THE DARK OF THE MOON SOCIETY
Gladys stood in her tent under the big murmuring pine tree washing
handkerchiefs in her washbasin. "I haven't enough left to last any
time at all now," she confided plaintively to Sahwah, "and I had three
dozen when I came. They're all gone where the good handkerchiefs go, I
guess. Somebody is forever getting cut and needing a bandage in a hurry
and my handkerchief is invariably the one to be sacrificed to the
emergency."
"That's what you get for always having a clean one," remarked Sahwah.
"Mine are never in fit condition to be used for bandages, consequently I
still have them all."
"But you never know where they are," said Gladys. "If you don't keep
your things in order you might as well not own them, for you never have
them when you want them anyway."
"And if you do keep them in order somebody else always borrows them and
then you don't have them when you want them either," said Sahwah.
"Life is awfully complicated, isn't it?" sighed Gladys.
"I should say it was awfully simple," said Sahwah, laughing at Gladys's
solemn tone. "No matter what you do it turns out the same way anyway. I
shouldn't call that complicated."
Gladys hung her handkerchiefs on the tent ropes where they would dry in
the wind and emptied the basin of water out of the end of the tent,
which opened directly on the bluff. A dismal shriek from below
proclaimed that somebody had received a shower bath. Gladys and Sahwah
leaned over the tent railing at a perilous angle and peered down. Half
way down the bluff, "between the devil and the deep sea," as Sahwah
remarked, sat Katherine on a narrow ledge of rock, dangling her feet
over the edge and leaning her head dejectedly on her hands. The
descending flood had landed on her head and was running in streams over
her face from the ends of her wispy hair, making her look more dejected
than ever. Her appearance made both the girls above think immediately of
Fifi on the occasion of his memorable bath.
"Oh, Katherine, I'm sorry," said Gladys contritely. "I ought to have
looked before I poured. But I never expected anybody to be sitting there
like a fly on the wall. What are you doing there anyway?"
"Just sitting," replied Katherine in her huskiest tones.
"What's the matter?" asked Gladys, catching the doleful note in her
voice and having inward qualms.
"Just low in my mind," replied Katherine lugubriously.
"Goodness gracious!" exclaimed Gladys. "What about? Can't we come down
and cheer you up? Is there room for two more on that ledge?"
"Always plenty of room on the mourners' bench," said Katherine, moving
over.
"All right, we'll come," said Gladys. "How do you get down? Oh, I see,
there's a sort of path going down behind mother's tent. Look out, we're
coming."
Sahwah and Gladys crawled backward down the bluff, hanging on to the
grass and roots, and dropped to the ledge beside Katherine. They settled
themselves comfortably and swung their feet over the edge.
"Now, tell us your trouble," said Gladys, mopping Katherine's head with
her last clean handkerchief and getting it as wet as those up on the
tent ropes.
Katherine hunched her shoulders and drooped her head until it almost
touched her chest. "I can't bear to think of going home!" she said
heavily.
"Going home!" echoed Sahwah and Gladys, nearly falling off the ledge in
alarm. "You're not going home, are you? Don't tell us that you----"
Words failed them and they stared in blank dismay.
It was Katherine's turn to look alarmed when she caught their meaning.
"Oh, I don't mean that I'm going home now," she said hastily. "I mean
that I can't bear to think of going home at the end of the summer."
"Gracious!" said Gladys weakly. "Who's thinking about the end of the
summer already? Why, it's hardly begun. You don't mean to say that
you're worrying now about going home in September?"
Katherine nodded, without cheering up one bit. "That's the trouble," she
said laconically. "I know it's a crazy thing to worry about, but when we
were having such a good time on the lake this morning I got to thinking
how I hated to leave it, even to go to college, and started to get blue
right away. And the more I thought about it the bluer I got, and the
bluer I got the more I thought about it, and--that's all there is to
it!" she finished with a characteristic gesture of her long arms. "And
now I can't stop thinking about it and I've just got the indigoes!"
"Well, of all things!" exclaimed Sahwah. "Aren't some people the
funniest things, though?"
She and Gladys leaned back and regarded Katherine curiously. Here was
the girl who stood unmoved by fire or flood, who never worried about an
exam; the girl who had calmly rallied the demoralized volley ball team
and snatched victory in the face of overwhelming odds, who seemed to
have optimism in her veins instead of blood, at the very beginning of
the most charming summer in her life, worrying because some time or
other it must come to an end! Katherine's "indigoes" were as startling
and unaccountable as her inspirations. And it was not put on for
momentary effect, either. She sat limp and listless, the very picture of
dejection, and no amount of rallying on the part of the two served to
bring her back to her breezy, merry self.
They left her at last in despair, and wearily climbed back to the tents.
"I wish we hadn't talked to her at all," wailed Sahwah. "Now the thought
of going home makes me so blue I can't bear to think about it." And her
voice had such a suspicious catch in it that it made a sympathetic
moisture rise in Gladys's eyes, and she declared she wished they had
never come, because it would be so hard to leave!
"Oh, mercy! What geese we are!" said Sahwah, coming to herself with a
start. "Worrying about something that's miles off! Cheer up. We may all
get drowned and never have to go home at all. You always want to look on
the bright side of things!" And then the pendulum swung the other way,
and the two leaned against each other and laughed until their sides
ached at their foolishness.
"But poor Katherine was really blue," said Gladys, when they were
themselves again. "She has those awful spells once in a long while and
they last for days unless she gets mixed up in something exciting and
forgets herself. I was really worried on her account once and asked
Nyoda about it and she said it was because Katherine has always had to
work too hard all her life and it's done something to her nerves, or
whatever you call them, and that's what makes her have the blues
sometimes. She said we should always try to give her something else to
think about right off when she got that way and she'd get over it sooner
and by and by when she grew stronger she wouldn't have them at all any
more."
"Poor, dear old Katherine!" said Sahwah fervently. "I wish something
would happen to cheer her up. If she doesn't get over it soon she will
have the whole family feeling as she does, and think how dreadful it
would be!" And then the Captain and the Bottomless Pitt appeared between
the trees and challenged them to a canoe race and they speedily forgot
Katherine and her woes.
That evening the twins got into a dispute as to who should sit on the
bow of the launch on the trip to St. Pierre with the mail and neither
would give in, so Uncle Teddy suggested that they settle the point by a
crab race on the beach. The crab race consisted of traveling on all
fours in a sidewise direction and was as difficult as it was ridiculous.
Anthony won because Antha stepped on her skirt and lost her balance.
Then Sahwah spoke up and said she must insist on her sex having fair
play and that in order to make the race fair and above board Anthony
must wear a skirt, too. Anthony protested loudly, but the Chiefs ruled
that it was right and just, and Anthony, still protesting, was hustled
into a skirt of his sister's and made to run the race over again. The
spectators wept with laughter as he fell all over himself, first to one
side and then to the other, as he stepped on the skirt, and Antha
touched the goal before he had completed half the distance.
"Oh, Anthony," jeered Pitt, "can't you make a better showing than that?"
"He probably did as well as any of you would," said Hinpoha.
"Bet I could do better," said the Captain.
"Let's see you do it," said Hinpoha.
"I will if the other fellows will," said the Captain, looking around at
the rest. "Will you, Slim?"
"Sure," said Slim.
"Slim will do anything--once," said Sahwah.
A few minutes later, an old turtle who had been sitting on a log near
the water all afternoon poked his head out of his shell in astonishment
at the sight of the enormous human crabs who suddenly swarmed over the
beach, laughing, tripping, shrieking and rolling over on the sand. The
Captain did beautifully, because he was tall and the skirt that fell to
him was short and did not impede his progress, but Slim, to whom Sahwah
had wickedly given one of Katherine's longest, got so tangled up that he
finally turned a somersault right into the water, where he lay kicking
and splashing. Katherine rescued him and the skirt, which was rather the
worse for the experience, while Uncle Teddy, who was judge, declared the
Captain to be the winner. He was the only one who had finished without
falling once.
"You're elected to take a lady's part in the next play we give," said
Gladys. "Such talent shouldn't be wasted on a desert isle."
The Captain smiled a ladylike smile and minced along, holding an
imaginary parasol over his head. "Bertha the Beautiful Cloak Model," he
said, laughing. "Now won't somebody rescue Pitt. He's all tied up in a
knot back there."
"And he has my skirt on," wailed Gladys. "Do rescue him, somebody."
"Never again," said Pitt solemnly, when he had been helped to his feet
and separated from the hampering garment. "How you girls do anything at
all with those horrible things on is more than I can see."
"Hurry up, all you who want to go in the launch," called Uncle Teddy,
and there was a general scramble. In the excitement of the big crab race
the twins had forgotten their quarrel and both sat side by side on the
bow.
"Wasn't that crab race the funniest ever?" said Gladys to Katherine, as
they gathered up the skirts and wended their way up the path.
"The funniest of all was when Slim fell over backward into the lake,"
said Sahwah from behind them.
"Funny for you, perhaps," replied Katherine, who still was steeped in
her indigoes, "but that was my skirt he had on. And he burst it open in
three places. It's ruined."
"Cheer up," said Sahwah. "Consider in what a good cause it perished.
You'd have ruined it sooner or later anyhow, but minus the grand
spectacle Slim made."
"Maybe so," grumbled Katherine, "but I was thinking that perhaps this
one would escape the usual fate. I had a fondness for that skirt."
"Then what did you let him take it for?" asked Hinpoha.
"I didn't give it to him, Sahwah did," replied Katherine.
"Well, you said I might," retorted Sahwah, "and, anyway, I'm as badly
off as you. Mine is finished, too."
"Let's not argue over it," said Gladys hastily. "We're getting as bad as
the twins. We started the business, so let's be game and not let the
boys hear us say anything about the skirts."
"All right," said Sahwah, and the subject was dropped.
"What's this?" asked Hinpoha, as they came to the top of the hill.
"A piece of paper tacked to a tree," said Sahwah. "What does it say?"
They all stopped to read. The only writing on the paper was the legend,
THE DARK OF THE MOON SOCIETY. Above it there were three marks done in
red paint, which gave them a curiously lurid effect. They consisted of a
circle with two diamond-shaped marks underneath it.
"What on earth----!" said Hinpoha.
"Those funny-shaped marks are a blaze," said Sahwah. "It was one of the
number we learned, don't you remember, Hinpoha? I believe it means
'warning,' or something like that. 'Important warning,' that's it. Now I
remember. This message is supposed to read:
"'IMPORTANT WARNING!
THE DARK OF THE MOON SOCIETY.'"
"What on earth is The Dark of the Moon Society?" asked Katherine.
They all shook their heads. "It's something the boys are up to," said
Gladys. "I suppose they are going to play some joke on us in return for
our neat little trick the day we climbed the trees and watched them get
supper. Just watch out, something will be doing before very long."
"Let's find out what it is and get ahead of them," said Katherine, her
eyes beginning to sparkle.
From that time on there was a suppressed feeling of excitement on
Ellen's Isle. The Winnebagos watched every movement the Sandwiches made,
and it seemed that there was something suspicious about the glances that
were constantly being exchanged between the Captain, Slim and the
Bottomless Pitt.
"Those three are at the bottom of it," declared Katherine to the other
girls who were gathered on her bed. "I don't believe the rest of the
Sandwiches know a thing about it. I heard Dan Porter asking the Captain
what they were talking about down on the beach awhile ago and the
Captain said, 'Oh, nothing,' in that tone of voice that means, 'It's
none of your business.'"
"But I saw Slim and Dan and the Monkey slipping off into the woods by
themselves just now," said Sahwah, "and they were laughing to themselves
and acting mighty mysterious."
The next day Hinpoha found a piece of birchbark in Eeny-Meeny's wooden
hand, bearing the now familiar warning blaze and signed with the
initials D. M. S.
"The handwriting on the wall again," she said to Gladys. "What can the
Dark of the Moon Society be, anyhow?"
After that mysterious warnings appeared all over camp. The girls would
find them tacked to the trees in front of their tents, tied to the
handles of the water pails and slipped in between the logs piled ready
for firewood. True to their agreement they never said a word about
finding them to the Sandwiches, but were constantly on the lookout for
the joke, which they knew would be sprung sooner or later. Katherine,
who had flung her indigoes to the winds at the first hint of mystery,
was the most intent on finding out what the boys were planning to do and
meant to get ahead of them if she could possibly do it.
"The thing to do first," said she with the air of a general, "is to find
out which ones are the Dark of the Moon Society. Then we can watch those
particularly."
"They're probably all in it," said Gladys.
"I don't think they are," said Katherine. "I'll lay my wager on the
Captain, Slim and the Bottomless Pitt. Those three are mighty chummy all
of a sudden. And I saw them go right past one of those signs on a tree
and never look at it. That looks suspicious. They saw me and pretended
they didn't notice the sign."
That night, Katherine, restless and unable to sleep, developed a thirst
from rolling around on her pillow, and rising quietly, made for the
water pail at the door of the tent. It was empty. Thirsts had been
prevalent that night. She stood a moment irresolute and then, putting on
her slippers and her gown, started boldly for the little spring on the
hillside. It was bright moonlight and she could find her way easily. She
took a drink from the cup hanging on a broken branch beside the spring,
and filling the pail so as to be prepared for a return of the thirst,
she started back up the hill. Half way up she paused and stood still,
looking out over the silvered surface of the lake, drinking in the magic
beauty of the scene with eager soul.
"Oh, you wonderful, wonderful lake!" she murmured to herself.
A branch cracked sharply behind her and a small stone came rolling down
the hillside. She turned hastily and looked up. Someone was moving among
the trees up there. "The Dark of the Moon Society!" thought Katherine,
and, dropping the pail of water, she ran up the path. The person above
made no effort at flight or concealment, but walked out of the shadow of
the trees onto a moonlit rock at the edge of the bluff. Then Katherine
saw that it was Sahwah.
"Are you thirsty, too?" she called up. Sahwah made no answer. She took a
step nearer the edge of the cliff and stood looking out over the lake.
"She's walking in her sleep again!" exclaimed Katherine. Since the
memorable night of the Select Sleeping Party when Sahwah had wandered
out into the snow, the Winnebagos lived in constant expectation of some
new performance.
As Katherine started toward her to lead her gently back to the tent,
Sahwah began to raise her arms slowly above her head, palms together.
"Mercy!" exclaimed Katherine, "she's going to dive off the cliff!" And
rushing up pell-mell she seized her around the waist and dragged her
back unceremoniously, regardless of the accepted rule about waking sleep
walkers suddenly.
"Goodness, how you scared me!" said Katherine, when she had deposited
Sahwah in her bed and answered her yawning inquiries as to what was the
matter. "You can't be trusted without a bodyguard." And in spite of
Sahwah's protests that she had never in her life "walked" twice in the
same night, Katherine insisted upon tying a string to her ankle and
fastening the other end around her own. Sahwah was asleep again in five
minutes, but Katherine lay and watched her for hours, expecting to see
her rise and try to wander forth a second time.
Once she thought she heard footsteps on the path along the bluff and
rose hastily to investigate, but the string she had tied around her
ankle tripped her and jerked Sahwah, who bade her lie down and be quiet.
Katherine subsided, rubbing her knee, which had received a smart bump,
and grimacing with pain in the darkness. She heard the footsteps no
more, but she had her suspicions that they belonged to the Dark of the
Moon Society.
The next day at noon she called a hasty council on her bed. "Girls," she
said in a thrilling whisper, "I've found the place where the Dark of the
Moon Society meets!"
"Where? Where?" they all cried.
"In a cave under the east bluff. I just discovered it today. The
entrance is all covered by trees. I found the ashes of a little fire
inside. That's where they're cooking up their plans and preparing
something to spring as a surprise on us."
"Oh, if we could only hide back in that cave when they are there and
hear and see what they are doing," said Sahwah.
"How are we going to know when they will be there?" asked Gladys.
Nobody was able to answer this.
"If we're smart enough we'll find out," said Katherine, waving her long
arms. She was as keen on the scent of the mysterious Dark of the Moon
Society as a hound after a stag.
That night darkness had hardly fallen when the Captain, Slim and the
Bottomless Pitt complained of being utterly tired out and announced
their intention of going to bed.
"What made you so tired, boys?" asked Mrs. Evans solicitously. "Are we
expecting you young people to do too much? I don't want you to go home
worn out."
"Oh, it was probably from running up and down the path so often with the
boards for the dock," said the Captain. "That's all." He yawned widely
behind his hand. "We're not doing too much every day, really we aren't.
You mustn't feel anxious."
Mrs. Evans made a mental resolve to see that the boys and girls all had
a definite rest hour each day.
Katherine's thoughts went into a widely different channel. At the first
mention of going to bed before the others she became suspicious, and,
looking closely, she was positive that the Captain's yawn was feigned.
Lying on her back on the sand so that her head was behind Sahwah and
Gladys she whispered very quietly, "D. M. S. meeting." Gladys and Sahwah
squeezed her arm to let her know they understood and as soon as the
three boys had started up the hill they rose also, saying they were
going up on the Council Rock. Hinpoha rose and followed them; Migwan and
Nakwisi apparently did not catch on, and remained where they were.
There was no time to follow the boys. The girls must be in the cave
before the Sandwiches got there to be able to overhear anything. Taking
a short cut, they came out on the bluff just above the cave. They could
hear the boys stopping for a drink at the spring on the other side of
the island.
"How'll we get down?" asked Gladys in a whisper.
"Crawl down the face of the cliff," said Sahwah. "And we'll probably
skin our whole mortal frames doing it."
"Sh!" said Katherine. "There's no time to crawl down. We've got to
hurry. Go half way down and jump the rest of the way. It's all soft sand
underneath."
"We'll be killed," said Gladys.
"Nonsense!" said Katherine scornfully. "Didn't I say it was all soft
sand underneath? Sh! I'll go first Sh-h!"
She swung over the edge, poised on the little ledge, flung out her arms
and leapt into the darkness below. There was a crash, a smash, a plump,
and a startled wail.
"What is it?" cried Gladys, throwing caution to the winds and shouting.
"I'm in the lake, I guess," called Katherine from below. "First I jumped
in and then the sky fell on me." Her voice sounded oddly muffled and far
away.
Gladys flashed her little bug light over the cliff and then shrieked
with laughter at the spectacle below. Flat on the beach sat Katherine,
her feet straight out in front of her and a tin washtub upside down on
her head, completely hiding the upper half of her. From the edge of it
the water was dripping in tiny streamlets. The main deluge had already
descended. All around her lay the clothes which had been soaking in the
tub ready to be washed out bright and early the next morning.
Of course her yell and the shouts of those above brought the rest of the
family on the run, and after one look at her nobody had strength enough
to lift the tub off her head. Uncle Teddy recovered first and removed
the eclipse.
"I forgot to tell you folks I had set the tub there," said Aunt Clara.
"But how could I guess that one of you would jump into it? Whatever
induced you to jump off the cliff in the dark anyway?"
"I was just 'exploragin','" replied Katherine meekly, rising and shaking
the water from her clothes like a dog.
There was no spying on the Dark of the Moon Society that night. Mrs.
Evans ordered Katherine off to bed at once, because it was too late to
get into dry clothes and the air was too cool to keep the wet clothes
on, and as Katherine was chief spy there was nothing doing unless she
headed it. So if there was a meeting in the cave after all that
commotion it went unobserved.
But a day or two later there was consternation in Katherine's tent. The
rumor had just gone around that the Dark of the Moon Society was going
to kidnap Eeny-Meeny and burn her at the stake. Sahwah had overheard a
bit of conversation in the woods that gave her the clue. It was going to
happen that night.
Katherine went "straight up in the air." "They sha'n't burn Eeny-Meeny!"
she declared, shaking her fist above her head. "They'll only touch her
over my prostrate body!"
Many were the elaborate plans made for Eeny-Meeny's defense. Katherine's
plan was voted the simplest and best. "Hide her!" she suggested, and
this course was agreed upon. But simple as this plan sounded it
presented unexpected difficulties. They couldn't get a chance to do it.
No matter when they approached Eeny-Meeny there was always one of the
Sandwiches close at hand.
"They're picketing her!" announced Katherine, baffled in several
attempts. "I pretended I wanted to touch her up with color and carried
her away from the Council Rock, and the Captain came right along, so I
had to do it, and the minute I was through he insisted on carrying her
back and I couldn't object without rousing his suspicions, so back she
went. Now Slim's sitting and leaning his head against her."
"The thing to do," said Hinpoha, "is to have a counter attraction at the
other end of the island that will draw them all away, and in the
meantime one of us can hide her."
"Good," said Katherine, "what shall we do?"
"It ought to be a panic," said Hinpoha, "and then if we yell loud enough
they'll forget everything and run to the rescue."
"What would we scream for?" asked Gladys.
"Oh, for most anything," answered Hinpoha. "The main idea is to scream
loud enough to start a panic. I'll think up something in a minute."
"Well, let us know when you're ready, and we'll bring our voices," said
Gladys.
Hinpoha departed to attend to her dinner duties and Katherine went out
into the woods to look for berries. In a little hollow she stumbled over
Antha, sitting in a heap against a tree shedding tears into her
handkerchief. "What's the matter?" asked Katherine, sinking down beside
her. She was so used to seeing Antha in tears that she was not greatly
concerned, but out of general sympathy she inquired what was the matter.
"I want to go home!" wailed Antha. "This is a horrible mean old place
and I can't have any fun at all."
"Why can't you have any fun?" asked Katherine.
"Because you girls are always running away from me and having secrets
that you won't tell me," said Antha with a gulp. "You're doing something
now that you won't let me know about."
True enough. They hadn't told Antha about the danger threatening
Eeny-Meeny nor the plan for her defense. Katherine reflected. "It _was_
kind of mean to leave her out of that. I wouldn't like it myself if I
were the younger one of a group and they kept having secrets from me.
I'm not being a real nice big sister at all."
"Never mind, Antha," she said, patting her hand. "I'll tell you about
it. The boys are planning to steal Eeny-Meeny tonight and burn her at
the stake and we're trying to keep them from doing it. We're going to
hide her. You may help us if you like. Won't that be fun?"
Antha sniffed, and with the perverseness of her nature lost interest in
the secret as soon as she found out what it was, and didn't seem to care
whether Eeny-Meeny was burned at the stake or not. And when Katherine
went farther and invited her to be her special helper in everything, and
offered to show her where the oven bird's nest was that everybody was
looking for, Antha declined to come along, preferring to go into the
kitchen where dinner was being prepared.
So Katherine went out alone to pay the oven bird's nest a visit and on
the way found a chipmunk with a broken leg, hopping around on the other
three and cheeping shrilly in distress. She tried to coax it to her with
peanuts and succeeded in getting it to take one, when suddenly from the
direction of the kitchen came the sound of a terrific explosion, shaking
the earth and making the air ring with echoes. The sound had scarcely
died away when there was a second report more violent than the first,
followed in a moment by a third.
"The gasoline stove!" thought Katherine. "Antha's been trying to fill it
and it's exploded!" And she set off like the wind toward the kitchen,
from which direction terrible shrieks were puncturing the air. She did
not know it, but she was yelling like a Comanche Indian all the way. She
staggered into the clearing, expecting to find the kitchen tent in
flames, but it was lying on the ground in a tangled mass from which
apparently detached hands and feet were waving wildly. "What exploded?"
she demanded.
Hinpoha was leaning against a tree, pale as death, and she grasped
Katherine by the arm and led her out of earshot of the others. "The cans
of beans," she said faintly. "Don't look so scared, Katherine, it's
only--the--panic!"
"What on earth did you do?" asked Katherine.
"I remembered that Migwan set a can of beans in the fire to heat once
when we were camping and it exploded, and I thought that would be a fine
way to start a panic here. So to make sure I took three cans--great big
ones--and buried them in the hot ashes. When they exploded I was going
to scream and make everybody come running."
"Well, they exploded all right," said Katherine drily. "I thought the
island blew up."
"So did I," said Hinpoha. "They went up just like dynamite. The kettle
was blown off the hanger and landed fifty feet away."
"To say nothing of blowing the tent down," said Katherine.
"Oh," said Hinpoha hastily, "that didn't blow down. The boys and Uncle
Teddy had taken it down this morning to fix it differently and they were
just setting it up again when the awful explosion came. They all yelled
and jumped and the whole thing came down on their heads."
Katherine looked over to where the arms and legs were still waving under
the billows of canvas and doubled up against a tree in silent spasms.
Then she suddenly straightened up. "Who is hiding Eeny-Meeny?" she
asked.
"Why," gasped Hinpoha, "you are!"
"I?" said Katherine.
"Yes, you!" said Hinpoha.
"I had forgotten all about the panic," said Katherine, "and the noise
scared everything out of my head."
"Quick, before it's too late!" said Hinpoha. "Run down and do it now
while everybody's still up here. It'll take at least five minutes to get
the boys out from under that tent."
Katherine fled from the scene as quietly as possible and ran to the
Council Rock. That whole end of the island was deserted. But when she
came to the place where Eeny-Meeny had always been she stood still in
amazement. Eeny-Meeny was not there. She had vanished mysteriously and
entirely, and in her place was a twig stuck upright into the ground,
topped with a piece of paper on which was drawn a picture of an Indian
maiden tied to the stake with the flames mounting around her, and
underneath was drawn in scrawling capitals: THE DARK OF THE MOON
SOCIETY.
Katherine pulled the twig from the earth and stood looking at it,
fascinated. Slowly the truth dawned on her. The Sandwiches had gotten
ahead of them again. Without having planned the panic they had instantly
seen the value of it and one of them had spirited Eeny-Meeny away during
the confusion. "Boys _are_ smarter than girls," she admitted
ruefully to herself. "At least, some are."
Then another thought flashed through her mind. She had told Antha not
half an hour ago that they were planning to hide Eeny-Meeny. Antha had
told the boys and they had decided to do the same thing themselves. Her
eyes filled with tears of rage and disappointment. After her
championship of Antha her action cut her to the quick. Her philosophy
had received a rough jolt. Utterly crushed, she returned to the girls
and spread the news that Eeny-Meeny had disappeared into the hands of
the Dark of the Moon Society. The Winnebagos were sunk in despair, but
were rallied by Katherine's oratory. Anyone hearing her would have
thought she was speaking on a matter of life and death, so eloquent did
she wax and so emphatic were her gestures, as she bade them rise up and
rescue Eeny-Meeny at the last minute.
"Not a word to any of them until we are ready to pour the water down
into the fire," cautioned Katherine, after she had outlined her plans
for rescue. "They must not guess what we intend to do or they'll change
their plans and get ahead of us again."
Needless to say, Antha was not admitted into this last council. The
suspicion of her perfidy had gone around the circle and it was agreed
that she was a horrid little tattletale and deserved to be left out of
everything that went on thereafter. As Sahwah had overheard the plot, a
large fire was to be built on the beach that night and then at a signal
Eeny-Meeny was to be flung into it from above.
"We'll get her first, never fear," said Katherine with a warlike
gesture. At times like this she became a creature inspired. Her hair
bristled up, her eyes shone, her husky voice gained strength until it
rang like a trumpet.
Rather to their surprise, immediately after supper the tom-tom sounded
its monotonous call, summoning them to the Council Rock. "What is this?"
asked Hinpoha uneasily. "Something new?"
"I don't know," said Katherine agog, with curiosity and on the alert for
anything.
Both exclaimed in wonder when they reached the Council Rock. Around it,
in a circle, low seats had been placed, built of rustic logs with
comfortable back rests. There was one for each person.
"Where did they come from?" all the Winnebagos were asking.
"We made them," announced the Captain with pride. "What do you think of
them? Don't you like them?"
"Splendid!" said Aunt Clara. "How did you ever get them made without our
knowing?"
"Down in a cave under the east bluff," said the Captain. "That's where
we had our workshop. We used to slip away quietly one or two at a time
and work on them whenever we had a chance. Sit in them and see how
comfortable they are."
The Sandwiches were circling around like polite shopkeepers, begging the
girls to try first this seat and then that, to find out which suited
them best. Wondering, the girls sank back into the seats, trying to get
the meaning of this new development.
"There's something else coming," said Slim importantly, going off with
the Captain.
Soon they reappeared, carrying a sort of pedestal with a flagpole
attached to it. "It's for Eeny-Meeny to stand on," explained the Captain
proudly, "and we put up the pole so the Stars and Stripes could float
over her and the people going by in boats could see her."
He set the pedestal down and turned toward the tree where Eeny-Meeny had
stood. "Why, where's Eeny-Meeny?" he asked in amazement.
"Where is she?" echoed Slim.
The girls sat dumb. "_You_ ought to know where she is," said
Katherine accusingly to the Captain at last. "You took her during the
panic yesterday."
"We--took--her--during--the--panic?" said the Captain wonderingly. "We
never did! What do you mean? I never noticed until just now that she
wasn't in her place."
"You have too got her," said Hinpoha. "The sign of the Dark of the Moon
Society was left tied to a twig where she had stood."
"The sign of the what?" asked the Captain.
"The Dark of the Moon Society," said Katherine sharply. It struck her
that the Captain was trying to appear dense.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said. He looked perplexed
for a moment and then strode over to Anthony and caught him by the neck.
"Where's Eeny-Meeny?" he said in an ominously even voice.
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Anthony, struggling to
pull out of his grasp. "Ouch! Quit your pinching me."
The Captain took a little firmer hold. "You'd better tell," he advised.
"It might not be healthy for you to keep it to yourself. So that's what
you meant when you said you knew something we didn't."
Anthony still wiggled and tried to free himself, protesting his
innocence.
Uncle Teddy pounded on the tom-tom. "Will somebody please tell me," he
said, "what's the matter with you boys and girls. There's been something
going on under the surface for the last week. Just now one of you
mentioned a 'Dark of the Moon Society.' Will whoever it is please tell?"
There was a rustle from where the girls sat and Sahwah rose to her feet.
"The time has come," she said with twinkling eyes, "for all dread
secrets to be revealed. You just asked who the Dark of the Moon Society
was. I've known for quite a while, and now I'm going to tell."
You could have heard a pin drop and all eyes were fixed on her
expectantly. "There isn't any DARK OF THE MOON SOCIETY!" she announced.
"Or rather, I'm it."
An incredulous murmur went around the circle.
Sahwah continued. "I kidnapped Eeny-Meeny during the panic yesterday and
hid her in that roll of sail cloth. The whole thing is a joke, gotten up
for Katherine's benefit. She was having such a terrible fit of blues
Gladys was afraid she would never get over it unless she had something
to occupy her mind, so I started this business to give her something to
think about. I wrote those mysterious warning notices and posted them
around the camp. When I saw what a beautiful effect it was having on
Katherine I couldn't resist the temptation to keep it up. I knew how
fond she was of Eeny-Meeny and decided that if anything threatened her
Katherine would think of nothing else night and day. I pretended I had
heard voices of the boys plotting to take Eeny-Meeny and burn her up
tonight.
"That night when Katherine thought I was walking in my sleep I had been
up putting a notice on Eeny-Meeny. When I saw Katherine I was afraid she
would be suspicious of my being out at that hour and the only thing I
could think of was to pretend that I was asleep." Here Sahwah
interrupted herself with a convulsive giggle. "And she tied a string to
my foot and kept ahold of it for the rest of the night!"
"And I jumped into that tub of water thinking I was on the trail of the
Dark of the Moon Society!" exclaimed Katherine, righteous wrath and
amazement struggling for possession of her.
"And I destroyed three perfectly good cans of beans getting up a panic!"
said Hinpoha.
"And brought down the house," added the Captain, who had been one of
those caught in the fall of the tent.
"And you mean to say," demanded Katherine, "that those boys never
intended to burn up Eeny-Meeny?"
"Perish the thought," said Sahwah, enjoying herself in the extreme.
"They're as innocent as day old lambs."
"Then so is Anthony," said Hinpoha.
"That's right," said the Captain. Then, turning to Anthony, he made a
frank apology for accusing him of hiding Eeny-Meeny.
And all the Winnebagos were filled with remorse when they thought how
they had blamed Antha for that same disappearance.
Katherine lay back overcome and fanned herself with a bunch of leaves.
"Well, I'll--be--jiggered!" she exclaimed feelingly. "All that trouble
to bring me out of a fit of the blues!"
"Boys," she went on in her best oratorical manner, "you certainly did
give us a surprise party tonight, much more of a one than you planned.
We came prepared to rescue Eeny-Meeny from a fiery death--witness the
water buckets concealed behind every bush on the hillside--and we find
some perfectly gorgeous council seats that you have been toiling to make
in secret while we suspected you of plotting base deeds. Instead of
seeking to destroy Eeny-Meeny you plan to honor her. Girls, let's make
fruit punch and drink to the health of the Sandwiches, and a long life
to the council seats, and to Eeny-Meeny on her pedestal."
"And don't forget the Dark of the Moon Society," added Sahwah, and once
more the woods resounded with laughter.