“HIGH C.”
All the members of Flamingo Camp Fire gathered close together on the sandy beach after the departure of the two Graham girls and held a low-toned discussion of the situation.
“There was only one thing missing this morning,” Hazel Edwards observed. “That was the perfume. I suppose they didn’t have time to spill it on in proper proportions.”
“I wonder why they came down here at this time of day?” said Harriet Newcomb. “There must be something in the air.”
“I bet they never got up this early before unless their house was afire,” Ethel Zimmerman ventured.
“Do you suppose they wanted to be on hand to witness our discomfiture when we discovered what had been done to our swimming place?” Azalia Atwood asked.
“That would imply that they knew who did it and may even have been a party to the plot,” Miss Ladd reasoned.
“And why not?” Azalia returned. “They don’t look to me, for a moment, to be above it.”
“I feel like a miserable hypocrite,” Katherine declared with a sarcastic smile. “I’m not used to extending warm expressions of friendship to people for whom I haven’t any use and asking them to call and see me.”
“Remember you’re a spy now,” said Helen Nash slyly. “When engaged in a praiseworthy spy work, always remember your mother and the pantry and the fist in the jam, if you have any doubt as to the worthiness of your occupation.”
“Enough said,” Katherine announced, “I’m convinced. The jam is well spiced and I smell it already. I shall expect to find it on somebody’s fist.”
The girls did not forego their morning plunge because of the removal of the “safety line,” but were careful to keep well within the approximate limit which they remembered fairly well. After about fifteen minutes in the water they returned to the camp and donned their khaki middies; then they had breakfast.
The breakfast dishes had not long been washed and put away when another caller arrived at the camp. Although not unheralded, the appearance of this new arrival was a surprise to all the girls, for they had not rested much importance upon the promise of Addie Graham to send her brother to them to offer his assistance in repairing the damage done by some mischief-maker in the night before.
The young male scion of the Graham family appeared so suddenly before the eyes of the girl campers that some of them afterward expressed the suspicion that he walked timidly on his tiptoes all the way from his home to the camp. Indeed all the members of Flamingo Fire have today a decided impression that the sound of his voice was the first notice they had of his approach.
Whether this impression be a true one or not, that voice was enough to compel memory of it ahead of anything else. It was the most effeminately high-pitched voice the girls had ever heard.
“Excuse me, young ladies, but my name is James Graham, Jr.,” squeaked the treble clef.
There was a general start throughout the camp. Most of the girls were seated upon the grassy plot within the crescent arrangement of the tents and engaged in their forenoon routine, and several of them actually dropped their craft work into their laps so great was their surprise. Ethel Zimmerman uttered a little cry of astonishment in almost the same key as the announcement of the newcomer.
The latter was almost as effeminate in appearance as in voice. First, he was very much overgrown and fleshy. He probably weighed 150 pounds. His face was round and very pale, and his eyes were not over-endowed with expression. He wore a “peaches-and-cream” two-piece suit and a panama fedora and carried a delicate bamboo cane.
“My two thoughtful sisters info’med me that you young ladies were in need of the assistance of a man, and I volunteered to offer my aid,” continued young Master Graham.
“Oh dear me,” replied Katherine; “it would be a shame to put you to so much trouble. We thank you ever so much for your offer, but we’d much rather retain the friendship of your folks by urging you not to insist. If you really must be so good as you suggest, you might go back and send your hostler or chauffeur, but tell him to bring a pair of rubber boots that reach to his ears.”
This rather enigmatical answer puzzled the not very quick-witted James, Jr., and his chin dropped.
“You see, we want a pile-driver out in the lake to sink some posts into the submarine earth,” Katherine continued. “But, by the way, come to think of it, you might help us wonderfully if you have a rowboat and would lend it to us for an hour or two.”
“Sure I’ve got a boat,” replied the “would-(not)-be ladies’ aid,” as one of the girls afterward dubbed him. The tone of relief with which he now spoke was unmistakable. “I’ll go and row it right over to you.”
“We won’t want it until about 11 o’clock,” said Miss Ladd. “If you need it between now and then you’d better wait.”
“Oh we won’t want it all day,” James, Jr., returned reassuringly. “I’ll bring it right away.”
“I hope he doesn’t tip his boat over on his ‘high C’,” Hazel Edwards said generously, as the caller disappeared in the timber. “He might be drowned in the billows of his own voice.”
“That’s his name—High C,” declared Estelle Adler enthusiastically. “I refuse to recognize him by any other name. Dear me, girls, did you ever in all your born days hear such a voice?”
“No,” cried several in chorus.
“He’s just the dearest thing I ever saw,” declared Ernestine Johanson, making a face as sour as the reputation of a crabapple.
At this moment the discussion of “High C” was dropped as suddenly as “it” had appeared upon the scene. Another arrival claimed the interest of the girls.
It was a little boy about ten years old, clad in steel-gray Palm Beach knickerbockers and golf cap, but not at all happy in appearance. He was a good looking youth, but there was no sprightly cheerfulness in his countenance. He seemed nervous and on the alert.
“My goodness!” exclaimed Hazel Edwards; “that’s Glen Irving, the little boy we——”
Katherine, who was seated close to Hazel, cut the latter’s utterance short by clapping her hand over the speaker’s mouth.