quiet lakes, their massive
forests, looked as deathless as time itself. "The Great North Woods"
could not have been more remote from, more scornful of the swarming
cities called civilization, if they had been on another star.

Luxury in camp did not extend to hot water in the bedrooms,
particularly as Mr. Dinwiddie had had no time to assemble a corps of
servants, and as Mary washed her face and hands in what felt like
melted ice, the shock made her tingle and she would have liked to sing.

A deep bell sounded. Doors flew open up and down the corridor, which
was immediately filled with an eager chatter. Rollo Todd stamped down
the stair singing "Oh, Hunger, Sweet Hunger!" The others took it up in
various keys, and when Mary went down a moment later they were all
swarming about the dining-table at the end of the living-room.

This room, which was fully fifty feet long and half as wide, was lit by
lamps suspended from the ceiling and heated by an immense fireplace in
which logs, that looked like half-sections of trees, were blazing in a
pile as high as a small bonfire. The walls were ceiled and decorated
with antlered deerheads, woven bright Indian blankets, snap-shots of
Mr. Dinwiddie's many guests, and old Indian weapons. In one corner,
above a divan covered with gay cushions, were bookshelves filled with
old novels. A shelf had been built along one side of the room for fine
specimens of Indian pottery and basket weaving. The comfortable chairs
were innumerable, and there was another divan, and a victrola. The
guide had filled the vases with balsam, whose pungent odor blended with
the resinous fumes of the burning logs; and through the open door came
the scents of the forest.

"Ideal place for everything but spooning," cried Todd. "The woods and
the lake are all right in fine weather, but what do you expect us to do
if it rains, mine host? D'you mean to say you haven't any little
retiring rooms?"

"Not a thing unless you retire to the gun-room, but who comes up to the
woods to spoon in the house?"

"Rolly never spoons, anyhow," announced Eva Darling, whose blue eyes,
however, were languishing toward the table. "But it makes him unhappy
to think he can't burst in on somebody----"

"Hold your tongue, Evy. You don't know what you're talking about.
Because I'm quite insensible to your charms, don't fool yourself that
I'm an anchorite. I merely prefer brunettes."

"Come, come, children!" Mr. Dinwiddie