g
outfit. He emptied the pipe he had been comfortably smoking. "Time
enough," he answered. Naki was a man of few words.

The chauffeur had walked over to Ruth's car and was assisting Miss Sallie
to descend. "You are to take this car into Lenox, I believe," Miss Stuart
began. "My niece will explain matters to you more fully. I am told we
cannot take the car any further up this side of the hill. Where is the
carriage in which we are to drive?"

"Oh, Aunt Sallie!" cried Ruth in consternation. "What are we to do? When
Naki wrote there would be seats in his wagon for those of us who wished
to drive up the hill, I am afraid he meant those seats in front by him
and his wife."

The guide looked perfectly solemn, even when he beheld Miss Sallie's
face. Imagine, if you can, Miss Sallie Stuart, nervous, as she was,
perched on top of a rickety wagon! Add the fact that she was to be driven
up an unexplored hillside by the side of the two queer, brown people to
whom they were confiding their fates!

"We don't ride 'longside of you, Miss," explained Naki to Ruth. "I leads
the horses up and my wife walks by their side. There's room for three of
you up there on the front seat. It's more comfortable than it looks. The
other two of you had better walk or you can ride in the grocery wagon.
The man's coming along behind us with the provisions."

Miss Sallie had not spoken again. Her expression was that of a martyr.

"Do you think you can manage, Miss Sallie?" Bab pleaded.

Ruth was explaining matters to the chauffeur. He was to take the car to
Lenox. Every afternoon at one o'clock he was to return with it to this
fork in the road and wait for half an hour. If "The Automobile Girls"
decided on a trip to one of the nearby towns, they would join him at this
place; for here the good road ended and the trail up the hillside began.
The camp was a long way from any town, but an automobile defies distance.

Miss Stuart looked truly miserable when she saw their car disappear down
the foot of the hill. Then she looked around her carefully. The place was
entirely deserted.

"Very well," she declared, resignedly. "I suppose there is nothing for me
to do but to climb up into that wretched wagon."

Ruth, Barbara, Grace, Mollie, Naki and his wife all assisted her to mount
over the wheel to the seat of honor. Violet cushions were piled back of
her, Grace sat on one side of her, Mollie on the other. Ruth and Barbara
were determined to walk.

"W