The Nowadays Girls in the Adirondacks or, The deserted bungalow on Saranac Lake
"In a day or so. I'll go and tell Mrs. Parson you will accept their
kind invitation."
So it was arranged. And a day or so later the little party went over to
Shedd Lake, about four miles from Raquette Lake, there to live under
canvas for perhaps a week.
CHAPTER XVIII
CANOEING
Camp Natalie it was named, in honour of the bride, though she
blushingly protested. But Sylvia and her chums insisted, and the name
was built up in bark letters on a board, and suspended in the little
open glade in front of the tents, which faced the blue waters of the
lake.
The camp was a most complete and modern one. A man had been engaged
to look after the putting up of the tents, and the arranging of all
matters, so that the fun-lovers had really nothing to worry about. And
the man had done his work well.
There were five canvas shelters in all, besides a small additional one
near the cook tent, where slept the buxom woman who presided over the
dishes, pots and pans.
A large tent that could be made open to the glorious breezes, or closed
in case of stormy weather, served as the dining-room. The cooking
was done in another tent, with a real stove, burning coal that was
transported to camp in a wagon. For there is nothing more exasperating
than to cook over a wood fire. Either it is too hot, or it has expired
before the cook is aware of it, and has to be brought hastily to life
again to the detriment of the viands. So coal solved the problem.
Then there were three sleeping tents, with ample accommodations and the
most modern of cots. In fact it was a most comfortable camp, and the
Nowadays Girls, as well as Natalie and her husband, pronounced it to be
perfect.
After setting the camp to rights, which was no small task, even though
the cook and her husband, a guide, helped, there followed a somewhat
lazy period. The girls went for strolls in the balsam-odorous woods, or
sat on the shores of the little lake, looking at the view. Sometimes,
when Rose was particularly pensive, Hazel or Alice would ask:
"Can't you stop it?"
"Stop what?" she would ask, sometimes before she thought.
"Thinking of Roy."
"Oh!" and she would blush rosy-red.
"Well, I don't blame her for thinking of him, if he's as nice as his
picture indicates," said Natalie--for so all the girls called her. "I
shall like him myself!"
"Oh!" exclaimed Hazel.
"In a perfectly brotherly way," Natalie added, calmly. "In fact I
almost think of him as a brother already."
"He _is_ awfully nice," declared Alice. "He is such a dear boy, and it
was too bad that this trouble had to come to him."
"I do hope he will get over it," Natalie said.
"We all trust so," replied his sister. "It means so much to him in his
success with that chemical firm. Roy really overworked, trying to solve
some chemical problem, and that brought on a breakdown. Only that the
doctor thought it best for us to keep away from him a little while, I
should be with him now."
Rose did not say so, but doubtless she, too, wished she could help
to minister to Roy. For between the two was a bond of more than mere
friendship. And presently Rose went off by herself in the green and
silent woods.
"Poor girl," murmured Natalie. "I know how she must feel. Bob was ill
once----But there, you don't want to hear about the troubles of an old
married couple!" and her merry laugh rang out.
There were glorious days in the woods, at Camp Natalie. The girls went
fishing a number of times, and explored little-travelled trails through
the forest. But they did not go far enough to get lost, and Mrs.
Rachlin was almost as expert in the woods as was her guide-husband. She
led forth the little parties, after her work in camp was done, and many
were the hidden mysteries of the forest that she laid bare.
Aunt Theodora, too, enjoyed this life in the open.
"I think, really," she said, in her precise little way, "that this
is more educating than some trips to Europe. One gets so tired of
following in the beaten paths, even of knowledge. This is positively a
revelation."
"I am so glad it isn't boring you," said Sylvia.
"Boring me! My dear, I would never be bored where you girls were!"
"Which is very nice for you to say, at any rate," laughed Hazel.
"Oh, I mean it!" declared "Guardy!" as the girls affectionately called
Mrs. Brownley at times.
"Positively I'm ashamed of my appetite!" said Hazel, after one meal.
"But, really, I never ate anything that tasted so good as the food does
here. I think it must be the air."
"Or the cooking!" added Alice.
"The cooking certainly has much to do with it," declared Sylvia. "Mrs.
Rachlin gets up some wonderful dishes. I really don't see how she does
it with the limited means at her disposal."
"Oh, I'm used to rough cooking," said the person under discussion. "You
girls are easy compared to lumbermen, and I've cooked for them when my
husband has been in charge of a gang. They certainly can eat!" and she
shook her head in remembrance.
The delights of the water added to the pleasure of the girls and their
friends at Camp Natalie. They had sent for canoes, which were brought
over on a wagon, and one day they set out to explore a small but rather
rapid and turbulent stream connected with Shedd Lake.
The four Nowadays Girls, in two canoes, went off by themselves, for
Mrs. Brownley would not trust herself in one of the frail craft, and
Natalie and Bob voted for a quiet and rather solitary stroll through
the woods.
"Now do sit quiet, Rose," begged Sylvia, who was in the bow of one
craft, while Rose was in the stern. Hazel and Alice were in like
positions in another canoe.
"Sit quiet! Don't I always?" Rose demanded.
"You do except when you see an old stump or floating log and think it's
an alligator!" Sylvia chided.
"As if she didn't know, by this time, that alligators are unknown
reptiles in the Adirondacks," laughed Alice.
So they started off in the canoes, threading their way in and out along
the winding stream, now floating lazily under some overhanging boughs,
and again moving rapidly down some little stretch where the waters
bubbled and foamed over the stones in such a manner as to have that
particular section designated as "rapids."
"Look out, girls!" Sylvia called back to Alice and Hazel, whose canoe
had dropped astern. "Here's a bad passage just ahead."
"All right. We see it!" answered Hazel.
"Now do sit steady, Rose!" pleaded Sylvia.
"Steady it is!" Rose answered, plying her paddle carefully.
Whether she disobeyed the injunction, or whether she gave a wrong turn
to the broad blade, will never be known, but just as the canoe was in
the midst of the swirling water there was a sudden scream from Rose,
echoing ones from Hazel and Alice, and the craft containing Sylvia and
her chum rolled over, spilling them both out.
CHAPTER XIX
THE MASQUERADE
"Steady! Back water!"
It was Hazel who gave the command, and the momentary feeling of panic
that had swept over Alice passed.
"Over that way!" Hazel went on, nodding to indicate that she meant to
steer their canoe toward a bit of still water, an eddy formed under an
overhanging bank of the stream.
"All right!" was the tense reply of her chum, and a moment later the
light craft shot past the rolling overturned one of Sylvia and Rose,
and was in quiet water.
Meanwhile, after the first sudden plunge into the stream--a plunge that
deprived them of their breath for an instant--the two girls who had
been spilled out regained control of themselves.
The Nowadays Girls had the almost invaluable faculty of remaining cool,
or quickly becoming cool in emergencies.
This had been proved in a number of instances in times past, when they
had been in no little danger. Once there was an incipient fire at Miss
Stevenson's school, and the alarm drill was called for. It remained
for our four friends and a few others, to lead to safety the majority
of the school, and for this bravery there had been no small thanks and
honour.
So now, in this time of danger, the two girls who were in a place of
safety remained calm and collected and were ready for rescue work.
Fortunately, however, the water of the stream was not deep. It could
hardly be so and fuss and foam over the rapids in the way it did. So
Rose and Sylvia, after having been rolled over and over a number of
times, during which period they clung to the paddles, found themselves
in comparatively still water, and struck out for shore.
It was then that the wisdom of Hazel and Alice showed itself, for they
were at the bank, waiting for their companions. There was no need for
them to leap in to the rescue, for they saw that Sylvia and Rose were
both swimming well, in spite of their wet and clinging garments. Their
dresses were light summer ones, which were not much more hampering
than bathing suits would have been. And they wore light, rubber-soled
boating shoes.
"Catch hold!" cried Hazel, flinging to Rose, who was in advance of
Sylvia, a long rope they carried in the canoe for mooring purposes. The
coils straightened out, and the end of the line fell near the swimming
girl.
"All right!" Rose answered, as she caught hold, and a moment later she
was being pulled toward the bank, suspending her swimming strokes, for
she was a little exhausted, not only by her efforts, but by the rolling
and tumbling process to which she had been subjected when the canoe
upset.
"We'll be ready for you in a moment, Sylvia!" called Hazel.
"Don't worry, I can touch bottom," was the reassuring answer, and,
to prove it, Sylvia stood up, a dripping and dishevelled figure, but
a smiling one, nevertheless. It took more than a ducking to disturb
Sylvia Pursell.
Rose, who had taken a little different course from that followed by her
companion in misfortune, now found herself in water that was not so
deep but that she could stand up, which she did, still keeping hold of
the rope.
"Well," said Sylvia, finally, after she had caught her breath, and
wrung enough water from her fallen hair so that it ceased to run in
little rivulets down her face. "Well!"
"Most decidedly--well!" exclaimed Alice. "A very wet well indeed! How
did it happen?"
"Don't ask me--ask Rose," laughed Sylvia. She could laugh now, though
it had seemed serious enough for the moment.
"It wasn't my fault," her companion asserted, smiling across the water
that separated them. Behind them foamed the little rapid, filling the
air with its insistent murmur.
"I guess we didn't make allowances for the speed and strength of the
current," Sylvia said. "It seemed to grip the canoe in a moment."
"By the way, where is the canoe?" asked Hazel.
They looked down-stream, and saw their boat apparently moving by itself
over the tops of the low bushes. It was turned upside down and was
bobbing about in a most unaccountable manner.
"Look--look at that!" fairly gasped Alice, from her position on the
bank.
"Why, what does it mean?" asked Hazel, faintly.
The four girls watched the canoe with increasing astonishment. It
seemed to be moved by spirit hands, gliding, upside down, over the tops
of the bushes in a curious undulating fashion.
"Could it have struck a rock, and bounced out on shore?" asked Rose.
"If it struck a rock with enough force for that, it would be in pieces,
instead of whole, as it seems to be," Sylvia answered.
"But isn't it remarkable?" murmured Alice.
"To say the least--yes," agreed Rose.
Then, as the girls watched, the canoe seemed to sink down in the
bushes, as a magician causes a certain card to appear from the centre
of the pack, and to descend again.