The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin | Page 3

at first sight, before they had ever spoken a
word to each other. Like fencers' swords their glances crossed and fell
apart, and each girl turned her back pointedly upon the other. Broken
threads of conversation were picked up by the group around them,
shouts of laughter came from the group surrounding Pom-pom, who
was reciting a funny poem, and the tense moment passed.
The other Winnebagos forgot the incident and gave themselves over to

enjoyment of the beautiful scene which was unrolling before their eyes
as the Carribou bore them further and further into the wilds; great dark
stretches of woodland brooding in silence on the hillsides; an
occasional glimpse of a far distant mountain peak wreathed in mist, and
near by many a merry little stream romping down a hillside into the
mother arms of the Onawanda. Gradually the shores had drawn close
together until the travelers could look into the cool depths of the forests
past which they were gliding, and could hear the calling of the wild
birds in their leafy sanctuary.
Just past a long stretch of woods which Hinpoha thought might be
enchanted, because the trees stood so stiffly straight, the Carribou
rounded a bend, and there flashed into sight an irregular row of white
tents scattered among the pines on a rise of ground some hundred or
more feet back from the river.
"There's camp," Sahwah tried to say to Hinpoha, but her voice was
drowned in the shriek of ecstasy which rose from the old campers.
Handkerchiefs waved wildly; paddles smote the deck with deafening
thumps; cheer after cheer rolled up, accompanied by the loud tooting of
the _Carribou's_ whistle. Captain MacLaren always joined in the racket
of arrival as heartily as the girls themselves, taking delight in seeing
how much noise he could coax from the throat of his steam siren.
Amid the racket the little vessel nosed her way up alongside a wooden
dock, and before she was fairly fast the younger members of last year's
delegation had leapt over the rail and were scurrying up the path. The
older ones followed more sedately, having stopped to pick up their
luggage, and to greet the camp directors who stood on the dock with
welcoming hands outstretched. Last of all came the new girls, looking
about them inquiringly, and already beginning to fall in love with the
place.

CHAPTER II
GETTING SETTLED

Along the bluff overlooking the river, and half buried in the pine trees,
stretched a long, low, rustic building, the pillars of whose wide piazza
were made of tree trunks with the bark left on. A huge chimney built of
cobblestones almost covered the one end. The great pines hovered over
it protectingly; their branches caressing its roof as they waved gently to
and fro in the light breeze. On the peak of one of its gables a little song
sparrow, head tilted back and body a-tremble, trilled forth an ecstasy of
song.
"Isn't it be-yoo-tiful?" sighed Hinpoha, her artistic soul delighting in the
lovely scene before her. "I wonder what that house is for?"
"I don't know," replied Sahwah, equally enchanted. "There's another
house behind it, farther up on the hill."
This second house was much larger than the bungalow overhanging the
water's edge; it, too, was built in rustic fashion, with tree-trunks for
porch posts; it was long and rambling, and had an additional story at
the back, where the hill sloped away.
It was into this latter house that the crowd of girls was pouring, and the
Winnebagos, following the others, found themselves in a large dining
room, open on three sides to the veranda, and screened all around the
open space. On the fourth side was an enormous fireplace built of
stones like those they had seen in the chimney of the other house. Over
its wide stone shelf were the words CAMP KEEWAYDIN traced in
small, glistening blue pebbles in a cement panel. Although the day was
hot, a small fire of paper and pine knots blazed on the hearth, crackling
a cheery welcome to the newcomers as they entered. In the center of
the room two long tables and a smaller one were set for dinner, and
from the regions below came the appetizing odor of meat cooking,
accompanied by the portentous clatter of an egg beater.
There was apparently an attic loft above the dining-room, for next to
the chimney a square opening showed in the raftered ceiling, with a
ladder leading up through it, fastened against the wall below. Up this
ladder a dozen or more of the younger girls scrambled as soon as they
entered the room; laughing, shrieking, tumbling over each other in their

haste; and after a moment of thumping and bouncing about, down they
all came dancing, clad in