r me, but
that I was afraid it would be too cold for you, didn't I?"

"I--I thought you were just fooling me; you knew I'd never let the
others go in if I didn't!"

"It's not my fault if you wouldn't believe me. All I promised was to
tell you whether it was cold or not! Come on, you girls! It _is_ cold,
but you won't mind it after you've been in for a minute!"

"Look out! Give me room for a dive!" cried Eleanor Mercer, suddenly
appearing from her tent. "I know this water; I've been in it every year
since I was a lot smaller than you. I'm afraid of it every year the
first time I go in, but how I do love it afterward!"

And, running at full speed, she sped down to the edge of the dock,
leaped up and turned a somersault, making a beautiful dive that filled
the girls who were still dry with envy. And a moment later they were all
in, swimming happily and enjoying themselves immensely. All, that is,
except Zara, who could not swim.

"Oh, I wish I could dive like that, Miss Eleanor!" exclaimed Bessie, who
had been one of the first to go into the water.

"Oh, that's nothing; you can learn easily, Bessie. You swim better than
any of us. Isn't this water cold for you? I should think you wouldn't be
used to it. All the others have been in pretty cold water before now."

"Oh, so have I! You see, around Hedgeville we used to go into the
regular swimming holes, and they never get very warm. There's no beach,
you just go in off the bank, and most of the swimming holes have trees
all around them so that they're shady, and the sun doesn't strike them.
They're in the shade all the time, and that keeps the water cold. This
is warmer than that, ever so much."

"I tell you what we'll do, girls; we'll fix up a spring-board and have
some lessons in real diving. Wouldn't that be fun?"

"It certainly would! I'd love to be able to do a backward dive!"

"Well, this is a good place to learn; no one around to make you nervous,
and good deep water. It's sixteen or seventeen feet off that dock, all
the time, and that's deep enough for almost any diving; for any that
we're likely to do, certainly."

Later they talked it over again, when they had dried and resumed the
clothes they wore about the camp, and Eleanor Mercer, her enthusiasm
warming her cheeks, told them something they had not heard even a hint
of as yet.

"A friend of mine is scoutmaster of a troop of Boy Scouts," she said.
"And he has teased me, sometimes, about our work. He