The Girl Scouts at Camp Comalong Part 24

"Oh, s.h.a.g was on guard," put in Cleo. "She was around by the side porch, but no danger of anyone making herself too much at home with s.h.a.g doing picket duty."

Miss Ramsdell lay down her piece of cake. Peg did likewise with her lemonade. Each had exchanged code glances.

"I'll run home and see if--if everything is all right," said the girl, anxiously. "Auntie, you can follow or stay, I'll be all right. Sorry to leave the picnic," she apologized. And the remarks that followed her did not all reach her ears, for as quickly as even she, the lightfoot, could do it, she was on Whirlwind and galloping away down the hills, leaving after her the chagrined Bobbies.

"Why did you tell her?" whispered Helen to Grace.

"Because she should know," replied the latter, emphatically.

Miss Ramsdell was also leaving.

"Peggie is so temperamental," she apologized. "But the Fairbanks family are not to be trusted--we have had our own troubles with those girls and their unscrupulous father."

"But we are so sorry you couldn't have stayed a little longer," said Miss Mackin. "I was just hoping our girls were finally going to get acquainted. You see we have so short a time here now, and your place has been an attraction from the first," she smiled condescendingly at the glowering Scouts.

"Please do not think us rude," begged Miss Ramsdell. "We are not free to act as we would always choose. Sometimes I doubt the wisdom of my niece's determination; but she is determined to the point of desperation, and she keeps offsetting my arguments with the hope of an early victory." (This was ambiguous but sounded effective.) "I must go right along after her," continued the little lady. "If that Leonore should become too aggressive I wouldn't wonder if Peg would just use some muscle on her," and she nodded her head insistently.

"We hate to have you go," murmured Cleo. She was going over to the shady spot where the black mare waited its rider. Miss Ramsdell drew on her gloves while the Scout led her horse up to a stone convenient for mounting.

"We are so grateful and have enjoyed our little picnic so much," said the woman. "Good-bye, everyone, and perhaps before camp breaks we may be able to offer our own humble hospitality." With a slight effort she was in the saddle. Yes, it was perfectly evident that Miss Ramsdell was very much at home on her horse.

"A one reel act," remarked Louise. "I shouldn't care to keep moving at the pace the Ramsdells run."

"They surely fear trouble," said Julia. "What can they be so secretive about?"

"Whatever it is I wouldn't like to be playing Leonore's part when Peg meets her," remarked Grace. "As her aunt said, she would likely use muscle on the intruder," and Grace demonstrated to the loss of a perfectly good half cup of lemonade that had been, until that moment, in the hand of Julia.

"And was s.h.a.g really keeping guard?" questioned Helen, keen on the scent of trouble for someone else.

"He was doing picket duty," replied Cleo. "It was too funny to see him snoop after Leonore's heels. And she was almost sweet to us. I fancy she thought we might take her part with s.h.a.g."

"Girls, when you have finished your chow we will take up the trail again," suggested Miss Mackin. "There are some ores and metallic veins in rocks about here, I believe, and we may make some interesting discoveries."

"Look out for the dynamite sign," warned Corene. "I wonder who ever planted those signs about?"

"Where are they?" asked Miss Mackin.

"Over by the Big Nose Rock," replied Louise. "We saw them the other day when we were riding."

"And we thought the boys might have a bandits' cove under the hills,"

added Cleo. "Let's go over that way and explore."

Eagerly this suggestion was followed--so eagerly Corene and Miss Mackin had difficulty in obliging the girls to get rid of every trace of the picnic, thus conforming to a Scout regulation. But when the paper bags had all been burned up in a carefully arranged little fire, after which every ember and spark were extinguished, then they took up the trail for Big Nose Rock.

They had some difficulty in cutting through from one hill to the next, as very heavy underbrush, especially the iron fibered mountain laurel, hid the rocks and betrayed the hikers' footing; but after a number of minor mishaps all disposed of by the process of exclamation, the Bobbies finally emerged in the little patch of soft green at the foot of the big gray rock.

"I found the first one!" called out Helen. "Here's a dynamite sign!"

"Don't touch it!" cautioned Miss Mackin. "There is a powder mill not far from here and there may be magazines about."

"Magazines!" questioned Corene. They were all inspecting the danger sign half hidden in the gra.s.s.

"Yes. You know they sometimes bury explosives under the ground. Then they build a little mound above it and call it a magazine."

"No mounds around here," declared Julia, glancing critically over the flat surface between the hill and the springs.

"But here's something," observed Cleo, who had wandered off a short distance. "Looks like pieces of gray stone." She stooped to pick up a sample and then hesitated. "See how they grow," she remarked, "in a sort of star."

Her companions gathered around to observe the curious formation, and Miss Mackin came closer.

"Those have been arranged that way," she said. "See, someone has placed the little flat stones in the shape of a star. The boys really must have been up here," she concluded.

The girls dropped on their knees and peered closely. Brus.h.i.+ng back the gra.s.s it was now quite evident that star had been carefully formed, but it was hidden in a little pocket of deep gra.s.s, between two slopes that curved up to the rocky hills.

"And see how deep the pieces are buried," commented Corene. She was prying up a sample with a small sharp stick.

"Some sort of clue, surely," insisted Grace. "What kind of stone is it?"

"I wouldn't disturb it," suggested Miss Mackin. "Suppose we just mark the spot so we can find it again, if we want to?"

"Yes, let's put one of the dynamite signs here," exclaimed Helen.

"I wouldn't," interposed clever Cleo. "Perhaps the dynamite people don't know anything about the star clue. We might lead them to it."

"But it's only a stone star," insisted Helen.

"And it didn't grow there," argued Cleo.

"Look!" exclaimed Corene, who was critically examining the tiny strip of stone she had pried loose. "There are some figures or something marked on this."

Everyone now crowded around her to see the characters.

"That is not Indian," declared Miss Mackin. "It looks as if it were burned in with acid."

She was scrutinizing the little flat mosaic-like block. Yes, there seemed to be a mark there, but it might easily have been on the stone before the star idea originated.

"I'm going to keep this piece, at any rate," declared Corene. "Maybe it's a real carved beetle, like the Egyptian Scarabus," she ventured.

"Hardly," replied the director. "Yet it is interesting and yours, Corey, as you dug it up."

"Then I'm going to have one also," cried Cleo, already on her knees before the broken star.

"Count the pieces," suggested Louise, "and perhaps we can all have a piece."

"Very well," agreed Miss Mackin, "but mark the spot well. It may have some significance."

The girls were eagerly digging up the little granite pieces. As they turned each over they found it marked with characters similar to that found by Corene.

"I know! I know!" exclaimed Julia. "I've read about this sort of marking. See, the straight lines. That's the rune."