hout delay.

The girl she was looking down upon always had amused Kara and herself.
She was so unlike any of them. Her light hair was almost as short as a
boy's and was boyish in appearance, save that it curled in an almost
babyish fashion. Her eyes were wide open and a light china blue. Here
her doll-like attributes ended. She had a short, determined nose, a
square chin, and a large mouth filled with small, even teeth.

She had an odd, boyish name as well, Evan Phillips. No one knew a
great deal about her. She had come with her mother to live in
Westhaven the winter before in order to go to school. She had spoken
of living in California before that time. A member of a Girl Scout
Patrol in the west, she had asked to be admitted into the Eagle's Wing
Troop in Westhaven.

The three other members of the second Patrol were Julia and Frances
Murray and Ann Fletcher.

"What is a crucible, Evan?" Tory inquired. "I don't care in the least
how many of our Scout principles are cast into it, if only Kara is
here at camp with us. I know what Louise means, but no one need be
troubled. If Kara will permit it, I shall wish to be with her always."

"You will not be allowed, Tory. Remember, Kara is our friend as well
as yours, and we have known her longer," Dorothy McClain and the other
girls protested, almost in the same words and at the same instant.

"Suppose you do not argue any more for the present," a quiet voice
interrupted, the same voice that so often gave Tory the sensation that
she had been quietly and politely restrained from too great intensity.

"I am sure I hear some one coming, three people in fact."

It was slightly annoying to the American Girl Scouts that in many ways
their English guest had a better outdoor training than any one of
them. However, this was not her first camping experience.

A moment or so later Dr. McClain appeared at an opening between two of
the trees in the encircling grove. He was accompanied by Sheila Mason
and Miss Frean. The two women remained outside. Alone Dr. McClain
entered the charmed circle. At once a dozen girls were crowding about
him.

A quarter of an hour after Tory Drew and Dorothy McClain were walking
with him toward the road that led back into Westhaven.

"We will have the little evergreen house made comfortable for Kara.
Miss Mason and all of us have decided she will be safer and easier to
care for there than in one of the tents. You are sure it will be best
for her?