"She won't cheer for Many Eyes because she's ashamed of her and doesn't want people to know she's her entry!" was the painful thought that came into Nyoda's mind.
The rest of the Winnebagos stood gamely together and shrieked for their entry at the tops of their voices. Slim and the Captain stood by them loyally and made as much racket as they could.
The ripple of amusement that had caused Agony so much chagrin when the "paper doll" began her flight soon changed to astonished applause, for Many Eyes won in a walk! Straight up she soared, "just like an angel," as Sahwah described it afterwards, tugging so hard on her leash that the stick upon which the string was wound spun around in Sahwah's hand like a bobbin and it was all she could do to hold on to it. Once she got started she left all the others far behind. As Slim said, she "made them look like a row of stationary wash tubs."
Sammy Boy and the Skyscraper got their tails twisted and came to earth in a tangled mass; American Eagle was top heavy and flopped around in circles and never rose higher than fifty feet, Mikado went up steadily but slowly, straining at its weighted tail; and Victory Bird, whom everybody expected to win, came a close second, and that was all. Many Eyes got to the end of her string first and danced triumphantly about in the air, several yards above Victory Bird. With everything dead set against her, broken looking glass, salt weights, only one eye, and not a single good luck symbol on her anywhere she had come out first in spite of it all!
Then the Winnebagos nearly split their throats cheering, and Agony, who had slipped back to them, cheered louder than all the rest, advertising to all within earshot that she was a Winnebago and belonged to the winning entry.
"And to think," marveled Hinpoha, "that with all her lucky symbols, the other Many Eyes came to grief, and this one won without a single thing to help her! I'll never have faith in good and bad luck signs again!"
The Scout who had scoffed at Many Eyes before the contest came around afterward and looked her over thoughtfully, and discussed her construction in a decidedly respectful tone with Sahwah.
"Now, can a girl design a kite?" asked Sahwah triumphantly.
"I guess she can," admitted the Scout as graciously as he could under the circumstances. He was the one who had designed Victory Bird and it was hard for him to admit that he had been beaten by a girl.
"But then, you're a Camp Fire Girl," he added, as if it were not so much of a defeat to be beaten by a Camp Fire Girl as by an ordinary girl.