n
in April.

Altogether it was a joyous evening that they spent at the Jaroth house.
Yet as Betty and Bobby cuddled up together in the bed which they shared,
Betty expressed a certain fear which had been bothering her for some time.

"I wonder where she is, Bobby?" Betty said thoughtfully.

"Where who is?" demanded her chum sleepily.

"That girl. Ida Bellethorne. If she came up here on a wild goose chase
after her aunt, and found only a horse, what will become of her?"

"I haven't the least idea," confessed Bobby.

"Did she return before this blizzard set in, or is she still up here in
the woods? And what will become of her?"

"Gracious!" exclaimed the sleepy Bobby, "let's go to sleep and think about
Ida Bellethorne to-morrow."

"And I wonder if it is possible that she can know anything about my
locket," was another murmured question of Betty's. But Bobby had gone fast
asleep then and did not answer.

Under the radiance of the big oil lamp hanging above the kitchen table,
the table itself covered with an old-fashioned red and white checked
cloth, the young folks bound for Mountain Camp ate breakfast. And such a
breakfast!

Buckwheat cakes, each as big as the plate itself with "oodles of butter
and real maple syrup," to quote Bob.

"We don't even get as good as this at Salsette," said Tommy Tucker grimly.
"Oh, cracky!"

"I want to know!" gibed his twin, borrowing a phrase he had heard New
England Libbie use on one occasion. "If Major Pater could see us now!"

Libbie and Timothy forgot to quote poetry. The fact was, as Bobby pointed
out, buckwheat cakes like those were poems in themselves.

"And when one's mouth is full of such poems, mere printed verses lack
value."

Romantic as she was, Libbie admitted the truth of her cousin's remark.

A chime of bells at the door hastened the completion of the meal. The boys
might have sat there longer and, like boa-constrictors, gorged themselves
into lethargy.

However, adventure was ahead and the sound of the sledge bells excited the
young people. They got on their coats and caps and furs and mittens and
trooped out to the "pung," as the elder Jaroth called the low, deep,
straw-filled sledge to which he had attached four strong farm horses.

There were no seats. It would be much more comfortable sitting in the
straw, and much warmer. For although the storm had entirely passed the
cold was intense. It nipped every exposed feature, and their breath hung
like ho