d have given to her
own children had she been blessed with any.

Ruth's other two close friends were the Cameron twins, Helen and Tom,
the children of a wealthy storekeeper who lived not far from the Red
Mill. The early adventures of these three are all related in the first
book of the series, "Ruth Fielding of the Red Mill."

One virtue of Uncle Jabez's, which shines as brightly in his rather
gloomy character as a candle in the dark, is that he always pays his
debts. If he considers he owes anybody anything he is not satisfied
until he pays it. Therefore, when Ruth recovers some money which had
been stolen from him, he is convinced that it is only right for him to
pay her tuition for at least a year at Briarwood Hall, where she goes
to school with Helen Cameron, while Tom goes to a boy's boarding school
called Seven Oaks.

The girls and Tom and his friends often got together for good times
during their school years, and, in successive volumes, we meet them in
winter adventures in the Northern woods at Snow Camp; in the summer at
Lighthouse Point; in Wyoming at Silver Ranch; in lakeside and woodsy
adventures on Cliff Island; enjoying most exciting weeks at Sunrise
Farm, where Ruth wins a reward of five thousand dollars in aiding in
the recovery of a pearl necklace stolen by the Gypsies. There are
volumes, too, telling of the serious loss by fire of a dormitory
building at Briarwood and how Ruth Fielding rebuilt it by the
production of a moving picture; of her vacation down in Dixie; of her
first year at Ardmore College, which she and Helen and several of her
Briarwood chums entered; then of Ruth Fielding in the saddle when she
went West again, this time for the production of a great picture
entitled: "The Forty-Niners."

With the entrance into the war of the United States, Tom Cameron
enlisted and went to France as a second lieutenant with the first
Expeditionary Force. Ruth and Helen went into Red Cross work, leaving
college before the end of their sophomore year for that purpose.

Ruth could not go as a nurse, but in the Supply Department she gained
commendation and when a supply unit of the Red Cross was sent to France
she went with it, while Helen went over with her father, who was on a
commission to the front. Once there, the black-eyed girl found work to
do in Paris while Ruth was enabled to be of use much nearer the front.

Indeed, at the opening of the present story the girl of the Red Mill is
at wo