“Oh, they must, indeed!” said Eleanor, remorsefully.  “And here we’ve been listening to them, and letting them talk while they were starving.”

She turned toward the fire, but already two of the guides had leaped forward, and in a moment the smell of crisp bacon filled the air, and coffee was being made.

“Oh, how good that smells!” said Dolly.  “I am hungry, but it was so exciting, remembering everything that happened, that I forgot all about it!  Isn’t it funny?  I was dreadfully scared when I was alone there, and again afterward, when we thought we were safe, and that horrid man caught us.

“But now that it’s all over, it seems like good fun.  If one only knew that everything was coming out all right when things like that happen, one could enjoy them while they were going on, couldn’t one?  But when one is frightened half to death there isn’t much chance to think of how nice it’s going to be when it’s all over, and you’re safe at home again.”

“That’s just the trouble with adventures, Dolly,” said Eleanor.  “You never can be sure that they will come out all right, and lots of times they don’t.  It’s like the thrilling story that the man told about being chased by the bear.”

“What was that, Miss Eleanor?”

“Well, he told about how the bear chased him, and he got into a trap, and the bear was between him and the only way of getting out, and it seemed to him as if he was going to be killed.  So they asked him what happened; how he got away?”

“And how did he?”

“He said he didn’t; that the bear ate him up!”

“Miss Eleanor,” said Andrew, the old chief guide, as the two girls began ravenously to eat the tempting camp meal that the other guides had so quickly prepared, “we’ve got something more to do here.”

Eleanor looked at him questioningly.

“We’ve got to find that gypsy,” he said, “and see that he spends the night in jail, where he belongs.  If I’m not mistaken, he’ll spend a good many nights and days there, too, after he’s been tried.”

“I suppose he must be caught and taken to a place where he can be tried,” said Eleanor.  “I don’t like the idea of revenge, but—­”

“But this ain’t revenge, Miss Eleanor.  If you was a-goin’ to say that you was quite right.  It’s self protection, and protection for young girls everywhere.”

“Yes, you’re right, Andrew.  Well, what do you want me to do?  I am afraid I wouldn’t be touch good in helping you to catch him.”

Andrew laughed heartily.

“I ain’t sayin’ that, ma’am, but there’s men enough of us to catch him, all right.  Maybe you didn’t notice it, but I sent out some of the men ’most as soon as they got here, just so’s they’d be able to fix things for him to have to stay where we could catch him.  Trouble is, none of us don’t know him when we see him.  I was wonderin’—­”

“Oh, no, not now, Andrew.  I know what you mean.  You want the girls to go with you, so as to point him out, don’t you?  But they’re so tired, I’m sure they couldn’t do any more tramping today.”