better after a good meal and a rest. Here Margery." Harriet
spread a blanket, which Buster welcomed by promptly crawling over to it
and lying down. "The rock is awfully hard," she complained.

"Never mind, dearie; we'll pour some water on it and soften it for
you," comforted Jane McCarthy.

"Speaking of water, that reminds me: Where are we to get our water for
the coffee?" questioned Harriet.

"There's a spring on the other side of these rocks. There isn't much
water in it, but I reckon there will be enough for us. Never mind.
Don't you get it. Don't you go puttering around where you can't see,"
Janus warned.

A little blaze sprang up from the pile of sticks he had heaped and
fired with a match. The light from the fire soon threw the outer world
into black darkness. They could not make it seem possible that there,
almost within reach of their hands, was a precipice dropping down
nearly two hundred feet. But the thought caused them to keep well to
the rear of the shelf.

The guide gathered the cups, and, with these and the coffee pot, went
to the spring, a mere trickle in the rocks, where he first filled the
coffee pot, then the cups, carrying them back and placing them in a row
against the wall. Harriet put the water over the fire to boil. Miss
Elting sliced the bacon, while Jane prepared some rice for boiling.
The latter occupied considerable time in cooking and was not
particularly palatable. Janus said that in the morning they would cook
enough of it to last for a day or two.

Hazel put the bacon in the frying pan. Each one, except Margery, found
something to do and found joy in the doing despite their aches and
pains, from which not a member of the Meadow-Brook party was free that
evening. The climbing had brought into activity little used muscles,
as the girls had by this time discovered.

The supper was late that evening. Janus had brought the small lantern.
This he secured above their heads by thrusting a stick into a crevice
and suspending the lantern from it, thus shedding a little light
besides that given off by the campfire. The party sat down with their
feet curled under them and thoroughly enjoyed the somewhat slender meal.

"How good everything does taste!" remarked Margery.

Jane averred that Margery's accident had done her good.

"I've been thinking about the accident to our guide," said Miss Elting.
"I don't know yet how it occurred."

"I caught my foot on a nub," Tommy info