“But--” Betty spoke humbly--“but oh, I know, of course, that I should have asked permission, and that I didn’t. But, Gerry, nobody ever trespasses in the school wood. What should bring them there just that one day? Nobody would dare to because of Witch’s Wood being so near. So it does seem strange.” “I know.” Gerry nodded agreement. “Miss Carey told the police, though, and some of them looked in the wood. There were traces, I heard Doron say, as though some one had been there. ‘Sign,’ you know. And they think that a tramp must have been resting there, and probably that he was a stranger and didn’t know the silly stories about Witch’s Wood. It couldn’t possibly be a villager, for none of them would dare to.” “It does seem like that,” sighed Betty. There was nothing for it after that but just to “keep on keeping on,” and to keep on hoping against hope too, though the chances of the Cup’s return seemed now very slight. With the near approach of Saturday, however, the spirits of the dormitory juniors rose. “It’s terribly appropriate just to be happening to have a tracking expedition,” remarked Mona. “Suppose--just suppose we found the Cup!” “Hidden in a hole by a tramp, d’you mean?” suggested Rene. “Yes; or something like that. Wouldn’t it be simply glorious to bring the tramp to justice! Just like a book. We might get a Guide medal from headquarters, I should think.” “You wouldn’t. It sounds terribly un-Guidy to say that it’s glorious to put tramps into prison,” put in Gerry. She turned to Betty for support. “You mean friends of all the world?” said Betty shyly. “Yes, I think so too.” “Well, I must say!” Mona flared up at once. “All I can tell you is, then--and Rene thinks the same--that we two would do anything for the sake of the patrol and for Sybil and everything. We’d do _anything_ to get the Cup back. And if Betty, of all people----” “You know perfectly well that Betty’s as keen to get it back as you are,” flared up Gerry in return. A grim silence fell on the cubicles. Brushes could be heard in vigorous use from the four corners of the room. Matters were still rather strained and the subject was a chilly one between the couples next day. Sybil, however, who with Eve--her second--and Doris, Jean and Lilian, the older Guides of the patrol, was to head the expedition, was certainly in no mood to notice petty trifles such as Tenderfoot feuds. The patrol was marched out in business-like fashion on to the moor, and the practice began. Vigorous, practical, and to the point, was the scheme of the afternoon’s work. The Tenderfoots were taken in hand first by the captain herself, and received a preliminary lesson in stalking and sign-reading.