Girl Scouts Series, Volume 3
The Girl Scout's Triumph
or
Rosanna's Sacrifice
By Katherine Keene Galt
THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY
CHICAGO AKRON, OHIO NEW YORK
MADE IN U. S. A.
Copyright, MCMXXI, by
THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY
THE GIRL SCOUTS SERIES
1 THE GIRL SCOUTS AT HOME
2 THE GIRL SCOUTS RALLY
3 THE GIRL SCOUT'S TRIUMPH
[Illustration: Claire was lying there on the rug, and Claire was crying.
Rosanna slid from her bed and ran across the room.]
THE GIRL SCOUT'S TRIUMPH
CHAPTER I
The red-haired girl stared fixedly out of the window. There was nothing
to look at but black night, and the light from within turned the glass
into a dusky mirror where her image was clearly reflected. But she
stared at it unseeingly, busy with her thoughts.
She was very early, but in fifteen minutes or so the Girl Scouts would
commence to arrive. It was something of an ordeal to face the strangers
and she had planned to be the first one in the room. She thought it a
distinct advantage to meet them so rather than to enter the room feeling
that the fifteen or twenty pairs of eyes were all noting her and the
brains belonging to them were registering the usual formula, "Goodness,
what _red_ hair!"
She never could see why people always spoke of her hair. Certainly there
were redder heads, and her heavy, waving locks were always perfectly
cared for, glossy and brushed with careful attention. She pulled the
long braid over her shoulder and looked at it. The braid was thicker
than her wrist, and when unbound it reached nearly to her knees. Almost
petulantly she swung it behind her and turned her eyes toward the window
again. They were queer eyes, a strange sea-green in color, and their
black lashes and straight brows gave them a dark and brooding
expression. She was pale, but it was not a wholesome pallor. She looked
like a girl whose hours were not good, who sat up too late, and ate the
wrong kinds of food. Her supple slender hands were bare except for a
little finger ring of green jade set in silver. Her wrist-watch showed
its tiny face from the center of a silver and jade bracelet. She wore
the jewel pushed far up her sleeve.
The door opened, and a tiny figure in the uniform of the Scout Captain
entered. The red-haired girl, still staring into the night, did not
bother to turn, and with a long glance at the unfamiliar and unfriendly
back the little lady who had just entered advanced to the table in the
center of the room and arranged the papers lying there. Occasionally she
directed a puzzled glance toward the girl at the window, but silence
filled the big room and the resolute shoulders showed no sign of
curiosity or embarrassment. The little lady at the table smiled. She was
well aware that the girl at the window, looking into the dark pane as in
a looking-glass, was watching her closely. She frowned suddenly at the
girl's rudeness, then smiled and went on with her task.
A little later the door opened and a laughing, chattering group entered.
Then and not until then did the red-haired girl rise and advance.
The girls stared, and the stranger's lip curled. Her red hair! It was
always so. Walking slowly toward the table, she started to give a
perfunctory salute, a salute which changed character and became snappy
enough as she felt her gaze held by a pair of deep, compelling eyes. The
Scout Captain was tiny and looked not a day over sixteen; but she was
the Captain, and the red-haired stranger reluctantly admitted it to
herself. She could not complain of the friendliness of her greeting.
Wanderer as she was, drifting here and there over the world, a Scout in
one place after another, she was aware that here were girls filled with
the simplest and most charming courtesy. Each one met her with a sweet
warmth of manner that almost pierced her chill and reserve, and when she
turned and took her seat as the business meeting commenced, the girls
were all along wondering if the stranger was shy, sad, or merely bored.
A feeling of puzzled resentment stirred in a few. If the strange girl
did not wish to be friendly, why had she brought herself and her jade
green eyes and her queer ring into their happy circle?
The meeting progressed quietly. The strange new element cast a spell
over the happy group. It was not as though they were depressed; it was
rather as though they were waiting for something to happen, as though
it was time for the curtain to go up on a new and exciting play.
The girls, all a little restless by nature, smiled, shifted in their
seats and occasionally touched each other with friendly, caressing
hands. They regarded the little Captain with adoring eyes and cast
questioning and friendly glances toward the newcomer.
She, however, ignored them all. It was as though she sat alone, her
strange, deep eyes fixed on the Captain's sparkling face, studying it
with cool, impersonal interest. She never changed her easy, graceful
position, and her delicate hands rested in her lap motionless as though
carved from wax.
The meeting closed, and as was their custom when a new girl joined, the
Scouts gathered around the stranger with pretty, friendly advances. As
they spoke to her, she regarded them with the same curious gaze she had
bent on the Scout Captain.
"We are so glad you have joined us," said a sparkling mite, dancing from
one tiny foot to the other. "You say your name is Claire Maslin? Mine is
Estella LaRue."
"And mine is Jane Smith," said a tall beauty with golden hair and
pansy-blue eyes.
"Plain Jane," laughed little Estella, swinging on Jane's arm.
"Have you just moved to Louisville?" asked another girl softly.
"Yes," said Claire. It was the first time she had spoken and the girls
waited breathlessly for more information. But the simple yes was her
whole contribution.
"Well, you must let us see a lot of you," said a bright-faced girl with
docked hair. "Where do you live?"
"At the Seelbach at present," said Claire Maslin. Her voice was very
deep and throaty for a young girl, and she spoke slowly.
Again the girls waited, expecting an invitation to call, but Claire said
nothing. The silence grew oppressive. At the table the Scout Captain and
a group of the girls were deep in some important discussion. No help
could be expected from that quarter. It came, however, as the colored
house-boy appeared at the door.
"Cunnel Maslin's car," he announced.
"Good-night," said Claire Maslin, her sudden smile sweeping the group
and embracing them all. She left them and, moving easily toward the
table, said a polite but brief good night to the little Captain.
"We will see you out," said Estella LaRue, tugging at plain Jane and
accompanying the newcomer to the door. She passively allowed them to
come, and the door closed.
In five minutes the two girls, round eyed and astonished, rushed back.
"Oh, what _do_ you think?" cried Jane.
"Yes, what?" echoed Estella, dancing up and down.
"_I_ think she is a fairy princess in disguise," said Jane, nodding her
golden head.
"_I_ think she is a grouch," said a stout girl at the table, turning
suddenly.
"Why, Mabel, you positively must not say a thing like that!" said the
little Captain in a shocked tone. "She is shy, and it is a good deal to
come and meet so many girls at one time."
"Do let us tell you what happened!" begged Estella. "We followed her out
into the cloak-room, and she put on the _best_ looking hat and Jane
commenced to look for a cloak that might be hers. But I was watching
her, and she put her hand inside her blouse, and brought out a little
handful of stuff and shook it out, and oh dear, oh dear, you never,
never saw anything so wonderful!"
"It was a big scarf of silk or chiffon or crepe. Something soft and
cobwebby and heavy all at the same time. She wound it around her, and
Estella stuttered, 'Won't you freeze in that?'"
"She said, 'My cloak is in the hall,' and we followed her down to the
door, and there--"
"Standing against the wall," broke in Estella--
"Like a graven image," interrupted Jane--
"Was a _Chinaman_!" cried both girls.
"A _Chinaman_!" exclaimed the crowd as one girl.
"Yes," said Jane, while Estella danced up and down and nodded violently.
"He had her cloak over his arm, and she spoke to him in some jabbery
language, Chinese I suppose, and he shook the cloak open and put it
around her shoulders. It was soft white fur."
"Simply _too_ lovely," sighed Estella.
"Then she said good-night, nothing else, and went out with the Chinaman
following," completed Jane.
"Who can she be?" said Estella dreamily.
"A fairy princess, I reckon."
"Fairy fiddlesticks!" laughed the little Captain. "It is all very
simple. Her father has been here to see me. He is a colonel in the Army
and for a long time was stationed in China. Hence the Chinese servant.
Her father, Colonel Maslin, is very anxious to have her know some nice
girls. Claire joined the Girl Scouts when they were stationed in
Washington. Colonel Maslin says Claire finds it difficult to make
advances, and I want you all to be as friendly as you can be."
"Well, I would hate to have a heathen holding _my_ cloak," said Mabel
piously. "What did he have on?"
"Chinese clothes, of course, and made of silk, and all loose and baggy
and flowing and embroidered, and sort of bluish and purplish and
goldish."
"Must have been rather weird," said Mabel, sniffing.
"It wasn't weird one bit," declared Estella. "It was the most gorgeous
thing I ever saw except that white fur cloak. Oh, and did you notice
that queer ring she wears? Just exactly the color of her eyes. I suppose
that is Chinese too."
"She has had a most thrilling life, I am sure," said the little Captain.
"I think she can tell us some interesting things when she feels
acquainted with us. She is either very reserved or very shy. Don't rush
her; just be your own dear friendly selves, my girls, and do all you can
for her. Something tells me that Claire Maslin needs us."
"Someone always needs us, seems to me," said Mabel. "We just get one
person off our minds when up pops someone else."
"Well, don't you think it is splendid and all sorts of fun to be of
service?" demanded a bright, pretty, blond girl with docked hair.
"I suppose so," grumbled Mabel, "but I think sometimes it would be nice
to think just about myself for a while."
The girls looked shocked, but the little Captain suddenly laughed. "Very
well," she said. "It is worth trying if you think it would make you
happy. I will detail you, Mabel, to make a study of this. For the coming
week I want you to think wholly and _only_ of yourself. You will keep a
daily notebook and jot down exactly what you do for yourself and what
you leave undone for others. Be sure to make note of the amount of
happiness you get out of it. You will report at our weekly meeting next
Saturday. There is an extra meeting on Wednesday but you need not
present any report then."
Mabel looked at Mrs. Horton with round, astonished eyes.
"Why, Captain, I can't _do_ it," she said. "My mother wouldn't allow it
at all. Why, she simply wouldn't! She is always preaching generosity and
unselfishness."
"I don't believe she will notice what you are doing," said the Captain.
"If she does, you can explain it to her. Otherwise say nothing at all.
This is a Scout order, remember, and I expect you to do it with all your
heart. We want to work this out. It will be very interesting to learn
just how much pleasure one can get from absolute selfishness. That is
what you really mean, you know, Mabel, when you want to live entirely
for yourself."
"If everyone did it, no one would have to do anything for anyone else,
would they? Everything would be all done, and everyone would be doing
just what they liked best to do," said Mabel, sticking to her point.
"Perhaps," granted the Captain. "It is worth trying out."
"Why don't we all try it for a week?" suggested Mabel, feeling that
perhaps there was safety in numbers.
"That would be upsetting," said the Captain. "You shall be our pioneer,
Mabel."
"Well, mother won't stand for it, I know," said the girl as she pulled
on her soft tam-o'-shanter and said good-night. She went out very
thoughtfully and the Captain with a queer little smile hurried to the
telephone booth and called a certain number. A long conversation with
Mabel's mother followed: a conversation punctuated by much laughter and
a little sadness.
When the Captain returned to the big scout room, all the girls had gone
excepting the three she loved the best. Elsie Hargrave, the little
French orphan adopted by Mrs. Hargrave and living in her splendid
residence near by; Helen Culver, whose clever father had once been old
Mrs. Horton's chauffeur; and the Captain's niece by marriage, Rosanna
Horton: Rosanna of the dark eyes and lovely smile; Rosanna, whose tender
and generous disposition made her well-loved wherever she went.
"What did you do that for, sweetness?" said Rosanna, putting an arm
around the tiny Captain.
"You mean that detail for Mabel?" laughed little Mrs. Horton. "She needs
it, and I am sure it will work out exactly right. Mabel is continually
fretting about what she has to do for other people and what she is
obliged to do at home. I think she is not nearly so selfish as she tries
to be, but she is certainly taking a wrong turn. I want to help her if I
can."
"She will be punished if she gets any worse than usual," said Helen with
conviction. "Her mother just simply _hates_ selfishness and keeps after
Mabel all the time."
"Perhaps that is where part of the trouble lies," said Mrs. Horton,
nodding her head. "Well, I don't believe she will interfere this time."
"Trust the dear little one to arrange all," said Elsie in her pretty
way.
"We will have a good many thrills, I think," said Helen, laughing,
"between Mabel's experiment and that funny new girl, Claire Maslin."
Mrs. Horton looked grave.
"Confidentially, girls, I have a feeling that the 'funny new girl' as
you call her, is not so funny after all. There is trouble enough there
somewhere, and we must help her through."