BACK TO AUNT SUSAN'S
After spending the night at Uncle John's, Aunt Susan and Ethel left for
Akron.
"Oh! what a lovely summer I've had," said Ethel, "and how much I've learned being a Camp Fire Girl; and I owe it all to you, Aunt Susan."
The next week Mr. Hollister came to take the girl home—and how he had missed her!
They spent the day with Uncle John. He and her father were like boys again.
"You must come here next year, Archibald," said John, "and go up to Camp and see the way these girls keep house. It's a revelation. What the women are coming to! I don't believe there'll be any room on earth for us men after a while."
Ethel's eyes were blinded with tears as she kissed her dear ones goodbye, and Mattie Hastings with Patty Sands came way to Akron to see her off, Mattie bringing the loveliest pin-cushion made for her by her sister Mollie.
One night Ethel and Mrs. Hollister had a serious talk. Grandmother made Archibald go and listen at the door, as Bella's voice could be heard throughout the house.
When Ethel left her mother she went directly up to her room, but Mrs.
Hollister said to Grandmother:
"This is your work and your sister's as well. Ethel is a changed girl and refused to obey me. She's going to take up low settlement work and belong to that Camp Fire business this winter, and she almost refuses to go into society at all. But for the fact that some of our best girls are Camp Fires I should positively forbid it. She is not yet of age, and I still have some authority over her, after all my slaving for her and sacrifices. Now she openly defies me."