Cora Kimball was not an unusually nervous girl, nor was she given to
hysterical demonstrations, but, somehow or other, she felt sick and
faint as she looked at the wiggling snake in its death agony. Her eyes
saw black, and she swayed so that Paul stepped forward and slipped an
arm around her waist.
"I thought you were going to faint," he said in explanation.
"I--I was," faltered Cora. "But I've gotten over the notion. Thank--thank
you, Paul. Could I have a drink of water?"
Jack brought her some from a spring not far away.
"Brace up, Sis," he said with rough, brotherly kindness. "You're all
right. That snake wouldn't have killed you anyhow. I've been bitten by
'em, and it isn't much worse than a mosquito."
"You have?" cried Paul, in such a queer tone that all save Cora realized
that Jack was bluffing for the sake of minimizing the effect on Cora.
Jack made this plain to Paul by winking quickly, and motioning to him to
confirm what he had said.
"Oh, yes, that's right," Paul went on. "I'd forgotten that the
copperheads aren't poisonous this time of year. You wouldn't have been
much damaged, Cora, if you had been nipped by this fellow," and with a
swift motion of his foot he kicked the still writhing reptile to one
side.
"Really?" she asked.
"Really."
She looked relieved. The faint spell passed and Cora smiled. The color
was coming back to her cheeks.
"I'm sorry I acted so," she said, "but I have a terrible fear of snakes,
even harmless ones. I thought this one was a curiously mottled root, and
I was going to pick it up. Suppose I had? Oh!"
She shuddered and looked at Paul.
"A miss is as good as a bird in the hand," he misquoted. "Come on now,
let's eat."
"Say, old man," said Jack to Paul, when they were alone a little later,
"that snake was a bad chap, wasn't he?"
Paul nodded in confirmation.
"I thought so," Jack went on. "Just as well, though, not to let her
know, she's so deadly afraid. There'd have been trouble if she had been
bitten?" he questioned.
"Yes," said Paul, simply. "Of course they're not sure death, but they're
dangerous enough."
"I thought so. Shake!"
After the temporary scare of the snake had passed, the picnic party made
merry, laughing and talking as they enjoyed the lunch the girls had put
up. It was a perfect day, rather warm, but cool enough in the shade, and
the mountain air was invigorating. There followed a delightfully lazy
time, lying on the grass under the trees when every one had eaten
enough.
Then they packed up the rest of the food and walked on, intending to
make a circle and return to Camp Surprise late in the afternoon. Now and
then they would come to some open space, where the sloping mountain
dropped away suddenly, revealing below a vista which made them pause in
admiration.
Once they reached a point where they could look down on Mountain View,
and, though they could not distinguish their own bungalows, they could
see about where they were situated.
Cora stood gazing down, in rather a thoughtful mood. Walter was by her
side, and noted her abstraction. He held up the proverbial penny.
Cora shook her head.
"No. I won't tell," she said with a smile.
Walter guessed that she was thinking of the snake, but he refrained from
saying so. And then Cora, fearing he might put a wrong construction on
her words added:
"I was just wondering when they were going to continue."
"What was going to continue?" he inquired.
"The surprises in our camp. You know----"
"Continue!" he interrupted. "I didn't know we had had any. I had begun
to think it was all a hoax."
"Oh, no," cried Cora, impulsively. "There was a----"
She caught herself just in time, for she recalled that she and Belle had
agreed not to mention the queer noise.
"Was it a ghost?" asked Walter.
"It wasn't anything," Cora hastened to say. "Look, see that curl of
smoke. Isn't it just like a great big ostrich plume? What a hat it would
require to carry it! A giant's hat."
"Lady giant you mean," said Walter. "But look here, Cora, you are
keeping something from me."
"Not at all."
Her manner was light, but Walter was a good guesser.
"Yes, you are!" he insisted. "Something did happen, Cora. Go on, tell a
fellow."
"Nothing really happened, Walter."
"Then you heard something."
"How did you know?" she asked with a start.
"I thought I'd catch you. Come now. Own up. You didn't have that toy
telephone strung to our bungalow just on general principles. Did you
hear something, Cora?"
She looked around to make sure none of the others were listening. Then
she told Walter of the queer noise, enjoining him to secrecy, however.
"So that's what it was," he said. "I thought it was thunder myself, but
if you heard it in your bungalow it couldn't have been."
"And it was in our bungalow," Cora said. "Seemingly away down in the
cellar, or sub-cellar, if they have such a thing."
"Not as deep as that, I guess, Cora. But it was a queer rumbly noise,
though how I could hear it, when it was under your bungalow I can't
imagine."
"Unless it came from the waterfall."
"How could it come from the waterfall?" Walter asked.
"I don't know," said Cora. "But there might be some sort of hollow
rock--blowing stones I believe they are called--and when air is forced
into the hollow, by the action of the water, it might give a roaring
sound, and vibrate the earth."
Walter considered a moment.
"It's worth looking into," he said. "I won't say anything, but the first
chance I get I'll have a peep at the fall. I think I can get behind the
water curtain."
"Oh, Walter! don't take any risks."
"I won't, Cora. But come on. The others will wonder what we find to talk
about and look at here. Not that I wouldn't want to stay talking a great
deal longer, but, well----"
"I understand," and she smiled.
"We're going berrying," cried Bess, as Walter and Cora came up to join
the others. "That is, unless you two want to stand there on the edge of
'Lovers' Leap' and think sad thoughts."
"Is that place called Lovers' Leap?" asked Cora.
"Well, it might be if any lovers ever jumped off there. Do you want to
go berrying?"
"Surely," said Cora, and Walter nodded assent.
The berry hunt was not very successful, though a few early ones were
found. However, it served as an incentive to call the young folks
farther afield and up the mountainside, and they found new beauties of
nature at every step.
"This is the nicest place I was ever in," declared Hazel.
"I like it, too, almost as well as any place we ever picked out for our
vacation," said Belle. "My hair doesn't get so slimpsy as at the beach."
"We're getting beautifully tanned, instead of the lobster-red I always
turn at the shore," said plump Bess.
"Say, hadn't we better begin to think of turning back?" asked Cora,
after a while, when the few berries that had been gathered had been
eaten, though Jack begged that they be saved for a pie.
"Yes, it's getting late," said Paul, looking at his watch. "And we have
a few miles to go."
"I should say they were a few!" chimed in Walter. "Seven at the least
back to Camp Surprise."
"Don't say that!" begged Bess. "You'll have to carry me."
"All right. We'll make a litter of poles and drape you over it in the
most artistic fashion," said Paul. "Do you prefer to be carried head or
feet first?"
"Feet, of course. Riding backwards always makes me car-ill."
"It's down hill, that's one consolation," came from Jack. "Well, come
on. All ready! Hike!" and he marched off, swinging a long stick he had
picked up to use Alpine-stock fashion.
There was a patch of woodland to go through, a fairly good path
traversing it. The party of young people went along, talking and
laughing, occasionally breaking into song as one or another started a
familiar melody.
"Say, Jack," remarked Cora at length, "aren't these woods pretty long?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean oughtn't we to be out of them by this time? Are you sure you're
going the right way?"
"Well, I never was here before," said Jack, "but I set our course by
compass," and he indicated the little instrument on his watch chain.
"We started to walk due west," he said, "up the mountain. Now we are
going east, as you can see, because the setting sun is at our backs. So
we are going toward camp."
"But we swung off to the right as we came up the mountain," Cora went
on.
"Exactly, a sort of northwest course," agreed Jack. "And now we are
heading southeast, which is exactly the reverse. Look for yourself,
Sis."
He held out the compass, the tiny needle vibrating as the instrument
rested in his hand. Cora was enough of a navigator to see that Jack was
right.
"Well, the only thing to do is to keep on," she said. "But I should
think, by this time, we'd be somewhere near the camp."
"Oh, not yet!" declared Jack. "We've got miles and miles yet to go!"
"You horrid creature!" cried Bess. "Oh, my feet!"
"This is the best exercise for reducing you could have," laughed Paul.
"Come on, I'll race you."
"Run? Never!" wailed the plump one. "I can only hobble."
They tramped on. The afternoon shadows were lengthening now, and Cora's
face wore a somewhat anxious look. They entered another patch of
woodland, and as they emerged into a clearing Cora cried:
"Look at the sun!"
"What's the matter with it?" Belle demanded. "I think that is a
perfectly good sun."
"But it's in front of us," said Cora. "It's in front of us!"
For a moment the others did not realize what she meant. They stared at
the big red ball which was sinking to rest amid a bank of gorgeously
colored clouds. Then Jack exclaimed:
"By Jove! you're right, Sis. The sun should be back of us. We were going
east, but we've got turned around, and are going west."
"Unless the sun has changed," put in Paul, with a laugh, "and is coming
up in the morning. We may have been walking all night and didn't know
it."
"It's no joke," said Cora, seriously, as the others laughed. "Jack,
we're lost!"