“We all can, Greta. Don’t worry.”
It was not long before Greta had been driven away. She had locked the door and taken a bundle of clothing with her. Cheerful waves from the girls saw her off and Jean told her not to forget to come to the camp as soon as she could.
There was another long tramp back to camp, for there was no boat to take them over, but Grace invited the boys to stay for as big a meal as they could get up on short notice. “Open some cans of beans, Grace,” suggested Jimmy, “and heat ’em up.”
“Beans it shall be,” laughed Grace, “but we’ll have some other things, too. Think it up, girls, on the way.”
Camp, however, afforded a pleasant surprise. There stood Mr. Standish and Mr. Lockhart in front of the house, drawn there by the sounds of arrival, and while Nan and Fran rushed “madly on,” as Jean said, Mr. Standish came from the house. “Oh, there you are!” she exclaimed in relief. “We just got here and while we saw that the cottage is all right, we were worried to death for fear something had happened to you. Your father and Mr. Lockhart were just starting to the boys’ camp to see if they were all right.”
“Here are Jimmy and Billy and Dan to tell you all about the time they had,” said Nan, hugging her mother. “We weren’t very scared, Mother,—‘sans peur,’ you know, but we have a lot to tell you about Greta Klein, a girl that lives near here.”
“Got a big description of the storm for the paper, Dad,” Jimmy informed Mr. Standish.
“All right. Write it up for me. I heard about the storm up here and we had the edge of it at home. Wires were down, so I thought we’d better drive up. Such roads. We came over the shaky bridge and may have to swim back.”
“In that case, I’ll stay with the girls,” suggested Mrs. Standish, laughing. “It was an awful ride, but I was thinking of you and the girls and could not get here fast enough, Jimmy. Where are the rest of the boys?”
“Back at camp, I suppose. We came up here to see if the girls had escaped.”