e rocks and enjoyed their meal heartily. The birds
were busy over their heads, the leaves were beginning to come thickly in
the tree crowns and the chipmunks scampered busily about, seeming to be
not at all frightened by the coming of these new visitors to their
haunts. Dorothy tried to coax one to eat out of her hand. He was curious
to try the food that she held out to him and his courage brought him
almost within reach of her fingers before it failed and sent him
scampering back to his hole, the stripes on his back looking like
ribbons as he leaped to safety.

Within a month the cave was in excellent working order. The box proved
to be a success just as the girls had planned it. They kept there such
stores as they did not care to carry back and forth--sugar, salt and
pepper, cocoa, crackers--and a supply of eggs, cream-cheese and cookies
and milk always fresh. Sometimes when the family thermos bottle was not
in use they brought the milk in that and at other times they brought it
in an ordinary bottle and let it stand in the hollow below the spring.
Glass fruit jars with screw tops preserved all that was entrusted to
them free from injury by any marauding animals who might be tempted by
the smell to break open the cupboard. These jars the girls placed on the
top shelf; on the next they ranged their paper "linen"--which they used
for napkins and then as fuel to start the bonfire in which they
destroyed all the rubbish left over from their meal. This fire was
always small, was made in one spot which Roger had prepared by
encircling it with stones, and was invariably put out with a saucepanful
of water from the brook.

"It never pays to leave a fire without a good dousing," he always
insisted. "The rascally thing may be playing 'possum and blaze out later
when there is no one here to attend to it."

A piece of board which could be moved about at will was used as a table
when the weather was such as to make eating inside of the cave
desirable. One end was placed on top of the cupboard and the other on a
narrow ledge of stone that projected as if made for the purpose. One or
two large stones and a box or two served as seats, but there was not
room inside for all the members of the Club. When there was a general
meeting some had to sit outside.

They added to their cooking utensils a few flat saucepans in which water
would boil quickly and they made many experiments in cooking vegetables.
Beans they gave up trying to coo