Bessie smiled, but said nothing. And presently she called to Zara and disappeared with her in the woods. "I want to give them a surprise, Zara," she said. "There's quite a long time yet before supper. And I saw an apple tree when I was walking through the woods. Let's go and get some of them." Zara was quite willing, and in half an hour or less the two girls were back in camp with a good load of apples. Then Bessie spoke to Wanaka when the Guardian was alone for the moment. "May I have some flour and sugar?" she said. Wanaka looked at her curiously, but gave her what she wanted. And Bessie, finding a smooth white board, was soon busy rolling pastry. Then when she had made a great deep dish pie, and filled it with the apples, which Zara, meanwhile, had pared and cut, Bessie set to work on what was the most difficult part of her task. First she dug out a hole in the ground and made a fire, small, but very hot, and, in a short time, with the aid of two flat stones, she had constructed a practicable outdoor oven, in which the heat of the embers and cinders was retained by shutting out the air with earth. Then the pie was put in and covered at once, so that no heat could escape, and Bessie, saying nothing about what she had done, went back to help the others. Obeying the unwritten rule of the Camp Fire, which allows the girls to work out their ideas unaided if they possibly can, so as to encourage self-reliance and independence, Wanaka did not ask her what she had done. But when the meal was over Bessie slipped away, while Wanaka was serving out some preserves, and returned in a moment, bearing her pie--nobly browned, with crisp, flaky crust. "I've only made one pie like this before and I never used that sort of an oven," she said, shyly. "So I don't know if it's very good. But I thought I would try it." Bessie, however, need not have worried about the quality of that pie. The rapidity with which it disappeared was the best possible evidence of its goodness, and Wanaka commended her before all the girls, who were willing enough to join the leader in singing Bessie's praises. "My, but that was good!" said Minnehaha. "I wish I could make a pie like that! My pastry is always heavy. Will you show me how when we get home, Bessie?" "Indeed I will!" promised Bessie. And that night, after a spell of singing and story telling about the great fire on the beach, Bessie and Zara went to bed with thoughts very different from those they had had the night before. "Aren't they good to us, Zara?" said Bessie. "They're simply wonderful," said Zara, with shining eyes. "And Wanaka talked to me about my father. She says she has a friend in the city who's a lawyer, and that as soon as we get back she'll speak to him, and get him to see that he is fairly treated. I feel ever so much better."