"Don"t we get asked in to have some cake and chocolate?" questioned Jack.
"Shall we?" queried Cora.
"Please do!" urged Paul.
And they did.
The plans for the next day included a long walk up the mountain to a place where it was said a wonderful view could be had. They were to take their lunch and stay all day, for they could not get back to the bungalow by noon.
"All aboard!" cried Jack, as he and his two chums called for the girls, crossing the rustic bridge at the foot of the fall. "All aboard!"
They started off merrily together, talking and laughing. Walter had been down to get the early morning mail, and there was a letter from Cora"s mother, which said, among other things, that the police had some clews to the men who took the automobile.
"Good!" cried Jack, when Cora read out this. "What"s the rest of it?"
"Well, it seems that some more bogus tickets have been disposed of in places around Chelton, and the men who sold them are described as the same two who sold the coupons in the tea room. The police seem to think there is a good chance of getting them."
"They didn"t see them have your car; did they, Cora?" asked Hazel.
"No such luck, I suppose. But mother doesn"t mention that."
The view was voted all that had been said of it, and after admiring it for some time, preparations were made to eat lunch.
"Let"s sit down here," proposed Cora, pointing to a gra.s.sy spot in the shade of a big sycamore tree. "Boys, spread the cloth and unpack the baskets. Oh, what a curious root!" she cried, stooping over toward something near a stone.
"Look out!" suddenly cried Paul, pulling Cora back so sharply that she nearly toppled over. The next moment Paul caught up a stone and threw it with all his force at the spotted root. There was an angry hiss.
"Narrow escape for you, Cora," said Paul, a trifle pale. "That was a copperhead snake!" and he pointed to the writhing, dying reptile. His stone had struck it fairly.
CHAPTER XVI-LOST
Cora Kimball was not an unusually nervous girl, nor was she given to hysterical demonstrations, but, somehow or other, she felt sick and faint as she looked at the wiggling snake in its death agony. Her eyes saw black, and she swayed so that Paul stepped forward and slipped an arm around her waist.
"I thought you were going to faint," he said in explanation.
"I-I was," faltered Cora. "But I"ve gotten over the notion. Thank-thank you, Paul. Could I have a drink of water?"
Jack brought her some from a spring not far away.
"Brace up, Sis," he said with rough, brotherly kindness. "You"re all right. That snake wouldn"t have killed you anyhow. I"ve been bitten by "em, and it isn"t much worse than a mosquito."
"You have?" cried Paul, in such a queer tone that all save Cora realized that Jack was bluffing for the sake of minimizing the effect on Cora.
Jack made this plain to Paul by winking quickly, and motioning to him to confirm what he had said.
"Oh, yes, that"s right," Paul went on. "I"d forgotten that the copperheads aren"t poisonous this time of year. You wouldn"t have been much damaged, Cora, if you had been nipped by this fellow," and with a swift motion of his foot he kicked the still writhing reptile to one side.
"Really?" she asked.
"Really."
She looked relieved. The faint spell pa.s.sed and Cora smiled. The color was coming back to her cheeks.
"I"m sorry I acted so," she said, "but I have a terrible fear of snakes, even harmless ones. I thought this one was a curiously mottled root, and I was going to pick it up. Suppose I had? Oh!"
She shuddered and looked at Paul.
"A miss is as good as a bird in the hand," he misquoted. "Come on now, let"s eat."
"Say, old man," said Jack to Paul, when they were alone a little later, "that snake was a bad chap, wasn"t he?"
Paul nodded in confirmation.
"I thought so," Jack went on. "Just as well, though, not to let her know, she"s so deadly afraid. There"d have been trouble if she had been bitten?" he questioned.
"Yes," said Paul, simply. "Of course they"re not sure death, but they"re dangerous enough."
"I thought so. Shake!"
After the temporary scare of the snake had pa.s.sed, the picnic party made merry, laughing and talking as they enjoyed the lunch the girls had put up. It was a perfect day, rather warm, but cool enough in the shade, and the mountain air was invigorating. There followed a delightfully lazy time, lying on the gra.s.s under the trees when every one had eaten enough.
Then they packed up the rest of the food and walked on, intending to make a circle and return to Camp Surprise late in the afternoon. Now and then they would come to some open s.p.a.ce, where the sloping mountain dropped away suddenly, revealing below a vista which made them pause in admiration.
Once they reached a point where they could look down on Mountain View, and, though they could not distinguish their own bungalows, they could see about where they were situated.
Cora stood gazing down, in rather a thoughtful mood. Walter was by her side, and noted her abstraction. He held up the proverbial penny.
Cora shook her head.
"No. I won"t tell," she said with a smile.
Walter guessed that she was thinking of the snake, but he refrained from saying so. And then Cora, fearing he might put a wrong construction on her words added:
"I was just wondering when they were going to continue."
"What was going to continue?" he inquired.
"The surprises in our camp. You know--"
"Continue!" he interrupted. "I didn"t know we had had any. I had begun to think it was all a hoax."
"Oh, no," cried Cora, impulsively. "There was a--"
She caught herself just in time, for she recalled that she and Belle had agreed not to mention the queer noise.