"I wonder where we will spend our vacation?" spoke Mollie. "We'll talk about that later," said Betty. "I hope we can be together, and somewhere near the water." "If we only could get a motor boat!" sighed Grace. "Oh, Bet, if no one claims that five hundred dollars maybe we can get a little launch with it, and camp at Rainbow Lake." "I'm only afraid some one will claim it," spoke Betty. "I dropped papa a card, telling him to send me a line in case a claimant did appear." "Oh, let's sit down and rest," proposed Mollie, a little later. "There's a perfect dream of a view from here and it's so cool and shady." The others were agreeable, so they stopped beneath some big trees in a grassy spot near the bank of the little stream. Grace took advantage of the stop to mend a pair of stockings she was carrying with her. It was so comfortable that they remained nearly an hour and would have stayed longer only the Little Captain, with a look at her watch, decided that they must get under way again. "Now it's noon!" exclaimed Grace, when they had covered two miles after their rest. "Mollie, open the lunch and let's see what it contains." There was a startled cry from Mollie. A clasping of her hands, a raising of her almost tragic eyes, and she exclaimed: "Oh, girls, forgive me! I forgot the lunch! I left it back there where we rested in the shade!" CHAPTER XIV THE BROKEN RAIL Dumb amazement held the girls in suspense for a moment. Then came a chorus of cries. "Mollie, you never did that!" "Forgot our lunch!" "And we're so hungry!" "Oh, Mollie, how could you?" "You don't suppose I did it on purpose; do you?" flashed back the guilty one, as she looked at the three pairs of tragic, half-indignant and hopeless eyes fastened on her. "Of course you didn't," returned Betty. "But, oh, Mollie, is it really gone? Did you leave it there?" "Well, I haven't it with me, none of you have, and I don't remember picking it up after we slumped down there in the shade. Consequently I must have left it there. There's no other solution. It's like one of those queer problems in geometry, or is it algebra, where things that are equal to the same thing are equal to each other," and she laughed with just the hint of hysteria. "But what are we to do?" demanded Grace. "I am so hungry, and I know there were chicken sandwiches, and olives, in that lunch. Oh, Mollie!" "Oh, Mollie!" mocked the negligent one. "If you say that again--that way--" Her temper was rising but, by an effort, she conquered it and smiled. "I am truly sorry," she said. "Girls, I'll do anything to make up for it. I'll run back and get the lunch--that is, if it is there yet." "Don't you dare say it isn't!" cried Betty. "Why can't we all go back?" suggested Amy. "Really it won't delay us so much--if we walk fast. And that was a nice place to eat. There was a lovely spring just across the road. I noticed it. We could make tea--"