“Not Edith Evans back again?” suggested Lily, hopefully.
“No. I won’t keep you in suspense any longer. Frances Wright has successfully passed the lieutenant’s test and since she was eighteen the first of this month, she has received the commission. The day that we stop to take the Sailor test, I thought we would have a formal meeting in the evening, and install her in office.”
The congratulations that followed assured the captain that she had not made a mistake in her choice.
It was around nine o’clock when the fire died down and the conversation commenced to lag, and they all voted that they were ready to go to bed. The strange croaking of the frogs, and hum of the insects, the distant ripple of the flowing water, and the breeze now and then moving the branches of the trees were the only sounds that broke the stillness of the woods. Tired, happy, and at peace with the world, the girls crept into their tents, and with their blankets wrapped around them, soon fell asleep.
CHAPTER V
THE BY-STREAM
The experiences of a canoe-trip are sometimes more interesting than those of any other kind of outdoor excursions, for there are not only the alternate pleasures of travelling by water and of camping on land, but there is the added joy of awaking each morning to find a new world. When the girls had pulled their canoes upon the bank the preceding afternoon, and had busied themselves with the unpacking and the erection of the tents, they had hardly realized how beautiful the spot of their encampment was. Now as they beheld it from their tents in the sunrise, they were deeply impressed. Marjorie was so eager to make the picture a permanent one that she got out her camera before she was fully dressed, and took a snap-shot.
“Marj, you’re so energetic!” yawned Doris, who was still buried beneath her blankets. “Probably that’s why you get all the prizes that are going. And I do believe you’ll get this one, too,” she added.
“Not if Ruth Henry knows it!” answered Marjorie.
“Do we swim before breakfast?” asked Doris, changing the subject hastily. “Or do we get dressed right away in the rest of our clothing?”