"Now, girls, do you know where you are?" asked the guardian, turning to her charges.

"Lost in the wilds of New Hampshire," answered Jane dramatically.

"No, not lost. We shall soon be among friends. I promise you a great surprise when we get down so near the sea that you hear the pounding of the breakers on the beach."

"I gueth you will be thurprithed, too," ventured Tommy.

"What do you mean, Grace?" demanded Miss Elting.

"I would suggest that we get started," urged Harriet. "I'm hungry. I want my supper, breakfast and luncheon all in one. You forget that I am a drowned person."

"We are not likely to forget it," answered the guardian, smiling faintly. "Yes, we will carry our equipment in. Jane, suppose we break it into smaller packs, so it can be the more easily carried. I think we are all ready for a good meal, and that is what we are going to have very shortly now. You know you always get good meals at Wau-Wau."

"Wau-Wau!" exclaimed the Meadow-Brook Girls in chorus.

"Why, Wau-Wau is in the Pocono Woods," said Harriet. "We are a long way from there, aren't we?"

"Oh, yes, yes!" The guardian flushed guiltily. "I spoke without thinking."

No one except Harriet and Tommy gave any special heed to the final words of the guardian. The others were busy getting ready to move.

They were in something of a hurry for their luncheon. Packs were divided up among them. Harriet insisted upon carrying one end of the trunk with Jane, in addition to the pack she had slung over her shoulder. They finally started down a narrow path that led on down to the sh.o.r.e, leaving some of their equipment behind to be brought later on in the afternoon. As they neared the sh.o.r.e the boom of the surf grew louder and louder.

The girls uttered shouts of delight when finally they staggered out into the open with their burdens, on a high bluff overlooking the sea.

The sea lay sparkling in the sunlight, while almost at their feet great white-crested combers were rolling in and breaking against the sandy bluff. The salt spray dashed up into their faces and the odor of the salt sea was strong in their nostrils.

"Isn't this glorious?" cried Harriet, with enthusiasm.

"I shouldn't think you'd ever want to see water again after what occurred this morning," replied Margery Brown.

"Oh, that! I had forgotten all about it. This is different, Buster.

This is the real sea, and it's perfectly wonderful. Isn't it, Miss Elting?"

The guardian, thus far, had not spoken a word. There was a look of puzzled surprise on her face.

"What is it, Miss Elting?" questioned Harriet, instantly discovering that something was wrong.

"I--I thought we should find some others here," replied the guardian hesitatingly.

"I told you there wath no one here," answered Tommy.

"Whom did you hope to find?" asked Harriet Burrell.

"Some friends of mine. It has been a rocky road to Wau-Wau, and we haven't reached it yet," muttered the guardian under her breath.

"I don't understand this, girls," she continued. "I fear we have made a mistake. This isn't the place I thought we were seeking. I must confess that I am lost. But the real place can not be far away. We shall have to walk from this on. Are you equal to it?"

"Not till I get thome food," answered Tommy with emphasis. "I'm famithhed. I want thomething to eat."

"So do I, darlin'," added Crazy Jane. "But I don't see anything hereabout that looks like food. Do you?"

Margery sat down helplessly. Harriet was smiling. She understood something of the plans of the guardian now; yet, like her companions, she was disappointed that the promised meal was not at hand. Miss Elting recovered her composure quickly.

"We shall have to cook our own dinner, dears," she said. "Harriet, you sit down in the sun and rest; we will take care of the meal-getting."

"You treat me as though I were an invalid. I am able to do my share of the work, and to eat my share of the food, as you will see when we get something cooked."

Jane already had run back toward the road to bring some dry sticks that she had discovered when coming in. Miss Elting began opening the packs.

"Oh, this is too bad!" she cried. "We must have left that coffee pot with the other things out by the road."

"I'll get it." Tommy bounded away. Hazel a.s.sisted the guardian in getting the cooking utensils ready, Margery walked about, getting in the way, but not accomplishing much of anything else. There were cold roast beef, b.u.t.ter and plenty of canned goods. The bread that they had brought with them had been dissolved in the water of the ice pond, as had the sugar and considerable other food stuff.

Jane came in with an armful of wood and quickly started a fire. Tommy arrived some moments later with the coffee pot and other utensils.

While all this was going on Harriet was spreading out their belongings so these might dry out in the sunlight. But the water for the coffee, secured some distance back, was brackish and poor. They made it do, however, and as quickly as possible had boiled their coffee and warmed over the beef and canned beans as well. As for drinking water, there was none at hand fit for this purpose. Dishes were somewhat limited, many of theirs having been lost when the automobile went into the pond. But they were glad enough to do with what they had, and when Jane sounded the meal call, "Come and get it!" there was not an instant's hesitation on the part of any member of that little party of adventurous spirits.

"Now take your time, girls," warned Miss Elting. "We will not gulp our food down, even if we have a walk before us this afternoon. And we may have to sleep out-of-doors, but it will not have been the first time for the Meadow-Brook Girls."

"Ith thith the thurprithe that you were going to give us?" asked Tommy innocently.

"It is a surprise to me, dear. This isn't the place I thought it was at all. The joke is that I don't know where the right place is."

"Perhaps, if you would tell us where you wish to go, we might be of some a.s.sistance to you," suggested Jane McCarthy.

"You can't get the secret from me, Jane," answered the guardian smilingly. "I am going to keep that little secret to myself at all costs. Don't tease me, for I shall not tell you."

"It hath cotht a good deal already," piped Tommy. "Let me thee. It hath cotht one automobile, theveral thkirtth, and a girl drowned.

Thome cotht that, eh? Pleathe path the beanth."

"Tommy has a keen appet.i.te for beans this afternoon. Will you please open another can, Jane?" asked the guardian.

"Certainly. Will you have them cold this time, Tommy?"

"I will not, thank you. My father thayth there ith more real nourithhment in beanth than there ith in beeftheak. I gueth he knowth.

He wath brought up on a bean farm."

"Then I'll take the beefsteak and never mind the nourishment,"

declared Jane, who was not particularly fond of beans.

"I'd rather have both," said Margery hungrily.

"Of courth you would," teased Tommy. "That ith why you--"

"Oh, say something new," groaned Buster.

Miss Elting permitted them to jest to their hearts' content. The more they talked the better was she pleased, because it kept them from eating too rapidly. Their meal finished and the dishes cleaned in salt water and sand, the guardian gave thought to their next move. But she was in no haste. The girls were allowed plenty of time to rest and digest their hearty meal, which they did by sitting in the sand with the sun beating down on them. After the lapse of an hour she told the girls to get ready.

"I will say to you frankly that I do not know where I am, though I am positive we are on the right road. Our destination can not be so very far from here, and I believe we have ample time to reach it before dark. However, each of you will put a can of beans in her pocket. We will take the coffee, our cups and the coffee pot. Thus equipped, we shall not go hungry in case we are caught out over night. Then, again, there must be houses somewhere along this road. The first one we see I shall stop and make inquiries."