Margaret Vandercook - The Camp Fire Girls by the Blue Lagoon

Not popular with the rest of the household, Juliet Temple had continued to live with Mrs. Burton in a position a little difficult to describe. Treated as a member of the family, she was useful to Mrs. Burton in a variety of ways, in fact she had come to depend upon her far more than she appreciated.

"Yes, I understood that you did not desire to be disturbed, but I think when you know who wishes to see you that you will feel differently," Juliet said quietly.

Accepting the cards that were offered her, Mrs. Burton exclaimed:

"Bettina, you cannot guess who has arrived, unless you have arranged to surprise me! Not to have seen one of you Camp Fire girls in all these months and now to have four of you appear at the same time scarcely seems accidental."

Bettina got up.

"I don't know what you mean!"

The Camp Fire guardian disappeared.

A moment later, returning to her sitting-room she was accompanied by three girls, one of them a tall girl with dusky black hair and eyes and a foreign appearance in spite of the fact that she was an American.

The other two girls were sisters, although utterly unlike in appearance; one of them was tall and slightly angular with gray eyes and reddish hair. The younger girl had golden brown hair and eyes, was small and softly rounded. Her expression at the moment was one of demure happiness.

"Vera Lagerloff, Alice Ashton and Sally Ashton, at your service, Bettina," the Sunrise Camp Fire guardian announced with a curtsey.

"But, Bettina Graham, how in the world do you happen to be in New York at this time?"

Bettina laughed.

"That is exactly the question I was about to ask of you."

"We are spending the winter in New York; actually I have been intending to write you for weeks, Bettina, but have been too busy; Alice and I are taking special courses at Columbia and Sally is here keeping house for us," Vera Lagerloff answered.

"Have I talked so much, Tante, that you have had no opportunity to tell me so important a piece of news?" Bettina inquired.

After finding chairs for her guests, Mrs. Burton had seated herself on a couch beside Sally Ashton. She now shook her head.

"No, Bettina, I could not have told you, since I had no idea the girls were in New York. You see, they have never before been to see me or let me hear where they were. Have you been in town long?"

There was a short, uncomfortable silence.

"About a month; but please let me explain," Alice Ashton said, seeing that the other girls were waiting for her to assume the responsibility of a reply. "I realize this must seem strange to you, and I grant you it does look odd, as if we had lost all our affection and gratitude. And yet you can not believe this of us!"

"I have made no accusation," the Camp Fire guardian returned, yet in her tone and manner there was an unconscious accusation, which made it difficult for Alice to continue.

"I am afraid you are wounded, Tante; I am sorry," she added awkwardly and paused.

Guardian of the Sunrise Camp Fire girls for a number of years, Mrs. Richard Burton, whose professional name was Polly O'Neill Burton, had given up her career on the stage and traveled with the Camp Fire girls in the west. Later when the great war turned the world upside down she had gone with them to Europe accompanied by a wealthy and eccentric spinster, Miss Patricia Lord. After two years in France and a summer in England they had come back to their own country and on account of the Camp Fire guardian's health had spent the preceding winter in the Adirondacks. 1 1 See "Camp Fire Girls" Series.

With the close of the winter Mrs. Burton had returned to the stage and the Camp Fire girls to their homes. There had been no meeting between them until to-day.

"Tante" was the title which the greater number of the Sunrise Camp Fire girls used in speaking to their guardian.

"Please don't behave as if you were too wounded to be angry," Sally Ashton remonstrated, moving closer to the older woman and slipping an arm about her. "And please remember that it is a good deal more of a trial for your Camp Fire girls to have been separated from you for all these months than for you to have had a brief rest from their society. Some of us at least realize that you have given too much of yourself to us for the last few years when a so much larger public needed you. I can't tell you how proud I am of your latest success. I have read dozen of notices in the papers and the critics all say that you are more wonderful than ever."

Mrs. Burton smiled.

"You are very complimentary, Sally dear, and of course I am immensely flattered. Nevertheless this does not explain why you girls have never come near me for a month, or taken the trouble to write or telephone. This would not have interfered seriously with the holiday which you seem to feel I have required."

Rising, Alice Ashton came over and stood before her guardian, her expression unusually gentle and affectionate. Ordinarily Alice was not tactful, although sincerity and a fine sense of honor were her ruling characteristics.

"See here, Tante, we are in an uncomfortable position and there is nothing to do save tell you the entire story and let you judge. You will say frankly whether you think we have been right or wrong. I feel sure that Sally and Vera have felt as I do, when I say there has scarcely been a day since our arrival in New York when we have not thought of you and longed to see you. We have been to your play several times."

"Why avoid me, dear? What can it be that you find so difficult to say? I prefer to know."

"Even if the reason will trouble you more than the fact? The truth is that Aunt Patricia would not agree to have us see you."

"So Aunt Patricia's influence is stronger than your feeling for me! Perhaps that is as it should be, but I can not altogether recognize what I have done which makes Aunt Patricia not only refuse to have anything to do with me herself, but wish to separate you Camp Fire girls from me as well. I suppose she fears I may affect you with the ingratitude and obstinacy I possess. As long as you were so compliant with Aunt Patricia's wish, Alice, why did you change? Aunt Patricia has not changed!"

"You are angry and hurt and I don't know how to go on," Alice returned, her gray blue eyes darkening, a flush coming into her cheeks.

"Then don't try, Alice," Sally interrupted. "Tante, please be sensible and don't make a tragedy over a situation that is uncomfortable enough for us all, goodness knows! I have no gift of words but at least I can speak plainly. Alice and Vera both feel under obligation to Aunt Patricia because she is paying their expenses in New York this winter. I have not been here so long as they have, in fact I only arrived a few days ago. Aunt Patricia has rented a lovely little apartment for us and is being generous as only she can be. So when she asked Alice and Vera not to come to see you, they considered that in a way they were obliged to do as she asked; I had no such feeling. Aunt Patricia has been spending a few days with us and this morning at breakfast, I had the matter out with her. I simply told her I was coming to call on you, that she of course must do as she liked, but that I had been caring for you all my life and had no idea of ever doing anything else. If she did not wish me to remain on at the apartment, she could of course send me home."

"Bravo, Sally!" Bettina Graham said softly under her breath.

"Of course," Sally added, "Alice and Vera have a different attitude toward Aunt Patricia. I have never been a favorite with her, as they have, or lived alone with her during their reconstruction work in France. My own opinion is that Aunt Patricia wants to see you so much herself that she is unwilling to have us see you, for fear we shall talk of you afterwards. She made it a stipulation this morning when she agreed we could come to see you that your name was not to be mentioned in her presence. I really am awfully sorry for her. She is very lonely this winter I am afraid, shut up in her big house near Boston. She cares for you more than any one in the world, and only comes to New York occasionally, I really believe to find out how you are, although no one of us has been able to discover if she has been to see you act."