The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin | Page 7

view, followed by
a head and a pair of shoulders. Katherine and Oh-Pshaw sat petrified at
the apparition.
"Did I scare you, girls?" asked a deep, strong voice, and the apparition
looked gravely from one to the other. It was a dark-skinned face,
bronzed by wind and weather to a coppery, Indian-like tinge, and the
hair which framed it was coarse and black. Only the head and shoulders
of the apparition were visible beside the arms, the rest being concealed
in the depths underneath the tent, but the breadth of those shoulders
indicated clearly what might be expected in the way of a body. After a
moment of roving back and forth between the two girls, the dark eyes
under the heavy eyebrows fastened themselves upon Katherine with a
mournful intensity of gaze that held her spellbound, speechless. After a
full moment's scrutiny the dark eyes dropped, and the apparition, using
her arms as levers, raised herself to the level of the floor and stood up.
She was taller even than they had expected from the breadth of her
shoulders; in fact, she seemed taller than the tent itself. Katherine, who
up until that moment had considered herself tall, felt like a pigmy
beside her, or, as she expressed it, "like Carver Hill suddenly set down
beside one of the Alps." Never had she seen such a monumental young
woman; such suggestion of strength and vigor contained in a feminine
frame.

Oh-Pshaw looked timidly at the human Colossus standing in the middle
of the tent, and inquired meekly, "Are you Miss Armstrong? Are you
our Councilor?"
"I am," replied the newcomer gravely, replacing the board in the floor
with a nonchalance which conveyed the impression that coming up
through floors was her usual manner of entering places.
"Why did you come in that way?" burst out Katherine, unable to
contain her curiosity any longer.
"Oh, I just happened to be under the tent," replied Miss Armstrong,
speaking in a drawling voice with a marked English accent, "looking
for the broom, when I spied that loose board and thought I'd come in
that way. It was less trouble than coming out and going around to the
steps."
"Less trouble," echoed Katherine. "I should think it would have been
more trouble raising that heavy board with my suitcase standing on it."
"Was your suitcase on it?" inquired Miss Armstrong casually. "I didn't
notice."
"Didn't notice!" repeated Katherine in astonishment. "It weighs thirty
pounds."
"I weigh two hundred and thirty," returned Miss Armstrong
conversationally.
"You do!" exclaimed Katherine in amazement. "You certainly don't
look it." Indeed, it seemed incredible that Miss Armstrong, tall as she
was, could possibly weigh so much, for she looked lean and gaunt as a
wolf hound.
"You must be awfully strong, to have raised that board," Katherine
continued, squinting at the muscular brown arms, which seemed solid
as iron.

For answer Miss Armstrong took a step forward, picked Katherine up
as if she had been a feather, threw her over her shoulder like a sack of
potatoes, held her there for a moment head downward, and then swung
her up and set her lightly on the hanging shelf, while Oh-Pshaw looked
on round-eyed and open-mouthed with astonishment.
Just then a shadow appeared in the doorway, and Katherine looked
down to see a shrinking little figure with pipestem legs standing on the
top step.
"Hello!" Katherine called gaily, from her airy perch. "Are you our
neighbor from Avernus? Do you want anything?" she added, for the
girl was swallowing nervously, and seemed to be on the verge of
making a request.
"Will somebody please show me how to make a bed?" faltered the
visitor in a thin, piping voice. "It isn't made, and I don't know how to
do it."
"Daggers and dirks!" exploded Katherine, nearly falling off the shelf
under the stress of her emotion.
"What's the matter with the rest of the folks in Avernus--can't they
make beds either?" asked Miss Armstrong, surveying the wisp of a girl
in the doorway with an intent, solemn gaze that sent her into a tremble
of embarrassment.
"My 'tenty' hasn't come yet," she faltered in reply.
"Who's your councilor?"
"I don't know; she isn't there." The voice broke on the last words, and
the blue eyes overflowed with tears.
Katherine leaped from the shelf to the bed and down to the floor. "I'll
come over and help you make your bed," she said kindly.
"All right," said Miss Armstrong, nodding gravely. "You go over with

her and I'll find out who's councilor in Avernus and send her around."
To herself she added, when the other two were out of earshot, "Baby's
away from it's mother for the first time, and it's homesick."
"Poor thing," said Oh-Pshaw, who had overheard Miss Armstrong's
remark.
"She'll