“Oh,” squealed the girls. “You shan’t take our picture in these!” “Yes, I shall! Peanut, you guard the path!” “Right-o,” said Peanut. “No lady shall pass save over my dead body!” Frank unslung his camera from the case, and made everybody get in a group, with the girls in front. They all tried to sit down, to hide the overalls, but Rob and Lou and Art kept pulling them up. Every time they were up, Frank snapped a picture. “Now I’ve got you all!” he laughed. “What? You were taking us all the time? Oh, you mean thing!” cried Alice. “Let’s break the camera, girls!” She started for Frank, but he disappeared over the ledge, with a hoot. The Scouts had left their hatchets behind, but they made a fire pit, and kindled a good fire with dead stuff, broken by hand. Peanut rigged up a stick rack beside it for Alice to hang her stockings over. Meanwhile, off in the bushes, they could hear the girls and women laughing, as they got out of the overalls. They came back looking like normal girls again, only their skirts were rather crumpled. The Scouts took the overalls, and, with the guide and Mr. Rogers, turned toward the road, which led back to the store. Peanut lingered a bit in the rear. “Toast your tootsies nice and warm,” he whispered to Alice, and ducked quickly away from the swing she aimed at him. “Alice!” he heard Art’s girl saying, “I wish you wouldn’t be such a tomboy.” Peanut grinned to himself, and caught up with the rest. “Some skirts, those, eh, Art?” he said, giving Art a dig in the ribs. Art turned red, and punched back for answer. “What was it Art was saying back in Beaver Meadow about wishing there weren’t any girls in the world?” asked Rob. “Oh, they’re all right, if they wear _pink_,” said Peanut. “You all make me sick,” Art retorted. “Gee, Peanut, you got your face slapped, all right!” “Sure I did,” said Peanut. “That’s a mark of affection. I made a hit with her, you see.” “That’s a rotten joke,” said Art. “All right. Here’s another. You go off and eat _your_ lunch by yourself, if you don’t like girls. The rest of us’ll have ours with the crowd. We’ll let him, won’t we, fellers?” Art only grunted, and made no answer to the laughter of the rest. “All of which goes to show, Art,” remarked Mr. Rogers, who had been listening, “that it’s not safe to generalize about women. A man’s always bound to meet one who’ll upset all his ideas.” “Or slap his face,” said Art, with a poke at Peanut. At the little store, the boys paid the guide for their share in the expedition, and shouldered both their own loads and the lunch baskets the other party had brought with them, and left in the store. Then they hurried back down the road.