“Nut cookies!” repeated Corene, unable to comprehend the sudden blessing. “How could you go to all that trouble?”
“’Tweren’t any trouble. A lady from up town brought the nuts. Edna, where is Zenta?”
“I’ll get her,” offered Edna, a blonde with skin like a flower in spite of unfavorable environment.
Miss Brooks was clapping her hands again, and the visitors were following “the big girls” over to the little knoll under the pine trees. Julia and Isabel were making the Scouts’ table ready, while Louise and Corene went to introduce the spring, and to offer a good supply of extra drinking cups.
Miss Mackin was urging Miss Brooks to take her lunch at the table under the trees.
“You won’t think me ungrateful,” replied the visitor, “but you see, the children like to have me with them. They will fairly swamp me with questions about the woodland beauties. I would love to have you join us, however,” she invited Miss Mackin.
“Then we would be without a leader,” put in Cleo, swinging a free arm around Miss Mackin.
“Exactly, I understand. How good it is to be beloved,” said the serious little woman with the brown eyes, that sparkled latent possibilities.
Healthy hunger was driving all the human animals to food now, and the “drive” included the Bobbies, as well as the children from the Beacon Settlement.
Quickly boxes and little bundles were untied and unwrapped, and even at a distance the excursionists could be seen literally devouring the “basket lunch,” only there were really no baskets. True, a little Italian girl carried her food in a handmade straw bag that might be called a basket, while a Russian displayed a quaint braided affair from the Homelands; but boxes and bags, American in make, were mostly in evidence.