was a handsome dog.

"This young man appears to have some trace of common-sense," said Mrs.
Batt. "I shall see to it that the Government is held responsible for
this odious act of insulting duplicity. I--I won't have my name given to
this--this wallow!--" She advanced toward me, her small eyes blazing: I
retreated to leeward of Arthur.

"Guide!" she said in a voice still trembling with passion. "Are you
certain that you have made no mistake? You appear to be unusually
ignorant."

"I am afraid there can be no room for doubt," I said, almost scared out
of my senses.

"And on top of this outrage, am I to eat your cooking?" she demanded
passionately. "Did I come here to look at this frog-pond and choke on
your cooking? _Did_ I?"

"_I_ can cook," said a clear, pleasant voice at my elbow. And Miss White
came forward, cool, clean, fresh as a posy in her uniform and cap. I
immediately got behind her.

"I can cook very nicely," she said smilingly. "It is part of my
profession, you know. So if you two guides will be kind enough to build
the fire and help me--" She let her violet eyes linger on me for an
instant, then on Brown. A moment later he and I were jostling each other
in our eagerness to obey her slightest suggestion. It is that way with
men.

So we built her a fire and unpacked our provisions, and we waited very
politely on the ladies when dinner was ready.

It was a fine dinner--coffee, bacon, flap-jacks, soup, ash-bread, stewed
chicken.

The heavy artillery, made ravenous by their journey, required vast
quantities of ammunition. They banqueted largely. I gazed in amazement at
Mrs. Doolittle Batt as she swallowed one flap-jack after another, while
her eyes bulged larger and larger.

Nor was the capacity of Miss Dingleheimer and the Reverend Dr. Jones to
be mocked at by pachyderms.

Brown and I left them eating while we erected the row of little tents.
Every lady had demanded a separate tent.

So we cut saplings, set up the silk, drove pegs, and brought armfuls of
balsam boughs.

I was afraid they'd demand their knitting and other utensils, but they
had eaten to repletion, and were sleepy; and as each toilet case or
reticule contained also a nightgown, they drew the flaps of their several
tents without insisting that we unpack Arthur's panniers.

They all had disappeared within their tents except Miss White, who
insisted on cooking something for us, although we protested that the
scraps of the banquet