As the scouts pushed off from the shore, they lingered until Marjorie and Frieda disappeared around a bend in the stream on their way to the farm-house. Then, still thinking of the peaches, they went slowly forward.

“Let’s go slowly, and give the girls a chance to catch us,” suggested Ethel. “I could eat a peach right now.”

“So could I,” agreed Lily.

“Oh, Marj and Frieda will soon catch us,” reassured Ruth. “They’re the two best canoeists we’ve got.”

“You’re right, Ruth,” said Florence Evans. “Really, it hardly seems worth while for the rest of us to go in that water meet. Marj will be so sure to carry off the prize!”

“What did I tell you, Lil?” asked Ruth, triumphantly.

“Well, don’t repeat it, or I’m liable to upset the canoe again.” She was in quite a good humor now, and could laugh about the episode. “But I do120 think,” she added, “that we all have a good chance to become as expert as Marj is, and we’re bum sports if we just sit back and complain that it isn’t fair! It would spoil all her pleasure!”

“Right you are, Lily!” commented Miss Phillips. “I am beginning to see that it is worth while to be a scout, after all.”

“Yes, I am ashamed of myself,” said Ruth, humbly. “But I am putting all my energy into the job, and I hope maybe I am improving, a teeny-weeny bit. How about it, Captain?”

“You are doing very well, Ruth,” she replied, with sincerity.

The girls paddled on in silence for a time, all the while keeping a sharp look-out behind them for the absent ones. But there were so many bends and turns, and the trees were so thick on either side, that they could scarcely see two hundred yards behind them. Suddenly Ruth noticed a little tributary to the right.

“Where did that come from, Captain?” she asked.

“Not far from the farm where the girls stopped for peaches. We might have followed it, but it would have necessitated a portage, so I preferred the longer way entirely by water.”

“That’s the one Marj and Frieda took!” cried Ruth, with assurance. “And you can mark my words, they’re ahead of us right now! They just thought they’d be smart and beat us!”

121 “But they’d have to make portage,” objected Ethel. “And with all those peaches——”

“Portages mean nothing in Frieda Hammer’s young life!” contradicted Ruth. “She’s as strong as an ox!”

“Well, if they did, I call it mean,” said Florence. “I’m dying for a peach.”

“Me too!” put in Alice.

They fell silent again; the creek as it approached the river was becoming swifter, and the canoes required more attention. Miss Phillips alone was worried about the missing girls; it did not seem like either Marjorie or Frieda to play such a trick. Had Ruth been one of the two she would hardly have given the matter a thought, but under these circumstances she was afraid that something had happened.

By the time four o’clock came they were approaching the locality which the captain had designated for their final night in the open. All the girls looked eagerly for the signs of a canoe or of their missing companions, and hoped at every instant to hear the familiar whistle. But they heard nothing except the sounds of nature, the dip of the paddles, and the lapping of the water against the sides of the canoes.

“They’re hiding, I’ll bet!” exclaimed Ruth, as she pulled in to shore.

“No, they’re not either!” said Miss Phillips, who122 had already landed her canoe. “I’m afraid something has happened.”

“I’ll go right back, Captain!” offered Ruth. “Who’ll go with me?”

“Thanks, Ruth,” said Miss Phillips; “but I’m afraid it’s too late. Remember, it would mean to paddle up stream. And ni............