“Oh, Marj and Frieda will soon catch us,” reassured Ruth. “They’re the two best canoeists we’ve got.”
“You’re right, Ruth,” said Florence Evans. “Really, it hardly seems worth while for the rest of us to go in that water meet. Marj will be so sure to carry off the prize!”
“What did I tell you, Lil?” asked Ruth, triumphantly.
“Well, don’t repeat it, or I’m liable to upset the canoe again.” She was in quite a good humor now, and could laugh about the episode. “But I do think,” she added, “that we all have a good chance to become as expert as Marj is, and we’re bum sports if we just sit back and complain that it isn’t fair! It would spoil all her pleasure!”
“Right you are, Lily!” commented Miss Phillips. “I am beginning to see that it is worth while to be a scout, after all.”
“Yes, I am ashamed of myself,” said Ruth, humbly. “But I am putting all my energy into the job, and I hope maybe I am improving, a teeny-weeny bit. How about it, Captain?”
“You are doing very well, Ruth,” she replied, with sincerity.
The girls paddled on in silence for a time, all the while keeping a sharp look-out behind them for the absent ones. But there were so many bends and turns, and the trees were so thick on either side, that they could scarcely see two hundred yards behind them. Suddenly Ruth noticed a little tributary to the right.
“Where did that come from, Captain?” she asked.
“Not far from the farm where the girls stopped for peaches. We might have followed it, but it would have necessitated a portage, so I preferred the longer way entirely by water.”