“Almost as heavy as Mrs. Johnston’s wash,” teased Madaline.  “Well, good-bye, Grace.  We will do all we can to find—­you know.”

Benny was almost close enough to hear the parting words, but in his boyish head, chuck full of sports and frolics, he had little room for girls’ secrets, and even the knowledge thrust upon him by Grace in her trip to the woods had long ago gone the way of his lost game of “Bear in the Pit.”  Boys have a wonderful way of forgetting failures, and it is that trait which later entitles them to the claims of being good sports, using the title “sport” in its best and most vigorous application.

“Well, that’s over, thank goodness!” breathed Grace, referring to her “confession,” as she smilingly turned to her piano practice, a duty indifferently done since her encounter with the writer of the mysterious letter.

CHAPTER XI

THE TANGLED WEB

While the Girl Scouts of Flosston were arranging to extend their troop activities so that they would include the girls from Fluffdown mills, who wished to join, two other girls were becoming more and more involved in an influence, seemingly subtle, but surely sufficiently powerful to “win out” eventually.

Tessie Wartliz was enmeshed in that oftquoted “tangled web,” coincident with the first attempt at deception.

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practice to deceive!”

Reading those lines mean very little to the girl who has never been so unfortunate as to know their fullest meaning, but Tessie knew not the lines, it was their threat she felt, their dark story she was living through.

Rose returned from the rally of the True Tred Troop with deeper blue in her eyes and brighter pink in her cheeks.  It had been so wonderful!  To see all those girls promising to do so much, not only for one another, but for all girls, then the inspiring ceremony, the lovely exercises, the music!  It did not seem possible that all this came to the good fortune of some girls in that mill town, while others struggled to gain advantage over their companions, as they worked in gloomy surroundings, prone to some sort of rebellion.

And to think Rose had been asked to help carry this new story to her former companions, and to those with whom she was now associated!

Sitting for a few precious moments in her little room at Mrs. Cosgrove’s, although her light had been extinguished, and it was too late to enjoy the tempting reverie, Rose, even in the dark, could feel the comfort and sense the luxury of that simple, well-ordered home.  How strange that she should have been picked up from the peril of waywardness, and become so safely sheltered by these benevolent strangers!  Was it because Molly Cosgrove, too, taught and practiced the girl scout principles, and because Mrs. Cosgrove was a pioneer from whom such principles emanate?