“They think you are awfully charming, dearest.”
Polly laughed. “To be charming, Peggy, is hardly a valuable characteristic of a Camp Fire guardian, or even of a Camp Fire girl, since there are a number of things I can think of as more important. Go ahead; be honest, dear. I have been thinking if our Camp Fire club is to go on for a time longer, as I wish it to do, I ought to know what we are accomplishing together.”
“Oh, well, Tante, you are terribly inspiring; the girls all think that and say they never felt so happy or so alive as they have since they came out here with you, and they never have learned so many things. But——”
“But what, Peggy, please?” Polly asked more seriously than she had yet spoken.
“But,” continued Peggy a little desperately, as if she felt herself pushed to the wall, “some of us don’t—at least, I don’t think you understand all of the girls equally well. Sometimes you seem to have favorites. Oh, I don’t mean that you are not extremely kind to us all alike, and I don’t want you to feel that any one is ungrateful.”
“Has some one complained of me to you, Peggy?” Mrs. Burton asked quickly.
Peggy shook her head. “Goodness no, dear, and it isn’t fair for you to be asking me questions if you are going to get wrong impressions from me. Mother always told me that you did not like being criticised.”
“Ridiculous! Think of Mollie Webster daring to tell her daughter a thing like that when she has been criticising me all her life and I have never dared resent anything she has ever said. I suppose because the things were mostly true,” Mrs. Burton ended, with her cheeks as crimson as a girl’s. “But you are right, Peggy; perhaps we had best not talk personalities. I am sorry I am not ‘understandy.’ It is perhaps the most valuable trait a Camp Fire guardian can have. Anyhow, I’ll be glad when the next few days are over. I confess I feel nervous over looking after all of you girls through these strange Indian ceremonies. They sound terrifying to me—the weird costumes and noises—and I’ve positive nightmares over the snake dance.”
“Oh, you have too much imagination, Tante, and you take us too seriously. After all, we are not babies and you are not responsible if things do go a little wrong with us. I sometimes think I ought to look after you more,” Peggy answered seriously. “But you know we have a friend at court. Tewa’s father is a kiva chief in Oraibi and Tewa will be sure to try to take care of us. He promised Bettina and me to show us over his father’s house one day. May we go? I’d like to see a real Indian house.”
Mrs. Burton shook her head. “We will be tired out with things Indian in the next week,” she answered, evading the question. “But I am glad that Terry Benton and Ralph Marshall and perhaps some of their friends are to watch the ceremonies with us. I feel a good deal more comfortable, being in their society than in an Indian’s on their festival days. I have no doubt Tewa’s veneering of civilization will pass from him completely.”