A Campfire Girl's Test of Friendship Part 6

And so, when the sound of wheels in the road heralded the return of Miss Eleanor in the buggy, the work was done, and the lean-to was completed, a rough-and-ready shelter that was practical in the extreme, though perhaps it was not ornamental.

"Splendid!" cried Eleanor. "But I knew you girls would do well. And I've got the good news I hoped to bring, too!"

CHAPTER V

GOOD NEWS FROM TOWN

Everyone rushed eagerly forward, and crowded around Miss Mercer as she descended from the buggy, smiling pleasantly at the bashful Tom Pratt, who did his best to help her in her descent. And not the least eager, by any means, was Tom Pratt's mother, whose early indifference to the interest of these good Samaritans in her misfortunes seemed utterly to have vanished.

"Oh, these girls of yours!" cried Mrs. Pratt. "You've no idea of how much they've done--or how much they've heartened us all up, Miss Mercer!

I don't believe there were ever so many kind, nice people brought together before!"

Eleanor laughed, as if she were keeping a secret to herself. And her words, when she spoke, proved that that was indeed the case.

"Just you wait till you know how many friends you really have around here, Mrs. Pratt!" she said. "Well, I told you I hoped to bring back good news, and I have, and if you'll all give me a chance, I'll tell you what it is."

"You've found a place for all the Pratts to go!" said Dolly.

"You've arranged something so that they won't have to stay here!" agreed Margery.

"I don't know whether Mrs. Pratt would agree that that was such good news," she said. "Tell me, Mrs. Pratt--you are still fond of this place, aren't you?"

"Indeed, and I am, Miss Mercer!" she said, choking back a sob. "When I first saw how it looked this morning, I thought I only wanted to go away and never see it again, if I only knew where to go. But I feel so different now. Why, all the time we've been working around here, it's made me think of how Tom--I mean my poor husband--and I came here when we were first married. Tom had the land, you see, and he'd built a little cabin for us with his own hands."

"And all the farm grew from that?"

"Yes. We worked hard, you see, and the children came, but we had a better place for each one to be born in, Miss Mercer--we really did! It was our place. We've earned it all, with the help from the place itself, and before the fire--"

She broke down then, and for a moment she couldn't go on.

"Of course you love it!" said Eleanor, heartily. "And I don't think it would be very good news for you to know that you had a chance to go somewhere else and make a fresh start, though I could have managed that for you."

"I'd be grateful, though, Miss Mercer," said Mrs. Pratt. "I don't want you to think I wouldn't. It'll be a wrench, though--I'm not saying it wouldn't. When you've lived anywhere as long as I've lived here, and seen all the changes, and had your children born in it, and--"

"I know--I know," interrupted Eleanor, sympathetically. "And I could see how much you loved the place. So I never had any idea at all of suggesting anything that would take you away."

"Do you really think we can get a new start here?" asked Mrs. Pratt, looking up hopefully.

"I don't only believe it, I know it, Mrs. Pratt," said Eleanor, enthusiastically. "And what's more, you're going to be happier and more prosperous than you ever were before the fire. Not just at first, perhaps, but you're going to see the way clear ahead, and it won't be long before you'll be doing so well that you'll be able to let my friend Tom here go to college."

Mrs. Pratt's face fell. It seemed to her that Eleanor was promising too much.

"I don't see how that could be," she said. "Why, his paw and I used to talk that over. We wanted him to have a fine education, but we didn't see how we could manage it, even when his paw was alive."

"Well, you listen to me, and see if you don't think there's a good chance of it, anyhow," said Eleanor. "In the first place, none of the people in Cranford knew that you'd had all this trouble. It was just as I thought. Their own danger had been so great that they simply hadn't had time to think of anything else. They were shocked and sorry when I told them."

"There's a lot of good, kind people there," said Mrs. Pratt, brightening again. "I'm sure I didn't think anything of their not having come out here to see how we were getting along."

"Some of them would have been out in a day or two, even if I hadn't told them, Mrs. Pratt. As it is--but I think that part of my story had better wait. Tell me, you've been selling all your milk and cream to the big creamery that supplies the milkmen in the city, haven't you?"

"Yes, and I guess that we can keep their trade, if we can get on our feet pretty soon so that they can get it regular again."

"I've no doubt you could," said Eleanor, dryly. "They make so much money buying from you at cheap prices and selling at high prices that they wouldn't let the chance to keep on slip by in a hurry, I can tell you.

But I've got a better idea than that."

Mrs. Pratt looked puzzled, but Tom Pratt, who seemed to be in Eleanor's secret, only smiled and returned Eleanor's wise look.

"When you make b.u.t.ter you salt it and keep it to use here, don't you?"

Eleanor asked next.

"Yes, ma'am, we do."

"Well, if you made fresh, sweet b.u.t.ter, and didn't salt it at all, do you know that you could sell it to people in the city for fifty cents a pound?"

Mrs. Pratt gasped.

"Why, no one in the world ever paid that much for b.u.t.ter!" she said, amazed. "And, anyhow, b.u.t.ter without salt's no good."

"Lots of people don't agree with you, and they're willing to pay pretty well to have their own way, too," she said, with a laugh. "In the city rich families think fresh b.u.t.ter is a great luxury, and they can't get enough of it that's really good. And it's the same way, all summer long, at Lake Dean.

"The hotel there will take fifty pounds a week from you all summer long, as long as it's open, that is. And I have got orders for another fifty pounds a week from the people who own camps and cottages. And what's more, the manager of the hotel has another house, in Lakewood, in the winter time, and when he closes up the house at Cranford, he wants you to send him fifty pounds a week for that house, too."

"Why, however did you manage to get all those orders?" asked Margery, amazed.

"I telephoned to the manager of the hotel," said Eleanor. "And then I remembered the girls at Camp Halsted, and I called up Marcia Bates and told her the whole story, and what I wanted them to do. So she and two or three of the others went out in that fast motor boat of theirs and visited a lot of families around the lake, and when they told them about it, it was easy to get the orders."

"Well, I never!" gasped Mrs. Pratt. "I wouldn't ever have thought of doin' anythin' like that, Miss Mercer, and folks around here seem to think I'm a pretty good business woman, too, since my husband died. Why, we can make more out of the b.u.t.ter than we ever did out of a whole season's crops, sellin' at such prices!"

"You won't get fifty cents a pound from the hotel," said Eleanor.

"That's because they'll take such a lot, and they'll pay you every week.

So I told them they could have all they wanted for forty cents a pound.

But, you see, at fifty pounds a week, that's twenty dollars a week, all the year round, and with the other fifty pounds you'll sell to private families, that will make forty-five dollars a week. And you haven't even started yet. You'll have lots more orders than you can fill."

"I'm wonderin' right now, ma'am, how we'll be able to make a hundred pounds of b.u.t.ter a week."

"I thought of that, too," said Eleanor, "and I bought half a dozen more cows for you, right there in Cranford. They're pretty good cows, and if they're well fed, and properly taken care of, they'll be just what you want."

"But I haven't got the money to pay for them now, ma'am!" said Mrs.

Pratt, dismayed.

"Oh, I've paid for them," said Eleanor, "and you're going to pay me when you begin to get the profits from this new b.u.t.ter business. I'd be glad to give them to you, but you won't need anyone to give you things; you're going to be able to afford to pay for them yourself."

Mrs. Pratt broke into tears.

"That's the nicest thing you've said or done yet, Miss Mercer," she sobbed. "I just couldn't bear to take charity--"