up the letter by some practical details which will serve as a key to all the rest. Won’t it be a box of literary bonbons for her to read in bed, poor darling! Let me see! I represent the cayenne lozenges, sharp but impressive; Margery will do for jujube paste, which I adore,—mild, pleasant, yielding, delicious.’
‘Sticky and insipid!’ murmured Madge, plaintively.
‘Not at all, my dear. Bell stands for the peppermints; Jack for chocolates, “the ladies’ delight”; Geoffrey for a wine-drop, altogether good, but sweetest in its heart; Phil—let me see! Phil is like—what is he like?’
‘No more like candy than a cold boiled potato,’ said his sister.
‘He is candid,’ suggested Bell. ‘Let us call him rock-candy, pure, healthful, and far from soft.’
‘Or marshmallow,’ said Margery, ‘good, but tough.’
‘Or caramel,’ laughed Polly; ‘it always sticks to a point.’
‘Thanks, gentle creatures,’ said a voice from the bushes on the other side of the pool, and Phil stalked out from his covert, like a wounded deer.
‘How long have you been in there, villain?’ cried Bell.
‘Ever since lunch; but I only waked from a sound sleep some twenty minutes ago. I’ve heard a most instructive conversation—never been more amused in my life; don’t know whether I prefer being a cold boiled potato or a ladies’-delight!’
‘You haven’t any choice,’ snapped Polly, a trifle embarrassed at having been overheard.
‘I’m glad it was my own sister who called me a c. b. p. (the most loathsome thing in existence, by the way), because sisters never appreciate their brothers.’
‘I didn’t call you a c. b. p.,’ remonstrated Margery. ‘I said you were no more like candy than a c. b. p. There is a difference.’
‘Is there? My poor brain fails to grasp it. But never mind; I’ll forgive you.’
‘Listeners never hear good of themselves,’ sighed Polly.
‘Are you writing a copy-book, Miss Oliver? I didn’t want to listen; it was very painful to my feelings, but I was too sleepy to move.’
‘And now our afternoon is gone, and we have not read a word,’ sighed little Margery. ‘I never met two such chatterboxes as you and Polly.’
‘And to hear us talk is a liberal education,’ retorted Polly.
‘Exactly,’ said Philip, dryly, ‘Come, I’ll take the books and shawls. It’s nearly five o’clock, and we shall hear Hop Yet blowing his lusty dinner-horn presently.’
‘Why didn’t you go off shooting with the others?’ asked Margery.
‘Stayed at home so they’d get a chance to shoot.’
‘Why, do you mean you always scare the game away?’ inquired Polly, artlessly.
‘No; I mean that I always do all the shooting, and the others get discouraged.’
‘Clasp hands over the bloody chasm,’ said Bell, ‘and let us smoke the pipe of peace at dinner.’
Philip and Bell came through the trees, and, as they neared the camp, saw Aunt Truth sitting at the door of Tent Chatter, looking the very picture of comfort, as she drew her darning-needle in and out of an unseemly rent in one of Dicky’s stockings. Margery and Polly came up just behind, and dropped into her lap some beautiful branches of wild azalea.
‘Did you have a pleasant walk, dears?’ she asked.
‘Yes, indeed, dear auntie. Now, just hold your head perfectly still, while we decorate you for dinner. We will make Uncle Doc’s eyes fairly pop with admiration. Have you been lonely without us?’
‘Oh, not a bit. You see there has been a good deal of noise about here, and I felt as if I were not alone. Hop Yet has been pounding soap-root in the kitchen, and I hear the sound of Pancho’s axe in the distance,—the Doctor asked him to chop wood for the camp-fire. Was Dicky any trouble? Where is he?’
‘Why, darling mother, are you crazy?’ asked Bell. ‘If you think a moment, he was in the hammock and you were lying down in the tent when we started.’
‘Why, I certainly thought I heard him ask to go with you,’ said Mrs. Winship, in rather an alarmed tone.
‘So he did; but I told him it was too far.’
‘I didn’t hear that; in fact, I was half asleep; I was not feeling well. Ask Hop Yet; he has been in the kitchen all the afternoon.’
Hop Yet replied, with discouraging tranquillity, ‘Oh, I no know. I no sabe Dicky; he allee time lun loun camp; I no look; too muchee work. I chop hash—Dicky come in kitch’—make heap work—no good. I tell him go long—he go; bime-by you catchum; you see.’ Whereupon he gracefully skinned an onion, and burst into a Chinese song, with complete indifference as to whether Dicky lived or died.
‘Perhaps he is with Pancho; I’ll run and see!’ cried Polly, dashing swiftly in the direction of the sky-parlour. But after a few minutes she ran back, with a serious face. ‘He’s not there; Pancho has not seen him since lunch.’
‘Well, I’ve just happened to think,’ said pale Aunt Truth, ‘that papa came into the tent for some cartridges, after you left, and of course he took Dick with him. I don’t suppose it is any use to worry. He always does come out right; and I have told him so many times never on any account to go away from the camp alone that he surely would not do it. Papa and the boys will be home soon, now. It is nearly six o’clock, and I told them that I would blow the horn at six, as usual. If they are too far away to hear it, they will know the time by the sun.’
‘Well,’ said Bell, anxiously, ‘I hope it is all right. Papa is so strict that he won’t be late himself. Did all the boys go with him, mamma?’
‘Yes, all but Philip.’
‘Oh, then Dicky must be with them,’ said Margery, consolingly. ‘Geoffrey always takes him wherever he can.’
So the girls went into the tent to begin their dinner toilet, which consisted in carefully brushing burrs and dust from their pretty dresses, and donning fresh collars and stockings, with low ties of russet leather, which Polly declared belonged only to the stage conception of a camping costume; then, with smoothly brushed hair and bright flower-knots at collar and belt, they looked charming enough to grace any drawing-room in the land.
The horn was blown again at six o’clock, Aunt Truth standing at the entrance of the path which led up the cañon, shading her anxious eyes from the light of the setting sun.—
‘Here they come!’ she cried, joyously, as the welcome party appeared in sight, guns over shoulder, full game-bags, and Jack and Geoff with a few rabbits and quail hanging over their arms.
The girls rushed out of the tent. Bell took in the whole group with one swift glance, and then turned to her mother, who, like most mothers, believed the worst at once, and grew paler as she asked:
‘Papa, where is little Dick?’
‘Dick! Why, my dear, he has not been out with us. What do you mean?’
‘Are you sure you didn’t take him?’ faltered Aunt Truth.
‘Of course I am. Good heavens! Doesn’t any one know where the child is?’ looking at the frightened group.
‘You know, uncle,’ said Geoffrey, ‘we started out at three o’clock. I noticed Dicky playing with his blocks in our tent, and said good-bye to him. Did you see him when you came back for the cartridges?’
‘Certainly I did; he called me to look at his dog making believe go to sleep in the hammock.’
‘We girls went down to the pool soon after that,’ said Bell, tearfully. ‘He asked to go