The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge | Page 9

the bright side of things in case our plans should fall through. Hello-- who's this?"
"This" proved to be Mollie's little sister Dora, or "Dodo," as she was called by almost everybody. With a sigh of relief, the girls saw that Dodo's twin brother, Paul, was not with her, for together the children were a simply unconquerable pair.
The twins had been spoiled by their widowed mother, Mrs. Billette, even before the time when they had been kidnapped and spirited off by a hideous Spaniard. But since their recovery, their joyful mother had indulged them in every way until they had become well nigh unmanageable.
Yet in spite of everything, the twins were very lovable, and every one loved them, even those whom they annoyed most.
And now as Dodo tore up the street toward them, waving something white in her hand, the girls instinctively glanced about to see what they ought to put out of sight before the cyclone struck them.
"Thank goodness, Paul isn't with her," murmured Grace. "Then we would be in for it."
"Dodo," cried Mollie as the child started up the walk, "scrape some of that mud off your feet before you come up, You will get Betty's porch all dirty."
"Name's Dora-- not Dodo," the little girl answered, paying not the slightest heed to Mollie's caution about the mud. "Dodo's a baby's name-- don't like it. Got something for you."
She stumbled heedlessly up the steps, leaving a trail of mud behind her, and almost breaking her neck in the bargain.
"Now just look at Betty's porch," Mollie was beginning in exasperation when Betty laughingly interfered.
"Oh, let her alone, Mollie," she coaxed. "The porch was dirty anyway and-- what's that you have in your hand, Dodo?"
"Sumfin' for Mollie," answered Dodo, leaning sulkily against the rail while the girls regarded her anxiously. "An' if Mollie aren't nice to me she can't have it."
"Oh, for goodness' sake be nice to her and get it over with, Mollie," urged Grace, uneasily conscious of the candy box she had shoved hastily behind her. She was afraid one corner of it might show.
So Mollie got down from her perch on the railing and went over coaxingly to the little girl.
"Give it to Mollie, honey," she begged. "I'll even call you Dora, if you will."
"Always Dora-- never Dodo?" asked Dodo eagerly, for she was growing out of babyhood just enough to resent being called by her baby name.
"Always Dora," Mollie promised.
For answer Dodo held out the white thing she had waved at them from the street, and with a little cry of excitement Mollie saw that it was a letter addressed to her in her Uncle John's firm hand.
At her exclamation the girls crowded round her eagerly. She hastily tore open the envelope and devoured the contents. Then she turned to the girls with a glowing face.
"It's all right, it's all right!" she cried, waving the letter round her head like a flag and nearly upsetting her chums. "Uncle John says it is settled. He is going to Canada for a couple of months and we can have the lodge for the whole time he is away or a part of it, just as we wish. Hooray! How's that for luck?"
The girls were so excited over their good fortune that they forgot all about Dodo. She, finding herself unobserved, had slipped around the girls to the swing, snatched the box of candy which Grace had exposed when she got up, had taken the steps two at a time and was flying off down the street before the girls saw what she was up to.
Then it was Grace who, with a dreadful premonition, thought of her candy. She turned quickly, saw that the box was gone, and uttered a wail of woe.
"That little Turk of a sister of yours has done it again," she cried, turning to Mollie, while Betty and Amy began to laugh. "You just wait till I catch her. I'll get my candy back if I have to-- spank her," this last with a fierce scowl.
Betty put an arm about her excited chum, led her over to the swing and put her down in it.
"By the time you caught Dodo there wouldn't be any of your candy left," she said, adding soothingly: "Never mind, honey. We will get you some more if we have to take up a collection."
"Makes me feel like an orphan's home," grumbled Grace, but she laughed nevertheless with the rest and immediately forgot both her candy and Dodo in renewed excitement over Wild Rose Lodge.
"Just where is this place, Mollie?" asked Amy. "What is it called?"
"Oh, that's the very best part of it," said Mollie, with a mysterious smile. "It has the most wonderful, most romantic name. Come closer while I whisper it-- Moonlight Falls. There, isn't that a real name for a