id it for us really. Perhaps after dinner we might walk up there to
thank her."

After dinner! How recklessly young caravaners can talk. But you shall
hear....

Kink with much skill got Moses and the Slowcoach into the field and
shut the gate, and then the great carriage rocked and swayed over the
grass, making no sound but a mixture of creaking and crockery. At last
he brought it to a stand just under a tall hedge, and Moses was at once
taken out and roped to a crowbar driven in the ground.

"The first thing," said Janet, "is the fire," and Jack and Horace were
sent off to collect wood and pile it near the Slowcoach, and fix the
tripod over it. As it was quite dry, one of Mr. Scott's lighters soon
had it blazing, and Mary, as chief cook, threw quickly into the water
in the pot the large piece of brisket they had bought at Woodstock,
together with potatoes and carrots and little onions and pepper and
salt.

That done, and leaving Horace with strict orders to keep the fire fed,
the others began to unpack. First of all mackintosh sheets and rugs
were thrown on the ground round the fire, and then Robert and Jack drew
out their tent and set it up on the farther side of the fire, some four
or five yards away, so that the fire was midway between the tent and
the caravan.

The tent was similar to those which gipsies use--not with a central
pole, but stretched over half-hoops which were stuck in the ground. It
was wide enough for three boys to lie comfortably in their
sleeping-bags side by side. Gregory was to sleep in the caravan with
the girls; Kink was to go to Woodstock.

Meanwhile, with all of them, except Mary and Gregory, who had done well
with Mrs. Gosden's tea, the pangs of hunger were at work, and the steam
of the great iron pot hanging over the fire did nothing to allay them.
Mary and Janet every now and then thrust a fork into the meat, but its
resistance to the point was heart-breaking.

"Hadn't you better have some biscuits to go on with?" Janet said at
last; but the others refused. It would spoil the stew, they thought.

"At any rate," Janet said, "let's get everything ready, not only for
supper,"--you see, it wasn't called dinner any longer,--"but for
washing-up afterwards."

So Kink went off for some more water, and a large basin was set on a
box, and dishcloths were put by it; and a rackety search began for
plates, and knives and forks, and mugs, and tinned fruits, and more
plates and spoons and mo