Page:Jackson Gregory--joyous trouble maker.djvu/123

Rh who came out in response to the drumming of the motor Beatrice spoke briefly.

"There is a man named Steele camping up by the Goblet. You are to sell him no supplies of any sort, to see so far as in your power that he gets no provisions or tools here. If so much as a tin of tobacco goes to him out of Camp Corliss you can ask for your time. That's all. Drive on, Parker."

From the camp, weaving in and out of cañons, densely wooded, murmurous with wilderness sounds, they mounted to the graded roadway leading to Summit City, climbed steeply through the further wooded slopes with nothing but the roadbed under them to give sign that they were not in the heart of a vast forest many miles from human habitation. Then, suddenly, having at last climbed to the crest of the ridge, they burst from the stronghold of the wild into as pretty, as spick and span a little hamlet as one could imagine outside an artist's folio given over to picturesque and charming villages. Perched high above the surrounding broken country, each and every detail lingeringly and lovingly gone over by its maker before it leaped forth into actual birth from Sydney Perrier's water-colours, Summit City was at once as pure a surprise here and as purely in harmony with its environment as any unexpected Alpine village. Beatrice's eyes brightened as they always did at the first steep-roofed, leaded-windowed cottage.

Now, under the rolling wheels of the car was a smooth gravelled road, young firs in proper rows stood on either