“Oh, no. It’s just part of a Girl Scout’s training. You’ve heard of Girl Scouts, haven’t you?”
“Yes, I believe I have. Anyway, I’ve heard of Boy Scouts, so I suppose the Girl Scouts is an organization like theirs—for girls.”
“That’s right,” agreed Mary Louise. “And I have always been very much interested in it. I don’t want to forget all that I have learned. So if I had a couple of sticks and a needle and thread, I could make a pair of flags and—and—practice every day.”
She uttered the last sentence haltingly, fearful lest Miss Stone might guess her reason for wanting them and refuse. But as the nurse had no idea that semaphore meant signaling messages, she was entirely unsuspicious. And it had always been her policy to humor her patients in pursuit of any harmless amusements.
So that afternoon she brought Mary Louise needles and cotton and scissors and sat with her while she cut up her red-and-white sports dress for the flags. It seemed a pity, Miss Stone thought, to destroy such a pretty dress, but it was not likely that Mary Louise would ever need it again. It was a sad fact that few of their patients ever returned to the outside world!
Mary Louise finished her flags just before supper and laid them carefully away behind the washstand. Tomorrow—oh, happy thought!—she would try her luck.
Hope is indeed a great tonic. Mary Louise went right to sleep that night and slept soundly until morning. She performed her duties so quickly and with such intelligence that even Miss Stone began to wonder whether there had not been some mistake in confining the girl to the institution. But as they did not take a daily paper at the asylum, and as they were entirely cut off from the outside world, she had no way of knowing about the desperate search that was going on all over the country for Mary Louise Gay.
“Now that I have finished my work, may I go out into the garden and practice my semaphore for an hour before lunch?” the girl asked her nurse.
“Yes, certainly,” agreed Miss Stone. “I’ll go with you, because I want to spray the rose bushes.”
Mary Louise was not so pleased to be accompanied, but after all, Miss Stone’s presence would mean freedom from other attendants. Nobody would molest her while her own nurse was with her.