ager burglar. What little ready money
they had the campers had carried with them, and there was no jewelry to
steal. Only Alberdina had been robbed. With many deep guttural
exclamations she found that her own little emigrant trunk had not been
overlooked in the pillage and her purse, containing ten dollars, was
gone.

The gentleman with the zither turned to go.

"I came to find a physician," he said. "Is there none here?"

"I know nod," answered the girl, shaken with sobs.

He lifted his old slouch hat.

"I bid you good day," he said, and started away, then turning back, he
exclaimed: "Perhaps I ought not to leave you here alone. But I must not
stay away so long. Phoebe will be frightened. Will you come with me to
my home?"

Alberdina shook her head. She was half afraid of the strange man. Who
knows but it might have been this stranger, himself, who had robbed her
of her savings?

"No, no; I vill stay here. The vorst is over yet already. Dey haf me
robbed of my moneys. I no more haf. Dey vill not come bag."

Having so spoken, she returned to her labors and was presently hanging
on the line a long row of deep pink clothing, headed by the red silk
handkerchief, the iniquitous author of the wicked deed.

In the meantime the motorists had proceeded joyfully on their way. They
sang and joked and made so merry that Dr. Hume felt that he had gone
back fifteen years in his busy life and was a boy himself. The road as
indicated on the map in the road book was cut through forests of
primeval growth. Sometimes it descended into the valley past villages
and farm houses. Once it took them through a splendid tract of land
dedicated with its club house to St. Hubert, patron saint of the hunt.
At last it began by degrees to climb upward, and with a sudden turn
around the mountain side, they came into view of an exquisite little
lake, reflecting in its mirrored depths the peaks of the high mountains
encircling it. Hundreds of silver birches, slender and elegant, fringed
its edges, gleaming white against a background of impenetrable green.

At one corner of the lake were a small boathouse and restaurant, where
customers are perpetually served with tea and maple cake. Long ago they
had eaten lunch and were quite ready for more refreshments. Then
everybody but Miss Campbell took a dip in the lake. The hours sped past
and the sun was well on its downward grade before they realized it was
time to return.

In the meantime, Billi