Esther laughed, touching Betty's auburn hair affectionately. It was loosened from her walk and curling round her face. "That is my soul's desire, Betty," she whispered, surprised at her sudden burst of confidence. But Betty's manner with her was unexpectedly more intimate than it had been since their first meeting. She could hardly have known that it was owing to the fact that she had just quarreled with her adored Polly. Of course Betty did not intend to be deceitful, she was simply in the habit of seeking consolation from some source, whenever things went wrong with her.

Now she put her hand the second time into her knapsack and, drawing forth a square white box, she proceeded to open it in a slightly shamefaced fashion and then handed it to Miss McMurtry. "I am a dreadful backslider from Camp Fire rules, but I just had to have some candy this afternoon. Do eat some with me, so I won't be the only sinner in camp," she begged.

Miss McMurtry shook her head. "Don't tempt Esther or any of the other girls, Betty," she replied in a tone that Betty was familiar with at school. "One of the health craft rules you girls have promised to observe is to give up candy between meals for three months. Of course if you wish to break your word you may, but I had rather you would not try to influence any one else."

Betty banged the lid back on her box.

"Oh," she replied unsteadily. "I am sorry you feel about me in that way. I didn't mean to be a mischief maker, but you need not worry about Esther, for she is not the kind that falls from grace."

She sat a few moments longer leaning her chin on her hand and looking toward the grove of pine trees where the shadows were now growing longer and darker as the afternoon lengthened. Sorry to have fallen from grace herself, Betty at this moment would have perished rather than confess it.

The other three girls had gone straight on up to the tents, Meg taking "Little Brother" with her. But now Eleanor appeared at the opening before their kitchen tent and began vigorously ringing a large dinner bell.

"Betty Ashton," she called, "it is half-past five o'clock and time to begin dinner. You know it is your turn to help with Juliet and me. Meg is putting the baby to bed."

Betty encircled her hand above her lips forming a small trumpet. "I am not going to help with dinner to-night, I am too dead tired," she halloed back. "I will help to-morrow instead."

"To-morrow?" Eleanor cried indignantly. "What has to-morrow, got to do with it? You are no more tired than the rest of us and besides it is your turn to-night and we have promised not to try to get out of things unless we are ill." Eleanor said nothing more, but even at a distance of a good many yards it was plain that she had flounced back inside the tent. When she came out again with some pots and pans her air was one of conscious and offended virtue.

A moment later Betty sighed. "I wonder if you would mind taking my place this afternoon, Esther?" she inquired. "I am very tired and you haven't been doing anything. Would you mind, Miss Martha?"

Betty made her request very prettily and really without the least idea that it could be refused, for she was not in the habit of being made to do what she did not wish. With her own family to have said she was tired would have been regarded as a sufficient excuse for any change of plan.

Perhaps Miss McMurtry would have been wiser had she agreed to Betty's request, and had she been another girl she possibly might have been more lenient. Now she decided that Betty was simply trying to shirk her responsibilities and so slowly shook her head.

"Of course if you are not well, Betty, I will be glad to take your place myself," she answered, trying to speak kindly. "However, if I were you, I would hardly say that Esther has been doing nothing since she has been sewing all afternoon on the ceremonial dress you promised to make your self, so that you may wear it to our Council Fire to-night."

Betty got up quickly. "Please don't do any further work for me while we are in camp together, Esther," she demanded, "for it is evident that Miss McMurtry thinks I spend my time trying to impose upon you. As far as the dress is concerned, I shall not need it to-night, for I shall not come to the Council Fire. I will do my part in helping to get dinner, of course, but I prefer to rest afterwards."

Hardly, knowing what she was doing because of her anger, Betty yet managed to get up quietly from her place and start toward camp without glancing at either Esther or Miss McMurtry, although she heard Esther following close behind her. "Please don't disappoint us, dear," Esther pleaded. "I know Miss Martha will be willing to let me do your work to-night, if we ask her again, and it will quite ruin our Council Fire if you are not with us. What will Polly say when you and she have planned the whole ceremony? And I--I shall be so disappointed, for I am to be made a Fire-Maker to-night. Besides, you know we are to talk over the names we hope to be known by in our club."

But Betty only walked steadily on as though deaf to the other girl's entreaty. Near her own tent she turned at last and Esther could see that her eyes were full of tears. "You are mistaken, Esther, though I am sure you are very kind," she insisted with her offended Princess air, about which Polly used so often to tease her. "I am sure no one will miss me in the least and my absence will give you a chance to bestow on me the t.i.tle you think really belongs to me, such as: 'Betty who won't bear her own burdens' or anything you prefer. Please leave me alone now."

So there was nothing more for Esther to do but to return to her work, knowing how little influence she had with Betty at any time.

CHAPTER X

PIPES OF PEACE

Half an hour later Polly discovered Esther seated alone by her slowly perishing fire taking the last st.i.tches in Betty's rejected ceremonial dress. She had even embroidered on the left sleeve a small crown in gold colored silk, since Betty's old t.i.tle "The Princess" would scarcely be changed whatever new names might be awarded to the other girls in their Camp Fire.

"Where's Betty?" Polly inquired carelessly. "I hope she wasn't cross; I suppose it was not kind of me to leave her and return another way, and she was right, it did make us late, but we had a delicious adventure!"

Polly had dropped down on the ground and put her arms about her, knees, slowly rocking herself back and forth, her face shining with mischief and excitement, so that her color came and went quickly and tiny sparks appeared to dart forth from the blueness of her eyes and the blackness of her hair.

But as Esther neither answered nor asked any questions Polly stared at her in amazement. She had no particular emotion for Esther one way or the other, perhaps because she was not yet a rival in Betty's affections, but she had always tried to make herself agreeable to her and to have her feel like one of them; moreover, she did not enjoy being disregarded.

Halfway up on her feet a glance at Esther's face made her drop back into her old position, except that she put one hand under the girl's chin, turning her face toward her.

"For goodness' sake, Esther, what is the matter?" she demanded. "I suppose it is Betty!"

And Esther nodded, feeling an absurd disposition to shed actual tears of disappointment. So much had been planned for to-night's Council Fire and this was the first disagreement in their camp. Should Betty fail to appear, the other girls, learning the cause, were sure to take sides and no one would be really happy.

Until Esther finished her story Polly listened without comment, although her face flushed and her lips were pressed close together.

"I do think Miss McMurtry was a little hard," she said finally. "It isn't fair to expect us to reform all at once and she might remember that Betty has never had the discipline of having to do things when she didn't wish to before. It is different when one has been poor, isn't it, Esther? Never mind, I will do my best. Betty hasn't any right to make everybody uncomfortable just because she is offended, particularly when she has had so much to do with our plans for to-night."

Polly disappeared, but when tea was served a short time later a signal to Esther reported that she had met with no success. Betty helped with the evening work, saying nothing but looking pale and tired, so that Miss McMurtry wondered if she had been too severe. Perhaps Betty was used up by her walk! She would have liked to have talked to her but had no opportunity, for as soon as supper was over (and three other girls always did the clearing up) Betty immediately disappeared inside her tent, and when her three friends came in to dress for their meeting they found her in bed covered up with her blue blankets and not in the mood for conversation.

Vainly Mollie and Esther attempted persuasion, reproaches, they received always the same answer--fatigue and not ill temper kept Betty from their entertainment. She was sorry of course but they would probably have a better time without her.

Curious, but in the half hour required by the three girls for their dressing, Polly, in spite of her promise, added not a single word of regret or entreaty in spite of Esther's pleading looks and Mollie's outspoken demands that her sister exert her influence. Appearing utterly absorbed in her own costume and in admiring Esther's and Mollie's, Polly only shook her head.

The June afternoon was a long one, so there still remained sufficient daylight for the girls to see to dress in their tent. Over the crest of Sunrise Hill a pale crescent moon with a single star glowing beneath it had now arisen and the moonlight later on promised to be radiant.

There were bursts of laughter, cries of admiration floating from one open tent to the other, for this was the first time the girls had seen one another dressed in their new costumes.

Polly plaited her long black hair in two braids, twining it in and out with narrow strips of bright orange ribbon, and then around her head she bound a broader band of ribbon the same color with a single black feather just above her forehead on the left side. With her dark hair and high cheek bones, which to-night were crimson with excitement, she made an unusually picturesque Indian girl. Mollie's hair was softer in texture and less heavy, so that she wore it hanging loose over her shoulders.

At first, however, Esther's appearance was not much of a success.

Although, apparently lost in languor and uninterested in anything, from her couch Betty observed her, wondering what could be done. For Esther to look so awkward and plain to-night, when as the first of their Camp Fire girls to be raised to the rank of Fire Maker she would be the center of all eyes, did seem hardly fair.

Trying to make the best of herself and without the gift most girls have in this direction, Esther had also arranged her hair in two braids, but while her hair was thick it was too short to be effective in this style, and parted in the middle accentuated the plainness of her long face with its irregular features, light blue eyes and large mouth; moreover, the bright yellow of her khaki costume with its red fringes, gay sh.e.l.l and beads made her complexion appear in contrast paler than ever. In despair she was twisting a band of bright red cotton decorated in bra.s.s spangles about her forehead, when a cry from Polly, who happened at this moment to catch sight of her, made her drop her head-dress.

"Stop, and don't you ever so long as you live, Esther Clark, dare to put a touch of red near your face," Polly demanded autocratically, rummaging at the same time in a small box on a table which she knew held a number of trinkets belonging to Betty. The next moment drawing forth a band of dull silver embroidery about an inch and a half wide, she crossed over to the older girl.

"Please let me fix you a little differently," she urged coaxingly, beginning at once to unwind Esther's hair and combing it out over her shoulders; then loosening it in front she put the silver band like a crown about it. Esther's hair wag red, of this there could be no denial, but now unbound it showed bright strands of gold and darker shades of red that could never have been discovered when tightly fastened to her head. Perhaps it was partly due to Polly's little act of friendliness making the other girl happier, but certainly there was a marked change for the better in Esther's appearance, so much so that Betty decided she looked almost pretty when a few moments afterwards her three friends bidding farewell to her went out leaving her alone in her tent, where the darkness was now closing in. In parting, Mollie and Esther had added a final plea to Betty to join them, but still Polly had spoken no word.

Lying alone on her couch Betty wondered why? Of course Polly was always being swept off her feet by new people and new interests and so after ten days in camp would not be so fond of her, but it was odd that she cared nothing for her presence at their Council Fire to-night, since they had planned the whole ceremony together and were to play leading parts.

Partly to close out the moonlight, which was now shining faintly inside her tent, and partly to shut her ears to the voices and laughter of her friends, Betty turned over on her balsam pillow with her face to the tent side, and there covering up her head lay perfectly still, so still that she would not even put her handkerchief to her eyes, although for some reason or other they were uncomfortably moist.

Fifteen minutes pa.s.sed and there was no noise of a returning footfall, but presently there was a faint, sweet odor in the lodge and Betty heard a low call such as a boy would make on a wild reed whistle.

She did not stir, so the sound was repeated more shrilly, and by and by a pair of hands forcibly pulled the blankets down from her face.

There stood Polly in her Indian costume with her intense love for the dramatic shining in her eager face and holding above Betty's head two perforated sticks, one painted blue to represent the sky, the other green to represent the earth, and both of them decorated in tiny feathers of birds and a pair of wing-like pendants.

"Betty," Polly asked quietly, "do you remember the names of these two Indian treasures and how hard we have worked to make them as like the originals as we could?"

"Of course, they are the calumets you are to use in the Council Fire ceremony to-night. They are pretty!" Betty conceded.

But Polly had dropped down by the side of her bed. "They have another name, Betty, which isn't calumets and you know it, and we were to use them at our Council Fire to-night. They are called 'pipes of peace' and I can't very well lead the party that is to bring them to camp and also the children who are to receive them."

A silence in the tent then followed, lasting several moments.