CHAPTER XXVI

AN ELOPEMENT

A little more than an hour after Mrs. Archibald had made known her project to her husband the three inhabitants of the cabin stole softly out into the delicate light of the early dawn.

Mr. Archibald had thought of leaving a note for Matlack, but his wife had dissuaded him. She was afraid that the wrong person might get hold of it.

"When we are safely at Sadler's," she said, "we can send for our bags, with a note to Matlack. It will not matter then who knows." She had a firm belief in the power of the burly keeper of the inn to prevent trouble on his premises.

With careful but rapid steps the little party pa.s.sed along the open portion of the camp, keeping as far as possible from the tent wherein reposed Corona and Mrs. Perkenpine, and soon reached the entrance of the wood road. Here it was not quite so light as in the open, but still they could make their way without much trouble, and after a few minutes'

walking they felt perfectly safe from observation, and slackening their pace, they sauntered along at their ease.

The experience was a novel one to all of them; even Mr. Archibald had never been in the woods so early in the morning. In fact, under these great trees it could scarcely be said to be morning. The young light which made its uncertain way through the foliage was barely strong enough to cast a shadow, and although these woodland wanderers knew that it was a roadway in which they were walking, that great trees stood on each side of them, with branches reaching out over their heads, and that there were bushes and vines and here and there a moss-covered rock or a fallen tree, they saw these things not clearly and distinctly, but as through a veil.

But there was nothing uncertain about the air they breathed; full of the moist aroma of the woods, it was altogether different from the noonday odors of the forest.

Stronger and stronger grew the morning light, and more and more clearly perceptible became the greens, the browns, and the grays about them. Now the birds began to chatter and chirp, and squirrels ran along the branches of the trees, while a young rabbit bounced out from some bushes and went bounding along the road. This early morning life was something they had not seen in their camp, for it was all over before they began their day.

There was a spring by the roadside, which they had noticed when they had come that way before, and when they reached it they sat down and ate some biscuit which Mrs. Archibald had brought with her, and drank cool water from Mr. Archibald's folding pocket-cup.

The loveliness of the scene, the novelty of the experience, the feeling that they were getting away from unpleasant circ.u.mstances, and in a perfectly original and independent fashion, gave them all high spirits.

Even Mrs. Archibald, whose sleepless night might have been supposed to interfere with this morning walk, declared herself as fresh as a lark, and stated that she knew now why a lark or any other thing that got up early in the morning should be fresh.

They had not left the spring far behind them when they heard a rustling in the woods to the right of the road, and the next moment there sprang out into the open, not fifty feet in front of them, a full-grown red deer.

They were so startled by this apparition that they all stopped as if the beautiful creature had been a lion in their path. For an instant it turned its great brown eyes upon them, and then with two bounds it plunged into the underbrush on the other side of the road. Mrs. Archibald and Margery had never before seen a deer in the woods.

The young girl clapped her hands. "It all reminds me of my first night at the opera!" she cried.

Two or three times they rested, and they never walked rapidly, so it was after five o'clock when the little party emerged into the open country and approached the inn. Not a soul was visible about the premises, but as they knew that some one soon would be stirring, they seated themselves in three arm-chairs on the wide piazza to rest and wait.

Peter Sadler was an early riser, and when the front hall door was open he appeared thereat, rolling his wheeled chair out upon the piazza with a b.u.mp--though not with very much of a b.u.mp, for the house was built to suit him and his chair. But he did not take his usual morning roll upon the piazza, for, turning his head, he beheld a gentleman and two ladies fast asleep in three great wicker chairs.

"Upon my soul!" he exclaimed. "If they ain't the Camp Robbers!" At this exclamation they all awoke.

Ten minutes after that the tale had been told, and if the right arm of Mr.

Sadler's chair had not been strong and heavy it would have been shivered into splinters.

"As usual," cried the stalwart Peter, "the wrong people ran away. If I had seen that bicycle man and his party come running out of the woods, I should have been much better satisfied, and I should have thought you had more spirit in you, sir, than I gave you credit for."

"Oh, you mistake my husband altogether!" cried Mrs. Archibald. "The trouble with him is that he has too much spirit, and that is the reason I brought him away."

"And there is another thing," exclaimed Margery. "You should not say Mr.

Raybold and his party. He was the only one of them who behaved badly."

"That is true," said Mrs. Archibald. "His sister is somewhat obtrusive, but she is a lady, gentle and polite, and it would have been very painful to her and as painful to us had it been necessary forcibly to eject her brother from our camp. It was to avoid all this that we--"

"Eloped," interjected Mr. Archibald.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'IF THEY AIN'T THE CAMP ROBBERS!'"]

The good Peter laughed. "Perhaps you are right," said he. "But I shall have a word with that bicycle fellow when he comes this way. You are an original party, if there ever was one. First you go on somebody else's wedding-journey, and then you elope in the middle of the night, and now the best thing you can do is to go to bed. You can have a good sleep and a nine-o'clock breakfast, and I do not see why you should leave here for two or three days."

"Oh, we must go this morning," said Mrs. Archibald, quickly. "We must go.

We really cannot wait until any of those people come here. It makes me nervous to think about it."

"Very good, then," said Peter. "The coach starts for the train at eleven."

Mrs. Archibald was a systematic woman, and was in the habit of rising at half-past seven, and when that hour arrived she awoke as if she had been asleep all night. Going to the window to see what sort of a day it was, which was also her custom, she looked out upon the lawn in front of the house, and her jaw dropped and her eyes opened. There she beheld Margery and Mr. Clyde strolling along in close converse. For a moment she was utterly stupefied.

"What can this mean?" she thought. "How could they have missed us so soon?

We are seldom out of our cabin before eight o'clock. I cannot comprehend it!" And then a thought came to her which made her face grow pale. "Is it possible," she said to herself, "that any of the others have come? I must go immediately and find out."

In ten minutes she had dressed and quietly left the room.

When Margery saw Mrs. Archibald descending the piazza, steps, she left Mr.

Clyde and came running to meet her.

"I expect you are surprised to see me here," she said, "but I intended to tell you and Uncle Archibald as soon as you came down. You see, I did not at all want to go away and not let Mr. Clyde know what had become of me, and so, after I had packed my bag, I wrote a little note to him and put it in a biscuit-box under a stone not far from my window, which we had arranged for a post-office, just the day before."

"A post-office!" cried Mrs. Archibald.

"Yes," said Margery. "Of course there wasn't any need for one--at least we did not suppose there would be--but we thought it would be nice; for, you must know, we are engaged."

"What!" cried Mrs. Archibald. "Engaged? Impossible! What are you talking about?"

"Yes," said Margery, "we are really engaged, and it was absolutely necessary. Under ordinary circ.u.mstances this would not have happened so soon, but as things were it could not be delayed. Mr. Clyde thought the matter over very carefully, and he decided that the only way to keep me from being annoyed and frightened by Mr. Raybold was for him to have the right to defend me. If he told Mr. Raybold I was engaged to him, that of course would put an end to the young man's attentions. We were engaged only yesterday, so we haven't had any time to tell anybody, but we intended to do it to-day, beginning with you and Uncle Archibald. Harrison came over early to the post-office, hoping to find some sort of a note, and he was wonderfully astonished when he read what was in the one I put there. I told him not to say anything to anybody, and he didn't, but he started off for Sadler's immediately, and came almost on a run, he says, he was so afraid I might go away before he saw me."

"Margery," exclaimed the elder lady, tears coming into her eyes as she spoke, "I am grieved and shocked beyond expression. What can I say to my husband? What can I say to your mother? From the bottom of my heart I wish we had not brought you with us; but how could I dream that all this trouble would come of it?"

"It is indeed a very great pity," said Margery, "that Mr. Clyde and I could not have been engaged before we went into camp; then Mr. Raybold would have had no reason to bother me, and I should have had no trouble with Martin."

"Martin!" cried Mrs. Archibald. "What of him?"

"Oh, he was in love with me too," replied the young girl, "and we had talks about it, and I sent him away. He was really a young man far above his station, and was doing the things he did simply because he wanted to study nature; but of course I could not consider him at all."

"And that was the reason he left us!" exclaimed Mrs. Archibald. "Upon my word, it is amazing!"

"Yes," said Margery; "and don't you see, Aunt Harriet, how many reasons there were why Mr. Clyde and I should settle things definitely and become engaged? Now there need be no further trouble with anybody."

Distressed as she was, Mrs. Archibald could not refrain from smiling. "No further trouble!" she said. "I think you would better wait until Mr.

Archibald and your mother have heard this story before you say that."

Mr. Archibald was dressing for breakfast when his wife told him of Margery's engagement, and the announcement caused him to twirl around so suddenly that he came very near breaking a looking-gla.s.s with his hair-brush. He made a dash for his coat. "I will see him," he said, and his eyes sparkled in a way which indicated that they could discover a malefactor without the aid of spectacles.

"Stop!" said his wife, standing in his way. "Don't go to them when you are angry. We have just got out of trouble, and don't let us jump into it again. If they are really and truly engaged--and I am sure they are--we have no authority to break it off, and the less you say the better. What we must do is to take her immediately to her mother, and let her settle the matter as best she can. If she knows her daughter as well as I do, I am sure she will acquit us of all blame."