The general insisted upon driving, and as it was his car, Bartlett perforce had to be content. He protested, however, that he knew the road thoroughly, and could direct the general with no instructions at all from the farmer, waving them all good-naturedly aside. They were all quiet as they started down the road. Henrietta was depressed thinking about Alphonse. She had always stood in awe of his superlative virtues, and the fact that he lacked several was a bit of a shock. The general also was grieved. He had trusted Alphonse and Alphonse had failed him. Billy was silent, for she wanted to think, and all her thoughts were of the youth beside her, tall, slim, good-looking, with his merry eyes and devil-may-care indifference. They could all go to New York together, she planned, and later, when her father and herself went to their summer place on the coast of Maine, they would get him to visit them there in their own home. And in the winter—and Billy’s thoughts lost themselves in the hazy rosy glow of the future, with its possibilities and pleasures. It was after three. The day was intensely warm, even in the shady wooded road on which they found themselves. They had been running through the woods for nearly an hour, and apparently had not reached the end of it. The last abandoned farm-house, gray, weather-beaten, forlorn, had long ago been passed. The birds chattered shrilly in the leafy profusion overhead; somewhere out of sight in the underbrush a brook gurgled refreshingly over its stony bed, and once, far away and very faintly, they heard the wild loon’s dismal cry. The general stopped the car and turned sidewise to face those on the back seat. "We are lost," said he. "Look at the odometer. We have come twenty miles since we left Stoneham and we are no nearer Harrison than when we started." "Lost again," wailed Henrietta. "How very stupid we are!" "It’s my fault," admitted Bartlett truthfully, but with contrition. "I said to take this turn back there near that barrel factory." "We can go back," suggested Billy. "Parker told me last night," said the general gloomily, "that there was no settlement north of here for forty miles. We have probably come north." "If we have come twenty miles, we can go twenty more without dying," said Bartlett. "I don’t know," laughed Henrietta. "I am famished now." "So am I," wailed Billy. "Henrietta, haven’t we a thing to eat?" "Not a thing," said Henrietta. "Hit her up," cried Bartlett jovially. "We will break some more speed laws, by George. I want something to eat." "We have heard nothing from father," teased Henrietta, her laughing eyes on the Watermelon’s face, full of tender amusement. He was so young and looked so serious and almost unhappy that she was unhappy herself.