Chapter XVI: Lost

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!"