"How?"
"In the easiest way you can imagine. I'll say that Harriet never has liked me and that she had taken my towel and hidden it purposely, just to produce it at the right time and accuse me of having been implicated in the hazing."
"But it wasn't your towel," protested Cora. "It was mine."
"That's all right. That will make it all the better. She will say it was your towel and I will say it was mine. Don't you see how that will mix the affair up? You must stand by me if it comes to that."
"Of course," answered Cora Kidder, but in rather a weak voice. She was not a bad girl at heart, but she was easily influenced; it was not difficult to persuade her to look at any matter with other eyes than her own. It was the bad influence of Patricia Scott that already had led Cora so far into mischief, and that gave promise of leading her still farther. Patricia, on the other hand, possessed a jealous and revengeful disposition. It had caused her trouble in her own home and lost her many friends in her home town. She had been sent to the camp in the hope that the wholesome life in the woods might give her a new point of view, and that the association with the Camp Girls might make a better girl of her. Thus far the desired result had not been attained, though she had managed to hide her shortcomings from Mrs. Livingston and the guardians. At times Mrs. Livingston, close observer that she was, had wondered as to the girl's real character, but Patricia's sweet smile, easily assumed to fit the occasion, had on each occasion disarmed the Chief Guardian.
"You must pretend to be very indignant if ever you are called to account, and I will pretend to be indignant, too. I almost hope she does complain of us, and she will, too. She is a sneak."
"I don't hope she'll complain of us," cried Cora in alarm. "I know I should die of mortification."
"You haven't any courage, Cora Kidder," declared Patricia scornfully. "I see I shall have to look out for both of us, and——"
"No, no," protested Cora. "Tell me what you want me to do. I will do it. I don't want to be found out for what I already have done and be sent home. What would I do? Oh, what would I do?"
Patricia gave her a withering glance.