Part 1 (1/2)

The Outdoor Girls in a Winter Camp

by Laura Lee Hope

CHAPTER I

DANGER

”How cold it is!” exclai closer about her a fur neck-piece, and plunging her gloved hands deeper into the pockets of her !”

”Nonsense!” cried Betty Nelson, her cheeks aglow ”Skate about, and you'll soon be warlorious, Mollie?”

”Surely, and the ice is perfect Come on Grace, and we'll see who'll be first to the bend!” and Mollie, her dark eyes dancing under the spell of the day, circled about the al waltz on skates

”I don't want to race!” protested the tall, sliirl who had complained about the weather

”Oh, but you must!” insisted Betty ”Come, we'll have a short, sharp one, and then you'll feel so warm you'll wonder you ever said it was chilly”

”I wish I had brought along that vacuum bottle of hot chocolate, as I intended,” murmured Grace, reflectively

”nobody stopped you!” exclaimed Mollie, a trifle sharply Of late she had had less and less patience with the ”confectionery-failing” of Grace, as she termed it

”Yes, you did!” declared the cold one ”You and Bet were in such a rush I didn't have ti,” and Grace perather on her pretty face as she ever indulged herself in--for Grace, be it knoas just a trifle vain, and desperately afraid of a wrinkle

”Oh, well, come on and skate!” invited Betty ”Amy and I will race you and Mollie, Grace That will--make us all feel better,” for the Little Captain, as she was often called, saw just the shadow of a cloud gathering over the two chums, who seldom, or never, quarreled

”Does Airl as adjusting her skates Amy was always quiet, but of late her chuuessed, rightly, that it had to do with theher identity, which

”Yes, I'll race,” said Ae, and she did not often consult her own personal feelings

So like a look of disappoint it Mollie laughed

”Grace was hoping Aet out of it!” cried vivacious Mollie ”That's the ti, A but a race will satisfy you, I suppose I racefully” ”I' can't make me much worse”

”It will be all the better,” insisted Betty ”Noe'll race in this fashi+on--team work to count Amy and I in one team, you and Grace in the other, Mollie Whichever ets to the bend first in You see,” Betty explained, ”one of a teaet tired, and then the other could keep on It's like a relay race”

”Oh, well, if I have to--I suppose I have to,” and Grace said this with such a doleful sigh that the others laughed heartily, even quiet A

”On your marks!” cried Betty ”Let's show that we are worthy of our names--true Outdoor Girls”

”Shoho?” asked Grace looking around

”Well, here comes your brother Will, for one, and I think Allen Washburn and Frank Haley are with hi off across the sparkling surface of the frozen Argono River

”Can't you see Percy Falconer?” asked Mollieto a certain foppish lad, who seereat fondness for the Little Captain