Girl Scouts at Dandelion Camp
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The scouts stood speechless at the top of the slope, but gradually the truth about this “moving brigade” dawned upon Mrs. Vernon. She turned instantly to the girls, and said: “Be very grateful, for your people have gone to a great deal of trouble to refurnish your camp.”
Mr. Bentley was only too thankful to drop his burden when he reached the scouts; Ruth caught hold of his hand, laughing merrily as she said: “Oh, can you ever stand up straight again, Daddy?”
“I doubt it,” returned he, holding the small of his back.
Then the others came up and deposited their donations beside the kitchen-table. As each one sighed and wiped streaming faces, the scouts declared they were the finest families on earth.
“You certainly are very self-sacrificing to bring all this furniture to camp,” added Mrs. Vernon.
“We would have been cold-blooded folks if we hadn’t, after hearing how all the rustic furniture was destroyed,” said May.
“But we got it all back!” exclaimed Julie, joyously.
“Got it back! I thought those rascals smashed it up,” said Mr. Allison.
“No – they just hid it behind bushes and trees; only the grass mats and little ornaments were broken up,” explained Joan.
“Dear me! Do you mean to say that we brought this load of odds and ends all this way for nothing?” cried Mrs. Bentley.
“Of course not! Now we can entertain company over-night, you see. With that mattress and spring we can have two people,” declared Julie, looking at her companions for credit of this idea.
“That’s so! And we can furnish a regular bedroom with the chairs and table – and banquet lamp,” added Joan.
“But we will have to pin a notice on those chairs so no one will use them,” ventured Betty, doubtfully, looking at the legless objects.
Every one laughed, and Ruth added: “We’ll build new legs on to them.”
“You’ll have to build another hut to hold the furniture,” now said Mr. Gilroy.
This attracted all attention to the stranger, and Mrs. Vernon suddenly flushed crimson, and said: “Oh! What a poor scout hostess I make. I quite forgot to introduce our guest, Mr. Gilroy.” Then the usual ceremony took place, midst the laughter of every one, for Mrs. Vernon was considered to be very particular about social customs.
“Now that all this furniture is here, what shall we do with it?” asked Joan.
“It won’t stand dew and weather like our rustic pieces, you know,” added Ruth.
“If you scouts will help move the ‘shower,’ we might pile it back of Hepsy’s shed and cover it with a canvas until you have built a hotel,” laughed May.
So, with merriment and strenuous labor, the furniture was neatly stacked up beside the shed until it could be better arranged.
Then every one sat down to listen to the story of the capture of the convicts. As all the scouts wished to tell the tale at the same time so that no one understood, the visitors quickly voted that Mrs. Vernon be the speaker. This was acceptable to the girls, and the Captain began.
She was a good story-teller, and the scenes were graphically described until she reached the part where the Chief stood on the roof of the hut, commanding the fugitives to come out. To make the recital more impressive, the Captain threw out her arm, which was supposed to hold the revolver, when quite unexpectedly the chair she sat in collapsed, and she found herself on the grass.
For a second every one held his or her breath, then laughed heartily at Mrs. Vernon’s surprised expression. Julie jumped up from the stump where she had been sitting and ran over to explain.
“Oh, I am so sorry, Verny! I forgot to tell you that the fore leg of this rustic seat was loose. I tied it on with string to make it look right, but I didn’t think any one would use it.”
“Good gracious, Jule! Did you think our camp wanted ornamental furniture?” demanded Joan, thinking thereby to give a strong hint to the friends who showered useless articles upon them that day.
This statement caused rather a silence in the visitors, until May said: “I hope you won’t find much trouble in repairing the pieces we brought for you.”
“Oh, we will make some sort of use of them,” replied Julie, frankly, as sisters will. “We can pull the old stuffing out of that sofa, you know, and use it for bedding for Hepsy, when we run short of dried leaves or grass.”
Every eye turned to look at the old sofa, and Mr. Gilroy had great difficulty in keeping his face straight. Finally the erstwhile owner of the sofa said: “Horses don’t like hair for bedding.”
Julie retorted: “Because it makes them dream of what all the tails and manes come to when they die!”
This caused a laugh, and Joan added: “Anyway, a horse in camp – ’specially a scout horse – can’t be choosers about bedding. They are glad to get what is to be had.”
Mr. Lee laughingly replied to this: “I’m glad I’m not a scout horse.”
Mrs. Vernon now turned to her sister-in-law and said: “I’m curious to hear what donations you found to bring out?”
“Oh, Pete told me there was a loft full of furniture over the old stables. So I rummaged and found all I could manage.”
“That reminds me, Mrs. Ormsby! We have not added your gifts to these because we could not carry them up the slope. They were too heavy,” explained Mr. Lee.
“My goodness me! More stuff?” exclaimed Ruth.
“Yes, but I think you will be pleased with my donations,” said Mrs. Ormsby, apologetically. “I heard how you had to manage with this poor camp-fire, so I brought a kitchen stove that was stored in the loft. I also – ” but the lady got no further at that time.
The scouts laughed so that some of them doubled over and rocked back and forth. Even Mrs. Vernon had to laugh at her relative’s pity.
“Oh, oh! This is the funniest thing I ever heard!” said she. “Why, my dear Kate, don’t you know that half the sport of camping is trying to do without modern equipment? Every camper tries to use wood-material only for home, furniture and outfit. What would the founders of the girls’ scouts say if they heard we cooked our camp meals on a kitchen range in the woods!”
“Do you really mean that you do not want it?” asked Mrs. Ormsby.
“Of course not! We have a fine fireplace and oven, so the stove and stove-pipe may as well go back on the truck.”
“Maybe you will scorn the walnut bed I brought as a great surprise? I heard there was a spring and mattress, so I had the bed brought from the loft and moved here on the truck with the other things. But it is so massive and heavy, no one could carry the head and foot boards up the hill. We thought Hepsy could do that,” explained Mrs. Ormsby, dubiously to be sure, after the reception her other gift had received.
Mrs. Vernon now laughed as heartily as the scouts had done just before this. “Oh! That awful bedstead that always took an acre lot to hold it! Where could we put it up? Our huts will never hold one section of it.”
“I have a brilliant idea, Mrs. Vernon,” now said Mr. Gilroy. “Suppose we put up the bed down there in some secluded nook and then with the spring and mattress I can have a wonderful suite of my own for a few nights.”
“There! I knew that bed would prove useful!” declared Mrs. Ormsby, sending a look of thanks to Mr. Gilroy.
“Maybe Mr. Gilroy would like the stove, too, to dry out the dampness from the ground where he camps,” suggested Julie.
Every one laughed excepting Betty; she took the idea as literal, and said: “That might be a good plan for us – to use it in front of the fireplace. You see, we can’t burn wood there ’cause it smokes so, but the stove-pipe can be run right up the flues so all the smoke from the stove will manage to get up where it ought to go.”
Another shout of laughter greeted this original proposition, and Mrs. Vernon finally gasped: “If the stove goes in the hut, we will have to stay out!”
“Then I suppose the stove has to go back?” Mrs. Ormsby wanted to know.
“We can sell it in Freedom, I have no doubt, and put the proceeds in the bank for the Adirondack Camp,” replied Mrs. Vernon.
“Oh, say, Verny! That’s what we can do with all this furniture, can’t we?” cried Julie, eagerly.
But her vivacious suggestion seemed to meet with another strange silence. Finally Mrs. Vernon broke the embarrassment by saying: “We ought to get dinner, as it is long past the hour.”
And Mr. Lee said: “I suppose the food-stock we brought to replenish the larder will be scorned.”
“Oh, no indeed, Daddy! We need things to eat!” said Betty.
As they all sat in a circle on the grass, eating and laughing, Eliza made a bold suggestion.
“Now, I sez we folks seem to be foolish over some things. One of ’em is, we hoard ole furniture and odds and ends that even a Dandelion laughs at! We pays rent fer jes’ sech useless trash that we never wants to use agin. Every house-cleanin’ time we moves and cleans the rubbish what collects moths, an’ finally, affer years of savin’, we throws it out.”
She paused to see what effect this statement had on her audience, and seeing it was politely received, she took another huge bite from the sandwich she held, and, while chewing vigorously, concluded her speech.
“Now, this is what I sez: ‘Let’s go home and clear out all the rubbage that clutters our attics, an’ give it to the poor, or sell it to a rummitch sale such as I hears tell of in Elmertown.’”
“I second that valuable motion!” laughed Mr. Lee.
And the men voted unanimously on the plan, but the ladies were not so easily persuaded. Mrs. Ormsby quickly added: “All opposed to the motion, say ‘Nay.’”
But the scouts and Mrs. Vernon shouted hilariously to drown opposition. There were two or three faint “nays,” so the motion was carried, and the men declared that they would see to it that it was fulfilled.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN – A VISIT TO GRANNY DUNSTAN’S CABIN
Mr. Gilroy’s “suite of rooms” was put in order by the men before they went back to Elmertown, and not only the walnut bed helped furnish the chamber, but several other pieces of furniture were carried back from the stack beside the shed, and placed to add a look of comfort to the “room.”
When all was done and the visitors were ready to leave, the scouts declared they would accompany their relatives down the slope and pass judgment on the “suite” to be occupied by their guest.
“It may be healthy to sleep out under the trees like this, but I prefer a plaster ceiling,” laughed Mr. Lee, waving his hand at the open woods that was to be Mr. Gilroy’s chamber.
“That’s because you never tried Nature’s ceiling. Once you sleep out in the open, you will never want to try indoors again,” replied Mr. Gilroy.
“I’d better not try it, then. I have to remain at home and see that some one provides the ‘pot-boiler,’” returned Mr. Lee.
The visitors climbed into the jitney and said good-by, and the scouts turned to go up the hill again, when Mrs. Vernon remarked: “Now that you have a boarder to look after, you must pay more attention to your cookery. Mr. Gilroy must not regret having accepted our invitation to camp with us for a few days.”
“But our invitation had ‘a string’ to it, Verny,” added Julie laughingly.
“That’s true – I said I would take ‘pot luck’ and teach the scouts many camping tricks to boot!” declared Mr. Gilroy.
Sunday morning at breakfast Mrs. Vernon said she was very anxious to meet young Dunstan, for he might have met her son in the Aviation Service. Then she had to tell Mr. Gilroy about it.
“I thought I would like to drive down to Freedom later in the day, Mrs. Vernon, and see if there was any mail for me. It was to be forwarded from Junction, you know. If you would care to go and ask about Dunstan, we might make a little party of it,” suggested Mr. Gilroy.
“Yes, Verny, let’s!” exclaimed the scouts.
“I am willing, as there seems little else one can do,” added Mrs. Vernon.
So Hepsy was hitched to the buckboard and the campers climbed in. As they started down the trail, Ruth remarked: “We ought to be thankful the posse found our hamper and seat in the Cave, and brought it back to camp.”
“Yes, or we’d have to ride on the floor of the buckboard,” added Joan.
“We’d have more room there than on this seat,” retorted Julie, who was clinging to the iron rail.
“We can take turns walking if we are too crowded,” suggested Mr. Gilroy, who shared the back seat with two scouts.
“We’ll have to do that, anyway, when Hepsy comes to a hill,” laughed Mrs. Vernon.
So with light banter the party rode to Freedom; there they were received like heroes, for every inhabitant of Freedom had clipped the papers and saved the items that mentioned the capture of the convicts. While Mr. Gilroy went with Lemuel to get his letters, Mrs. Vernon asked if young Dunstan had been heard from.
“Not yet, but sometimes he takes the Crest Trail to hum. In that case, he nary comes nigh Freedom,” replied an old native.
“Where does the Crest Trail start?” asked Mrs. Vernon.
“Wall, that’s the way Mr. Gilroy went from Junction. It runs along the top affer one gits halfway up from Junction.”
As this description was not very accurate, the Captain decided to trust to Mr. Gilroy’s ability to lead them there. So she made a proposition to Mr. Gilroy. The girls did not hear what it was, so they knew nothing of the outing planned for the morrow.
“I think it will be fine, Captain, and I will see the man who has charge of the stable,” returned Mr. Gilroy, in a low voice.
Soon after this Mr. Gilroy went down the main street and turned in at the livery stable. He was not gone long, however, and when he returned, he nodded satisfactorily to Mrs. Vernon.
That night Mrs. Vernon said to the scouts: “You must all go to bed early, as we have a jaunt planned for you to-morrow. Breakfast must be out of the way quite early, as we hope to start from camp about eight o’clock.”
“Where are we going, Verny?” asked Ruth.
“I heard Verny asking about Dunstan’s Cabin, and I bet she plans for us to walk there,” quickly added Julie.
Mrs. Vernon smiled at this added proof of Julie’s mental alertness, but she shook her head as she said: “Not a walk, but a ride.”
“A drive, you mean,” corrected Joan.
“No – just what I said. There will be horses from Freedom brought to camp before eight to-morrow, if it is clear,” explained Mrs. Vernon.
“Good gracious! I haven’t any habit!” exclaimed Ruth.
“We will ride in the bloomers we wear at camp,” said the Captain.
“I never knew there were enough saddles in Freedom for all of us,” laughed Julie.
“That is what I went to find out,” said Mr. Gilroy. “The man, Mark, who has charge of the stable, told me he could hire some from the farmers round about. He is going to bring up the horses in the morning and take them back in the evening.”
“What will he do meantime, to kill time here?” asked Joan.
“He said he would make some bird-boxes for you, and nail them up in various trees, so you can entice the birds to nest here.”
But the scouts had not yet studied bird-life, so they were not aware that the nesting period was past. They delighted in the news that they were to have bird-houses, however.
When Mr. Gilroy took up his flashlight to go down to his “Royal Suite,” as the scouts called the walnut bedstead, Joan said: “Shall we escort you down the trail?”
“Oh, no! I can find the bed, all right. It is such a huge affair that I would have to be blind not to see it in the dark.”
The scouts were soon in bed after this, and honestly tried to go to sleep, but the new adventure planned for the morrow kept them awake. After telling each other what they would wear and how well they could ride horses, one after the other quieted down, and, last of all, Mrs. Vernon was able to sleep.
It was past eight when Mark was seen coming up the trail leading a line of horses, saddled and ready to ride. Stopping at the Royal Suite, he waited for Mr. Gilroy to get upon the largest horse. Then they continued to the camp.
The girls had breakfast out of the way, and were anxiously waiting for the horses, so Mark had quite an audience as he rode up on the plateau.
The scouts seldom had opportunity to ride a horse when at home, and now they commented on the different animals. Julie instantly said: “I choose the brown one – he is so shiny.”
“Seems to me they look awfully tall,” whispered Betty.
“They be the usual size, miss,” said Mark, who overheard.
“Maybe they won’t seem so high when we get up,” added Joan.
Mrs. Vernon laughed. “That is always the first thought of an amateur rider – how high up the saddle seems!”
Mr. Gilroy assisted the Captain to mount, then he helped the girls up. Mark had an extra horse, and now he said: “I brung my own hoss ez I figgered I’d best lead the way as fur as Crest Trail. After that it’s easy going and you can’t miss Dunstan’s Cabin.”
“All right, Mark – lead on,” said Mr. Gilroy.
“As the hosses is all safe fer ridin’, the scouts needen’ fear ’em. They ain’t colts ner air they skittish,” said Mark.
Mr. Gilroy smiled, for he surmised as much. The mounts, in fact, seemed aged enough to be pensioned for the rest of their lives.
As Mark led the way up the trail, he described Granny Dunstan and her abode. “She’s most a hunerd years old, an’ she’s allus lived in that cabin. This boy is her great-gran’son, but his folks lives in a town some forty mile away. He come to stop wid’ Granny when she got so old, an’ he likes the woods life.”
“But he enlisted, you say, to fight the Germans,” said Mrs. Vernon, eagerly.
“Yeh! He keeps up to th’ times, an’ hes books and papers up thar. When the Lusertani was sunk he got reel mad, an’ come down to Freedom an’ wanted to git a crowd of young uns up to go and shoot the Huns. But they diden’ want to go so fur from hum. Then he got his dander up an’ says: ‘I’ll jine myself, then. You’ll hear of me some day!’ And off he goes. Some folks said he oughter have stayed wid his Granny, so a few of us druv up to ask her about it. Golly! she mos’ made us deef with her shoutin’ at our bein’ slackers, cuz she said her boy was the onny true Yank in Freedom!
“She made us feel mighty small when she shouts out: ‘Yuh call yer town Freedom! Bah – it ain’t nothin’ but a handful of cowards. It oughter be called “Slack town.”’ We got away pritty soon affer that, an’ folks ain’t so anxious to visit Granny as onct they was.”
This explanation gave the scout party a good idea of the old woman they were about to visit, and Mrs. Vernon said:
“Do you think we should have told her we wanted to call?”
“Oh, no! she don’t mind strangers. She goes about her chores jes th’ same ez ef no one was there,” said Mark.
The seven horses padded softly up the grassy trail, and when they reached the cross-trail near the top of the mountain Mark reined in his mount.
“Now, yeh foller that trail to the crest an’ then turn t’ th’ left. Foller the road clear on till yeh come to the Cabin.”
Mark waited and watched until the last horse had disappeared on top of the mountain, then he rode back to camp to wait. The scouts continued on the trail, passing noisy streams that ran madly over rocks or fell over cliffs. The birds and flowers were many-hued and beautiful, so that every step of the way was enjoyable. Mr. Gilroy rode in front, and the Captain at the rear of the line.
After a ride of about three miles along the Crest, Mr. Gilroy stopped his horse and looked at a tiny cabin half-hidden under vines and giant trees. It sat back from the trail about twenty feet, and might have been passed by unless one was looking for it.
“Isn’t that lovely?” Joan said.
“Yes, in summer; but think how dreadful it would be in winter,” added Julie.
“She doesn’t live here all winter, does she?” asked Ruth.
“Yes; Mark says she won’t leave the place, although her granddaughter – the aviator’s mother, you know – begged her to move down to her home,” explained Mrs. Vernon.
“The roof’s as green as the grass,” now said Betty.
“It’s moss on the old shingles,” said Mrs. Vernon.
“Mark told me that folks at Freedom say the old lady has a heap of money hidden away in this old cabin, and no one knows where except her great-grandson, who will be the heir,” said Mr. Gilroy.
“But that is all conjecture, Mr. Gilroy, as no one has ever heard a word about it from Granny or her boy,” added Mrs. Vernon.
“I think it is idle gossip, for how could the old dame make the gold up here? It would take all she could earn with her herbs to pay for her living,” admitted Mr. Gilroy.
“Does she sell herbs?” asked the scouts, eagerly.
“Mark said she is the greatest Nature physician ever found around here. If the medical men can’t cure a sickness, they send for Granny Dunstan, and she gives the patients a drink of simples and they recover quickly.
“She used to sell these remedies all over the countryside, but of late years she doesn’t come down to the towns like she used to. Her boy sells his pelts instead, so that is why the people said she had gold enough.”
“I’m glad you told us this, Mr. Gilroy,” said Mrs. Vernon, “as I should like the scouts to learn from the aged woman how she gathers and prepares the tea and balms.”
The riders dismounted and tied their horses to trees, then followed Mr. Gilroy across the grass to the cabin. The door stood open but not a sound was heard from within.
“Just look at this construction!” cried Julie. “She’s used stones, logs and everything in the walls.”
“And the growing trees were used for corner-posts of the house,” added Mrs. Vernon, examining the odd structure.
Mr. Gilroy rapped politely on the door, but no one replied. Again he rapped louder, and a shrill bark sounded from a distance back in the woods.
“I guess she’s out in her garden,” said Mr. Gilroy.
“I heard a funny grunt from the little shed at the back of this room,” whispered Julie.
“Let’s go around the corner of the cabin and see if she is back there,” suggested Mrs. Vernon.
So they followed Mr. Gilroy, and all had to laugh when they found the grunt came from a sow with a litter of little pigs. She was queen of the shed that leaned against the cabin, so the scouts watched her with interest for a time, then turned to follow after Mr. Gilroy and the Captain.
But the sow grunted excitedly when the little ones ran after the visitors. They thought there would be something to eat, and having never seen strangers before they knew no fear of them. The angry grunting of the old mother hog made the dog bark again from the woodland, and soon after a bent-over form could be seen coming from the woods.
A hound bounded before her, barking shrilly at the trespassers, until the old woman shouted: “Be quiet, Bill!”
Instantly the dog dropped behind his mistress, and Mr. Gilroy lifted his hat as he greeted the aged dame.
Mrs. Vernon went forward also, and said: “We came to see you, Mrs. Dunstan; I heard your boy was an aviator in France, and I felt an interest in meeting and talking with you and him. My boy was one, too, but he was shot down.”
This was an opportune introduction, as nothing melted the old lady’s scorn and indifference to visitors like the interest one took in aviation.
“Now, this be a real treat! Them folks at Freedom won’t dare to come and see me since we went to war!” declared the centenarian in a strong voice.
Granny Dunstan squinted keenly at the visitors to make sure they were truthful, and, finding they seemed earnest, she led the way to the cabin.
“I rickon we better sit outside; the cabin’s too small to hold more’n three of us,” announced Granny, as she turned to address her visitors.
Her criss-crossed wrinkled face seemed to roll up with that grin, showing shrivelled toothless gums. Yet the aged face was attractive, with a subtle kind of wholesomeness seldom seen in old people. Mrs. Vernon said, later, that it must be the result of living alone with Nature and her children for so many years.
“You said you had a boy what was aviator in France?” questioned Granny, the moment the scouts had seated themselves.
“Yes, and when I heard your boy had been over, I was anxious to meet you both,” said Mrs. Vernon.
“Wall, my boy’s got a cross from France, an’ now he’s ben sent for to go to Washin’ton and meet some big folks what’s here visitin’ from France. I tell you, John’s a right smart soljer!”
The proud old dame wagged her head briskly as she gazed from one to the other of her hearers. Then she suddenly changed the conversation.