“I would never trust those indifferent men to get it sent out to-day if we didn’t just stay here and superintend,” declared Cleo. “I have two promises for two men with light trucks. Let’s see if either will come.”
So the real work began. But it was all so novel, and the woods smelled so of the pines and cedars and larches—no wonder that spot had been given the name Tamarack Hills.
By night fall the camp site had been cleared; the girls raised a pretty crop of blisters in their frantic efforts to get things cut down. The tent pegs were all driven in, Benny and his Boy Scout friends helped with the driving, but the hoisting of the tent was considered too important a task to be left to “such little girls,” so much against the ambition of Corene that piece of work was actually done by a corps of real Scouts—to wit—three very interested fathers, who came to the camp site in the autos that brought them from the early evening train.
For the sake of identification we will call these gentlemen after their daughters, so it was Mr. Cleo who ran the ridge pole under the center of the tent, while Messrs. Julia and Louise, at the signal, raised the tent by lifting the poles and carrying them to their places. It took some little time to get the big canvas house properly adjusted, but it was worth all the trouble.
“Hurrah!” shouted the Bobbies as their headquarters was finally in evidence.
“How can we ever go home and leave it to-night?” bewailed Grace.
“Folks at home are worrying lest you have worked too hard to-day,” declared the man with the big gray car. “You must come along, kiddies.”
“But we didn’t, daddy, really,” protested Corene. “We loafed more than we worked. There was so much to see and so many things to distract us. I’m not one bit tired.”
“Oh, h-h-h!” groaned Louise, almost falling into Cleo’s arms. “She isn’t a bit tired! I’m dead!”
“But Corey is always in such good form,” said Julia. “This is where all her exercising comes in.”