"We all want her, don't we girls? All right, give her the welcome!"
Instantly the girls raised a chorus:
"Do we want her!
Do we want her!
Yes, we do, do, do!"
This cheering call echoed through the woods and it filled the heart of the little mountain girl with happiness.
It seemed to be Kit's unlucky day, for as she climbed down the wall her skirt caught once more on the wire and completed its destruction.
"Now that dress is done for! What a clumsy colt I am! You'd think I'd never been broken to saddle!" exclaimed Kit as her brown eyes snapped. "Don't I look a sight?"
The three girls were fascinated by the stranger. She walked with long swinging strides that she had learned in climbing hills from babyhood. Even the way she expressed herself was different from the girls in the village.
"What a pity you've spoiled your dress," said Bet. "I'll have that wire taken off immediately!" she exclaimed in indignation. "That's for tramps too, but I've told Dad more than once that the wire must go. Now I'll just have to insist."
It was Kit's turn to stare in amazement, for Bet's face was stern and reproving as she spoke of her father, much as if he were a small boy who had to be punished.
"Now where I come from, fathers say what's what, and not daughters," laughed Kit. Dad Patten was a pleasant man, quiet and given to few words, but he was the one who ruled, and no one else gave orders.
"Bet is a lucky girl, Kit. She's an only child and I'll tell you a secret, she's frightfully spoiled. She does just as she pleases all the time." This was from Shirley, who had scarcely spoken before. She was not less friendly than the others but found it harder to express herself freely.
"Don't believe her, Kit," laughed Bet Baxter. "There are lots of things I'm not allowed to do. Dad is one of the best and most understanding Dads but I always do exactly as he tells me."
"That's the joke," laughed Shirley. "Her father never tells her to do anything!"
CHAPTER II
THE PICNIC
"Let's eat!" exclaimed Joy. "I'm almost starved!" She was twirling on tiptoe on the top of a flat stone. "Do let's unpack the basket!"
"And I must go. I told Mrs. Stacey I'd be back soon. If you'll just tell me which way to start out. I'm lost!" laughed Kit.
"Oh you can't get lost in Lynnwood if you'd try. All roads lead to Main Street," declared Bet.
"Or away from Main Street, as I've found out this morning!"
"Oh but you must stay for the picnic; we wouldn't enjoy it now without you," urged Joy.
"But Mrs. Stacey might worry. No, I won't start in by causing her trouble. That wouldn't be right."
"I'll tell you what I'll do," exclaimed Bet. "You girls arrange the lunch under that tree and I'll run home and telephone Mrs. Stacey. She'll say yes, I know she will."
Without waiting for Kit's assent, Bet raced up the path, her hair flying in disorder, then she disappeared in the shrubbery. In a short time she returned with the good news that Kit was to spend the afternoon and evening with the girls. Mrs. Stacey was more than delighted that her young charge had found so congenial a group of friends. Not having children of her own, she hardly knew what to do with Kit. And when Bet promised to look after her, she was greatly relieved, for everyone in Lynnwood knew the bright little daughter of Colonel Baxter and trusted her.
When Bet returned with the good news, the lunch was already spread.
"Why this isn't a lunch at all!" exclaimed Joy with enthusiasm. "It's a banquet. And one of Auntie Gibbs' special ones. Isn't she a dear! She remembered that I liked devilled eggs."
"How you flatter yourself! Don't imagine for a minute that she made those for you. They were for her own little angel, Bet," said Shirley with a quiet laugh.
"An angel is the last thing she'd call me, Shirley. I know I've been frightfully contrary lately and I'm not in Auntie Gibbs' good graces. She said the other day she wished I had come a boy; that boys were lots nicer."
"The very idea!" cried the girls together. "Boys better than girls! That's silly!"
"Well if it's boys she likes, you certainly do your best to make her happy, for you look like a boy – and act like one most of the time," teased Joy.
"Thanks for the flattery!" Bet tossed her head with a pretended air of superiority. "I'd love to be a boy!"
"What would you do?" asked Joy.
"I'd run away to sea!"
"Old stuff! Take a big jump and get up to date!" Joy came back at her with a snap.
"Why be so old fashioned?" laughed Shirley. "Do something modern!"
"Maybe I'd stow away on an airplane then, going to China."
"That's more like you, Bet Baxter. That sea stuff never appealed to me. They always were made to work. And there isn't much work on an airplane," said Joy helping herself to another devilled egg.
"Do unwrap that package there," cried Shirley. "Let's see what Auntie Gibbs made for me. Chicken sandwiches, oh boy! And Auntie Gibbs' chicken sandwiches are the best ever, aren't they?"
"We ought to know," laughed Bet. "We've eaten about a ton of them. – Here Kit, do help yourself. Have another egg."
Kit had never tasted such a lunch. And it was all put up in such an appetizing way, it seemed a pity to disturb it. Everything was wrapped in wax paper or put up in small jars. There was actually a dish of crisp salad. There were stuffed olives and Bet grasped the jar with a little cry:
"Let's see if it is Auntie Gibbs' special. Oh girls, it is, it is! Auntie Gibbs' stuffed olives!"
"Well she has outdone herself!" Joy was munching an olive as she showered praise on the old housekeeper at the Manor.
"You know, Kit," explained Bet, "these stuffed olives are Auntie Gibbs' own invention and what goes into the filling of them, no one knows but herself. It's her secret!"
"And it's a secret to the death!" laughed Shirley. "She says she'll never tell and when she dies she will bequeath the recipe to her best friend. Won't that sound funny in a will?"
Kit laughed heartily at these new friends and Bet continued: "Oh yes, Auntie Gibbs makes a sort of religion out of her cooking. And when she hits upon something especially good, she guards the recipe as if it were a treasure and freezes up hard if anyone asks her how she made it."
"I wonder why?" ventured Kit.
"She says if everybody makes the same thing, it's no treat."
"This is very different from an Arizona picnic, girls," exclaimed Kit suddenly.
"Do tell us about it, Kit. What did you eat?"
"We mostly had Arizona strawberries and mountain trout," chuckled Kit and was pleased to see Bet's face express disbelief.
"Why, I didn't know you had strawberries in Arizona."
"And where do you get trout in that hot desert country, when the streams all go dry half the time?" asked Shirley.
Kit laughed with all her might. "There I knew I'd get caught at that old joke. Well you see it's this way. Arizona strawberries are the little red Mexican beans, which we pretty nearly live on out there. And the mountain trout are the strips of bacon that are fried to go with them."
"Oh you mean thing, trying to fool us like that!" shouted Joy, who had been sitting still so long that she had grown tired. Now she danced away down the path with a sandwich held above her head.
"What else would you have for a lunch?" asked Shirley.
"Oh like as not we'd take a Dutch oven along and bake biscuit – and make coffee. They are great on coffee in the desert. Sometimes we have great big picnics when people for miles around come."
"And are