“Are you sure this is the road, Marie?”

“The man said it was.”

“That doesn’t make it so,” retorted Alice. “I never knew such poor directions as those given by persons who have lived in a place nearly all their lives. You scarcely ever can depend on them.”

“That is so,” agreed Natalie. “I remember we were at Atlantic Highlands one summer, and I went for a walk. I got a little confused, and asked an old gentleman how to get on the right road. He was an old settler—he told me so—and yet he directed me a mile out of my way, and it was twice as far from where I was to our cottage as he said it was. Oh, I was so provoked!”

“I do hope nothing like that occurs this time,” ventured Mrs. Bonnell. “Whom did you ask about the road, Marie?”

“The boy who brings our milk.”

“Not that stupid chap?” remonstrated Mabel.

“He isn’t stupid,” declared Marie. “It’s only bashfulness. He’s eighteen, and he ought to know——”

“Yes, he ought to know enough to be bashful with this crowd,” laughed Alice. “Oh, Marie, couldn’t you get any better guide?”

“There you go!” exclaimed Jack’s sister. “You left it all to me, and when I do get directions you’re all finding fault. It isn’t fair!” and she swung ahead on the narrow path as though she wanted to have done with the argument.

It was two days after Natalie had overheard what she believed was a clue to the location of the Gypsy camp, and the girls had determined, after a somewhat lengthy consultation, to at least go near enough to spy upon it, and decide later what to do—perhaps with the help of the boys.

Behold them now on their way to Bear Pond, a rather lonesome bit of water about five miles back in the woods from Green Lake. They had gone in two boats to a certain cove whence ran a path, more or less well defined, to the pond, and the talk now ran on the chances of reaching their destination.

“Though we may get there all right,” Natalie asserted. “The question is—can we get back again?”

“I don’t see why not!” exclaimed Marie, who had assumed the post of leader. “If you get to a place you can always get back.”

“This path seems to twist and turn so,” said Alice, as they went single file along the winding trail, that circled in and out among the trees, now descending into a little glade, and again ascending a slope. “If it will only stay crooked, and not straighten out when we come back, maybe we can remember it. Don’t you think we ought to make some kind of landmarks as we go along, girls?”

“We could blaze a trail,” suggested Natalie, “only I don’t believe any one brought a hatchet.”

“Well, here’s one way not to forget,” said Mrs. Bonnell. “There, breath-of-the-pine-tree, we’ll know this white birch when we meet it again,” and with a hairpin the Guardian began making a series of zig-zag scratches on the white silver-like bark of a sapling that stood along the path.

“Oh, don’t ever tell the boys you did that!” gasped Marie.

“Why not?” Mrs. Bonnell wanted to know. “Is it against the law to scratch a tree I’d like to ask? That isn’t any worse that chipping it with a hatchet.”

“Oh, but blazing a trail with hairpins!” gasped Marie, laughing heartily. “What would the boy scouts say? We might as well scatter side combs along the trail, or take a skein of baby ribbon with us, tying the loose end to our tent pole, and unreeling it as we go along. Don’t tell the boys—Camp Fire Girls blazing a trail with hairpins! Oh, dear!”

“I don’t see but what it is just as good as when done with a hatchet,” said Mrs. Bonnell, imperturbed. “And you are far less likely to cut yourself. I shall blaze our trail with hairpins, girls, the accepted boy scout method to the contrary notwithstanding.”

And she did, not heeding the laughter of the girls. At every tree with a light-hued enough bark to permit of it, she made her mystic scratches with the hairpin points, sometimes drawing a fantastic figure, Indian fashion, which further increased the mirth of the girls.

“How far did your bashful youth say it was?” asked Mabel, after a pause, during which they climbed a little rise, passing under great pine trees, the needles of which made a slippery, brown, woodland carpet beneath their feet.

“Oh, you’re coming to think that he wasn’t such a bad guide after all then?” demanded Marie, a trifle mollified.

“I just want to see how nearly he can estimate the distance,” was the answer.

“He said it was five miles—five short ones,” and Marie hastily corrected herself.

“And the path a straight one?”

“No, indeed. We have to turn to the right after we pass the spring which is near the ruins of an old house. Oh, I’ve got it all written down,” and Marie began searching for the pocket of the short brown skirt that with the middy-blouse, and low shoes, formed the Camp Fire Girls’ outfit. A blank look came over her face.

“What’s the matter?” asked Natalie.

“That paper—my directions. I wrote them down on a slip of paper. I was sure I put it in my pocket—I know I did—but now——”

She turned the pocket inside out, but a handkerchief, and a few other personal belongings, was all that came to view.

“Maybe it’s in with the lunch,” suggested Alice.

They had brought along some sandwiches, and a large bottle of olives, stuffed with Pimento peppers, for they did not expect to get back to camp for dinner. But an inspection of the several packets into which the “eats”, as Alice called them, were divided, disclosed no chart, map or other sailing directions for locating the Gypsy camp.

“Never mind!” exclaimed Marie. “I’m sure I can find it without that. Reuben went over it very carefully with me.”

“Reuben being the aforesaid bashful boy?” asked Mabel.

“Yes. And you needn’t make so much fun of him, either. He’s real nice when you get to know him, though he does say ‘yes, ma’am,’ and ‘no, ma’am,’ to me, and he’s older than I am.”

“How much?” inquired Natalie promptly.

“I sha’n’t tell! But come on if we’re going to get to Bear Pond before noon,” and she quickened her pace.

“I wonder if the boys suspected where we were going?” ventured Alice.

“I don’t believe so,” replied Mrs. Bonnell. “I told them they mustn’t feel obliged to look after us, or to accompany us everywhere we went. It was very nice of them, I said, but we had come to the woods to be real Camp Fire members, and didn’t want to trouble them.”

“I don’t believe they call it trouble,” said Marie.

“Not as long as Natalie is along,” added Mabel. “And we’re not a bit jealous, dear,” she added quickly, as breath-of-the-pine-tree blushed. “You may share all our brothers. Sometimes I wish some one would take all of Phil. He’s such a tease when he sets out to be!”

“I guess in this case they were glad not to be asked to go anywhere with us to-day,” went on the Guardian. “I didn’t so much as hint where we were going—merely saying we might go for a row—which we did. I rather think they had some plan of their own they wanted to carry out. They took their fish poles, but I didn’t hear them talking about bait, which seems is hard to get here. So I wouldn’t be surprised but what they were going to Mt. Harry to look for the Gypsy camp that is really at Bear Pond. They want to surprise us.”

“And we’re going to turn the tables!” exclaimed Marie. “Won’t it be a joke!”

“If we find the camp,” added Mabel.

“Of course we will,” asserted the leader. “I have all the directions down in my head.”

“There’s another good tree to hairpin!” exclaimed Mrs. Bonnell, as, with her useful little implement, she again made her mystic scratches. “We can’t help seeing that. Is it much farther, Marie?”

“We haven’t come to the spring yet, and it’s a mile past that. But you’re not getting tired, are you?”

“Oh, no; only I wanted to know the worst. Lead on—we will follow!” and she looked for more trees to “blaze.”

As the girls walked along, now taking little runs, and experimental dashes on side paths, they broke into song now and t............