Chapter XIV: Giving a Toboggan Points

A brilliant sun, gilding the peaks of Chocorua and shining in her eyes, awoke Harriet Burrell.

A panorama of sunlit hills, still darkened caverns and gorges, precipitous cliffs and sombre ravines caused the Meadow-Brook Girls to exclaim joyously. Thin, silvery ribbons in the landscape showed where foaming brooks ran. There were short waterfalls, long cascades, bright little lakes and countless valleys of green.

"It's too beautiful to be real!" throbbed Harriet Burrell as she unwound herself from her blanket and started to replenish the fire.

The coffee pot was already on the fire, supported by two stones. It was steaming and sputtering. Then, for the first time, she observed that Janus Grubb was nowhere in sight. Harriet got up and tip-toed softly to the edge of the cliff, where she lay down flat, peering over. At first she saw nothing of interest; then all at once she caught sight of a moving speck at the foot of the cliff.

"It's Janus!" she exclaimed. "Why, he doesn't look any larger than a chessman. I wonder how much would have been left of Tommy had she fallen down there?"

Harriet shuddered at the thought of her companion's narrow escape--the narrow escape of the entire party, for that matter. Crawling cautiously back, she lay gazing off over the valley. "The poisoned lake" lay in plain view. The girl pondered over the tragedy of which the guide had told them. Such tragedies, such deeds of violence as he had named, should have no place in a peaceful scene such as this, thought Harriet.

"Harriet!" She turned her head to find Miss Elting sitting up with a worried expression on her face.

"For pity's sake, come away from there! My nerves will not stand many more such shocks as we had last night."

"Why, I am not afraid," answered Harriet.

"What are you doing there?"

"Watching Janus. He is down below. You ought to take a peep at him. He looks so small and so funny."

"Thank you. I am well satisfied to take your word for it. Will you please come away from there?"

"Certainly, if you wish it." Harriet got up promptly and walked back, stepping over her companions, then sitting down beside the guardian.

"You are a brave little girl, Harriet, dear," said Miss Elting softly, patting the brown head affectionately. "But don't you think you are just a little bit foolhardy?"

"I--I hadn't thought about it," answered the girl, flushing. "I do not mean to be."

"I know. You are thoughtless of your own peril. You know we must not let anything happen to any of our party. We want to have other happy summers in the open together; and, were anything serious to occur to any member of our party, that would end it. Neither your parents nor those of the other girls would permit them to go out again in this way. Will you promise to be more careful in future?"

"I don't like to do that; I am afraid I might not keep my promise," admitted Harriet, hanging her head. "But I will promise to do the best I can and not to take any more chances than I have to."

Jane awakened at this juncture and lay blinking at them for a moment, after which she sat up, rubbing her eyes.

"Good morning, Misses Owls. Have you two been croaking there all night?"

"No, Jane, dear, we have not. We have been conversing for the past ten or fifteen minutes. Previous to that time I was peeping over the edge at Mr. Grubb, who is down there looking for Tommy's blanket. Still farther back than that I was sound asleep. Miss Elting has been reading me a lecture. It is your turn now."

Margery sat up at this juncture. She unrolled her blanket, flung it aside, and, going to the wall, sank down against it, resting her still heavy head in her hands.

"What's the matter with you, Margery?" questioned Jane.

"Matter?" complained Buster. "One might as well try to sleep in that boiler factory at Meadow-Brook as in this camp."

"That's so, Little Sunshine; I agree with you. This is a dynamite as well as a boiler factory, with an explosion twice, every day and at least once in the night."

"Dynamite?" piped Tommy. "Where ith it?"

"There, you see! You have awakened every one of us except Hazel," complained Jane. "Now, go on talking and you'll waken her, too; then we'll all be awake, and can think about cooking breakfast."

"Jane McCarthy, you can talk more and say less than any person I ever knew," exclaimed Margery petulantly.

"I agree with you, Little Sunshine. I agree with every word you have said this morning, and I'm going to come right over there and kiss you for your sweetness. Isn't she good-natured, and so early in the morning, too?" laughed Jane, her eyes sparkling with mischief.

A shout of laughter greeted Crazy Jane's naive words. The shout awakened Hazel. Margery dropped her hands from her face. Her petulant mouth relaxed into an unwilling smile; then she burst out laughing.

"I thought I'd chase away that sour face," teased Jane.

"I'll look crosser than ever if you don't stop," threatened the stout girl.

One by one the girls went over to the rivulet and washed. There was not much water to be had, but it made up in coldness what it lacked in quantity and freshened them greatly. Harriet started to prepare the breakfast as soon as she had washed and dried her face and hands. The dishes were set out on the granite shelf, and there, more than two thousand feet in the air, the Meadow-Brook Girls sat down to their morning meal. Janus had not returned by the time they finished, but came in about half an hour later. He had the blanket and the handle of the frying-pan that Tommy had dropped. He said that was all there was left of the frying-pan. He thought the handle might be useful somewhere, so had brought it back with him.

"I suggest that we take the handle home and frame it. We might give it to Tommy as a souvenir," suggested Harriet.

"Never mind. I've thouvenirth enough as it ith. I've got thouvenirth all over my perthon," declared Tommy.

"You may have more before the day is done," chuckled Jane, pointing to the heights that they were to climb that day. Tommy eyed them askance. She did not fancy what was before her, but with a sigh of resignation went about getting her pack ready for starting. The other girls were now doing the same, Janus passing on the packs after they had been made ready. To have a pack come open while climbing a steep mountain would mean the loss of almost everything in that pack. But the danger of this was not so great now as though the luggage were being carried on pack horses.

The start was made in a leisurely manner. Janus halted every little while to point out some interesting feature of the landscape, or to relate some legend of the past associated with this or that particular bit of mountain scenery. An hour had been occupied in this easy jogging before they came to the sheer climb that lay before them. This latter was more than a thousand feet, but the guide proposed to take the greater part of the day for it. There was no need for haste, as the journey could be made easily before night.

As one gazed up the jagged side it did not seem possible that anything other than a bird could make the ascent. It looked a sheer wall from where the girls stood, the projections and jutting crags appearing perfectly flat to them. Even Harriet Burrell and Miss Elting were a little dubious.

"Do you think it safe?" questioned the guardian apprehensively.

"No. Mountain climbing is never safe," replied Janus. "It can be done, and easily at that, if that's what you mean. Shall we go ahead or go back, Miss?"

"Ahead, of course," the guardian nodded.

Janus got his line ready, a small but strong and pliant rope. He nodded to his party, glanced up for the most favorable starting point, then began to go up. The Meadow Brook Girls followed in single file. Miss Elting bringing up the rear. Now the guide passed the rope to them as the ascent became more precipitous. Up and up wound the trail. The climbers kept a firm grip on the life line, for a misstep here would mean a bad tumble, and might take others down also. At times the girls were out of sight of each other, like the ends of a train rounding a sharp curve. The advice of the guide to "look up, never down," was followed by each one. In fact, none dared to look down, fearing to lose her head and grow dizzy.

"We rest here," announced Janus, after they had been climbing for an hour without once stopping during that time. It was not a particularly desirable place in which to rest, being located on a steep slope, but the spot was surrounded by bushes, so that, when all came together and sat down, they could see nothing of the rugged mountain scenery about them.

"Better get out some biscuit or something to munch on, for we shan't find a place where we can cook a meal until we get nearly to the top. We'll have to rest hanging on by our eyelids after this," declared Janus.

"No more mountain climbing for me," declared Margery.

"This is nothing," chuckled the guide. "Wait until you climb Mt. Washington."

"Wait until I do!" nodded Margery with emphasis.

"That is to be our next," Miss Elting informed them. "By the time we have finished that I think we shall be seasoned mountain climbers."

"Yeth. And we'll have the habit so badly that we'll be climbing telephone poleth every day when we get home," averred Tommy. "I withh my father could thee me now. He wouldn't thay hith little girl wath lathy, would he?"

Janus got up and walked out where he could look about him. He stood stroking his whiskers reflectively, glancing critically at the rocks above; then along a narrow, barely indicated trail around the side of the mountain. He turned on his heel and returned to where his party lay stretched out on the rocks. There were rents in their clothing, their boots were scratched and cut from contact with sharp points of rocks, and the faces of the Meadow-Brook Girls were red and perspiring.

"I reckon we'll go around another way," decided Janus. "It's too steep here. You'll ruin your clothes. No need of it at all. You will get just as much fun out of the roundabout way as by climbing straight up."

At first the girls protested that they did not wish to take the easier way, but when he assured them it was just as hazardous, they were satisfied.

"This new way we will see some scenery that is scenery, and you'll have a chance to look at it, which you wouldn't have in the straight-up climb. You see, you'd be too busy hanging on. I wanted to show you the 'Slide' anyway," he added.

"What ith the 'Thlide'?" questioned Tommy.

"You will see when you get to it; one of the curiosities of Chocorua, and a lively one. They say the Indians used it when in a hurry to get down the mountain or to escape from their enemies. But, mind you, I don't expect any of you young ladies to follow the example of the Indians. Now, shall we move along?"

Interested in this new proposal, the girls sprang up, eagerly announcing their readiness to push on. Janus led the way to the right, instead of following the perpendicular trail. The former trail led them around a jutting point of rock, then over boulders, irregular slabs and crags, obliging them to pick their way with caution and cling to the life line.

They were now following a sort of spiral; for, though the party seemed to be encircling the mountain, they were rising gradually toward the blue dome of the summit. Here and there a mountain bird, dislodged from its perch, would hurl itself out into space, giving the girls a start, and threatening, for the moment, their equilibrium. But they did much better than the guide had hoped for. Greatly to his relief, he was not obliged to go to the rescue of a Meadow-Brook Girl that day.

About noon, however, Margery Brown got a blister on her right heel, and Hazel turned one of her ankles. This put an end to the mountain climbing for the time being, but not to the hanging-on. The girls perched themselves behind rocks for support while the guardian was dressing the sprain and the blister. Janus went on to look over the trail and pick out the easy places. While they were waiting for Miss Elting to attend to Margery and Hazel, the guide returned with an armful of dry sticks.

"We aren't going to starve even if we can't move on," he cried cheerily. "I promised you that you shouldn't have a warm meal until we reached the summit this evening. I'm going to give you a surprise, though. Now, what will you have?"

"I think I'll have a thirloin thteak," answered Tommy.

"A cup of coffee will help me, I am sure," declared Harriet.

"I would eat the frying-pan handle if I couldn't get anything better," added Jane. "Mountain climbing is something like work, eh?"

Janus bolstered up his dry wood in a crotch formed by a jutting rock, and built a fire where one would scarcely have believed it were possible to do so. He got water from a little spring just above them, and by the time Miss Elting had disposed of her patients for the moment the water for coffee was boiling. But there was no setting of a table. To have put a dish down on that slope would have meant to lose it, and they had too few dishes to be able to afford to lose even one.

The coffee was drunk without milk, though lumps of sugar were produced from each girl's blouse pocket and dropped into her cup with much laughter. They made the best of their circumstances; but when, about the middle of the afternoon, Miss Elting informed the guide that she did not think Hazel's ankle would permit of her going any further that day, there was a flurry in the mountainside camp.

The guide declared that they must go on until a suitable camping place were reached, but how he did not say until he had consulted his whiskers and studied the valleys below. He then gravely announced that he would carry Hazel on his back. She promptly declared that she would not permit it, and Miss Elting agreed with her. Then Janus rose to the occasion by telling them that he would make a litter if one of the young ladies thought she could bear up one end of it. Both Harriet and Jane settled the matter by declaring they could carry the litter with Hazel in it.

Janus made the litter by first laying two ropes on the ground about eighteen inches apart. On these at right angles he tied sticks until the affair resembled a carrier belt on a piece of machinery. A loop with a stick rove into it was arranged at each end and a blanket was thrown over the litter, which was then pronounced ready. None of them ever had seen anything like it. The girls feared the litter would sag so that no one could ride on it without being dragged along the ground. Janus said the advantage in a rope litter was that they could go around a bend with it and not break the side pieces, and, furthermore, that it was soft and had plenty of give. Jane winked at Harriet, Hazel looked troubled, while Tommy's face assumed a wise expression.

"Now for the start," called the guide, taking the front end of the litter, after all was in readiness. "The one who takes the other end had better not carry her pack, but lay it on the litter."

"I prefer to have my pack on my back. I know where it is then," remarked Harriet.

"Now, hadn't we better strap Hazel to the litter?" proposed Jane thoughtfully.

"It is not necessary. There's no danger," declared the guide promptly.

"All right, then," nodded Harriet. "But, Hazel, if you wish my advice, you'll take pains to hold fast."

The leader of the Meadow-Brook Girls lifted the loop over one shoulder, passing it under one arm with the end stick resting slantingly across her back. Janus took up the other end after Miss Elting had carefully helped Hazel upon the litter, which tilted dangerously.

"Be careful not to drop me," begged Hazel. "It's a shame I'm so helpless that I have to be carried, though Mr. Grubb says it isn't far to the camping spot."

"Pick your way carefully, bearers," urged Miss Elting.

"Wait! Let me get ahead of you," begged Tommy, scrambling forward. "I don't like the lookth of that thing." Miss Elting and Jane followed behind the litter, with which Harriet and Janus made good progress, though Hazel had to do some clever balancing in order to keep the affair right side up.

For nearly half an hour the two bearers bore their burden without halting. It proved easier work than Harriet had expected, and perhaps that fact gave her too great assurance. The way was growing steeper and narrower, with sharp fragments of rock on the trail, and below them, alongside, the tops of dwarfed mountain trees.

All at once Harriet stubbed her toe, plunging forward and tilting the litter so that it turned turtle, like a cranky hammock. With a little scream of alarm Hazel Holland pitched out headfirst and took a graceful, curving dive into the top of a tree just below them. The others saw her feet disappear in the foliage, heard a muffled cry for assistance, then silence.