But “Greta Klein” had not changed so much in four years that her own mother did not know her. “Ann,—Ann-girl,” said Mrs. Everett Gordon, rising at once from her chair and walking across the big room as if there were no one there but herself and the girl who was staring at her with startled eyes. “Oh, what have they done to my little girl all this while! Don’t you remember, Ann?”
One by one the girls began to slip out of the room. It was very confusing to the girl who had been Greta Klein as she thought. Even Jean deserted her, and here were a gentle lady and a kind man, who held her close by turns and scarcely said more than her new name, Ann, Ann and Ann again. Best of all she knew them for her own. “Oh, yes, it’s you, Mother! I know! Please take me home, Father!”
It was not necessary to look for the identifying beads and handkerchief. Ann had changed very much, her mother said, in height and expression, but the face could not be mistaken. Nothing but some disfigurement could have made her hard to recognize at once. Mr. and Mrs. Gordon could scarcely bear to have her out of their sight. Jean protested against her being taken away at once, but Ann drew Jean’s arm within her own as she said, “Suppose you had just found your father and mother again, Jean, wouldn’t you want to see home with your own eyes? I’ll never forget what you girls have done for me and my father says I may come back; but I have two little brothers, Jean. Think of it! I will write you all about it.”
With this Jean was satisfied. In a whirl of cheery goodbyes the Gordon car took them all back to town and the train. “My,” said Jean, “doesn’t it seem lonesome without Sybil?”
“Yes,” Grace answered, “yet she was here only two weeks. Do you realize, girls, that the time I have to spend here is getting short?”
The vacation was flying, as Grace said, but when Grace felt that she must go back, there were several tired mothers that thought a short vacation would do them considerable good. They were welcomed as chaperons by the S. P.’s and not allowed to cook or lift anything but an admonishing finger. By this time, moreover, the S. P.’s could “really cook,” as Jean put it. The advent of the mothers, one by one, prolonged the camping until within a few weeks before school began; then the beloved cottage was dismantled and the caravan of campers returned. The boys had gone first, but some of them came back to help the girls pack up.
Billy persuaded Jean to ride on the truck which Jimmy drove, with Grace beside him. He fixed a safe perch and sat beside her to hear the latest, he said.
“Well, Billy, the latest is that we are really the Social Progress Club, announcing our name to everybody, and that we think the Sibyl Pixies a clever idea of you boys. The only thing secret will be our initiations; so that that mystery is over. But the great mystery of the S. P.’s was the one we didn’t expect at all, the one that made Ann Gordon out of Greta Klein! Sure enough, I did go up there to find a cousin. Suppose we hadn’t gone camping. Suppose we hadn’t had a S. P. Club!”
“You would have gone East with your father and mother, and Leigh would have gone somewhere with hers, and Molly,—well, you would have been scattered.”
“And oh, Billy, I’ve something to confess to you. I’ve just dreaded doing it, but I have to, for the sake of my little conscience!” Then Jean started in to tell Billy all the details about how she started the S. P.’s. Fortunately, Billy did not take it as seriously as she feared, though she did not spare herself. He doubled over with mirth when she told him how she saw the S. P. on a sign as they passed.