The Three Midshipmen

Anne said as the two walked back

so different from anything else-so fresh and picturesque and f

er the country. The trouble is that there are no

they get th

soon be others in other cities," Anne returned, and then, wit

work I could take up, among girls, and this appeals to me as nothing else has done. It seems

O Laura, I'm so glad. We can

camp now. Do you suppose Mrs. Royall will be w

I can teach you all I learned before I took char

s. Royall. Father is going to Alaska on a business trip and I've been trying to d

all right now and arrange it,

the camp as long as you like," she said, "and if you really want to be a G

as they left the Chief Guardian. "I don

red, "She is the most motherly woman I ever met. She seems to have room in her big, warm heart for every girl that wants mothering, no matter who or w

d and one questions to

o hard for the girls to stop chattering after the curfe

sted and excited to sleep at once, lay in her cot looking out across the open space now flooded with light from the late-risen moon, and thought of the girls sleeping around her. Herse

ching over to the adjoining cot, she touched her friend, whispering, "Anne, An

ck, "It's a ghost dance, Laura. Some of those irrepressible girls

lence!" Laura said under her breath. "I should t

ack to bed," Anne returned. "So long as they do it in utter silence so as

vel

suddenly they melted into the shadows and were gone. Then she too slept till a shaft of sunlight, touching her eyelids, awak

Anne replied. "Almost everybody wa

lem?" Lau

t night. We Guardians call her the Problem becaus

ged, as, dropping the sides of

ears about us here," Anne cautioned. "There'll be time fo

" Laura said, and made q

ed, when they were seated on a rocky poi

il he drank himself to death. There were three children older than Olga-two sons who went to the bad, following their father's example. The older girl married a worthless fellow and disappeared, and there was no one left but Olga to

cried

o would have been glad to help had they known, but Olga's pride is something terrible, and it seems as if she hates everybody because her father and her br

" sighed Laura. "No

oyall, who has been

n your Ca

be married next month and will live in New York, s

the other

girls-salesgirls in store

happen to join

y of the games; but work-she has a perfect passion for work, and it seems as if she can do anything. She has w

ests me," Laura said thoughtfully. "Anne, maybe

ou sure you would like it? Wouldn't you rathe

t-those that need me most-and from what you say, I shoul

and always clinging to the person she happens to be with. The Camp Fire is a splendid organisation, Laura, and it will do a deal for the girls, but still almost every one of them is some sort of 'p

ous appetite," Laura replied. But she did not find

r tramps if you are going to be a

entered the big dining-room wit

pulled out a chair for Laura and

in laughter. She never checks the girls unless it's really nece

at must be Olga-the dark still girl, a

her. All at that table belong

permission for her to spend a month at the camp with Anne Wentworth and Mrs. Royall. He kept the girls on the yacht f

aura said wonderingly, as she and her fri

as they came out into the camp and found it

is," she said. "I see some one moving

s fashion in which things are done. Probably some one said, 'There are blueberries over yonder-loads of