t. One was unhurt but the
other had to be fished out of the pool. He was taken with a cramp and
almost died before they got him. But this Slide isn't a circumstance
to the one over on Moosilauke. That one is nigh to a thousand feet
long. That ends in a lake, too. I'd like to see any fresh young
gentleman take _that_ slide."

"Harriet could do it," declared Tommy.

"Harriet is not going to try it, my dear young friend," retorted
Harriet laughingly. "She has had quite enough falls to satisfy her.
Besides, she values her life, liberty and happiness."

"How long is this slide, Mr. Grubb?" asked the guardian.

"Over a hundred feet," replied the guide, measuring the distance with
his eye.

"Oh, what a lovely thlide!" bubbled Tommy. "How funny it would be to
thee Buthter toboggan down that thlide! Wouldn't that be funny, Mith
Elting?"

"All of you keep away from here," ordered the guide. "I'll lose my
reputation if what we have already experienced gets out. Nobody will
want a guide who can't take care of his party better than I've done."

"You aren't to blame," replied Harriet. "It has been just Meadow-Brook
luck, that is all. We always have plenty of excitement. Why, it is
tripping right along ahead of us all the time, though we do not always
catch sight of it until too late to stop. We will keep away from the
Slide until morning. I want to see it before we leave, and so do the
other girls. Maybe we might have some fun bowling stones down it. Are
there any big ones that we may roll down, Mr. Grubb?"

"There's a whole mountain of them."

"Hooray!" cried Crazy Jane. "We will have a rolling bee in the
morning, and Margery and Tommy shall bring the stones for us."

"Yeth. Buthter will fetch the thtoneth, too. It will be good
exerthithe for her."

"Grace Thompson, if you don't stop making remarks about me I'll never
speak to you again as long as I live," threatened Margery.

Tommy did not reply to this awful threat. She appeared to ponder
deeply over it, then, edging up closer to her companion, gazed up into
the latter's face with twinkling eyes.

"Do you mean that, really and truly?"

"Yes, I do."

Tommy shook her head.

"I'm tho thorry I teathed you, Buthter, but you know that you do need
exerthithe," repeated Tommy.

"Tommy!" expostulated Margery hopelessly.

"There! You did thpeak to me! you did thpeak to me!" cried Tommy,
dancing about and clapping her hands. "You didn't mean it