“Now,” she continued, “I want you to try to keep together; and always remember this: no fewer than two girls must travel together in the woods; but if anything ever should happen to separate one of you from your companions, and you find that you are lost, select a high, open spot and make two fires—carefully piling on lots of leaves and grass to make smoke; for Girl Scouts have adopted the signal that two smokes arising together mean ‘I am lost—help.’
“Now run along, girls, before you get cold!”
While the remaining girls—Edith, Marian, Lily, and Helen waited the ten minutes, Miss Phillips instituted a game to keep them from becoming cold.
When the time was up, they started off, looking carefully for signals of the trail. Miss Phillips told them to call out when they discovered a trail and instructed each girl to keep count of the signs she discovered first. Once or twice, everybody missed a mark, and went straight ahead; then, failing to see any evidences of the trail, they all turned back and discovered they had missed the turn.
Finally Dorothy spied a smoke in the distance. “Can that be our girls?” she asked.
“I guess so,” replied Miss Phillips. “One smoke means ‘We are camping here.’”
The girls ran as fast as they could, and soon reached the spot. Ethel had spread the big blanket on the ground, and the other girls had succeeded in starting a good fire. Ruth had filled her canteen from a spring not far distant, and offered the girls water. Frances was trying to fasten branches into the ground from which to suspend the kettle for hot water.
“It’s pretty hard to dig a deep enough hole without a spade, Frances,” said Miss Phillips, after she had laid down her pack. “Let your fire die down a little, and put two green logs on each side of it; then we can set the kettle across them right over the fire.”
She turned to Ruth. “Now what have you for lunch?” she inquired.
“Doggies, rolls, cocoa (we have that in the thermos bottle), and baked beans; and a surprise for dessert!”