"Don't worry," said Winona cheerfully. "We aren't going to miss any of the refreshments, and neither are you! What do you think Camp Fire Girls are good for?"

"Lots!" said Billy honestly, "but I don't see--"

"That's because you aren't looking," laughed Winona.

She pointed towards the little tent that draped the kitchen door. From out that tent issued haughtily Thomas's two negro waiters, each bearing a steaming, creamed-oyster-laden tray.

"You'd better sit down," suggested Winona, "Everybody else has."

"Well, this is great!" cried Billy enthusiastically, between bites of creamed oysters and sandwiches, and sips of fruit lemonade that was really better than that the Bent Street gang had stolen. "You don't mean to say you girls did all this right off the bat, while we were hunting the hoodlums, do you?"

"Why, of course we did," and Winona dimpled with pleasure. "There were such a lot of us that it wasn't hard at all."

"Anyhow, whoever managed it was a mighty clever person," said Billy, meditatively eating his last oyster. "Don't you think so?"

This happened to be a rather embarra.s.sing question.

"Why, no!" she said thoughtlessly.

"Then it was you!" said Billy, jumping cleverly to his conclusion.

"We all helped," said Winona, blushing. "Everybody brought something. I only thought of it first-that was easy."

"Easy if you know how!" said Billy skeptically.

"Winona knew how," a.s.serted Helen's voice behind them. She began to talk to Winona and Billy very earnestly about several things that didn't seem to have much to do with life in general. They had to turn half round to face her, which was what she wanted, for it prevented Winona from seeing that all the members of the Camp Fire were cl.u.s.tered near her place. The first she knew of it was Mrs. Bryan's voice saying:

"All together, girls-a cheer for Ray of Light, who saved the refreshments!"

The girls' voices rang out in the triple cheer for Winona, who blushed harder than ever.

"I didn't do anything but suggest it!" she explained uselessly. Then she remembered her manners and sprang up.

"Thank you, Sisters of the Camp Fire-even if I _don't_ deserve it!" she said gayly.

Then the band started up and dancing went on.

The evening ended with a riotous Virginia reel (which, by the way, meant an honor bead for every girl, because the boys none of them knew much about reeling, and had to be shown) and a final ringing cheer for the Camp Fire Girls by the Scouts. Then the party broke up. Though broke up is hardly the word, for the girls marched out, as they had come, in a body, with a military file of Scouts on either side of them. Altogether it certainly was the most festive of parties, and everybody thought so even next morning, when the mournful things about a party are apt to occur to you.

The Scouts insisted, by the way, on replacing the various things that had been taken out of various pantries. The girls had intended to pay their families scrupulously back, but the Scouts extracted an exact account of the commandeered supplies from their sisters and cousins.

Then they saw to it that everything, from the last loaf of bread to the last peanut, was redelivered by four next day. And so ended "the very best party," as everybody agreed, "that we ever had."

CHAPTER EIGHT

"It _was_ a nice party!" sighed Winona, for the tenth time, next day.

"It was," admitted Tom. "I enjoyed it myself. Also the eats were good.

Very clever of us to give a party like that. The question is, if you girls had to manage a real meal what would happen?"

"That's exactly what we're going to do," said Winona. "This very afternoon, at Mrs. Bryan's!"

"Oh, can't I go?" clamored Florence.

"Well, it's just Helen and Louise and Adelaide Hughes and I," Winona hesitated. "It's the maid's day out, and we're going to get the supper and clear it away. Four of the others are going to do it a day or so later. And we're all going to try to get the same supper at our own houses, the next night."

"Then of course I want to go!" said Florence, "so I can get the same supper at home the next night."

Still Winona hesitated. It certainly is a nuisance to have a small sister who wants to tag, when you are just starting off to have a particularly nice time with your most intimate friends. And to add to the charm of the situation, just then in rushed Puppums through the back door, and seeing Winona with her hat in her hand, promptly sat up and began to beg wildly. Winona began to laugh.

"Oh, come on, then, the whole family!" she said.

Florence and Puppums both yelped for joy.

"Shall I send Tom over to bring you back this evening?" asked Winona's mother, who was sitting near.

"Oh, no-it isn't far," said Winona, "and it won't be late when I get back. Besides, I'll have Florence and the doggie."

"Very well," said her mother. "And don't try to cook things that are too gorgeous, my dear, because we haven't as much money as the Bryans, and it might turn out to be very expensive."

"I'll remember," said Winona, starting off with her little sister beside her, and Puppums careering wildly about them both. But it was one of the things that never did worry the Merriams, whether or not they had as much money as their neighbors. The three children and the dog, as their friends said, "always did seem to be having such a good time!" They were handsome and light-hearted-that is, the children were. Puppums was more remarkable for brains than beauty, as Tom said; being part pug, part bull-terrier and part fox-terrier, with a dash of retriever suspected in his remote ancestry. However, as long as he had his own way and plenty of bones and enough laps to sit on, neither his looks nor anything else worried the Puppums dog. His family had intended to give him a very fine name, but as Puppums he started when he was a small, wriggling mongrel-baby, and to nothing but Puppums would he ever deign to answer.

So the family made the best of it. It was a way they had, anyway.

Florence began to career around her sister very much as the dog was doing, singing at the top of her voice meanwhile. So, as Winona did not have to talk, she began to think. What her mother had said about their not having so much money as the Bryans set her to wondering, not about herself, but about Adelaide Hughes. She had noticed that Mrs. Bryan seemed to want Adelaide to make friends with the other girls, and that Adelaide herself was very apt to leave the first advances to them. And the reason, she supposed, was that Adelaide felt she was too poor to keep up with them, or so Tom had said.

"But I don't ever feel as if I had to keep up with Helen, and she has twice as many dresses and twice as much money to spend as I have,"

meditated Winona. "I wonder if I could ask Adelaide about it without hurting her feelings. I will if I get the chance."

About this time Winona and her caravan reached the Bryan house, and Florence ran ahead so quickly to ring the bell that Winona had to run, too, to be there when the door opened.

"I've brought my family, Mrs. Bryan!" said Winona. "I hadn't any choice-they simply would come. It's really your fault for being so popular with them."

"Your family's very welcome!" said Mrs. Bryan. "If it's willing to be useful. What about it, Florence,-will you run errands for us if we want you to?"

"Course I will!" said Florence, flinging herself bodily on Mrs. Bryan and hugging her hard. "I want to work!"

"Puppums wants to help, too," said Helen.

"Well, you can't help that way, you little villain," said Louise, appearing ap.r.o.ned in the doorway and making a dash for the dog. He had his paws on the table, and was most ill-manneredly trying to find out what was wrapped up in the paper with the lovely meaty smell. Louise rescued the package, and carried it out to the kitchen.

"Is everyone here?" asked Mrs. Bryan. "No, I miss Adelaide."

"She's just coming now," said Helen from the living-room window. "I wonder if she's remembered to bring her ap.r.o.n?"

"Oh," cried Winona, "I never brought mine!"