The Camp Fire Girls at the Seashore

proach were directed at them instead of at the pale and angry Gladys, who stood, scarcely able to believe

mean, Miss Merce

e one of us unless you mean sincerely and earnestly to keep the Law of the Fire. We are a

rejection seemed to sink

ked in a shrill, high pitched voice that showed she was on

to me. I do not blame you greatly for this. I would rather have you act thi

p Fire! I wouldn't join for any

e first time. "To join the Camp Fire is a privilege. Remember this-no girl does the Camp Fire a favor by joining it. The Camp Fire does not need any one girl, no matter ho

s when she tried to answer. She

the Guardian of the new Camp Fire, o

d, very gently. "You and I will have a talk presently, when y

the circle of the firelight and made her lonely way over the beach toward the tents of her own camp. For a few moments silence reigned.

t I think that very few of us will have any difficulty in remembering many times when we have been wrong, and have been sure that we were right. Glady

ed for a

repel us, who do not want our love. It is easy to love those who love us. But in time we can make Gladys love us by showing that we want to love

n, mingling in the lovely strains of that

d the ending of a Council Fire, the circle broke up, a

begged Dolly and Bessie. "Oh, I'm so ashamed!

not angry a bit! Just at first I thought I was going to be furious. But-well, somehow I c

d? Of course, she's all wrong, but she had to be plucky to sta

ght to insult all

been brought up to feel a certain way about things, and she couldn't change all at once. A whole lot of girls, while they believed

hypocrite, no matter what her other faults are. She's not afrai

t way, and there's no use pretending. I suppose the real reason I'm so angry is that I'm really very f

Bessie. "Because you want to remember if she's plucky enough to hold out against all

king of, Marcia. Will she stay here? Don't you suppose she'll go home right away? I know I wou

stion, for in the darkness, Gladys herself,

h you, Dolly Ransom, and your nasty old Miss Mercer, and the whole crew of y

nst you, Gladys," s

got my own opinion of a lot of girls who call themselv

, I haven't

had happened to you, and I'd joined before, I'd have got up and thrown their nasty old ring back at them! I

when I spoke to you lately two or three times, and I hope you'll forgive me. And I

o swallow all that! You've done just as many mean things as anyone else! And now you stand around and act as if you were asha

temper now it would only be by the exercise of the grimmest determination. Sure enough, Dolly's hand was tremb

right; I've done things that are meaner than anything you did at Lake Dean.

nd I'd never be able to hold up my head if I thought a lot of common girls had frightened me into running away from this place. I'm going to stay h

rned on her hee

lf as much to me as she did to you, I never could have stood it, I can tell you! Wh

look here, Marcia, I might as well tell you now. Th

itterly. "And it's all my fa

you can mean," sai

t I really think you'd better know

or when Bessie's ideas disagreed with hers, Dolly poured the story of the adven

exclaimed, when the story was told. "So tha

Marcia. And don't you think i

's dreadful, Dolly-just dreadful.

impulsively and kissed her, wh

ut it sometimes. She seems to think that girls won't want to have anything to do with

what you are, and for the way you behave-not on account of things that you really haven't a thing to do

ut her father and mother some day. I don't believe Mr. Holmes would be taking all the trouble he has about her

e is heiress to a fortune, or something like that, and he wan

nd Bessie says that it can't be any question of money that makes him so

y're never content, and that's one reason why so many men work themselves to death, simply because they haven't

s that can't be the reason, but just the same sh

whole lot to stop him from doing what he's trying to do, whatever that is? I'm just thinking-my fath

lushed u

must have spent a terrible lot on my affairs already, and I don't see how I'm ever going to pay them back! And i

those horrid people were able to get hold of you and make you

ys had plenty, even though her family was by no means as rich as Marcia's, felt the same way about the matter. Neither of them valued money particularly; but Bessie,

de, and it worried her constantly to think that her good friends were sp

they spend on me," she said, wistfully. "As soon as we get back to the

e as she was, she belonged, like Gladys Cooper, to the class that looked dow

e, I believe you'll have to wait until things are more settled. It would be so

s to," said Dolly. "And, anyhow, I really believe things are g