The Girl Scouts' Motor Trip

A CHALLENGE.

Marjorie Wilkinson and Lily Andrews sauntered down the hall of the dormitory towards their rooms, humming tunes and dragging their hockey sticks along the floor behind them. They were enjoying a particularly jubilant mood, for their team had just been victorious; the sophomores of Turner College had succeeded in defeating the juniors in a closely contested game of hockey. And Marjorie and Lily both played on the team.

As they paused at the door of their sitting-room, Florence Evans, a member of the old senior patrol of Pansy Troop of Girls Scouts, and now a freshman at college, came out to meet them. She had run in for news of the game, and finding the girls away, had decided to await their return.

“Who won?” she demanded, without any ceremony.

“We did!” announced Lily, triumphantly. “Naturally—with such a captain!” She nodded proudly towards Marjorie.

“Congratulations!” cried Florence, seizing both girls by the hands and leading them back to the room. “Now—tell me all about it!”

Marjorie had scarcely begun her account of the thrilling match when she was interrupted by the abrupt entrance of Alice Endicott, another freshman who had been a Girl Scout of the same troop, looking as if she carried the most startling news in the world. Naturally vivacious, her cheeks glowed and her eyes shone with even greater brilliancy than usual. The girls stopped talking instantly, aware that her excitement was not due to any event so ordinary as a hockey game.

“Girls!” she flung out. “Guess what?”

“What?” they all demanded at once.

Alice waved an open letter before their eyes.

“The most magnificent thing has happened—”

“To you?” interrupted Florence, who always wanted to be explicit.

“To _us_—all of us—of the senior patrol. A plan for this summer!”

“The scouts aren’t to get together again, are they?” cried Marjorie, jumping up and going over towards Alice, as if she wanted at a single glance to learn the contents of that mysterious letter.

“Have you found a baby, or only a boot-legger?” asked Lily, laughingly. “Because it’s too late to get our tea-house back again, after the money’s all spent!”

“Neither of those things,” replied Alice. “Only a rich relation.”

“Why the ‘only’?” inquired Florence. “I think that’s almost enough. But tell us about it. How does it concern us?”

“Just wait till you hear!” laughed Alice, turning to her letter again.

“Well, do let us hear!” begged Lily, impatiently. “We’re waiting.”

Alice seated herself upon the couch and paused a moment before she started upon her explanation, as if to make the situation more dramatic. At last she began.

“Of course you know our family are all in modest circumstances, but it seems that there is this one wealthy relative—an elderly, maiden aunt on my father’s side. I have never seen her, because she has lived in California during all of my life, but naturally I had heard of her before. She never took any interest in us, however, and always said she was going to leave all of her money to her two nephews whom she is raising.

“Well, I hardly thought she knew of my existence, when suddenly, out of a clear sky, I got this letter from her with its thrilling proposition. She must have learned somewhere of the work we did last summer, and of our reason for doing it, and she was impressed. She evidently never knew any Girl Scouts before, or in fact any girls who were interested in anything so worth while as a sick mother or a tea-house. So, lo and behold, she writes to me and tells me she wants to make my acquaintance—and not only mine, but that of the whole patrol!”

“But we can’t go out west, Alice!” interrupted Marjorie, jumping at her meaning. “We couldn’t possibly afford it.”

“No,” added Florence, “I was thinking of looking for a job for the summer.”

“Wait till you hear the rest of it!” said Alice. “We won’t need any money. Aunt Emeline is offering to pay all our expenses, if we motor to California!”

“Motor!” repeated Marjorie. “We girls? By ourselves—?”

“No; we may, in fact, we must have a chaperone.”

“It would be a wonderful thing to do!” exclaimed Florence, contrasting the pleasures of such a delightful excursion with the routine duties of an office position, such as she had planned for herself. “But is it possible?”

“Why not?” demanded Alice. “Lots of girls have done it before—I’ve even read accounts of their trips in the magazines, telling all about what to take, and how much it costs.”

“But they are always older girls than we are!” objected Lily.

“Girl Scouts can do anything any other girls can do!” asserted Marjorie with pride. “I’m sure we could make the trip. Now, tell me again, please, Alice: just which of us are invited?”

“All the girls who took part in last summer’s work at the tea-house,” replied Alice. “That means us four, Daisy Gravers, Ethel Todd, Marie Louise Harris—and—Doris and Mae if they want to.”

““If they want to” is good!” laughed Marjorie. “Imagine those two brides leaving their husbands for a two months’ trip!”

“Of course you could hardly expect Mae to,” admitted Alice; “she’s quite too recent a bride. But Doris will have been married a year.”

“But she and Roger are just as spoony as ever!” interrupted Lily. “No, I’m afraid we can’t count on them. But the other three girls probably will.”

“To continue,” said Alice: “you know that I told you my aunt is queer—a little “off” we always considered her. Well, she goes on to add that we must make the trip inside of six weeks, follow the Lincoln Highway, not spend more than a certain sum of money she is depositing in my name, and—the last is worst of all—”

“What?” demanded two or three of the scouts at once.

“We are not to accept help of any men along the way!”

The girls all burst out laughing immediately at the absurdity of such a suggestion. Yet there was not one among them who doubted that she could fulfill the conditions.

“And what happens if we do take assistance?” asked Florence, when the merriment had subsided. “Do we have to pay for our own trip?”