Page:Betty Gordon at Mountain Camp.djvu/186

176 Bobby. "Bees could crawl in through the gimlet holes and sting her."

"I'd like to have seen her jumping that fire on horseback," sighed Libbie. "It must have been wonderful!"

Mr. Gordon looked rather disturbed as he stared at his niece.

"That's exactly what I shouldn't want to see her do," he said. "I do not know what I am going to do if, as she gets older, she grows more energetic," he added to Mr. and Mrs. Canary. "Betty is more than a handful for a poor bachelor uncle, I do believe!"

He forbade any more excursions away from the camp after that unless the excursionists took some adult person with them. He went himself to Candace Farm to see Hunchie Slattery; but he took only Ida Bellethorne with him. They went on their snowshoes. During this trip Mr. Gordon won the abiding confidence of the girl.

Meanwhile the youthful visitors at Mountain Camp allowed no hour to be idle. There was always something to do, and what one could not think of in the way of fun another could.

Mr. Canary's men had smoothed a coasting course down the hillside to the lake not a quarter of a mile from the Overlook. There was a nest of toboggans in one of the outhouses. Tobogganing afforded the nine young people much sport.