“What’s your idea, Betty?” asked Dorothy encouragingly.  “Anything but sewing.  I utterly refuse to join that kind of a club.”

“I knew a girl in Chicago,” said Ruth, “who belonged to a cooking club.  They met every two weeks at the different houses to practice, and once in two months they cooked a supper and invited other girls and boys.  She said they had great fun and really learned a great deal.”

“That’s just my idea,” declared Betty promptly, “only I couldn’t get it quite clear in my own mind.”

“I don’t like cooking,” said Charlotte soberly, “but I suppose it wouldn’t hurt me to know something about it.”

“The first thing, of course, is to ask our mothers and Mrs. Hamilton,” said Dorothy, who was always practical.  “I know mamma will be glad to have me learn, though I’m afraid the cook won’t like to have us in her kitchen.”

“Our Hannah wouldn’t mind if you met at our house every time,” said Betty.

“That can all be settled later when we find out whether we can really do it,” declared Charlotte impatiently.  “In the meantime I’m pining for a piece of that fudge; isn’t it hard yet, Dolly?”

“Just right,” answered Dorothy, taking it in from the window-ledge.

“Dorothy, this is certainly the best fudge I ever tasted,” declared Ruth impressively.  “Mine was never half so good.  Girls, I move that in consideration of Miss Dorothy Marshall’s skill as a maker of fudge she be made president of the new club.”

“Second the motion,” cried both the girls at once, and as there was no one left to vote on it, it was declared settled.

Dorothy rose, bowed, tapped on the table with the chafing-dish spoon, and said with a fair imitation of her mother’s stately manner: 

“Ladies, I thank you for the honor you have conferred upon me.”  Then dropping her official manner, she added, “Let’s keep it a dead secret at first from the boys, because they never tell us anything about their old Candle Club.”

“What’s that?” asked Ruth with great interest.

“Oh, six of the boys belong to it, and they’ve fixed up one of the rooms above our stable,” answered Dorothy.  “They call it the Candle Club because at first they used candles, but now the name doesn’t fit.”

“They might call themselves ‘electric sparks,’ now,” drawled Charlotte; “but boys are so unprogressive.”

“We shall need some more officers,” said Betty.  “I think Charlotte ought to be secretary because she likes to write, and Ruth—­”

What Ruth was to be was not destined to be told at that meeting, for just at that moment there was a loud knock which made the girls jump.  Ruth opened the door and for a second saw no one.  Then a plump, curly-haired boy, very purple as to his face and hands, and rather bedraggled as to his general appearance, walked in hesitatingly.  Close at his heels followed a depressed-looking Scotch terrier.  At sight of the latter, every individual hair on Fuzzy’s spine stood up straight, and with remarks in several different languages he fled to the top of a high-backed chair, where he sat and glared at the enemy.