gas--gasoline. They use that in their torches."

"But why ask girls for it?" insisted Cora.

"Because girls are supposed to be soft, and they might give it. Catch
a fellow giving anything to a gypsy!"

"Well, that might be so, but I have a queer feeling about that old
witch's threat. She looked like three dead generations mummified. Her
eyes were like sword points."

"She must have been a beaut. I should like to have met her witchship.
But, Cora dear, don't worry. We boys are not going to run away again,
and if we see the gypsies we will see them first and last."

"But there are bands of them all over the hills, and I have always
heard that they have some weird way of notifying each band of any
important news in the colony. Now, you see, Jack, the arrest of that
man would be very important to them. They are as loyal to each other
as the royalty."

"Nevertheless it is a good thing the fellow is landed, and it was a
blessing that he went for the cottage instead of to Miss Robbins'
bungalow. _They_ had no means of calling help," mused Jack.

"I suppose it was," answered Cora. "But I tell you, I do not want
another such experience. It was all right while I had to act, but when
it was all over I had to----"

"React! That's the trouble. What we do with nerve we must repeat
without nerve. Now, what do you think of your brother as a public
lecturer?" and Jack laughed at his own attempt to explain the reaction
that Cora really felt.

"My, wasn't that a bright stroke of lightning?" exclaimed Cora.
"Listen! Something is struck!"

"That's right!"

"An explosion!"

A terrific report followed the flash. Then cries and shrieks all over
the hotel alarmed those who were not directly at the scene of the panic.

"Oh, it's the kitchen! See the smoke!"

Jack and Cora rushed indoors, their first anxiety being to make sure
that all the girls and boys of their party were safe.

"Where is Bess?"

"Where is Belle?"

"Where are Walter and Ed?"

"Oh! where is Miss Robbins?"

Every one was looking for some one. In the excitement the guests at
the hotel were rushing about shouting for friends and relatives, while
smoke, black and heavy, poured up the stairs from the basement.

Jack, Ed and Walter were among the first to get out and use the fire
extinguishers. There were plenty of these about the hotel, but on
account of the injury to the men who were working in the kitchen at the
time of the explosion, a