against one of the empty packing boxes that littered the place, and began to laugh.

"Oh, my dear," she exclaimed, "if you only knew the awful things we were thinking about you before we knew who you were!"

"Why? Do you mean to say that you're snobbish, too, and didn't want neighbors you didn't know? Like my girls at Lake Dean?"

"No, but we thought you might be kidnappers, or murderers, or fire-bugs, like our last neighbors!"

"Eleanor! Are you crazy—and if you're not, what on earth are you talking about?"

"I'm not as crazy as I seem to be, Mary. It's only fair to tell you now that this beach may be a pretty troubled spot while we're here. We seem to attract trouble just as a magnet attracts iron."

"I think you are crazy, Nell. If you're not, won't you explain what you mean?"

"Look at our camp over there, Mary. It's pretty solid and complete, isn't it?"

"I only hope ours looks half as well."

"Well, this morning at sunrise there were just two tents standing. Everything else had been burnt. And I was doing my best to get the police or someone from Bay City to rescue two of my girls who were prisoners on a yacht out there in the cove!"

Mary Turner appealed whimsically to Charlie Jamieson.

"Does she mean it, Charlie?" she begged. "Or is she just trying to string me?"

"I'm afraid she means it, and I happen to know it's all true, Mary," said Charlie, enjoying her bewilderment. "But it's a long story. Perhaps you'd better let it keep until you have put things to rights."

"We'll help in doing that," said Eleanor. "Dolly, run over and get the other girls, won't you? Then we'll all turn in and lend a hand, and it will all be done in no time at all."

"Indeed you won't!" said Marcia. "We're going to do everything ourselves, just to show that we can."

"There isn't much to do," said Mary Turner, with a laugh. "So you needn't act as if that were something to be proud of, Marcia. You see, I thought it was better to take things easily at the start, Eleanor. They wanted to come here with all the tents and things and set up the camp by themselves, but I decided it was better to have the harder work done by men who knew their business."

"You were quite right, too," agreed Eleanor. "That's the way I arranged things for our own camp the day we came. To-day we did do the work ourselves, but there was a reason for the girls were so excited and nervous about the fire that I thought it was better to give them a chance to work off their excitement that way."

"I'm dying to hear all about the fire and what has happened here," said Mary. "But I suppose we'd better get everything put to rights first."

And, though the girls of the new Camp Fire insisted on doing all the actual work themselves, they were glad enough to take the advice of the Manasquan girls in innumerable small matters. Comfort, and even safety from illness, in camp life, depends upon the observance of many seemingly trifling rules.

Gladys Cooper, who, more than any of her companions at Camp Halsted, had tried to make things unpleasant for the Manasquan girls at Lake Dean, had not been with the first section of the new Camp Fire to reach the beach. Dolly had inquired about her rather anxiously, for Gladys had not taken part in the general reconciliation between the two parties of girls.

"Gladys?" Marcia said. "Oh, yes, she's coming. She's back in the wagon that's bringing our suit cases. We appointed her a sort of rear guard. It wouldn't do to lose those things, you know."

"I was afraid—I sort of thought she might not want to come here if she knew we were here, Marcia. You know—"

"Yes, I do know, Dolly. She behaved worse than any of us, and she wasn't ready to admit it when you girls left Lake Dean. But she's come to her senses since then, I'm sure. The rest of us made her do that."

Bessie King looked a little dubious.

"I hope you didn't bother her about it, Marcia," she said. "You know we haven't anything against her. We were sorry she didn't like us, and understand that we only wanted to be friends, but we certainly didn't feel angry."

"If she was bothered, as you call it, Bessie, it served her good and right," said Marcia, crisply. "We've had about enough of Gladys and her superior ways. She isn't any better or cleverer or prettier than anyone else, and it's time she stopped giving herself airs."

"You don't understand," said Bessie, with a smile. "She's one of you, and if you don't like the way she acts, you've got a perfect right to let her know it, and make her just as uncomfortable as you like."

"We did," said Marcia. "I guess she's had a lesson that will teach her it doesn't pay to be a snob."

"Yes, but don't you think that's something a person has to learn for herself, without anyone to teach her, Marcia? I mean, there's only one reason why she could be nice to us, and that's because she likes us. And you can't make her like us by punishing her for not liking us. You'll only make her hate us more than ever."

"She'll behave herself, anyhow, Bessie. And that's more than she did before."

"That's true enough. But really, it would be better, if she didn't like us, for her to show it frankly than to go around with a grudge against us she's afraid to show. Don't you see that she'll blame us for making trouble between you girls and her? She'll think that we've set her own friends against her. Really, Marcia, I think all the trouble would be ended sooner, in the long run, if you just let her alone until she changed her mind. She'll do it, too, sooner or later."

"I guess Bessie's right, Marcia," said Dolly, thoughtfully. "I don't see why Gladys acts this way, but I do think that the only thing that will make her act differently will be for her to feel differently, and nothing you can do will do that."

"Well, it's too late now, anyhow," said Marcia. "I see what you mean, and I suppose you really are right. But it's done. You'll be nice to her, won't you? She's promised to be pleasant when she sees you—to talk to you, and all that. I don't know how well she'll manage, but I guess she'll do her best."

"There's no reason why we shouldn't be nice to her," said Bessie. "She isn't hurting us. I only hope that something will happen so that we can be good friends."

"She really is a nice girl," said Marcia, "and I'm awfully fond of her when she isn't in one of her tantrums. But she is certainly hard to get along with when everything isn't going just to suit her little whims."

"Here she comes now," said Dolly. "I'm going to meet her."

"Well, you certainly did give us a surprise, Gladys," cried Dolly. "You sinner, why didn't you tell us what you were going to do?"

"Oh, hello, Dolly!" said Gladys, coolly. "I didn't see much of you at Lake Dean, you know. You were too busy with your—new friends."

"Oh, come off, Gladys!" said Dolly, irritated despite her determination to go more than half way in re-establishing friendly relations with Gladys. "Why can't you be sensible? We've got more to forgive than you have, and we're willing to be friends. Aren't you going to behave decently?"

"I don't think I know just what you mean, Dolly," said Gladys, stiffly. "As long as the other girls have decided to be friendly with your—friends, I am not going to make myself unpleasant. But you can hardly expect me to like people just because you do. I must say that I get along better with girls of my own class."

"I ought to be mad at you, Gladys," said Dolly, with a peal of laughter. "But you're too funny! What do you mean by girls of your own class? Girls whose parents have as much money as yours? Mine haven't. So I suppose I'm not in your class."

"Nonsense, Dolly!" said Gladys, angrily. "You know perfectly well I don't mean anything of the sort. I—I can't explain just what I mean by my own class—but you know it just as well as I do."

"I think I know it better, Gladys," said Dolly, gravely. "Now don't get angry, because