Will Ford, the brother of Grace, had caused the girls, and especially his sister, anxiety and uneasiness because of his failure to enlist with the other boys. In the end he justified himself, however, by delivering a German spy to justice and enlisting in the service of his country immediately afterward. The girls also recovered some valuable jewelry that the spy had stolen from them. Then in the volume directly preceding this, entitled "The Outdoor Girls at the Hostess House," the girls had befriended an old woman who had been knocked down by an unscrupulous motorcyclist. They later learned the secret tragedy in the life of their little old lady. Now the girls had come home to Deepdale for a much needed rest, only to be confronted with the terrible, though, naturally, expected, news that the boys had been ordered to the front. "Yes they may be, probably are, facing death at this minute," said Mollie slowly, finishing the broken sentence. "Perhaps at the very minute we were playing and singing and enjoying ourselves--" "Mollie, don't!" cried Amy brokenly. "I don't feel as if I could ever enjoy myself again." "Well, we've got to, whether we can or not," said Betty, striving to control her quivering lips and tilting her little chin at a brave angle. "We can't just lie down at the very first shot, you know." "You talk as if we were on the firing line," said Grace hysterically. "I suppose in a way we are," returned the Little Captain slowly, wishing desperately that those troublesome tears would stay where they belonged--her eyes were so misty she could hardly see Grace! "Only ours is a harder kind of battle, because it's made up mostly of waiting and working without any of the thrill and excitement of the real fight to help us. But I'd like to know," and there was a little ring of pride and renewed courage in her voice, "what the real fighters would do without us anyway. We're just as much soldiers as they are, and if we don't do our share, they can't do theirs." "Of course you are right, Betty dear, you always are!" cried Mollie, taking heart and even smiling a little. "We can't do anybody good by moping." "No," added Grace with a philosophy unusual in her. "That's why we have the hardest share, I guess--because we have to keep gay and bright, no matter how we feel." "And we still have our work at the Hostess House," Amy reminded them. "Maybe," she added, a little wistfully, "if we work hard enough we'll be able to forget--" "What's all this about working and forgetting?" cried Mrs. Nelson, coming gayly into the room. "I thought you had come home for a vacation." The girls explained, and Mrs. Nelson looked pityingly at their grave young faces. "So that is it," she was beginning, when Mollie sprang to her feet with a cry. She was staring at the paper that Mrs. Nelson had carelessly thrown on the table. "What is it?" they cried, as she snatched it up and read the glaring headlines.