never see it at all.

"Oh," exclaimed Jean, "it's wonderful! How Jock will love this
place! Don't you believe this very cave was used by Rob Roy and
his men?" and Alan, swelling with pride to think he had found it
all himself, said yes, he was sure of it.

"I tell you what we'll do," cried Alan, a minute later. "We'll
just leave the basket here in the cave, and when we've found the
boys we'll come back and have our lunch here."

They tucked the basket away out of sight on a rocky shelf in the
cave, and found their way down the steep rough stairway to the
bed of the stream again and, making a wide detour, came out above
the fall. They struggled on for nearly a mile farther still
without finding any trace of the boys, and were beginning to be
discouraged, when they saw a break in the trees with glimpses of
blue sky beyond, and a few moments later came out upon the shores
of a tiny mountain lake, shining like a beautiful blue jewel in
the dark setting of the pine trees on its banks.

Beyond the lake the purple peaks of higher mountains made a
ragged outline against the sky. The sun was now almost directly
overhead; the waters of the lake were still, and its lovely
shores were mirrored on the placid surface. A great eagle soared
in stately circles in the deep blue sky. It was so beautiful and
so still that the children stood a moment among the rocks where
the tarn emptied itself into the mountain stream to look at it.

"It's just the place for a water cow, or a horse maybe," Jean
whispered to Alan.

"Sh!" was Alan's only reply. He seized Jean's hand and dragged hear
down behind a rock and pointed toward the south. There, coming out of
the woods, was a beautiful stag. It poised its noble head, and sniffed
the air, as if it suspected there might be human beings about, and
then stepped daintily to the lake-shore and bent to drink. Its lips
had scarcely touched the water when the children were startled by the
loud report of a gun.

"Poachers," gasped Jean, hiding her face and wishing they had
never come. "Oh, where are Jock and Sandy?" Her only thought was
to make herself as small as possible and keep out of sight behind
the rocks, but Alan peered through the screen of bushes which hid
the rock and made violent gestures to Jean to make her look, too.
Jean crawled on her hands and knees to Alan's side, and when she
looked, what she saw made her so angry that she would have sprung
to her feet if Alan had not held her do