WOODLAND MAGIC
"Oh come on, girls! Don't bother waiting for the big girls. They're
going to drill. I can't wait to see the letter, Cleo. Did you get Hal
Crane? And will he surely take it for us?"
It was Grace who, dragging Cleo and attempting to lasso Madaline with
her book strap, besought her friends to hide away from their companions
that they might read the wonderful letter, and then dispatch it to its
post box under the stone in the River Bend Woods.
"I'm so excited," Grace confessed. "I honestly do feel, girls,
something wonderful will come from our woodman mystery. His letter
proves he is nice."
"So you have given up the tramp idea, Grace," Cleo smilingly remarked.
"I'm glad of that. I didn't just fancy writing my best stationery
letters to some hobo."
"I'm perfectly sure he is a nice clean man," declared Grace, "for there
wasn't a smudge on that little note, and I have noticed since that the
paper is a fine quality. Oh, I am perfectly sure he is a very nice
young man," and the bright-eyed, pink-cheeked girl laughed at her own
deductions.
"But Mrs. Johnston's wash?" Madaline reminded her. "What about that?"
"Why, perhaps he didn't steal that at all. He might even have rescued
the bag from a real tramp," replied the resourceful Grace.
"Hal is going to meet us at three-thirty down at the stone wall,"
injected Cleo, "and if you girls want to see this letter before he
flies off with it you had best come along. Of course he is coming on
his bicycle."
"Oh, yes, let's hear it," pleaded Grace. "I'm sure it's splendid. I
never could have answered that note myself."
Cleo accepted the compliment and the three little second-grade scouts
hurried along in the direction of the young willows, behind which an
ancient stone wall gave historic prestige to the now modern Flosston.
Nimbly they sprang the wall and quickly they devoured the letter. It
read, from the hands of Grace, as follows:
"DEAR WOODSMAN: We girl scouts of True Tred Troop have decided to
answer your letter. Perhaps you need friends. If you do, could we help
you? Our rules oblige us to assist all fellow beings in distress. Are
you in need of help? You see, we not only can assist others, but in
doing so we earn promotion. When one of us tied you up she thought it
was brave to do so, but now we feel that may have been a mistake."
Grace paused. She did not like the idea of admitting a mistake even
thus remotely.
"Couldn't we leave that out?" she asked Cleo.
"Why, no, how could we apologize and expect to make friends with him if
we didn't try to fix that tieing-up business?" Cleo inquired.
"Oh, all right. I like the letter, Cleo. I was only wondering if we
couldn't forget that. I'll read the rest. Where was I? Oh, yes, now
listen!" and she continued:
"If there is any way we can help you or if you know any girls who would
like to join our troop, please leave another letter in this same place.
"Very truly, THREE GIRLS OF TRUE TRED."
There was no time to discuss the last few paragraphs, for Hal Crane was
now seen flying along the macadam road.
"Be sure he knows just where to go," Cleo warned Grace, who had sealed
the letter and now stood waiting the courier.
"What's the idea, anyhow?" demanded Hal. "Isn't the post-office good
enough for your troop?"
"Oh, you see, Hal," Grace explained, "maybe our friend can't leave the
woods."
"Got something the matter that makes him hide out there, and you don't
mind exposing me to it?" Hal was laughing good-naturedly. He evidently
was just as keen on the adventure as were the girls.
"Now, you have promised to keep our secret, you know, Hal, and we are
sure we will find out something awfully interesting if he answers this
letter."
"Suppose he gobbles me up?" returned the big boy, thrusting out his
right arm expectantly.
"Oh, you know you have scoured and scouted these woods lots of times,
and I suppose you know every squirrel by name," Madaline said. "But go
on, Hal, and we'll wait here for you till you come back. There may be
another letter under the stone," and her cheeks fairly burned in
anticipation.
"Well, so long! Take a good look at me, girls. Your cave man may turn
me into a monkey or some other forest creature," and waving his free
hand, Hal Crane sped off like the modern boy-scout courier he was.
"Nothing could possibly happen to him, do you think?" Grace asked just
a little anxiously. The memory of her own thrilling experience in those
woods had grown to something like a big black shadow that dragged from
her the bag supposed to contain Mrs. Johnston's wash. And Grace also
recalled the mysterious note pointed out the fact that the writer still
held on to the historic piece of rope Grace had left around the figure
at the tree, and, just suppose the man should take revenge on Hal!
"Oh, goosey!" Cleo replied to her expressed fear. "Don't you suppose a
boy scout like Hal can take care of himself! Why, when the men went out
hunting for little Angelo Botana, Hal was the very bravest of all. He
even waded in the swamp knee deep when the men couldn't manage the big
drag nets. Why, Hal is as strong as any man," Cleo valiantly insisted.
It was not now a simple matter for the scout girls to occupy their time
while awaiting the return of the messenger, even walking the stone
wall, and jumping the breaks, usually a popular pastime, seemed flat
and uninteresting now to them.
"Let's hunt four-leaf clovers," suggested Madaline, "and we will give
any we find to Captain Clark as a new pledge, like our own clover-leaf
badge."
"But ours are three-leaf, not four," Cleo reminded her. "Suppose we
hunt the oddest, the prettiest, and the biggest number of varieties?
See these lovely variegated ones. They come with the pink blossoms. We
might mount a whole display of leaves on one of brother's butterfly
glasses. I think it would do for a nature study, also."
"Oh, yes, that's a perfectly splendid idea," applauded Grace. "I
haven't added a single discovery to my list this whole week."
So absorbed did they become in this newly invented task no one noticed
a wheel-chair being driven along the pleasant country footpath. In the
chair was a little girl about the age of the scouts--perhaps fourteen
years. Her pretty face betrayed not the slightest hint of the infirmity
which compelled her to recline in that chair, in fact her cheeks were
as pink as the much-lauded color Grace was so often complimented upon,
but which to herself seemed rudely healthy.
Directly in line with the three scouts who were crawling through the
grass, hunting clovers, the nurse propelling the chair drew her little
passenger to the roadside and stopped.
All the girls hunched up on their knees like human "bunnies" and the
little girl in the wheel chair laughed outright.
Cleo stared her surprise.
"Oh, please excuse me for laughing," spoke the child, "but you look too
cunning--just like--like colored animals," she faltered.
Cleo smiled her forgiveness, while at that moment Madaline shouted the
find of the first four-leaf clover.
"And such a lovely big fat one!" she qualified, now skipping over the
tall grasses quite kangaroo fashion.
"A four-leaf clover!" exclaimed the girl in the wheel chair as her
nurse moved on.
"Oh, why didn't we show it to her!" lamented Cleo. "She can't walk to
pick them!"
"But she didn't tell us who she was," objected Grace.
"I don't care. I'm just going to run after her and give her this
four-leaf clover," declared the warm-hearted Madaline. "I think we were
awfully stiff and snippy," and without waiting for approval she hurried
after the disappearing chair, just as it turned into the avenue.
"Would you like this!" offered Madaline, almost breathless as she
overtook the two strangers.
"Oh, I should love it!" exclaimed the little girl, the sincerity in her
voice and expression vouching for the truth of her simple words.
Madaline wanted to say something else, but feared to touch on the
delicate subject of the little girl's infirmity. So she merely smiled,
and said she could find plenty more, and that she was a girl scout
doing a little nature work.
"Oh, a girl scout!" exclaimed the little invalid, her eyes fairly
blazing enthusiasm.
"Yes," replied Madaline, edging away. "We have a lot of fun being
scouts. Good-bye!" and she ran off without affording herself a chance
to say anything else.
"Did she take it!" asked Grace unnecessarily.
"Yes, and she just loved it. But I couldn't think what to say, and I
said we had fun in being scouts, when I saw she couldn't move for any
kind of fun. Wasn't that awful?" wailed Madaline.
"No," the practical Cleo assured her embarrassed companion. "It is
always well to speak of scout work. Perhaps she will take an interest
in it now. But look! Here comes Hal. Oh, I wonder what news he has!"
The girl in the wheel chair was quickly forgotten with the approach of
the boy.
"Oh, he has a letter! See how he wags his head!" exclaimed Grace.
"Yep, I got one!" the boy called, now near enough to make himself
heard. "Do I hear the good news?" he inquired, handing over the yellow
envelope.
"It's for me!" Grace insisted, making sure of the prize.
"It's addressed to the 'Scout Bandit'" announced Hal. "I don't know
that I would stand for that, Grace," but the girl, nervously attempting
to open the yellow envelope, paid no attention to the insinuation.
"Thank you so much, Hal," Cleo had the politeness to express. "Come on
over to the bridge, and maybe we will tell you what's in the letter."
"No, thank you," he refused. "I'm due at a baseball practice and late
now. So long, girls. Hope you make your points, whatever they are, by
all that woodland stuff," and with commendable disregard for possible
thrills, Hal turned his wheel in the direction of the ball field.
Now what girl could possibly have resisted the chance of sharing the
woodland secret? Yet, being a boy, Hal ignored the offer and happily
raced off to his belated ball practice.
"We can all squat down in this patch of grass," suggested Madaline,
who, as yet, had not even glimpsed the envelope Grace had passed on to
Cleo. "Do let's read it!" she begged impatiently.
"All right!" and Grace did squat down beside the others on the little
patch of grass that hung over the deep gutter. "Now listen!" (Needless
admonition.)
"'Little Bandits,'" she began, "'if you find this I will know you are
going to play our game. First I must tell you I have to keep my
identity secret for some time yet. My reason for doing so is a worthy
one, which I will some day make clear to you. But I am not a lazy
tramp, nor a wild woodsman in the ordinary sense, so, if you will keep
faith, we can play a wonderful game.'"
Grace paused and breathed audibly.
"There!" she exclaimed. "I knew he would be nice."
"After you decided not to have him a horrid old tramp," teased Madaline.
"Oh, read it, Grace," Cleo insisted. "What does he want us to do?"
She resumed reading the rather broad sheet that might have been called
typewriter paper, if the girls had been familiar with its style.
"Let me see. Oh, yes. 'Will you do something for me?'" she continued
reading. "'If you have any little book of your rules and plans, and if
you will leave one in the hollow stone for me, some day I will repay
you for your confidence.
"'Your victim, "'THE MAN BY THE TREE.'"
"Oh, what can he want a scout book for?" eagerly asked Grace, folding
the letter.
"We couldn't give it, without permission--unless, it would be too bad
to give away our secret to get permission," pouted Grace.
"We might get permission without telling all about it," suggested Cleo
adroitly. "We could say we wanted to influence a stranger, and besides,
anyone can buy a manual in the stores."
"Of course," decided Madaline, happy that the secret would not be
spoiled. "Perhaps he wants--"
"To be a scout!" roared Grace in one of her gales of laughter.
"Wouldn't it be too funny if he were to fall in love with Captain
Clark!"
"And marry her!" topped off Cleo.
"Then your noble deed, Grace, would be noble indeed," added Madaline.
"I guess Miss Clark can marry whom she pleases. She's very pretty."
"And her dad is rich too, so I don't believe we can solve our mystery
that way," finished Cleo, and none of the three had quite decided just
how she would like to end it when the five o'clock bell from the "Home"
out Clinton way chimed a warning hour.
"So late!" exclaimed Grace, "and I have to practice before tea."
"And I have to help mother, for Martha's out," added Madaline.
"Let's run," suggested Cleo, and those who happened to see the trio
scampering along never could have guessed they guarded so carefully the
mystery of the woodsman's letter.