ill explain
the whole thing. We were just about to call you aside and lay our
trouble before you."

"Trouble," Miss Ladd repeated deprecatingly, "I hope it isn't as bad
as that."

She drew an upholstered armchair close to the girls and began at once
to examine the letters that Marion handed to her. Marion and Helen
watched her closely as she read, but the Guardian of Flamingo Fire
indicated her strength of character by a stern immobility of
countenance until she had finished both letters. Then she looked at
Marion steadily and said inquiringly:

"I suppose you have no idea who wrote these letters?"

"Not the slightest," replied the girl addressed, "unless the shorter
one was written and mailed by some of the Boy Scouts at Spring Lake.
Helen thinks it was, and I am inclined to believe with her that it
doesn't make much difference to us who wrote it. The other letter is
the one we are most interested in."

"I agree with you thoroughly," said Miss Ladd energetically. "And we
have got to do something to prevent him from carrying out his threat."

"Ought we to inform the other girls now?" asked Marion with a sense of
growing courage, for she felt that in the Camp Fire's Guardian she had
found elements of wise counsel extending even beyond that young
woman's experience.

"Why, yes," Miss Ladd replied. "I see no reason for delay. I'd rather
tell them now than just before or after we get to Hollyhill. If we
tell them now they'll have a couple of hours in which to stiffen their
courage. There are eleven girls besides you two. Suppose you call them
here in three lots in succession, four, four, and three, and we'll
tell them quietly what has occurred and give them a little lecture as
to how they should meet this crisis."

"All right," said Marion, rising. "I'll bring the first four and you
get your lecture ready."

"It's ready already," said the guardian reassuringly. "It is so simple
that I have no need of preparation."

"I'm afraid I need some drill in the best means and methods of reading
character," Marion told herself as she walked back to the rear of the
car. "I was really afraid to take the matter up with Helen or Miss
Ladd for fear lest they recommend something foolish. Now it appears
that each of them has a very clever head on her shoulders. Maybe I'll
find the other girls possessed of just as good qualities. If I do,
this day will have brought forth an important revelation to me, that
the average girl, afte