ct it as
their destination.

Holmes was between two fires. If he let the ride go on, he faced
discovery of something he was trying to keep secret; if he tried to stop
it short, or to divert it to some other spot, he was sure to arouse
suspicions that, by the merest luck, as he supposed, his treatment of
Bessie and Dolly had not aroused. So he did what most people would do in
the same circumstances; he kept still, and trusted to his luck to carry
him through.

"Oh, I see," he said, finally. "You're going to stop in the grounds and
have a picnic, or something like that, eh? That's fine--that will be
great sport."

"That's what I thought," said Charlie Jamieson, innocently, but Bessie
was sure that he had winked at her.

The wagons drove up, however, to the very front of the crumbling old
house.

"Everybody out!" called Jamieson. "Here Holmes, where are you going?
Stay with us, man! The fun is just going to begin." For he had seen
Holmes trying to slip off to the back of the house, and, smiling, he had
seized the retired merchant's arm.

"Here's something I want you to hear," he said. "Eleanor, start the
girls to singing that song I like so much--that 'Wohelo for Aye' song,
you know."

In a moment the clear voices were raised in the most famous of all the
Camp Fire Songs, and Holmes, with a savage wrench, got himself free. But
it was too late. For, as the first notes rose, a window above was flung
open, and a voice that Bessie knew as well as she did her own joined in
the chorus. In a moment the singing stopped, and every pair of eyes was
turned up, to see Zara leaning from a window!

"Oh, Bessie--Miss Mercer--please take me away from here! I'm so
frightened!"

"The game's up, Holmes," said Jamieson, in a changed voice. "Did you
really think we'd take your word against those two girls you treated so
shamefully today? Come on, now, I'm not going to stand for any nonsense!
Will you take me upstairs to where you've got Zara hidden? You played a
cool game, and you thought you could get away with it because you were
so respectable. But we've got a complete case against you. It was in
your automobile that Zara was taken from Miss Mercer's house, and as
soon as you played that trick today I was sure that you had had a hand
in the game."

Holmes looked at him darkly. His face was working with anger, but he
evidently saw that the game was up, as Jamieson said.

"I guess you win--this time," he said at last, coolly e