“But isn’t it a glorious day!” cried Natalie, as she waltzed around the platform with Marie as a partner. “Most glorious!” agreed Alice. “Oh, here comes our train, and I know I’ve forgotten to put in my tennis slippers to use in the canoe!” “Too late now,” decided the Guardian. “You can write for them. Now, girls, we’ll try to get seats together.” Then the train steamed in, they hurried aboard, amid many admiring glances from other passengers, and soon they were on their way to the camp in the woods. “Wo-he-lo!” sang Natalie softly, as the train gathered speed. “Wo-he-lo!” CHAPTER VI THE OLD MAN “That rope should go the other way!” “No, I remember Jack saying you should fasten the other rope first.” “Are you sure the pegs are driven in tightly enough?” “There! I knew something would be missing. We haven’t a hammer to drive in the pegs with.” “But where are the tent pegs?” Thus the girls questioned and commented as they had gathered about an indiscriminate collection of canvas, boards, ropes and other things at the campsite on Green Lake. They had made a quick trip in the train, and the little lake steamer had landed them at Crystal Springs, as their camping-ground was called. “There are the pegs,” said Alice, after a look about, and she indicated some articles that looked like exaggerated clothes pins, save for the slot. “That’s so, we must decide where they are to go, and drive them in, so we’ll have something to fasten the ropes to,” declared Natalie. “I remember Blake saying that.” “But no hammer!” cried Marie. “Use a stone, girls,” suggested Mrs. Bonnell. “There are plenty hereabouts. Then we must set up the oil stove and make tea. I’m famished for some.” “I hope the man left oil,” murmured Alice. “Yes, here’s some in a can,” called Mabel, who was looking about. “And the stove is just like one we have.” “Girls!” called the Guardian, “just slip your middy-blouses over your waists, and put on the skirts too. You can work so much better then, and not be afraid of soiling anything.” The change was quickly made, the girls having brought in their suit cases their Camp Fire garments. Then they began once more to try to solve the problem of the tent. But it was not so easy as they had supposed, even with the help of a diagram Marie had made from Jack’s vivid description. “Oh, dear!” sighed Alice. “I wish the boys were here after all. One never knows how much one needs them until they are not on hand.” “Oh, we can do it!” asserted Mabel. “Let’s try the small cooking tent first. That will be easier.” “Why didn’t we think of that?” asked Alice. “We can use it as a sort of model. Come, girls. Wo-he-lo!” “If you shout like that some will surely hear, and come to help us,” said Marie. “I wonder where the boys are?” and she looked toward the point of land, where a waving flag denoted the presence of the camp of their brothers. But the boys were not in evidence.