THE GHOST OF WAU-WAU
A silence so deep that the light breathing of the Camp Girls was plainly
heard, had settled over the interior of the tent. The faces of some of the
girls wore a horrified expression; on the faces of others there were
lurking smiles. Harriet suppressed her laughter with difficulty. But Mrs.
Livingston understood how to deal with Crazy Jane.
"It might be an appropriate costume for some occasions, Miss McCarthy,"
she said quietly. "If you will glance about you will see that the Camp
Girls dress alike, and in the most simple costume. Have you a uniform
with you?"
"Uniform? Gracious no. I'm not a soldier."
Mrs. Livingston explained that the dresses worn by the Wau-Wau Girls were
called uniforms. Jane McCarthy had known nothing about this before coming
to the camp. Her wardrobe was an elaborate one. The Chief Guardian said
she thought she might have a uniform that with slight alterations would
fit Jane, but that she had better sit down now and eat her dinner. Jane
promptly accepted the suggestion. Her chagrin at the Guardian's criticism
of her costume quickly passed and within a few moments Jane was
monopolizing the greater part of the conversation to the delight of some
of the girls and the disapproval of others.
Harriet was amused to see the shocked expressions on the faces of several
of the Wau-Wau Girls. The dinner ended, Harriet, regardless of the glances
of disapproval on the faces of some of her companions, linked her arm
within that of Jane and walked with the latter to her own quarters. Hazel,
Margery and Tommy followed. For the rest of the evening the Meadow-Brook
Girls chatted with Jane who showed them her frocks, told the girls how
much the frocks cost, then all at once, as Mrs Livingston in company with
one of the girl leaders came in, Jane spied three strands of brightly
colored beads on the neck of the latter.
"Oh, how pretty," she cried.
The leader smiled, permitting Jane to finger the beads.
"I must have some of those," she decided with enthusiastic emphasis.
"You may, but you know you will have to earn them," Mrs. Livingston
informed her.
"Earn them? Why should I have to earn them? I've got plenty of money. I'll
buy them. Earn them? I guess not. Harriet, I'll buy you some more. Why,
you've got only two beads on your string. That's a shame."
"You do not understand, my dear," explained the Chief Guardian. "A girl
wins her beads as she would win honors in any other position in life--by
accomplishment. You would not value your beads so highly if you were to
purchase them, as you would were you to earn them by doing something worth
while."
"Tell me what I can do to earn them," urged Jane after brief reflection.
"For instance, you drive an automobile?"
"Yes; what of that?" asked Jane brightening.
"In that line a girl may win an honor if she is able to drive an
automobile for five hundred miles in one season without help or
advice----"
"Five hundred miles, why Mrs. Livingston I've driven that old rattle-trap
of mine more than two thousand miles already this season and done all the
repairing myself."
"That entitles you to a bead, a red one."
"Only one!" pouted Jane.
"Only one," smiled the Guardian.
"How may I earn another?"
"By some other achievement such as----"
"I can climb a tree."
"Tho can I," piped Tommy. "But I can't get down again."
"You ride horseback, your father tells me. You may win a bead by riding
forty miles in any five days."
"I've done better than that, too, this season."
"That is two beads. You see you were earning them all the time and did not
know it."
Jane was becoming enthusiastic. Mrs. Livingston was instilling the Camp
Girl spirit into her almost without Jane's realizing it.
"What else can I do to earn a bead? I nearly ran down a man coming out
here to-day. Do I get a bead for that?" asked the girl, causing her
companions to indulge in a merry laugh.
"Mithith Livingthton, pleathe give her a bead becauthe thhe didn't kill me
one time when thhe nearly ran over me," urged Tommy.
"I will tell you how you may win two more beads."
"Yes, yes."
"You are a resourceful girl, I know. Now suppose you get up some sort of
entertainment and carry it through; some entertainment for the girls of
the Camp, something unusual."
"A candy pull!"
"Well, perhaps. We do not eat much candy here. However, I think a candy
pull might prove entertaining even though it is not an unusual thing to
do."
"I'll make it unusual," promised Jane.
"I'll tell you what to do. Make it a candy pull and ghost party,"
suggested Harriet.
"What do you mean, Miss Burrell?" questioned the Guardian.
"Pull candy and have certain girls tell ghost stories."
"Yes, that will be entertaining. Miss Thompson, do you think you would
have the nightmare after an evening such as that?" asked Mrs. Livingston
with a twinkle in her eyes.
"I hope not," answered Tommy with promptness. "Not if I didn't thee the
ghotht."
"Then you may see what you can do, Miss McCarthy. I have all the supplies
necessary to make the candy. I shall look for you to distinguish yourself.
Good night, young ladies. I called to see if you were well taken care of,
Miss McCarthy."
"Fine. This is a jolly old shack. Good night, Mrs. Livingston," added the
girl with more gentleness than she had yet shown. "Good old party, isn't
she?"
"Oh, Jane don't speak like that. Mrs. Livingston is a very superior woman.
She is more than that here; she is the mother of us all and she is so
good."
"Then I'll call her mamma. But Harriet?"
"Yes?" smiled Harriet.
"You'll have to mix the stuff for the candy."
"Why?"
"I never made any in my life."
"That is too bad. I can't make it for you. That would not be honest, but I
will write down the recipe and tell you how to make it. You must do the
actual work yourself. There is another thing I think perhaps I should
mention to-night. The girls hazed myself and Tommy the other night. They
may try to haze you, though I hardly think they will dare so soon after
the other affair. There was considerable trouble raised over that."
"Haze me?" Jane laughed merrily. "Feel that," she commanded, extending a
bare arm that to Harriet's touch seemed as hard as iron, "Do you think
they will haze Crazy Jane, eh?"
"I hardly think they will," answered Harriet, smiling and nodding. "I
should feel sorry for them if they tried."
"They'd feel more sorry for themselves."
"It is nearly nine o'clock, dear. You had better get ready for bed,"
advised Harriet. "All lights must be out at nine o'clock except on special
occasions like to-morrow night when we shall undoubtedly get permission to
sit up later."
The next day was an active one in camp. There was a baseball game in the
morning, a basketball game in the afternoon with tether ball and quoits on
the side. Jane was admitted to all these. She was strong and active, but
she lacked the skill of her friend Harriet. The latter's playing in
basketball and tennis was a revelation to the guardians who had never
known a high school girl who could play such an even and skilful game. It
was a foregone conclusion that Harriet was in a fair way to earn more
beads by her accomplishments in the games of the camp.
Tommy with her usual bad luck came to grief in pitching and catching the
medicine ball, a large ball stuffed with yarn. The ball weighed ten
pounds, and after catching it successfully once or twice Tommy failed to
stop it with her hands. It struck her with considerable force and losing
her balance she fell backward down a little hill and rolled into the brook
which ran at the foot of the incline. There she splashed about frantically
and implored her companions to "thave" her until helped to terra firma by
Harriet.
The day was a busy one for Harriet and Jane. The latter was making many
mysterious preparations for the evening. She had studied Harriet's
directions for making molasses candy as faithfully as she could study
anything, consulting learnedly with Mrs. Livingston about the quantity
that should be made, but making no reference to the other part of the
entertainment.
When evening came and the candy was brought out in great yellow heaps to
be pulled there was excitement in plenty. Tommy followed the girls who
carried the candy licking her fingers daintily.
"Have you been eating molasses candy already?" demanded Margery.
"Yeth. Tho have you. I thee thome on your fathe. Ithn't it delithiouth?"
"I should say so!" exclaimed Margery. "Jane McCarthy, you certainly know
how to make molasses candy."
"Thank you." Jane's cheeks were flushed, her eyes sparkled with
excitement. She never was so happy as when leading, no matter whether it
were in making candy or racing with a motor car.
The candy pull was a great success, the ropes of sweet stuff being thrown
over low-hanging limbs where the candy was pulled and pulled amid much
laughter and many shouts. Several trees were used for the purpose. The
candy pull being finished all the girls gathered about the fire, sitting
down Turk fashion.
"The little ghost will now appear among you and relate some live stories
from ghostland," announced Crazy Jane.
A slender white figure stepped from behind a tree so quickly as to bring
little screams of alarm from several girls. The figure was dressed in
white with a white mask covering her face. Some of the girls recognized
Harriet Burrell, but the majority did not. They did, however, shout with
laughter when a second ghost, the assistant to the first tripped out from
behind another tree with a little chirp that was distinctly unghostly.
"Hello, girlth," she piped.
The second ghost's usefulness was thereupon ended for the evening. The
girls grabbed and unmasked her. Harriet raised a wand, in this case a
burning fagot.
"Maidens fair," she began in a deep impressive voice. "Do you know what a
banshee is?"
"I know," cried Hazel. "A banshee is a ghost, that the peasants in Ireland
believe in. It stands outside their windows at night and wails dismally.
Its appearance is supposed to foretell the death of a member of the
family."
"Quite right," replied Harriet. "Now listen to my story. Once upon a time
there lived a family of poor people in County Mooreland in Ireland. With
them lived their beautiful child Muriel. Now the fairies and the banshees,
the wood nymphs and the sprites coveted this beautiful child Muriel
because they knew she would make a good fairy. But they dared not approach
the hut where Muriel made her home, in the daytime. At night little Muriel
was sound asleep behind closed doors. There was no way for the banshees
and the wood nymphs and the sprites to get into the house and take her
while she slept, for there always was a fire in the fireplace. As
everybody knows a fairy cannot pass through flames without singeing her
wings----"
"Why didn't thhe wear water wingth?" piped Tommy Thompson.
"Every night the fairies used to perch in the flowers and under the
shamrock that grew in Muriel's door yard, waiting and hoping to catch the
little one and kidnap her."
"Some one should have called the police," ventured Margery.
"If the sprites could reach Muriel," went on Harriet, ignoring Margery's
flippant remark, "they could quickly transform her into something else and
in that manner get her away. You see these were bad fairies and gnomes and
sprites and things."
"Yeth," agreed Tommy. "I thee."
"Well, one night a very powerful banshee came along and asked them what
they were doing there. They told it they were waiting for the beautiful
child Muriel that they might bear her away, but that they could not get to
her.
"'Oho, aha!' cried the banshee. 'I have a plan. I will call upon the
friend of my people, the west wind, to blow hard. Stand close and when the
door of the cottage blows open see that you enter by one door but do not
go out by the other. The west wind will blow thrice, then will die away.
It is for you to gather the child then. I can summon the wind but once.'"
"It thertainly had thome confidenthe in itthelf," observed Grace Thompson,
nodding her head.
"The fairies and the gnomes and the sprites and the banshees gathered
about the door of the shack," continued the first ghost, "Suddenly they
heard a wild, weird wailing off on the moor. The ghostly little
conspirators trembled with fear, for these midnight wailings, these
moaning winds across the moor boded no good for all of their kind. It
meant that the spirits of evil were abroad.
"Suddenly a mighty gale struck the little house, causing it to tremble
from cellar to roof. Then the front door burst open with a crash. The west
wind with an awful wail and roar rushed into the shack, carrying with it
the fairies and the gnomes and the sprites and the banshees. No sooner
were they inside the cottage than the other door burst open and all the
fairies and the gnomes and the sprites were hurled out and carried away on
the great gale. But one little banshee had found lodgment on a beam where
it clung until the gale had passed.
"And what do you think it did?"
"Carried away the child?" suggested a voice.
"Did you ever hear of anything so perfectly ridiculous?" exclaimed Cora
Kidder.
"I gueth it went to thleep and fell off into the fire," suggested Tommy.
"No. It waited until the gale had passed, then dropping down touched the
sleeping child with its magic wand, whereupon Muriel became a butterfly.
The banshees carried the butterfly away with them and in their home she
grew to be as beautiful a banshee as she had been a child. But she grew
and grew. There was no stopping her. She grew almost as rapidly as Jack's
beanstalk by which he climbed to the home of the giant."
"What a fright she must have been," interrupted a voice.
"As she grew she began to hate the banshees who had taken her from her
home and made her become like them. She determined to avenge herself. This
she did by making war upon all the other banshees. So powerful was she and
so familiar, too, with their hiding places in the flowers that she had
little difficulty in clearing the country of the little pests. Those who
were not killed were driven from the country, all of which accounts for
there being no banshees in Ireland now. But they are to be found in some
other parts of the world."
"Are--are there any over here?" questioned a timid voice from among the
girls.
"I have never seen any," replied Harriet. "Still, we do not know. A
banshee might fly into any one of our tents on a dark night and change us
into butterflies or banshees or something of that sort, and we wouldn't
know anything about it until we had been changed. When we woke up we
should be in so different a form that we shouldn't know ourselves if we
were to look into a mirror."
"I know who that draped figure is now," exclaimed Patricia. "It's that
hateful Harriet Burrell. Isn't she silly and presuming?"
"Yes," was the reply. "I am amazed that Mrs. Livingston allows her to be
so forward. She and that McCarthy girl make an excellent team. One is as
tiresome as the other."
"I have heard," continued the ghost, "that this great and powerful banshee
came to America to look for the descendants of the banshees who made her
become one of them. It has even been hinted that she has been seen in the
Pocono Woods."
"Oh, my gracious!" exclaimed Hazel, glancing about her apprehensively.
"What if we should see her? I'd die of fright, I know I should."
"Fiddle! Who ith afraid of a banthhee?" jeered Grace. "Now if I thaw that
banthhee I'd jutht thtep on her with my heel, tho!" She dug her little
heel into the ground to show how she would crush the banshee.
Harriet might have been observed to gaze off into the forest almost
apprehensively herself now and then. There was a quizzical smile on her
face, but it was hidden by the white mask she wore.
Suddenly she cried out: "Oh, girls! girls!" Then pointed directly over
their heads into the forest. "The banshee! The banshee! Look! Oh, look!"
Tommy sat shivering, not daring to turn her head. A few girls mustered up
sufficient courage to look behind them. Then a series of wild screams rent
the air. There was a mad rush for the protection of the tents, in which
even the guardians--or nearly all of them--joined. What they had seen had
sent a thrill of terror through every girl that had gazed upon the
terrifying sight.
Tommy Thompson rose and stood trembling. "Thave me!" moaned Tommy. "I'm
tho thcared!"
[Illustration: "It's the Banshee!"]