble and anxiety. "_Whatever_ does the child do in that room all by herself?"

No one would ever know! In the most shadowy corner of the Eyrie Pat had crept and there she had found strength to bear the suspense! Kneeling before one of the old broken chairs, she repeated over and over a little prayer she had made:

"Please God, make Garrett well! He was so brave and I was so wicked! I'm the one you ought to punish! Please make him well and I'll never, never be wicked again!"

Sometimes she would vary the wording of her little prayer and once, thinking that perhaps her clumsy sentences might not reach the Father's ear, she carried a prayer-book to the Eyrie and slowly, with great emphasis, repeated the prayer for the sick that she had often heard in church.

Going downstairs from one of these vigils in the Eyrie she heard Sheila's voice. Her heart stopped beating with an instant's fear! She rushed into the room where Sheila was talking to Aunt Pen and her Daddy.

"He is----" She could not make herself ask the question.

Sheila turned. Her tired face was bright with joy. "Garrett's better! He will get well! We didn't telephone because I wanted to tell you! I had to come home, for mother needed me."

"Really, truly?" Pat could scarcely believe that the black shadow was lifted from her. Sheila nodded laughingly.

"Really, truly! The doctor says he has a wonderful constitution! And we're all so glad, because we love Mrs. Lee so much!"

With quivering lips Pat turned and threw herself into her father's arms. There was so much she wanted to tell--of her silly vanity, her wicked recklessness, her leading another into danger, but the words would not come!

"I'll always remember--how he looked--up on the bank!" she shuddered, her face hidden against her father's coat. "I asked God to make him well and He did, and I guess I'll remember never--to be--wicked again!" And as though he understood how truly repentant poor Pat was, her dear Daddy patted her shoulder and held her very close.

*CHAPTER XVI*

*GOOD TURNS*

The winter days passed quickly in the Everett household. Each moment was filled with work or play. And so delightfully intermingled was the play with the work that the girls found themselves tackling their Latin verbs with the same zest they threw into their outdoor recreation.

In spite of the holidays and the suspense of Garrett Lee's illness the routine of Aunt Pen's "school" had been renewed with little difficulty. Pat, who always before had been very indifferent to the report system followed at Miss Prindle's, suddenly developed deep concern and pride in the reports that Aunt Pen carefully prepared at the end of each week to show Daddy and then tucked away in the spinnet desk to wait mother's return. She was improving in her Latin and her French; she could write a letter now with only one or two misspelled words; she tackled the difficult problems in Algebra in a fine fighting spirit, and with great pride--after many mortifying failures--was able to set before her father three beautifully browned loaves of bread!

Daddy had declared that such triumph must have its reward and had carried them all--pupils and teacher--off to the theatre to see "Penrod."

The Eaglets still gathered in the Eyrie. How much nearer each was coming to her ambitions no one of them could tell--that they were still steadfastly true to their pledge to help one another was certain; unconsciously perhaps, they did it by the strength of their friendship.

"LaDue and Everett" had developed a thriving business. Pat, quite all by herself, had gone to Brown Brothers, the leading bookstore in the city, and had sought and obtained an order for hand-painted valentines. This had given her courage to approach Miss Higgins and a nearby Gift-shop. Very proudly she presented the three orders to the senior member of the firm.

"There, I guess _that'll_ make us work!"

At first Renee was aghast at the amount of work, but with Pat to help her and by steady application--although Aunt Pen was firm in her command that the work must not interfere with the outdoor play--she was able to complete the orders by the first of February. And so beautifully had the little valentines been made that Brown Brothers immediately ordered ten dozen dinner cards!

The rush of business set Pat at the company's books which had gotten into such a muddle that they had to be taken to Daddy to be straightened out. Pat's figures were like a Chinese puzzle running up and down the pages of her imposing ledger. Poor Mr. Everett had a knotty problem putting them into proper shape and Pat had a lesson in accounting!

Altogether, after all expenses had been paid, there was left to the account of the youthful firm a sum of eighteen dollars and fifty cents. Two-thirds of this, Pat declared, must be Renee's, because the responsibility of the work fell upon her--"though I'll just say it isn't any fun getting up your nerve to go in and ask for an order! They always treat you like a kid!" she explained, indignantly.

There were many demands upon their earnings. The scout uniforms had been bought; the girls each pledged six dollars to the Victory Army; there was the Red Cross, too, and the French Babies and the Vacation Fund for the tots at home--innumerable other good causes, worthy of their help.

"It makes me feel so grown-up to sign my name to all these pledges and things and pay for it out of my _very_ own money!" And Pat assumed a comically mature air.

Pat was a real "Yellowbird" now and Renee was a "scrub." The girls had joined a swimming class, too; Pat, having spent many summers at the seashore was like a fish in the water, and helped Renee, who had to overcome a physical terror at the very thought of slipping over into the tank!

Early in February Garrett Lee was brought back to the city from Hill-top. Pat, with Aunt Pen, had immediately gone to see him and his mother. Mrs. Lee's kind welcome drove away the fear that had teen in Pat's heart; impulsively she threw her arms about Mrs. Lee's neck and, because Mrs. Lee could always see straight into the hearts of her boys and girls, she knew what prompted the caress and gave an affectionate hug in return.

"Garrett doesn't want one single word ever said about it all," she whispered in Pat's ear.

After that Pat went almost daily to the Lee house--sometimes with a book, or a basket of fruit or some home-made candy. At first she was a little shy in her friendly devotion, but after a while, so truly grateful did Garrett seem for her company and the things she brought to relieve the monotony of his convalescence, she simply rang the bell and ran straight up to his room. When these frequent visits interfered with lessons Aunt Pen said not a word, for she knew Pat was trying to make up in some small way for the harm she had wrought!

As Garrett grew stronger the young people deserted the Eyrie for the pleasant Lee living-room. "It does him more good than a trip to Florida!" his mother declared, looking with satisfaction at her patient. And the boys and girls were learning thoughtfulness and considerateness. When Peggy, of her own will, suddenly lowered her voice, and Jim Archer, without a word, shoved a pillow back of Garrett's head as he sat on the old divan, Mrs. Lee had thought--hard as it had been--Garrett's illness had brought some good.

Pat had never known before the wholesomeness of jolly comradeship with a large circle of boys and girls; she found it now in these pleasant gatherings at the Lees. Bob Slocum and Peggy could think of so many games; Jim Archer--all in one afternoon--had composed, staged, and produced a melodrama, "Heinie the Hun," although, because Pat could not control her giggling, the irate author-manager had made her play the drum to mark the dramatic climaxes. There were endless and lively discussions over everything under sun and earth; jolly songs with Mrs. Lee at the piano, and always some careful eye to notice when Garrett showed signs of fatigue.

And to Pat the best of all was when Garrett, one afternoon, had confided to her that he was planning an airship with a new kind of stabilizer; showed her his drawings and explained how, for days since his illness, he had been studying a housefly which he had caught and imprisoned in the old fish bowl. Pat wanted very much to tell the others what great things Garrett was going to do but he had made her promise on her scout's honor to keep his secret, so she carried it faithfully locked away in her heart, proud that Garrett should have honored her with his confidence after the unhappy accident at Hill-top!

"We're _pals_--just's if I was a boy," she said to herself.

As the weeks slipped by Renee, to Aunt Pen's delight, was rapidly developing a fascinating and forceful personality. With so many true friends and playmates the shyness had gradually disappeared from her manner; contrasted with Pat's dynamic spirits Renee would always seem quiet, but her will was strong and often, in her gentle way, she was a leader among the young people. With a character that had been moulded and guarded by a simple life, she had in her a rare beauty and purity of thought that seemed to shine in her pretty face and clear eyes. Happiness and healthy living were dispelling the shadows from her young life; she could talk of Susette and the old cottage without a quivering of the lips; she often drew for Pat, as though she enjoyed it, a vivid description of how splendid Emile had looked in his uniform as he had marched away with the others--a rose she had given him stuck jauntily in his belt!

The cessation of the fighting and the approaching peace had brought many problems. Wounded men were coming home, employment was uncertain, living expenses soaring higher and higher; actual want stalked in many homes. And to add to it all a terrible epidemic had raged through the city, leaving in its wake untold misery and suffering.

There was serious work for everyone to do. There were countless ways in which the Girl Scouts helped. "Good turns," they called it and they held themselves always ready for the command of any organization, never counting one moment of sacrifice, tireless and faithful.

"What do you think now?" Pat burst in upon her family from a special meeting of the troop. "The Scouts are going to adopt families!"

This astonishing announcement caused Mr. Everett to throw up his hands in mock dismay.

"Good gracious, Pat, black or white?"

"I'm really very serious, Daddy, and Mrs. Townsend from the Red Cross says we can make it a beautiful work! One family is assigned to each of us. We give as much time as we can spare and do everything we can--amuse the children, take 'em out, make things easier for the mothers so's they can rest and get strong again! You see these are families that have been sick. Mine is Mrs. K-a-s-u-b-o-w-s-k-i," she read from a card.

Pat had, in her way, expressed the scout orders. To each of the older scouts had been assigned a family that had suffered from the epidemic. Each girl was to work under the direction of the District Nurse and in cooeperation with the Red Cross. She was to give brief reports of each visit. And knowing that these girls could, in the homes to which they were sent, win trust where older women often met suspicion and unfriendliness, the Red Cross hoped to build up through their services, a sympathy and understanding that would benefit everyone and draw more closely the bonds of common interest.

In her youthful mind Pat did not sense any such vision; she only knew that her scout orders directed her to go and do all she could for a family whose name she simply could not pronounce; that her card stated that there was a Rosa, aged seven, a Josef, age six, a Stephanie, aged three and a baby Peter; that everyone of them had been desperately ill, including the father and mother; that only within the last two or three weeks had the father been able to go back to work and that upon the poor mother, still weak from the ravages of fever, had fallen the burden of making the meagre savings tide them over.

Pat called them all her "Kewpies." Her first two visits left her discouraged, the children were dirty and quarrelsome, the mother unfriendly. But, gradually, armed with picture books and toys, Pat won the liking of the little ones; at the next visit she gave them cakes of soap which Renee had carved to resemble dogs and pigs and promised them more if they would use these "all up"; warm sunshine permitted a long walk and outdoor play and Mrs. Kewpie, gratefully realizing that for an hour she was absolutely without chick or child, caught a much-needed moment of rest!

Renee had not been given a family by the Red Cross. At first she was disappointed, then, wholeheartedly, she fell to helping Pat. Aunt Pen and Daddy, too, were deeply interested. Almost every evening the "Kewpies" were discussed at the "pow-wow." Aunt Pen was aghast that Mrs. Kewpie could speak only a word or two of English!

"How can she be expected to bring up good American citizens--let alone be one herself?" she asked heatedly.

Through Rosa Pat learned that poor Mrs. Kewpie would really like to talk and read English. Her husband had learned it at his shop, the older children were learning it at school; less and less they were talking the only language she had ever known! She felt, with the quick instinct of her mother's heart, that they were growing away from her into a world of interests where she could not follow. No one had ever offered to teach her this new, strange tongue! She was afraid of the teachers in Rosa's school! She misunderstood and resented the approaches of the few English-speaking women she had met; proud herself, she had thought them patronizing and officious! But Pat was just a girl!

So Pat, quite unconsciously, began making a good American citizen out of Mrs. Kewpie. She found that the picture books she brought the children interested the mother, too--not because of the pictures alone but because the mother could make out, through them, the meaning of the words beneath them. When Pat told of this at home Aunt Pen thought of the beautiful plan of making for Mrs. Kewpie a primer out of pictures. Every evening, for a week, the entire Everett family worked industriously with scissors and paste, compiling what Aunt Pen laughingly called: "Everett's First Lessons in the American Language."

"She'll know all about this country of ours when she's graduated from _this_ book," declared Mr. Everett, proudly smoothing down a colored picture of the Capitol at Washington.

"And for everything I teach her in English I'm going to ask her to teach me a word in Polish! It's such a funny looking language and then it _sounds_ like music! They have lots of awfully exciting stories in their history--Keineth Randolph told us some that her father had told her! And in the next book, let's have pictures of flowers and mountains and water and things like the country, 'cause I guess poor Mrs. Kewpie thinks there _aren't_ such things!"

Prompted by this thought on her next visit Pat carried to the Kewpie kitchen a pink geranium plant. Then she conceived the idea of making the untidy kitchen look as much like Mrs. Quinn's as possible! So interested did she grow in her work that for two afternoons she completely forgot basketball practice, thereby bringing down upon her head the fury of the Captain of the Yellowbirds!

And when Baby Peter fell sick with some digestive disorder, Pat, with the help of the District Nurse, was able to persuade Mrs. Kewpie that a daily bath would reduce the slight fever and to substitute the sweet, fresh milk that the nurse had brought in the place of the coffee she was accustomed to feed the baby.

Now Renee, to her delight, was given an opportunity to share the "good turns."

One afternoon Mrs. Lee, always an angel of kindness and of wide charity, had sought Renee's help. She explained to Renee, as they walked along together, that this was a "case" of her own, and that she was taking her to this house because she thought she might bring a little sunshine into a very lonely life there.

"Poor Mrs. Forrester is very cross and very queer, my dear! No one ever goes to see her now and she lives all alone with a servant almost as old as she is! I thought that if you would go there once in awhile and read to her you might help her pass the long hours."

Mrs. Lee did not add that she hoped the child's quiet, sympathetic manner might waken some tenderness in a heart as cold and dead as stone.

Mrs. Forrester lived in a very old house in an out-of-the-way street. Standing almost concealed by trees and overgrown shrubbery, it looked like some forgotten corner of the big, growing city. The door creaked on its hinges as the untidy old servant grudgingly opened it just far enough to permit them to enter. The rooms were dark, dusty and absolutely bare of any furnishings except a few worn chairs. Not a picture, not a book, not one spot of color was to be seen! There were no curtains at the windows and the cracked dingy-brown shades had been pulled close to the sill as though to forbid one tiny gleam of sunlight filtering through.

Renee thought it the most horrid house she had ever seen and wondered how Mrs. Lee could step into it so cheerfully!

But always tender with old people, she immediately felt sorry for the queer old woman propped up against a pile of pillows in a great, ugly bed.

"It isn't that she's so very old--or sick! I believe she just _won't_ stir! Mrs. Lee says she has had a very unhappy life," Renee explained at home. Now Mrs. Forrester and the ugly old stone house shared the interest of the pow-wow.

Another time Renee told, with much amusement, how she had insisted upon raising the shade at the bedroom window so that Mrs. Forrester might see how spring-like the sun made everything look and how the old lady had promptly hopped out of bed and had pulled it down with such a snap that it fell to the floor!

"But she just _had_ to go back to bed and leave it there and I went on reading's though nothing had happened and I know she really loved the sunshine because she lay there as quiet as could be, staring at the window!"

But one afternoon Renee returned, deeply excited, with a secret that she kept for Pat's ears and the seclusion of the Eyrie.

"I was reading something awfully stupid for I thought she might go to sleep and I know she wasn't listening at all, and finally I heard her say, "If I could find my baby--I'd be ready to die!" Now I wasn't reading a _thing_ about dying or a baby and she frightened me dreadfully! I suppose she had forgotten I was there. Then when I went on reading she said it again--real plain! Now, Pat, isn't that exciting? Where _do_ you suppose her baby is and _how'd_ she ever lose it?"

None of Pat's experiences could equal this for mystery! Pat stared at Renee and Renee stared back; in the quiet of the Eyrie they thought up all sorts of explanations and stories--tragic, all of them! Pat fairly shivered with delight.

"Aren't you _lucky_, Renee--to have such a spliffy mystery! It's just _spooky_! I'm going to write a story about that! You get her to talk more--read a lot about babies and listen hard! And talk to that old Crosspatch, maybe she'll tell you something. That's the way they always do in detective stories. Something dreadful _must_ have happened to make her live like that, in that ugly old house! Oh, rapture, I _know_ I'm going to be famous! This goes way ahead of Aunt Pen's story! Of course," she added, hastily, "I don't know _all_ Aunt Pen's secret sorrow yet and she doesn't stay in bed and act queer! I think I'll call this "The Lost Baby!"

So that evening, armed with several newly-sharpened pencils and much of Daddy's writing paper, Pat began her first chapter. However, its progress met with a serious setback when Aunt Pen laid in her hands a letter from Angeline Snow. Pat opened it eagerly; she had not heard from any of her old schoolmates at Miss Prindle's for a long time.

She read it quickly. Miss Angeline, in a few breezy sentences, informed Pat that she would come immediately to make her a visit!

"... You were _such_ a dear to ask me (Pat read that twice, thoughtfully)--and the doctor says I need a teeny rest. Mama is in California and of course I cannot go to her! But we'll have a perfectly sweet time together and I'm just dying to see you again. We've missed you dreadfully here! I have _bushels_ to tell you--just you. (About the girls and things--you'll _die_ when you hear it all!) I'll come on the Empire on Thursday, so please meet me. I have a stunning new hat, henna and turquoise blue and a feather you'll want to _eat_. Bye-bye, your Angeline."

So intent was Pat upon examining the gold crest on the paper that she did not see the curious look that flashed over Aunt Pen's face.

"Good gracious," she exclaimed, suddenly, "that's to-morrow!"

"Yes," Aunt Pen answered quietly, "and we must do everything we can to make her visit pleasant!"

*CHAPTER XVII*

*ANGELINE*

At a first glimpse, from the crown of her glossy black head to the patent tip of her smart little shoe, Angeline Snow, arriving the day following, was like a stranger to Pat!

Pat had left her at the close of that last term of school, after parting embraces and repeated pledges of undying friendship, a girl, long of leg and short of skirt like herself; now she beheld a fascinating young creature whose slim body was robed in a dress of the most stylish fabric and cut, its clinging skirts reaching quite to the tops of the little patent leather shoes, and the hair that Pat had always loved to braid and unbraid was pinned in curious puffs and waves close to the small head.

However, in the transformation, Angeline had lost none of the fascination that had made of Pat, in the old days at Miss Prindle's, a sort of adoring slave. She was amazingly pretty, her black hair made her white skin dazzling, the faintest of rose-pink flushed her cheeks and the tip of her pointed chin; her eyes set deep under long black lashes were as blue as a June sky; her mouth alone marred the perfection of her face--when the lips were not twisted into an affected smile, acquired after faithful study before the mirror, they glaringly betrayed the girl's little weaknesses.

There might well be some doubt in anyone's mind as to why a doctor had prescribed a rest for the young lady! From the moment when, clasping her Pekinese under her arm and followed by a porter with two huge shiny leather suitcases she stepped down from the train, she fairly bubbled with spirits!

Quickly Pat fell under the old charm! Because Renee had developed a light attack of influenza which confined her to her bed and kept Aunt Pen in close attendance, lessons were suspended and the two girls were left very much to themselves. At Aunt Pen's suggestion Pat moved into Celia's room, which adjoined the room assigned to Angeline. A door opened from one to another and every night and morning Pat crept in under Angeline's covers for a little while and listened breathlessly while Angeline told the "secrets" of the school. Almost always there was a box of chocolates under Angeline's pillow so that at regular intervals the stories were interrupted while the two girls munched on the candies.

"The very most exciting thing of all--and don't you _dare_ breathe it to a soul"--and Angeline sat bolt upright and clasped her arms about her knees--"is the _awful_ scrape that Jule Kale and I got into and that's _really_ why I'm here!"

Jule Kale had been a Junior when Pat had been at Miss Prindle's. Pat remembered her as a daring young lady whose adventures had more than once thrilled her and the other girls in the school.

"You know she'd been writing to a French soldier for over a year, even after Prin said we couldn't and what _do_ you think! He _came_ to New York! He was the handsomest thing--the girls were all crazy about him, when we described him! He wrote to Jule right away and asked her to meet him at the Waldorf and she went real often and took me with her. I used to take a book and pretend to read, but I watched every minute so's I could tell the other girls. Once he bought me some chocolate, too, when Jule told why I was sitting there. He said there were some more Frenchmen coming over and he'd introduce them to us! Oh, the girls were _wild_ with excitement! Then one afternoon Jule went to a tea-room and danced with him and she didn't take me and some one saw her there and told Prin and Jule was awfully scared, 'cause you remember Prin had told her that the next scrape she was in she'd have to leave the school! And what does Jule do but tell Prin that he was her _cousin_ who had been in the French flying service! And Prin _insisted_ that she invite him up to school for dinner like we always do our relatives and have him give a talk about the war and Jule had the _worst_ time explaining how he had to go away and couldn't come! And we knew all the while that Prin was sniffing around the way she does for more information so Jule thought I'd better go away for awhile so's she couldn't question me! I pretended to faint one day--I can do it awfully well now--and Prin never said a word when I told her I wanted to come here for a visit. But wasn't that all exciting and wouldn't it be _funny_ if some day Jule married the French soldier? His name is Henri Dupres. Only Jule says his teeth are all filled with gold and he shows 'em _all_ the time as if he was proud of them!"

Contrasted to these exciting revelations Pat felt that the telling of her little experiences--the happy school with Aunt Pen, the Eyrie and its secrets, the jolly hours at the Lee's, the basketball games, the Scout work and play, would be stupid to Angeline!

Aunt Pen had bade Pat do everything she could to entertain her guest; Pat found that Angeline was easily entertained. Indeed, the young lady never failed to indicate with daring frankness just what she wanted to do and what she did _not_ want to do. And to Pat's dismay none of Angeline's desires included any of the other girls! Angeline stated very plainly that she considered Peggy "stupid," Keineth "a kid," and Sheila--"downright common."

"Why, do you mean she lives in that tumble-down house and her mother keeps _lodgers_?" she had asked with scorn.

Pat had opened her lips to answer and then closed them quickly. Something within her told her that nothing she could say would win Angeline's approval of Sheila--she, too, months ago, when she was at Miss Prindle's, might have thought the same thing!

Angeline, with pretty condescension, found Renee interesting. "Poor little refugee!" she said when Pat told Renee's story.

The two girls divided their time in the moving-picture theatres, the chocolate shops and the stores. Angeline never tired of hanging over counters and showcases; because she was smartly dressed and possessed a fund of information as to styles, she commanded respect and attention from the clerks. Each day Pat grew more and more envious and impressed by Angeline's "grown-upness."

Under Angeline's influence Pat began to feel ashamed of her own simple garments and to contrast them unhappily with the finery Angeline spread out over the bed for her inspection. She turned the henna and turquoise creation over and over while Angeline told that it had cost twenty-five whole dollars! "That's more than Renee and I earned all winter," Pat thought. And Angeline put into her hands a pair of pumps, gleefully remarking that "they were sixteen and I got them for twelve--_wasn't_ that a great bargain?"

In her rude way, which Angeline considered pretty frankness, she made Pat understand, too, that she was "simply amazed" to find that Pat lived in such a plain old house!

"Of course it's nice and roomy and all that--and a long time ago it must have been fashionable, but you just _ought_ to see Brenda Chisholm's father's new house on the Drive--why, it's like a _palace_!" She enlarged, then, upon its grandeur until Pat felt deep chagrin that her father had preferred to live on in the old homestead rather than to move into a newer part of the city.

Pat knew that she loved the old library with its deep fireplace and the rows of book shelves reaching to the ceiling and the long, deep windows overlooking the slope of lawn between her house and Sheila's, the old paintings on the walls and the softly colored rugs; she knew that her own room, over the library, held all her memories of nursery days; that she loved the way the morning sun, streaming in through the little conservatory where the birds sang among the flowers, turned to gold the dark oak panels of the dining-room. However, it must seem shabby to Angeline after she had visited Brenda's new home! She looked at the more modern houses they were passing, great piles of stone and marble surrounded by well-kept lawns, and resolved to urge her Daddy to move immediately!