Chapter XXI: Harriet Plans to Outwit the Tramp Club

A long conversation was held between Harriet and the Gipsy queen, the latter drawing a map on the ground with a willow wand to show the girl the route that she was to travel after the Meadow-Brook Girls had gone on for another day.

Harriet's eyes were sparkling. She thought she saw a way to outwit the Tramp Club. Harriet was chuckling gleefully when she joined her companions. She declined to tell them that night, however, just what the Gipsy had communicated to her.

"Where shall we sleep to-night?" asked Miss Elting.

"Sybarina says we may have the wagon to sleep in," answered Harriet. "Shall we use it?"

"No. I think I prefer to sleep in the open," answered the guardian. "It is not a cool night. Suppose we roll up in our blankets and sleep by the campfire? What do you say, girls?"

"I thay yeth," spoke up Tommy. "I'll put my feet againtht the fire; then I won't have cold feet any more."

They were sound asleep in a few moments after turning in. Even the Gipsy dogs that had been barking most of the evening, and the crying babies, to whom none of the tribe had given the slightest heed, were now quietly asleep. Sybarina watched her guests roll up in their blankets and nodded approvingly.

"The true Romany," she muttered. For a long time the old woman sat by the fire, sat until the embers fell together and the sticks began to blacken, when she rose and peered into each sleeping face of the Meadow-Brook Girls. Sybarina then hobbled to her own wagon and disappeared within.

The Meadow-Brook Girls awakened next morning with the sun in their eyes. Miss Elting sat up and called softly to Harriet. The guardian and Harriet rubbed their eyes and blinked dazedly about them. There was something strange about their surroundings, but just what that strangeness was they for the moment did not know. All at once they discovered what had happened. They were absolutely alone, save for their sleeping companions.

"Why, they've gone!" cried Harriet.

"Gone and we never woke up," laughed Miss Elting. "How strange."

"Who hath gone?" mumbled Tommy, sitting up.

"The Gipsies," answered Harriet.

"They must have left in a great hurry, for some reason," suggested the guardian. "I don't understand it. Nor do I understand how they managed to slip away so quietly."

The wagon tracks were plainly outlined in the soft earth and the remnants of the campfire were there, but that was all. Yet it was not all. As Harriet sought to draw on her shoe she felt something hard in the toe. Groping in the shoe with her fingers she drew forth a tightly wrapped paper. Opening this she found a tiny brass triangle. On it were crudely cut several strange characters.

"How curious," breathed Harriet. "But how did it get in my shoe?" she wondered.

"Look on the wrapping paper," suggested Miss Elting.

Harriet did so. As she looked the puzzled expression on her face gave place to a smile.

"It is from Sybarina," she exclaimed. "This is what she writes: 'A charm for the Romany girl. No harm shall come to her who wears it. Happiness and prosperity shall be hers forever and always. It is the Gipsy good luck charm. Who knows but that, some day, you may wear it as a queen? Farewell until we meet again.'"

"How strange!" murmured Harriet, holding up the trinket that her companions might see.

"I wonder if it ith a charm againtht bullth?" piped Tommy.

"I would suggest, girls, that we return to our own camp. It may not be there by this time."

Upon reaching their own camp they were much relieved to find everything as it should be. Nothing had been disturbed. But, ere they had finished their breakfast, three farmers came striding in to know if anything had been seen of the Gipsies.

"They left early this morning," answered Miss Elting. "Why?"

"Wal, nothing only one of them traded off on me a ring-boned, spavined old hoss, which he said was sound. I'll catch them when they come this way again."

"I think I understand why the Gipsies took such an early departure," said Harriet after the men had gone. "But I do not believe Sybarina had anything to do with such dishonest dealing."

The day's route was laid out after breakfast. The boys undoubtedly had gone on, for nothing was to be seen of their campfire. Miss Elting rather thought they would see no more of the Tramp Club after the fortune-telling that Harriet had given the chief the night before. But with the route that Sybarina had laid out for the girls, the guardian believed they could make some time and gain the advantage over the boys.

Camp was hurriedly struck after breakfast. Their route that day lay across lots and their camping place was to be on the edge of a forest easily accessible to Jane with her motor car. Using government maps, as they were doing, they were able to locate every little rise of ground, every hollow and almost every clump of bushes along their way. These government maps Miss Elting had purchased at a comparatively small cost, as any one may do. They are very useful to one who is taking a tramp through the country, and the Meadow-Brook Girls found them so.

Jane accompanied her companions out to the highway and followed along behind them in her car for the first mile. Then their ways parted, the tramping girls to climb a hill, Crazy Jane to follow the highway on to the point where she too was to leave the road and make camp for them. But there was always a long wait for Jane, so the girl occupied the time in driving to the nearest village to make a number of purchases at the stores.