ewhat reassured by these words. His fists went suddenly to his eyes
and he began to sob hysterically. Hazel moved toward him with more
sympathetic reassurance, when there was an interruption of proceedings
from a new source.

A girl about 18 years old stepped up in front of the two Camp Fire Girls
and reached forward as if to seize the juvenile refugee with both hands.
She was rather ultra-stylishly clad for a negligee, summer-resort
community, wearing a pleated taffeta skirt and Georgette crepe waist and
a white sailor hat of expensive straw with a bright blue ribbon around
the crown. Hazel afterwards remarked that "her face was as cold as an
iceberg and the odor of perfume about her was enough to asphyxiate a
field of phlox and shooting-stars."

The boy ceased sobbing as he beheld this new arrival and his face became
white with fear, while he shrank back again into the bushes as far as he
could get. The girl of much perfume and stylish attire seemed to be
unmoved by the new panic that seized him, but took hold of him and
dragged him roughly out of his hiding place.

"Oh, do be careful," pleaded Hazel. "Don't you see he's scared nearly to
death? You may throw him into a spasm."

"Is that any of your business?" the captor of the frightened youth
snapped, looking defiantly at the one who addressed her. "He's my
brother, and I guess I can take him back home without any interference
from a perfect stranger. He's run away."

"I beg your pardon," Hazel said gently; "but it didn't seem to me to be
an ordinary case of fright. I didn't mean to intrude, but he's such a
dear little boy I couldn't help being sympathetic."

"He's a naughty bad runaway and ought to be whipped," the girl with the
cold face returned as she started along a path through the timber,
dragging the little fellow after her.

"Isn't that a shame!" Hazel muttered, digging her fingernails into the
palms of her hands. "My, but I just like to----"

She stopped for want of words to express her feelings not too riotously,
and Katherine came to her relief by swinging the subject along a
different track.

"Do you really believe that boy is Glen Irving?" she inquired.

"No, I suppose not," Hazel answered dejectedly. "You heard that girl say
he was her brother, didn't you? Well, Glen has no sister. But, do you
know, I really am disappointed to find that he isn't the boy we are
looking for, for my heart went right out to him when I first saw his
crouching fo