Meadow Brook

“ The ghosts in the persons of the Meadow-Brook Girls were on their way to their rowboat. Beaching it they sat down and laughed until their eyes were wet with tears.
"It was a mean trick to play on them," gasped Miss Elting. "But I think we have more than won our wager. It is a wonder that they didn't suspect us."
"There goes a boat!" cried Jane. "It's a launch."
"It is the boys. We have frightened them off," answered Miss Elting.
The girls rowed quickly home, but ere they had reached the entrance to the secret creek they were startled by the sound of a shrill scream. ”

“ At last, after a brief dive, they saw the black trunk leap free to the surface of the pond. The Meadow-Brook Girls uttered a yell. Harriet had accomplished a task that would have proved to be too much for the average man. Down there, underneath the water, crouching under the backward tilting automobile on the bottom of the pond, she had unbuckled three stubborn straps, rising to the surface after unbuckling each strap, taking in a new supply of delicious fresh air, then returning to her task. ”

“ MARY.
v PREFACE. In this story of Meadow Brook there is, I am aware, nothing very startling or wonderful; but it has the merit, at least, of containing more truth than books of the same character usually possess. From this, however, the reader is not to infer that I have made myself the heroine; for though the early home, the childhood, and childish experience of “Rosa Lee” are mostly my own—while more than one whiskered young man will recognize the little girl of thirteen, at whom he once made faces from behind his desk as the “schoolma’am”—the similarity extends no further. ”

“ Neither Jane nor any of her companions had thought of the big headlights on the car, the glint of which had flashed on the foliage of a tree near the gipsy camp just as Jane was swinging into the byway that led down to the Meadow-Brook camp. Perhaps the old gipsy’s keen eyes had caught this flash and read it aright. But this the girls were never to know. Their attention, just now, was attracted by the sound of loud talking. ”

“ Nut Meadow Brook. The river is broadly open as usual this winter. You can hardly say that we have had any sleighing at all . . . though five or six inches of snow lay on the ground five days after January 6th. But I do not quite like this warm weather and bare ground at this season. What is a winter without snow and ice in this latitude? The bare earth is unsightly. This winter is but unburied summer. . . .
At Nut Meadow Brook the small sized water-bugs are as abundant and active as in summer. I see forty or fifty circling together in the smooth and sunny bays all along the brook. ”

“ The camp was some little distance from where the Meadow-Brook tent was pitched. A note for Jane was pinned to the tent flap on the same spot where she had pinned hers; then the party set out through the darkness. Not a man of the tribe was to be seen. The guardian asked no questions. She knew that Sybarina’s word was law and that keen eyes were upon the Meadow-Brook camp, that no marauders would be permitted to enter there that night. ”

“ Even western New York, with her hundreds of large and flourishing villages, her well cultivated farms, her numerous schools, her educated, intelligent people, and her vast wealth, is looked upon with distrust by some of her eastern neighbors, because, forsooth, her boundaries lie farther towards the setting sun, and because she once bore the title of “way out west in the Genesees.”
Of course I speak only from observation and personal experience; for at Meadow Brook, ten years ago, many fears were expressed lest Anna should miss the society to which she had been accustomed ”

“ He had heard the whole story at Meadow Brook, but this was the first time he had hinted it to Ada, who turned very pale and without another word left the room, going back to Cedar Grove, where for three weeks she pouted and cried alternately. At the end of that time, however, she concluded it better to “make up” so she wrote a note to us both, asking my pardon for her rudeness and begging my husband to forgive her for the many falsehoods she had told concerning her engagement with Herbert, which she now frankly confessed. ”

“ The guardian did not permit them to remain on the shelf of rock for a long time, fearing that their muscles might become stiffened. Then the journey was taken up again. So full of enthusiasm and determination were the Meadow-Brook Girls that not one of them offered a word of complaint; but when at two o’clock that afternoon, they emerged from the canyon into the open country, Tommy and Margery were limping a little.
Beyond in the haze of a distant valley lay Meadow-Brook. The girls eager to get to their journey’s end pushed on again. After half an hour’s walking, Miss Elting called a halt. ”

“ To Nut Meadow and White Pond road. Thermometer +45°. Fair, with a few cumuli of indefinite outline in the N. and S., and dusky under sides. A gentle west wind and a blue haze. Thaws. . . . The ice has so melted on the meadows that I see where the muskrat has left his clamshells in a heap near the river side where there was a hollow in the bank.—The small water-bugs are gyrating abundantly in Nut Meadow Brook. It is pleasant also to see the very distinct ripple marks in the sand at the bottom, of late so rare a sight. ”

“ Ah, she did not know that with the first dawn of day I stole up to her chamber to look on her once more for the last, last time. There were tears on her cheek, I kissed them away; tell her that, and perchance her heart will soften towards her poor old father.”
From that time he sank rapidly, and one bright September day, near the hour of sunset, it was told in Meadow Brook that he was dying. On such occasions, in a small country village, the liveliest sympathy is felt ”

“ If he will not listen—if he still persists in marrying me, tell him I would rather die ten thousand deaths than wed a man I do not love, and then his pride will come to his aid. But not a word of this to Mr. Delafield, Charlie, never let him know how I loved him. My affection is not returned, and he would despise me—would never visit my grave or think with pity of one who died so far away from home.”
Then followed a message for the loved ones of Meadow Brook, but this Dr. Clayton did not hear. ”

“ The guide led the way, followed by the entire Meadow-Brook party, Margery Brown having become so interested as to forget her troubles for the moment, though the lump on her head was still large and painful.
Just before reaching the trees where the horses had been tied, Miss Elting suggested that all save the guide and Harriet stop where they were.
"If so many of us go forward we shall not only be likely to miss any clues there are, but perhaps destroy them altogether. I have an idea that we are going to find something that will enlighten us," she added. ”

“ Cora Kidder informed them. "Some strange people come out of Meadow-Brook, don't they, girls?"
"Yes," agreed Patricia, "One hesitates to even remain in the same camp with them. I am sure my parents wouldn't allow me to stay here if they knew that such crazy girls were admitted." ”

“ The Meadow-Brook Girls and Miss Elting said good-bye to the Tramp Club that evening and spent the night at the village hotel.
"We've had a fine time at any rate," said Jane McCarthy as they discussed all over again the exciting happenings of the day before, at breakfast the next morning. "Where are we going next? Vacation isn't half over yet."
"Why we're going home, aren't we?" asked Harriet, turning to Miss Elting. ”

“ The foliage of these trees is like tinder.”
“You are right!” exclaimed the guardian. “To build a fire would be the height of folly. Hurry, please. We will be here when you come back,” she added with a forced laugh.
“Be brave, girls. Remember, we are Meadow-Brook Girls,” said Harriet, as with a shouted “good-bye” she started back along the trail on her mission. Both arms were outspread so that she might be warned by touch when getting too close to the sides of the trail.
“Girls,” began Miss Elting brightly, after Harriet had left them. “Harriet reminded us that we are Meadow-Brook Girls. ”

“ The espalier apple, like a screen, hides the meadow from me, so that the descending starlings appear to dive into a space behind it. Sloping downwards the meadow makes a valley; I cannot see it, but know that it is golden with buttercups, and that a brook runs in the groove of it.
Afar yonder I can see a summit beyond where the grass swells upwards to a higher level than this spot. There are bushes and elms whose height is decreased by distance on the summit, horses in the shadow of the trees, and a small flock of sheep crowded, as is their wont, in the hot and sunny gateway. ”

“ His little world seems large to him and all his experiences great in their importance. A ten-acre meadow appears like a boundless prairie, and a half-mile wide piece of woods an unbounded forest.
On one side of the farm is a clear stream known as Ragged Brook, that, starting among the foothills of a low mountain range, laughs and chatters, leaps and tumbles, down the hills, through the gorges and over the ledges as if endowed with life. Since he is not blessed with brothers or sisters, this, together with the woods, the birds and squirrels, becomes his companion. ”

“ A night’s debauch was always followed by a day of weakness and debility, in which he was incapable of exertion, and so 193everything seemed on the verge of ruin, when he suddenly conceived the idea of advertising for an efficient man, who would take the entire charge of affairs and relieve him from all care.
About this time I went back to Meadow Brook for a few weeks to be present at the bridal of my oldest sister. Anna, too, was urged to accompany me, but she declined, extorting from me a promise that if it were possible I would not divulge the real state of things. ”

“ At four o’clock all was in readiness for the start.
“We are going to travel eastward over the mountains, girls,” explained Harriet. “We shall have dense forests to go through and rugged paths to follow, but we shall save a number of miles and a great deal of time by 137 going that way. We ought to reach Meadow-Brook some hours ahead of the boys if they take the road, as I heard Mr. Baker say they would. We shall touch the road occasionally, especially after we get over the mountains. And you, Jane, must leave a sign on the fence. We will do the same. ”

“ According to my calculations, it will be a twenty mile hike to Meadow-Brook by the way we propose to go. The boys will have a good ten miles further to travel if they go by way of the road. But having better going they will naturally travel much faster than we. Listen! We must travel light, with nothing in our packs except just sufficient food to carry us through. Jane, you will have to spend the night at the nearest farm house and come back for the tent and supplies in the morning. I hardly believe any one will disturb them over night. ”

“ You will need it before we have gotten our big boat in. It is going to be a hard pull to get it through all this foliage and then it is going to be another difficult job to get it out again. When we get those boys on the Island of Delight we are going to give them something to think about," chuckled Harriet. "This time, the Meadow-Brook Girls will score." ”

“ It is very interesting to walk along such a brook as this in the midst of the meadow, which you can better do now before the frost is quite out of the sod, and gaze into the deep holes in its irregular bottom and the dark gulfs under the banks. Where it rushes over the edge of a steep slope in the bottom, the shadow of the disturbed surface is like sand hurried forward in the water. ”

“ That proves that it was lightning, not matches, that set your barn on fire.”
“What were you doing in my barn?”
“Thleeping with the mithe and the bugth,” volunteered Tommy.
“Who be you? You ain’t Gipsies?”
“No. We are from Meadow-Brook, and we are walking home from the Pocono Woods, where we have been spending the summer in camp,” Miss Elting informed the man.
“So, that’s it, hey?”
“Yes, sir. A young woman friend of ours 45 usually meets us at night. She has our equipment in her automobile, but we took the wrong trail to-day, and have lost her. ”

“ It hasn't been but a few minutes since that identical idea popped into my head, and I had just now decided that if I could secure options on this property I would have a real summer resort here—one that would make Hollis Creek and Meadow Brook mere farm boarding-houses. Do you see how close together these hills draw at their feet? The hollow is at least a thousand feet across at the widest part, but down there at the road, where the stream emerges to the fields, they close in with natural buttresses, as it were, to not over a hundred feet in width. ”

“ Miss Elting told the boys the whole story. How the boys did laugh when the guardian described how Jane had chased the Italians about the field with her car!
“We will keep out of the road when you are abroad, Miss McCarthy,” said George. “I don’t believe you are a safe person to be allowed on the highway.”
“You are right, she isn’t,” nodded Miss Elting. “Well, have you settled your plans for the contest?”
“All the plans we can make. We are to walk to Meadow-Brook. Neither party should actually walk more than ten hours a day——”
“My goodneth,” interrupted Tommy. “Ten hourth a day. ”

“ He will make straight for Granite Spring, you see if he doesn’t.” 232
“Then I don’t think we’ll see the lads again this trip,” concluded Jane. “But, girls, you’ve got to get busy if you hope to win this contest. Three more days of hiking will bring you to Meadow-Brook. If the boys once get ahead of you, you can’t expect to catch up with them and win in that length of time.”
“We simply must win, Jane,” returned Harriet determinedly.
“Then you’d better begin to think about how you’re going to do it,” advised Jane dryly.
“Jane is right,” agreed the guardian. “We must plan to-night. ”