e bushes, and took its way home through the woods and the fields.

"I never should have believed it of Hal--never!" said Helen, quite
forgetting that she had always warned the others of what they might
expect. "To desert us on his birthday, and for a boy that does not
care a bit about him, except to make use of him!"

"It is funny," said Jim thoughtfully. "I never should have thought
that Hal would have allowed another boy to order him about as Dodds
does. Why, he fags for Dodds just as Hal would like us to fag for him;
only we won't. And he did not seem to mind a bit."

But Drusie never spoke one single word the whole way home. To think
that Hal--her own twin--from whom, until a short three months ago, she
had been almost inseparable, should arrange to spend the whole of his
birthday away from home caused her bitter grief. It was not even that
he had forgotten the fact of their birthdays. She knew quite well he
remembered, from the momentary hesitation he had shown. No; he had
deliberately chosen to desert her, and Drusie felt as if she should
never get over it.

[Illustration: Chapter IV tailpiece]

[Illustration: Chapter V headpiece]

CHAPTER V.

THE FORT IN THE WILDERNESS.

All, the Danvers, except, perhaps, Tommy, who was too young to take
things very much to heart, awoke the next morning with a weight on
their minds, and not, as Helen said afterwards, "with a bit of birthday
feeling about them."

Hal was ashamed of himself. Though he was unaware, of course, that
they had overheard his conversation with Dodds, he guessed from their
downcast faces that they knew that he intended to desert them on his
and Drusie's birthday, and was not going near the fort.

He was more ashamed than ever when, lying beside his plate at
breakfast, he found one of the handsomest pocket-knives he had ever
seen. It had no less than four blades, besides so many other weapons
that, as the man who sold it remarked to Drusie and Jim, "it was a
carpenter's tool-chest in miniature."

And a dreadful feeling of remorse came over Hal when he remembered that
he had neglected to get something for Drusie. It was not that he had
forgotten her birthday either--seeing that it was on the same day as
his own, he could not very well do that; and when he had gone to school
he had quite made up his mind to put aside at least half of his
pocket-money every week, and save it for her.

"It does not matter in the least,"