The Camp Fire Girls Across the Seas

"Why aren't you in bed, Polly mine?" she asked. "I saw that the gas was shining or I should never have disturbed you."

In answer Polly without rising pushed a low rocking chair toward her mother. "I wasn't sleepy. Is that the same reason that keeps you awake, Mrs. Wharton?" she queried.

In all their lives together Polly O'Neill and her mother had always held a different relation toward each other than ordinarily exists between most mothers and daughters. In the first place Mrs. Wharton was so very little older than her children that in the days in the cottage when they had lived and worked for one another, they had seemed more like three devoted and intimate friends. Of course the two girls had always understood that when a serious question was to be decided their mother remained the court of the last decision. However, in those years few serious questions had ever arisen beyond the finding of sufficient money for their food and clothes and occasional good times. S