"Strange thing that your hat should get lost just in the spot where I happen to come ashore," remarked Jane sarcastically. "How long have you been spying upon my movements, Miss Virtue?"
"I haven't been spying on you," declared Agony hotly. "I hadn't any idea you were out. To tell the truth, I never missed you this evening when we were on the river."
"Well, I suppose you'll pull Mrs. Grayson out of her bed now to tell her the scandal about Jane Pratt," continued Jane bitingly, "and tomorrow morning at five o'clock there'll be another departure from camp."
"O Jane!" cried Agony, in distress. "Will she really send you home?"
"She really will," mocked Jane. "She sent a girl home last year who did the same thing."
"O Jane, how dreadful that would be," said Agony.
"And how sorry you would be to have me go—not," returned Jane derisively.
"Jane," said Agony seriously, "if I promise not to tell Mrs. Grayson this time will you promise never to do this sort of thing again? It would be awful to be sent home from camp in disgrace. If you think it over you'll surely see what a much better time you'll have if you don't break rules—if you work and play honorably. Won't you please try?"
The derisive tone deepened in Jane's voice as she answered, "No I will not. I'll make no such babyish promise—to you of all people—because I wouldn't keep it if I did make it."
"Then," said Agony firmly, "I'll do just as we do in school with the honor system. I'll give you three days to tell Mrs. Grayson yourself, and if you haven't done it by the end of that time I'll tell her myself. What you are doing is a bad example for the younger girls, and Mrs. Grayson ought to know about it."