The Nowadays Girls in the Adirondacks or, The deserted bungalow on Saranac Lake
Sylvia and Rose won by a small margin, much to their delight,
especially Rose's, for she was an enthusiast, though the other girls
were good players, too.
"Well, now for some tea, and then we'll freshen up for the dance
to-night," suggested Hazel, as she removed her yellow chamois gloves.
"I feel just like a dance!" and she curved and pivoted over the grass.
"We certainly are having a fine time here," declared Sylvia, "but
we must not forget our plan to go on to Saranac. I know Roy will be
anxious to see us, now that he knows we are coming. And I do so want to
see him, and know that he is getting better."
"We all do, my dear," said Alice.
"There was no word to-day; was there?" asked Rose.
"No, I told the folks at home to relay the messages here every second
day, as we could not tell just where we would be. But what do you girls
say now to starting on through the Chain to-morrow, or next day?"
"Whatever you say," said Hazel. "They told me at the hotel there was
good fishing around here, in some of the Fulton Chain lakes, and I'm
anxious to try."
"Let's go fishing before we start on our trip!" proposed Rose, and
Sylvia assented.
The next day they engaged boats and guides--two boats for four of them,
and began to try their luck.
The girls at once won the admiration of the fishermen, for neither
Sylvia, Rose, Hazel nor Alice was afraid to bait her own hook, and they
could remove the fish once they had landed them.
"Oh, what luck!" cried Rose, as she hooked a large lake trout. She
played her catch well, and brought him exhausted to the side of the
guide-boat, to the envy of her companions.
But Sylvia was not far behind, with a good-sized bass. The season had
opened only a few days before, so that the fish had not been thinned
out.
Alice and Hazel had fair luck also.
"Well, those girls certainly can do anything!" declared one of the
members of the porch rocking-chair brigade as the four came back with
strings of fish. "I wonder their folks allow them to rough it in this
fashion."
"Why, they are with that delightful Southern lady," said a companion.
"She is chaperoning them."
"Humph! I don't call it much chaperoning when she sits on a porch all
day reading, and lets the girls go off with the fishermen."
"The fishermen around here are the finest men you could meet," was the
quick answer. "I and several of my friends have been out with them.
They are real gentlemen!"
"Humph!" sniffed the other. "They don't look it!"
There was a last dance at the hotel, a dance that brought forth many
expressions of regret from the young men who had enjoyed the company of
the Nowadays Girls.
"Will you stop here on your way back?" had been an oft-repeated
question.
"Perhaps," Sylvia said, with a smile.
Once more they were going onward. They engaged guide-boats and guides
and started up the Fulton Chain for Raquette Lake, where they intended
to spend some time.
"And there we'll get a motor boat," said Sylvia, "and do a bit of
exploring."
"That will be jolly!" cried Rose.
With their luggage, they took their places in the guide-boats, and the
start was made. It is twelve miles from Old Forge to the head of Fourth
Lake of the Fulton Chain, where the first carry must be made. They had
made an early start, and intended to have lunch in the open at the
beginning of the carry, which they reached in due course.
"All out!" cried Sylvia, as the boats grounded on the shore. "All out,
and get ready for lunch!"
CHAPTER X
A NIGHT OUT
Three men had been engaged to take the party of girls and Mrs. Brownley
through the Fulton Chain of lakes. As has been said, the journey may
be made in a day, enabling one, with proper equipment and by using due
speed, to reach Raquette Lake in time for a late dinner. This had been
the plan of Sylvia and her friends.
They had planned to stop for lunch _en route_ and, accordingly, had
brought with them materials for a satisfying meal. One of the three men
was a camp cook, and to him was entrusted the work of getting the meal
ready. The other two men were guides or boatmen in whose craft the trip
had thus far been made.
"Now if you'll get lunch ready we'll be ready for it as soon as we hear
you call," Sylvia said to the chef.
"Are you going away, miss?" he asked, pausing in the work of taking
from the boat various cunningly stowed-away packages.
"Just for a stroll in the woods," she told him.
"Well, don't go too far," he advised her. "If you don't know the trails
you might get confused, and have trouble findin' your way back. And if
you expect to get to Raquette Lake to-night we can't lose much time."
"Oh, we'll not go far," Rose said.
"No, indeed!" chimed in Hazel, as she gave a surreptitious glance
into a mirror hidden in the flap of her handbag, and gave her nose an
equally secret "dab," though why she should, up in that wilderness, she
herself could not have said.
"Too hungry to go far," added Alice.
"Why, can one become lost in these woods?" asked Aunt Theodora.
"Yes, indeed, lady!" exclaimed one of the boatmen. "I knowed a man who
started to walk from one tree to another while he was waitin' for his
coffee to boil, but when he got back the coffee pot had melted!"
"Indeed!" exclaimed the chaperon, with a lifting of her aristocratic
eyebrows. "Did the fire become too hot?"
"Well, not exactly, lady, but you see the man got lost, and was gone so
long that the coffee boiled away and the bottom of the pot melted. I'm
only tellin' you that, so you won't go too far."
"There's no danger," Sylvia said, with a laugh. "We'll keep on the
trail. And I think we'll have tea, instead of coffee," she added to the
chef, for a tea outfit had been brought along, and one of the men was
lighting the alcohol stove which was not only to boil water for the
beverage, but also to warm some of the numerous viands. Solid alcohol
was used as fuel.
Indeed the Nowadays Girls had gone carefully into this matter of
sojourning in the Adirondacks, and while they expected to spend most
of the time at well-known hotels or in camp resorts, they were also
provided for some life in the open, either in tent or cabin, and they
had purchased the very latest in outfits.
"No smoky wood fires for us, except when we've had our meals and want
to sit around it and be romantic," Sylvia had said, and the others had
agreed with her. Consequently they had a small camping outfit with them
that for compactness and convenience would be difficult to surpass.
So while the girls and Mrs. Brownley started off to admire the beauty
of the woods and the end of Fourth Lake nestling amid the trees, the
cook got ready the meal. He was an expert in his line, and after he had
set the kettle over the flame of the nickled alcohol stove he found a
good place to set the table on the ground, spreading the cloth over a
layer of flat balsam branches which gave forth a most appetising odour.
The boatmen prepared to set off with the craft on the one-mile carry
to Sixth Lake, the fifth, as I have explained, being omitted from the
water route in covering the chain, since it was so winding that nearly
twice the distance would have had to be covered if they kept to the
boats.
There was not a little luggage to be transported, in addition to the
boats, and the men would be kept busy. The heavier baggage had been
sent on ahead to the town of Raquette Lake, located on the lower end
of that body of water, just beyond the point where Brown's Tract Inlet
joins it.
"Oh, did you ever see a more perfect place?" demanded Alice, as she
came to a pause in the woods, and gazed about her.
"It's just grand," agreed Rose. "It makes one just glad to be alive;
doesn't it, Baby?" she demanded of her diminutive chum, who was
thoughtfully gazing off into the depths of the forest.
"What is it? Oh, yes, of course!" was the rather hasty answer.
"She hasn't heard a word we've said!" laughed Alice. "Never mind, Baby.
We all know what _you_ are thinking of, at any rate," and playfully she
ruffled the hair of the smaller girl.
"Oh, don't!" was the protest.
"What matter? No one to see you here, Baby, except the boatmen, and
they don't count."
"Oh, but we must always look our best, even before servants, my dears,"
remonstrated Mrs. Brownley, gently. That was one rule she insisted on.
Négligée had in this lady one of its most deadly enemies.
"Oh, well, of course, I didn't mean just that," apologised Alice.
They strolled on through the dense woods that came to the very edge of
the trail. Now and then the silence was broken by the crashing down of
some old tree, or the fall of a dead branch. Again, birds would give
voice to their chirping notes, and the flutter of their wings would be
heard. Occasionally, from some lonely and unseen pond, would come the
call of the loon, that strange and often solitary bird whose cry has
such a weird sound, especially if heard at the dead of night. Again
would come the distant voices of boatmen, or of camping parties, _en
route_ even as our friends were.
"And to think," said Sylvia, softly, "that up there," and she pointed
to the north, "Roy is in these same woods. I wonder what he is doing?"
"Getting well and strong, I hope," said Mrs. Brownley, cheerfully.
"I hope so, too," murmured Rose.
They returned to the place where they had left their boats to find a
simple but perfectly-prepared meal awaiting them. Spread out on the
snowy cloth, set off wonderfully well by the border of underlying layer
of green balsam boughs, were the viands they had brought. The kettle
sang cheerfully on the alcohol stove and there was an omelet, so light
that it seemed a breath would flatten it out like a griddle-cake.
"Just in time, ladies," the chef remarked. "The omelet is all ready to
serve."
Such appetites as the girls brought to the feast!
"There won't be much left to take over the carry," observed Sylvia.
"Pass the olives, Rose dear. That is, if Alice has left any."
"Left any! What do you mean?"
"Oh, we all know your fondness."
"There's an unopened bottle," remarked Hazel. "I had some extra ones
put in."
"Bless you, my dear!" murmured Alice. "They are so tasty, especially in
the woods."
The luncheon went on amid merry quip and laughter. When it was over
the men had their meal, and one of them offered to walk on ahead with
the girls and Mrs. Brownley, and show them the trail to Sixth Lake. It
was quite plain, through the woods, for it was much-travelled, but the
guide was not going to risk his reputation by having any of his party
stray off into the forest, and have it be said of him that he did not
look well after his patrons.
The chef and the other guide remained behind to bring on the luncheon
articles. The boats and baggage, having been safely transported,
awaited the arrival of the girls at Sixth Lake.
"About what time do you think we shall get to Raquette Lake?" asked
Sylvia of the man in her boat, when they were once more under way.
"We ought to be there about seven o'clock, miss. That is, if nothing
happens," and he gave a hasty glance at the sky.
"If nothing happens! What do you mean?" demanded Mrs. Brownley.
"Well, it's nothing to be alarmed about, but I think we're going to
have a thunderstorm," he remarked. "That might delay us, for sometimes
it rains so hard that it's hard to see where you're rowing, and we may
have to stop on shore until it's over."
"Are there any places to stop?" asked Sylvia, determined to make
provision for the worst, if necessary.
"Oh, yes, there are open camps, and some closed ones where we could put
up if we couldn't reach Raquette Lake. But we'll try to get you there.