AN AUTUMN WALKING EXPEDITION
"It is simply too lovely to go home to-day," exclaimed Grace Harlowe to
her three chums as they strolled down High School Street one sunny
afternoon in early October. "I move that we drop our books at my house
and go for a walk."
"I'm willing to drop my books anywhere and never see them again,"
grumbled Nora O'Malley, who was not fond of study.
"I ought to go straight home," demurred Anne Pierson, "but I'll put
pleasure before duty and stay with the crowd."
"What about you, Jessica?" asked Grace.
"You couldn't drive me home," replied Jessica promptly.
"Very well," laughed Grace, "as we are all of the same mind, let's shed
these books and be off."
After a brief stop at Grace's home, the four girls started out, keenly
alive to the beauty of the day. The leaves on the trees were beginning
to lose their green and put on their dresses of red and gold. Though the
sun shone brightly, the air was cool and bracing, and filled one with
that vigor and joy of living which makes autumn the most delightful
season of the year.
Once outside the gate, the chums unconsciously headed in the same
direction.
"I believe we all have the same place in mind," laughed Grace. "I was
thinking about a walk to the old Omnibus House."
"'Great minds run in the same channel,'" quoted Jessica.
"I haven't been out there since the spread last year," said Anne.
"I have," said Grace, with a slight shudder. "I am not likely to forget
it, either."
"Well we are not apt to meet any more Napoleon Bonapartes out there,"
said Nora, referring to Grace's encounter with an escaped lunatic, fully
narrated in "GRACE HARLOWE'S SOPHOMORE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL."
They were nearing their destination when Anne suddenly exclaimed: "Look,
girls. Some one is over at the old house. I just saw a man go around the
corner!"
The girls looked quickly in the direction of the house. Just then a
figure appeared, stared at the approaching girls and began waving his
hat wildly, at the same time doing a sort of war dance.
"It's another lunatic," screamed Jessica. "Run, girls, run!"
"Run nothing," exclaimed Nora. "Don't you know Reddy Brooks when you see
him? Just wait until I get near enough to tell him that you mistook him
for a lunatic. Hurrah! David and Hippy are with him."
"Well, well, well!" exclaimed Hippy as the girls approached. "Here is
Mrs. Harlowe's little girl and some of her juvenile friends. I'm very
glad to see so many Oakdale children out to-day."
"How dare you take possession of the very spot we had our eye on?" asked
Grace, as she shook hands with David.
"I came over to try my bird before I have it sent home for the winter,"
replied David. "I was just locking up."
"And the exhibition is all over," cried Grace in a disappointed tone.
"I'm so sorry. You see, I still have a hankering for aëroplanes."
"There wasn't any exhibition, after all," said David. "It wouldn't fly
worth a cent to-day. I shall have to give it a complete overhauling when
I get it back to my workshop. What are you girls doing out this way?"
"Oh, we just came out to walk, because it was too nice to stay indoors,"
said Anne. "And now we are particularly glad we came."
"Not half as glad as I am," replied David, looking at her with a smile.
"Speaking of walking," remarked Hippy, "I have decided to go in for a
little on my own account. Object, to become a light weight. Is there any
one who will encourage me in this laudable resolution, and beguile me
while I go 'galumphing' over the ground?"
"Oh, I know something that would be perfectly fine!" exclaimed Nora,
hopping about in excitement.
"Watch her," cried Hippy. "She is about to have a conniption. She always
has them when an idea hits her. I've known her for years and----"
"Make him stop," appealed Nora to David and Reddy, "or I won't tell any
of you a single thing."
"I'll desist, merely to please the Irish lady, not because I'm afraid of
you two long, slim persons," said Hippy, cleverly dodging both David and
Reddy.
"Suppose we go on a walking expedition," said Nora. "We can start early
some Saturday morning, with enough lunch to last us all day, and walk to
the other side of Upton Wood and back. My sister would be glad to go
with us, so that will settle the matter of having an older person along.
We can have the whole day in the woods, and the walk will do us all
good. We won't have many more chances, either, for winter will be upon
us before we know it. It's a shame to waste such perfect days as these."
"What a perfectly lovely stunt!" exclaimed Grace. "We'll write to Tom
Gray, and see if he can't come, too. The walking expedition wouldn't be
complete without him."
"I'll write to him to-night," said David. "I certainly should like to
see the good old chap."
"Will there be plenty to eat?" asked Hippy. "I always feel hungry after
such strenuous exercise as walking. I am not very strong, you know."
"Hear him," jeered Reddy. "One minute he vows to walk until he reaches
the skeleton stage, and the next he threatens to kick over all his vows
by overeating."
"I didn't say anything about overeating," retorted Hippy. "I merely
stated that there are times when I feel the pangs of hunger."
"Stop squabbling," said Jessica, "and let's lay some plans."
"Where shall we lay them?" innocently asked Hippy.
"Nowhere, if you're not good," said Nora eyeing him severely.
Then an animated discussion began, and the following Saturday was agreed
upon, the weather permitting, as the best time to go.
Saturday turned out fair, and by nine o'clock the entire party were
monopolizing the Harlowe's veranda.
"Well, are we all ready?" said Tom Gray, as he glanced at his watch.
"Everybody scramble. One, two, three, walk."
Eight highly excited boys and girls accompanied by Miss Edith O'Malley,
hustled down the steps, waving good-bye to Mrs. Harlowe as she stood on
the veranda and watched them out of sight.
The lunch had been divided into four packages and each boy strapped a
package to his shoulder. Grace wore a little knapsack fitted to her back
with two cross straps. "There's nothing in it but some walnut fudge that
I made last night, but I couldn't resist wearing it. It belonged to my
grandfather," she confided to the girls when they had exclaimed over it.
"My, but it's great to be here," said Tom Gray to Grace as they entered
Upton Wood. "I'm so glad I could come."
"So are we," she replied. "A lark in the woods wouldn't be half the fun
with our forester missing."
"Back to nature for me, every time," he exclaimed, taking a deep breath
and looking about him, his face aglow with forest worship.
"I love the woods, too," said Grace, "almost enough to wish I were a
gypsy."
On down the shady wood road they traveled, sometimes stopping to watch a
squirrel or a chipmunk or to knock down a few burrs from the chestnut
trees they occasionally found along the way. Once they stopped and
played hide and seek for half an hour. By one o'clock they were
ravenously hungry. Hippy clamored incessantly for food.
"Let us feed him at once, and have peace," exclaimed Nora. "I'm hungry,
too. It seems an age since breakfast."
A halt was made and the contents of two of the lunch packages were
arranged on a little tablecloth at the foot of a great oak. The hungry
young folks gathered around it and in a short time nothing remained of
the lunch excepting the packages reserved for supper.
"I move we all take a half hour's rest and then go on," said David. "We
still have a mile to go before we are through the wood. We'll feel more
like walking after we've rested a little."
"Let us all sit in a row with our backs against this fallen tree and
tell a story," said Grace. "Hippy, you are on the end, so you can begin
it, then after you have gone a little way, Nora must take up the
narrative, and so on down the line until the story is finished."
"Fine," said Hippy. "Here goes:"
"Once upon a time, in the heart of a deep forest, there lived a most
beautiful prince. He had all that heart could wish; still he was not
happy, for, alas, he was too fat."
At this statement there was a shout of laughter from his listeners, at
which Hippy, pretending anger, glared ferociously and vowed that he
would not continue. Nora thereupon took up the narrative and convulsed
her hearers with the remedies tried by the fat prince to reduce his
weight. Then the story was passed on to Anne. With each narrator it grew
funnier, until the party screamed with laughter over the misfortunes of
the ill-starred prince.
Hippy ended the tale by marrying the hero to a princess who was a golf
fiend and who forced the poor prince to be her caddy.
"From the day of his marriage he chased golf balls," concluded Hippy,
"and the habit became so firmly fixed with him that he even rose and
chased them in his sleep. He lost flesh at an alarming rate, and three
months after his wedding day they laid him to rest in the quiet
churchyard, with the touching epitaph over him, 'Things are not what
they seem.'"
Hippy buried his face in his handkerchief and sobbed audibly until David
and Reddy pounced upon him and he was obliged to forego his lamentations
and defend himself.
"It's time to move," said Tom Gray, consulting his watch. "I don't
believe we'd better go on through the wood. We'll have to about face if
we expect to get home before dark."
So the start back was made, but their progress was slow. A dozen things
beguiled them from the path. Tom's trained eye spied a wasp's nest
hanging from a limb. It was as large as a Japanese lantern and a
beautiful silver-gray color. Anne stopped to pick some ground berries
she found nestling under the leaves. Then they all started in wild
pursuit of a rabbit, and in consequence had difficulty in finding the
road again. Finally they all grew so hungry they sat down and disposed
of the remaining food.
"How dark it is growing," exclaimed Jessica, as they again took the
road. "It must be very late."
"It's after four o'clock," replied David, "and there's a storm coming,
too. I think we had better hurry. I don't fancy being caught in the
woods in bad weather. Hustle, everybody."
As they hurried along the path a blast of wind blew full in their faces.
The whole forest seemed suddenly astir. There were strange sounds from
every direction. The branches creaked and the dry leaves fell rattling
to the ground by hundreds. Another gust of wind filled their eyes and
nostrils with fine dust.
"Don't be frightened," called Tom. "Follow me."
He led the way with Reddy, but the storm was upon them before they had
gone ten steps. The wind almost blew them off their feet and black
darkness settled down over the woods. They could just see the outlines
of the trees as they staggered on, a blinding rain drenching them to the
skin.
Tom divided the party into two sections, four in one and five in the
other. They were to hold each other's hands tightly and keep together.
Frequent flashes of lightning revealed the woods in a tremendous state
of agitation and it seemed better to be moving than to stand still and
watch the terrifying spectacle.
On they stumbled, but suddenly came to grief, for the four in front fell
headlong over a tree that had been blown across the path, and the other
five hearing their cries of warning too late, followed after.
By the time they had picked themselves up the storm had grown so furious
that they could only press miserably together and wait for it to pass.
Suddenly Tom amazed them all by putting his hands to his mouth and
blowing a strange kind of hollow whistle that sounded like the note of a
trumpet.
He repeated the whistle again and again. "You may not believe it," he
said between calls, "but the hunter who taught me this, told me never to
use it unless I was in dire need. Then help of some sort would surely
come. It is called the Elf's Horn."
"Did you ever try it before," asked Reddy curiously.
"No," he answered, "I never did. I suppose it's only superstition, but
I love hunter's lore. Perhaps it may work. Who knows?"
"Hello-o-o!" cried a voice seemingly close by. "Hello-o-o!"
"Where are you?" called Tom.
"This way," answered the voice, and a light flashed a little distance
off, revealing to them a man waving a lantern with one hand and
beckoning with the other. One and all dashed toward the light, feeling
that shelter was at hand.
"It must be a hunter," panted Tom, "and he has heard the Elf's Horn."
It was a hunter, and none other than old Jean. Their blind wandering had
taken them straight to the hunter's cabin.
"It is Mademoiselle Grace and her friends," cried the old man with
delight. "When the sky grow so dark, I take my lantern and go out to my
trap I have set this morning. Then I hear a strange whistle, many
times, and I think some one get lost and I cry 'hello,' and you answer
and I find mademoiselle and her friends."
"That was the Elf's Horn, Jean," replied Tom, "and you heard because you
are a hunter."
"I know not what monsieur mean by Elf Horn, but I hear whistle, anyhow,
and come," remarked the old man, smiling.
The others laughed.
"It's a shame to spoil it," replied David, "but I am afraid your Elf's
Horn and Jean's helloing were just a coincidence."
"Coincidence or not," replied Tom good-naturedly, "my faith in the fairy
horn is now unshakable. I shall use it again if I ever need to."
Before a blazing fire kindled by Jean in the big fireplace, the whole
party dried themselves. The old hunter listened to the story of their
mad scramble through the woods with many expressions of sympathy.
It was eight o'clock when the storm had abated sufficiently to allow
them to sally forth, and in a short time they were in Oakdale.
Fifteen minutes later they were telling Mr. and Mrs. Harlowe just how it
all happened.