"All the girls ought to know about this letter," Helen replied. "But
you can't go to them and blurt out anything so sensational. We must
break the news gently, as they say in melodrama. I wish we hadn't
come."

"So do I," Marion replied, but with just a suggestion of
disappointment in her voice.

"Not that I am afraid of getting hurt," Helen added hastily, realizing
the suspicion of cowardice that might rest against her. "Still, if my
advice had been asked, I would have argued against this very dangerous
vacation scheme of yours."

"Why?" inquired Marion in a tone of disappointment.

"Because of the very situation complained of in that
skull-and-cross-bones letter. I hope I don't hurt your feelings,
Marion, but it is very natural for some of these rough miners to
suspect that your plan was cooked up by your father to pull the wool
over their eyes, and to regard you as a tool employed by him to put
the scheme into operation."

"Some of the girls' parents raised the objection that there might be
danger in a mining district during a strike, but none of them
suggested anything of this sort," Marion remarked with humble anxiety.
"I explained to them that there could hardly be any danger even if the
strikers should get ugly, as the mines are some distance from where we
live and any violence on the part of the miners would surely be
committed at the scene of their labors. This seemed to satisfy them.
Most of the miners live at the south end of the town or along the