, and lost
itself with a little wail of anger amongst the old tors. Then at last
came a long shout, and Dan appeared, and almost at the same moment a
drop fell smartly on Kitty's cheek, then another and another, and
suddenly a heavy downpour descended on them.

"I saw it coming," gasped Dan. "Look!" and Kitty looked across the land
stretching below, and saw rain in a dense column rushing towards them,
driven by a squall which dashed it into them pitilessly.

In little more than a moment the whole place had changed from a sunny,
idyllic little paradise to a bleak, howling wilderness, lonely, weird,
exposed to all the worst storms of heaven.

"Where are the others?" gasped Kitty, seizing some of the packages to
run with them to the cart.

"I told them not to climb up here again, but to start for home and we
would overtake them as quickly as we could. It wasn't raining then, or
I'd have told them to run to the little shanty; but I should think
they'd have the sense to do that," said Dan.

"Oh yes, I expect they are all right. Now then, run, but run
carefully," added Kitty. "All the cups are in that basket, and Aunt
Pike will be very angry if we break any."

But it was not easy to run at all, or even to hurry down that rugged
slope, while carrying five baskets and a rug or two, with a squall
catching them at every turn, and the short, dry grass becoming as
slippery as glass with the rain; but at long last they reached the foot
and the little hut, and there they found Betty struggling with all her
might to get Mokus between the shafts of the cart.

"He will have to be taken out again, I expect," said Dan in an aside to
Kitty. "She has probably done up every strap wrongly. It is good of
her, though, to try."

"I am glad she made Tony stand in under shelter," said Kitty thankfully,
as her eye fell on her little brother in the doorway of the hut.
"Where is Anna? I suppose she is inside."

"You bet," said Dan shortly. "Anna knows how to take care of herself."

But Anna was not in the shanty, or anywhere within reach of their
shouts.

"I expect she is ever so far towards home by now," said Betty absently,
quite absorbed in the interest of harnessing Mokus. "She started to
walk home as fast as ever she could. I called to her to wait, but she
wouldn't listen."

"Oh, well, it's all right; she can't miss the road, and we shall soon
overtake her," said Dan. "Now then, in you get."

It was great fun packing