It took some little time to do this, but it was finally accomplished. "Well, shall we decide on it?" asked Betty after a pause. "Shall we form the Deepdale Camping and Tramping Club?" "I move you, Miss Chairman, that we do!" exclaimed Grace. "The sooner the better." "Second the motion!" came laughingly from Mollie. "All in favor--" "Aye!" came in a joyous chorus, and the little club was thus quickly formed. CHAPTER III JEALOUSIES "What do they find to talk about so often?" "And so secretly. As soon as any of us other girls come near they begin to speak of the weather--or something like that." Thus remarked Alice Jallow to Kittie Rossmore a few days after the formation of the Camping and Tramping Club. The question and comments took place in the court of the High School, just before the bell was to ring for the morning session. "It's all Betty Nelson's doings," declared Alice, who had often tried to make herself more intimate with the quartette of friends, but unsuccessfully. The other girls did not care for these two. "Yes. Grace, Mollie and Amy will do anything Betty tells them," asserted Kittie. "I don't see why she is so popular. She hasn't a bit of style about her." "I should say not! Her skirt is entirely too wide, and her blouse never seems cut right." "They say her mother doesn't believe in style. But I do," said Alice. "I'd rather have a cheap dress, if it was in style, than something old-fashioned, even if it cost a lot more." "So would I. Look at them now, with their heads together! I wonder if they're going to have a dance?" "I don't know. How can we find out?" "Leave it to me. Jennie Plum is quite friendly with Mollie. I'll get her to ask some questions." "Do; and then tell me. I'm sure they're getting up some affair." "I shouldn't wonder. If they'd only ask us--" "We have a right to be asked!" and Alice flared up. The warning bell interrupted further conversation, and the girls and boys filed into their classrooms. As Alice had remarked, there was a good deal of talk going on among the four members of the newly-formed Camping and Tramping Club. Every spare moment the four seemed to have something to say to each other, as one or the other thought of some new point to consider. Following the hasty formation of the organization, the girls had sent letters to their friends and relatives asking if it would be convenient to entertain them. Some favorable answers had been received, others were delayed. There were no refusals. "As soon as we know on whom we can depend, we can make up a schedule--'an itinerary'"--Betty had said. "We will know just where we will stop each night, so the folks can send us word, if they have to," she added. "Why should they have to, unless something happens?" asked Amy. "Oh, that five hundred dollar bill might be claimed," said Betty. "We'd want to know about that." "And you haven't heard a word yet?" asked Grace.