Chapter 7 SAHWAH THE SUNFISH.

Migwan sat on a rock on the beach making notes in her journal, now and then lifting her eyes to the lake to watch the shadows gliding across the water, as the clouds floated by overhead. Sometimes the sunlight was darkened for a few minutes and the lake looked gray and cold, but on the opposite shore a tiny village nestled at the foot of a mountain, and over there the sun was shining, and the white houses gleamed brightly against the dull brown background. "It looks like a mirage," said Migwan to Hinpoha, who had dropped down on the sand at her feet.

Hinpoha glanced across the lake at the fairy scene and then back at Migwan. "What are you always writing in that book of yours?" she asked curiously.

"Wouldn't you like to know, though!" replied Migwan, closing it up.

"Oh, let me see some of it, won't you, Migwan, dear?" said Hinpoha coaxingly. "I love to read what you write and I never make fun of it, you know that. Please do." After a little more coaxing Migwan relented and handed Hinpoha the page she had just written. Hinpoha spread it out on her knee and read:

"I was sitting in the woods rather pensively the other day when I suddenly became aware of two merry eyes fixed on me from the ground beside me. There was something so irresistibly roguish in their expression that my sadness leaked out of me unceremoniously. As I looked the eyes disappeared behind a leaf, only to appear an instant later on the other side, and a tiny, round red face nodded cheerfully at me. Visions of wood sprites went through my head and I sat perfectly still, so as not to frighten him away. He had retired behind his leaf after that last nod, but as I made no sound he soon looked out again to see if I was still there. This time I got a good look at him. He was no elf, but a berry; a brilliant round red berry with two little holes in him that looked just like eyes. 'Such a cheerful berry, I thought, 'deserves a whole face,' so I made him a nose and mouth with my pencil. When last I saw him he was still playing peek-a-boo among the leaves, enjoying the world for all he was worth."

"Oh, how lovely!" exclaimed Hinpoha, when she had read that far, "you must let the other girls read this. Wouldn't you like me to illustrate it for you? I'm just itching to paint that little red berry."

"That will be fine," said Migwan, and Hinpoha sped after her paint box. Hinpoha could not have written that little sketch if her life depended upon it, but her talent with the brush was unmistakable. With a few deft strokes she pictured Migwan sitting in the woods and beside her the little red berry with its comical face. Now it was Migwan's turn to admire. Hinpoha went on to the next paragraph:

"I walked on through the wood, admiring the little green moss stars that twinkled up from the ground. 'Oh, I must get a closer view,' I said, half aloud, and immediately my wish was granted, for a pine tree put out his foot and tripped me and I fell with my face right in the moss."

"How I should like to have seen you!" laughed Hinpoha as she painted Migwan sprawling on the ground. "Haven't you some more stuff I can illustrate? There's such a lot of paint mixed up. Oh, here's another one," she said, turning over the pages:

"I am sitting in the woods near Sandy Beach. Have been gathering blueberries and my cup runneth over. The sun has turned the beach into a Sahara, but here in the woods it is dim and cool and pleasant. I am leaning against a big tree with my feet stretched out in front of me. There is a spider weaving a web from one foot to the other. I hate to break down his handiwork, or rather, his footiwork, but I can't stay here forever, much as I would like to. He ought to have been more careful about getting a clear title to his property before building. This will teach him a lesson, I think.

"Just now a tiny red squirrel ran down a tree, paused beside me, gave an impertinent whisk of his tail and disappeared. 'Lazy girl,' he seemed to say, 'idling away this beautiful summer weather when you ought to be storing nuts for the winter. You'll repent when the snow begins to fly. Idle in summer, hungry in winter.' With a disapproving cough he disappeared.

"There is a blueberry bush nearby hanging full of large luscious berries. I never saw blueberries in their native wilds before. I had a sort of hazy notion that blueberries grew in quart boxes in market stalls."

"That reminds me," said Hinpoha suddenly, "it must be getting near time for our promised trip to Blueberry Island." She painted a bush with berries nearly as big as marbles and read on eagerly:

"I have surprised an acorn in a gross neglect of duty. He is lying on the ground where he fell last fall and hasn't sprouted in the least. I thought all acorns aspired to be oak trees. Think of being a nut half an inch long, and in that half inch to have the power of becoming the King of the Forest, and then let that power lie unused! If I were an acorn I would feel eternally disgraced if I hadn't sprouted."

Hinpoha duly portrayed the delinquent acorn. "I'll tell you what we'll do when we grow up," she said, leaning back and surveying her work critically, "you write books and I'll illustrate them!"

All this time Nyoda and Sahwah had been working on a canoe a little farther up the beach. Sahwah had crossed the lake in the dark the night before and had grounded on a sharp rock that jutted up just underneath the surface, ripping a hole in the bottom of the canoe nearly a foot long. Now she and Nyoda were repairing the damage. "Don't anybody take this canoe out for a couple of days," said Nyoda to the girls, "the pine pitch we put on isn't hard yet."

Hinpoha showed Nyoda the leaves from Migwan's journal which she had illustrated and Nyoda was delighted. "You two had better form a permanent partnership," she advised. "You will produce something worth while in time." Then she added: "Wouldn't it be a fine idea for you to make an illustrated book of the camp doings and send it to Professor Bentley and Professor Wheeler? As long as they are so much interested in Camp Fire Girls nothing would please them better." Migwan and Hinpoha were enthusiastic over the idea and promised to begin that very day.

Sahwah, having determined not to clash with Gladys again, and to make a friend of her at all costs, lost no opportunity to do her service. She filled Gladys's water pail in the morning, she hung up her wet bathing suit when Gladys had gone off and left it lying on the tent floor, she paddled her out in the heavy sponson when she was dying to skim over the lake in the sailing canoe, and in short, sacrificed herself at every turn for Gladys. And Gladys in time began to look on her as a sort of serving maid, who would do any unpleasant task she happened to want done. Nyoda could not help noticing this and wondered how long Sahwah would stand for it, but she said nothing to either one of them, preferring to watch matters take their course.

Things finally came to a head one afternoon during rest hour. Sahwah was out of sorts that day. The night before she had stayed out on the lake after she had promised to come in and as a result had injured the canoe in the darkness. While Nyoda had not scolded her for staying out so long she knew she was disappointed in her and it made her cross with herself. Then the first thing that morning she had received a letter from her mother chiding her for not having written home for two weeks. That made her crosser yet. During the folk dancing hour she could not keep her mind on her feet, and blundered so many times that Gladys, who was her partner, left the ring in disgust. Sahwah was sensitive about her dancing, which did not come very easy to her, and tried especially hard when dancing with Gladys, who did the figures with wonderful grace and skill, and Gladys's conduct on this occasion filled her with unutterable mortification.

Sahwah rushed away to her tent and got into her bathing suit and sat down on the dock, impatiently waiting for Nyoda's "All in!" In swimming hour she managed to get herself into disfavor again. Hinpoha was taking her test for towing a person to shore and was swimming with Nakwisi in tow. She was just nearing the dock where Nyoda stood watching to see if she could land her burden when Sahwah dove off the high tower, right on top of her and Nakwisi, carrying them both under the surface and breaking up the test. Nyoda uttered an impatient exclamation and sent Sahwah out of the water as a reminder to look before she dove the next time. Sahwah's heart was nearly broken and she could hardly eat her dinner. She and Gladys were washing dishes that day, but when the time came Gladys pleaded a headache and went to the tent to lie down, leaving Sahwah to do them alone. It seemed that every dish in camp had been used that day. She finished at last, all tired out, and flung herself on her bed, resolved not to move until rest hour was over, and not then if she didn't feel like it. She was just sinking off into a delicious doze when Gladys reached over and pulled her by the foot.

"What do you want?" said Sahwah drowsily.

"Come on, take me for a ride in the sponson," said Gladys.

"Can't, it's rest hour," answered Sahwah.

"What of it?" said Gladys, "Let's go anyway. Everybody's asleep.

They'll never know the difference."

Sahwah looked at her with an expression of horror. "It doesn't matter whether any one knows it or not," she said stiffly. "It isn't a custom of the Winnebagos to go boating in rest hour."

"It doesn't seem to be a custom of the Winnebagos to do anything they want to," said Gladys sneeringly. "You girls let Miss Kent lead you around by the nose as if you were six years old! It's a pity if girls as old as we are have to take a nap after dinner like babies. I for one won't stand for it. I don't want to lie down for an hour every afternoon and I'm not going to do it, so there! If you had any spirit you'd rebel, too. But you haven't. You're just like wax in her hands. If she told you to go bed at four o'clock in the afternoon and stay there, you'd do it! I dare you to slip out and go for a boat ride with me now, I dare you! I dare you!"

Sahwah's hair nearly stood on end with fury at this attack on her beloved Nyoda. "Dare all you like," she said in a choking voice, "I'll not break a camp rule to please you."

"Very well, then, don't," said Gladys, "and see if I care. If you would rather abide by silly old rules than have a good time it's your loss, not mine. I wouldn't be such a baby." She went back to her bed and lay down with the air of a martyr. Every few seconds she would look over at Sahwah and pronounce the word "baby" in a taunting tone.

Sahwah closed her eyes resolutely and pretended not to hear her. She was filled from head to foot with contempt for Gladys. Sahwah was heedless and hot-tempered and undiplomatic, but in matters where honor was concerned she was true blue. All her admiration for Gladys vanished when she tried to lead her into dishonor. As she lay there thinking over her attempts to win Gladys's friendship she saw clearly how Gladys had been working her all this time, getting her to wait on her hand and foot and in return treating her in a patronizing manner as if she were an inferior being from whom such service was no more than due. Her rage rose at the very thought of Gladys. "Catch me doing anything for her again!" she muttered to herself.

She lay very still with her eyes closed for a long time, feigning sleep. After a while a stealthy rustle from Gladys's bed caught her ear. She opened one eye slightly and then opened both very wide in surprise. Gladys was in the act of drawing a box of candy from under her blankets. Opening it, she proceeded to eat one piece after another. Sahwah was so astonished that she could not repress an exclamation.

Gladys looked in her direction. "Have a piece of candy?" she said mockingly, holding out the box, "or are you afraid to do that too?"

Sahwah disregarded the taunt. "Where did you get that candy?" she asked sternly.

"I bought it down in the village, Miss Simplicity," answered

Gladys.

"Did you know that we weren't to buy candy and eat it between meals, or didn't you?" continued Sahwah.

"Certainly, I knew it was against the rules," said Gladys, "but I don't intend to have any one dictate to me whether or not I shall eat candy. I've eaten candy all my life and it's never hurt me. If I can't eat it openly I'll eat it on the sly, but I will eat it!"

"Didn't it occur to you that it's dishonest to do things on the sly like that?" said Sahwah in a husky voice. If she had held Gladys in contempt before there was no name for what she thought of her now.

"Who says it's dishonest to break silly rules?" said Gladys, putting another piece into her mouth. "Such rules were made to be broken."

"What would Nyoda say?" asked Sahwah.

"I don't care what she says," said Gladys recklessly.

"I thought you admired her so much," said Sahwah, remembering how

Gladys was constantly fawning on Nyoda.

"I do admire her, more than any of you," said Gladys loftily, "but that's no sign she can order me around. Go and tell her if you like, old busybody!"

"Tell her what?" asked Nyoda, appearing in the door of the tent.

"That I buy candy in the village and keep it in my bed to eat during rest hour!" said Gladys brazenly.

Nyoda opened her eyes very wide. "That you do what?" she asked. Gladys held up the box. Nyoda said nothing, but merely looked at her, and before the expression in her eyes Gladys wilted and was covered with confusion.

"I don't care, I want some candy," she said, looking ready to burst into tears.

"Why didn't you wait until supper time and pass it around?" asked

Nyoda quietly, but there was a note in her voice that robbed

Gladys of her air of bravado.

"Because I wanted it now," she said sulkily.

"Gladys," said Nyoda, trying to conceal her disgust at this untrustworthy trait revealed in the character of her charge by the episode, "have you any idea why that candy rule was made?" Gladys shook her head. "It was made," said Nyoda, "to keep me from dishonor." Gladys looked at her uncomprehendingly. "It is a very responsible thing," continued Nyoda, "to take a group of girls so far away from home. Many of the girls' mothers were unwilling to have them go, and I promised every one of them, on my honor, that no harm should come to their girls that I could in any way prevent and that we should all come back in better health than we went. Now, a change of climate and drinking water is hard on any one, and you girls have enough to do adjusting your systems to the new order of things even with a carefully regulated diet. Eating candy between meals is one good way to produce an upset stomach, and up here we can't take any chances. It would be inconvenient to take care of a sick person in camp, and besides, think of all the fun you would lose! So when we were discussing the difficulties of camping out for so long we all agreed, willingly and cheerfully, to live on a strict schedule recommended by experienced campers, and to run no risks by eating candy between meals. So you see that the rule, which you probably consider merely a piece of tyranny on my part, is not my rule at all, but was adopted by unanimous consent at a meeting of the group. If I were to allow you to eat candy between meals I would be breaking my promise to your parents, and you know that we Camp Fire Girls have taken a vow to be trustworthy."

Gladys flushed and hung her head, although Nyoda had made no reference to her breaking of trust. Nyoda continued: "You, of all the girls here, have need to be the most careful. You are the least robust of them all, and enter into our sports with the least vigor. Your racket stroke is weak and your paddle stroke is weak, and exertion which does not affect the other girls at all leaves you exhausted. That is a condition of which you should be ashamed, inasmuch as you have no definite ailment. 'Hold on to Health' is only another form of 'Be trustworthy,' for it means taking good care of the body which has been given into our keeping. I know you never thought about it in just that way and broke the rule because you saw no reason for it, not because you have no sense of honor.

"And now about this candy you have on hand. I will ask you to put it in the kitchen where it will keep dry and pass it around to the girls at meal time as long as it lasts. After that I must request you not to buy any more, even to eat with meals. We have home-made candy three times a week and that is sufficient."

Nyoda withdrew from the tent, leaving Gladys feeling very small. Hinpoha and Migwan had waked in time to hear the last of Nyoda's speech and saw the candy, and while they were too polite to make any remarks their attitude plainly showed their disapproval, and this state of things galled Gladys more than Nyoda's chiding. Sahwah, with a fine sense of charity, had left the tent when Nyoda appeared. Her generous nature forbade her to crow over a fallen foe.

A nature walk was on the program for the afternoon, but Gladys feigned a headache and remained at home. "Somehow I don't feel like going on a nature walk, either," said Sahwah, when they were ready to start. This was so unusual from Sahwah, who was generally enthusiastic about everything that was proposed, that Nyoda looked at her in some anxiety.

"Don't you feel well, dear?" she asked.

"Yes, I feel perfectly well," said Sahwah. "That's the trouble.

I feel too well to go on a nature walk."

"Feel too well to go on a nature walk!" repeated Nyoda. "What do you mean by that?"

"I don't know," said Sahwah. "I feel so full of-of something that I'd like to wrestle with an elephant!"

Nyoda understood the feeling. She had watched Sahwah's growing irritation all day long and knew that in her case the only relief would be strenuous activity. "Then perhaps it would be better for you to stay at home," she said lightly. "You might do some damage to us peaceful citizens. By the way, have you ever swum as far as Blueberry Island? It's a mile, I think. That ought to work off some of your superfluous energy. You have special permission to go in this afternoon. When you get there wait until I come for you in the launch. We can keep our eye on you from the road while you are swimming." Sahwah jumped for joy and ran to get into her bathing suit.

The cool water closed around her limbs like the caress of a loving hand and her irritation vanished like magic. Water was Sahwah's element, and as she propelled herself gracefully across the sparkling lake, feeling the absolute mastery of her muscles, changing regularly from left to right in her side stroke, she might have been taken for a mermaid by some Neckan of the deep. She reached Blueberry Island in good time and, climbing up on the rocky shore, sat down in the sun to dry.

Meanwhile Gladys was not having anywhere near such a glorious time. She tossed on her bed for a long time, feeling more sorry for herself every minute. She still thought Nyoda's explanation of the candy rule a weak excuse for an act of tyranny, and was furious at the thought of having been caught in an undignified position. The tears, which she had managed to hold back in front of Nyoda, came now, and she cried herself into a genuine headache. But it was all self-pity; there was no real sorrow for her fault. She considered herself the most abused girl in the world; deserted by her parents, disliked by girls whom she considered beneath her, and deprived of her rights by a young woman who had no real authority over her.

"I bet the other girls eat candy between meals too," she said to herself viciously, "only they're too clever to get found out. I wouldn't have been found out either, if it hadn't been for that snippy little Sahwah making a fuss!" She worked herself into a perfect fury, and blamed Sahwah for all of her troubles. "I'd give a whole lot to get even with her," she said to herself, and immediately began looking around the tent for something of Sahwah's which she could damage. The only thing in evidence was her tennis racket, and Gladys took it out and deliberately put a stone through it. Then, frightened at what she had done, and thoroughly homesick and miserable, she sat down and began a letter to her father, begging him to send for her immediately.

"Dear Papa," she wrote, "if you only knew what a dreadful place this is you would not leave me here another day. The girls are very rude and horrid and low class; they are continually fighting and playing rough jokes on each other, and especially on me. I don't like Miss Kent as well as you said I would. She makes me go in bathing until I'm all tired out and cold and tries to make me swim when it's impossible for me to learn. She takes me out beyond my depth and ducks me under when I don't make my hands go right. She treats me as if I were a baby and won't trust me out of her sight. It seems they have a rule here about not eating candy between meals and I didn't know it and I bought some and ate it and she called me a sneak before all the girls and made me throw the candy into the lake. I am very miserable and sick most of the time as we don't get enough to eat, and what we do get isn't good. I'm always cold at night and they often let it rain right in on our beds. If you don't send for me right away I may get sick and die before very long.

"Your miserable daughter,

"GLADYS

"P.S.: Aunt Sally is going to Atlantic City in August; may I go with her?"

She gave the letter to the captain of the steamer when he stopped to bring the supplies and then sat down on the dock and stared moodily out over the lake. She was lonesome; and in spite of the fact that she had stayed home of her own accord she resented the fact that the girls had gone off and left her. The canoes lay side by side on the beach and Gladys was seized with a fancy to get into one and go gliding out over the smooth surface of the lake.

She was not allowed in a canoe because she had not taken the swimming test, but she considered this another piece of tyranny on Nyoda's part. She could paddle pretty well, as Sahwah had taught her to handle the sponson, and she saw no reason at all why she couldn't enjoy a quiet canoe ride up and down the beach while no one was around to interfere.

"I'll stay near shore," she told herself, as she laid hold of one of the canoes and launched it as she had seen the girls do. She managed to seat herself in the right end and pushed off from the shore. It was more fun even than she had imagined, and the canoe seemed so light in comparison to the sponson that she sent it flying through the water with little effort. "I'll bet they're keeping me out of the canoes on purpose, so they'll have more use of them themselves," she thought ungraciously, "and it's not because I can't swim at all. That was a safe rule to make when I'm the only one who can't swim. And they're my own father's canoes!"

Gladys edged a little farther out from the shore, then a little farther and a little farther. The end of the canoe swung around until it pointed directly out across the lake, and Gladys kept on paddling in the way it pointed. When she had reached a distance about halfway between Blueberry Island and the dock she noticed with terror that the canoe was leaking. She had not been in the group when Nyoda had warned them about not using the one canoe for several days, and as luck would have it, the canoe she picked out was the very one which Sahwah had grounded on the rock. The gash was opening again and the canoe was filling with water. Helpless from fright, Gladys dropped her paddle overboard and buried her face in her hands after one wild look at the distant shore. It seemed to her like a swift judgment from heaven for her outrageous conduct that day.

Sahwah, grown weary of sitting in the sun doing nothing, fixed her eyes on the camp dock to watch for the putting out of the launch. No launch was forthcoming, but she saw a canoe gliding out from the dock. "Something must be the matter with the launch and Nyoda's coming for me in a canoe," thought Sahwah. "How slowly she is paddling, it will take her an age to get here!" Sahwah waited a little while and then slid off the rocks into the water. "I'll swim out and meet her," she said to herself. When she had gone about half the distance she saw that it was not Nyoda in the canoe, but Gladys, and an exclamation of astonishment escaped from her lips. Coming nearer yet she saw that Gladys was in distress and had dropped her paddle overboard, and she doubled her speed, shooting through the water like a speed boat. Raising up her head once, she shouted to attract Gladys's attention. Gladys evidently did not hear her, for she did not turn around. When she was nearly there Sahwah saw that the canoe was sinking, and with a mighty spurt she reached it just as it settled to the water's edge, and Gladys, with a wild scream, fell into the lake.

Sahwah caught her by the hair as she came up and held her head out of water. "What did you take a canoe out for, you goose?" she sputtered. "You deserve to drown." The canoe had not sunk entirely yet, and Sahwah thought that if she could turn it over keel up it would be all right until they could come for it. So, turning Gladys over on her back, she bade her float while she kept one hand on her to keep her above water and reached out for the canoe with the other. Gladys struggled and choked, but Sahwah paid no attention to her, for she knew that she was safe and could not get a strangle hold on her. Grasping one end of the canoe she tried to turn it over. At first it would not move, and so Sahwah exerted all her strength in a mighty push. The canoe stood partly on end, and then came down with a crashing thud on her outstretched arm.

An instant of numbness was followed by the most excruciating pain, and the arm sank limply through the water. Sahwah knew that it was broken. But even then her presence of mind did not desert her. Shoving Gladys out ahead of her with her good arm, she propelled herself with her legs, swimming on her back, and slowly they began to move toward the distant shore. The half mile that was nothing to Sahwah ordinarily now became an endless stretch. The pain in her arm made her feel faint, and her limbs, tired from her long swim, seemed suddenly to have turned into lead. The clouds above turned black, then blood red, then every color of the rainbow. Strange lights and shadows danced in front of her eyes, and there were strange noises in her ears. Her breath came in long, sobbing gasps. The arm that was holding Gladys became cramped and weak, but there was no relief. "Draw, kick, close! Draw, kick, close!" The monotonous rhythm beat itself into her brain. "Draw, kick, close!" Throb! Throb! Throb! Would the nightmare never come to an end? Through the sound of strange voices that were echoing in her ears Sahwah heard a cry that sounded like Nyoda's, and then darkness settled around her and her efforts ceased.

Nyoda, coming down to untie the launch, reached the dock just as Sahwah and Gladys came alongside of it, and held out her hand to help Gladys up. She thought she was being towed for fun. "Sahwah, you naughty girl, what did you swim all the way home for?" she began, and then gasped in astonishment as Sahwah stiffened out in the water and went down. She grasped her by the collar as she came up and pulled her out on the dock, limp and dripping. "What does this mean?" she asked Gladys.

"She towed me in when the canoe went down," said Gladys, her teeth chattering with fright. "She broke her arm and held me up with the other while she swam with her legs." Gladys's knees gave way and she sank down on the dock, burying her face in her hands.

And Sahwah the Sunfish, the lover of maiden bravery, the envier of heroines, was the greatest of them all, and knew it not.