Lydia scarcely heard him.  “John Levine!” she murmured.  “My best friend!  Oh, I can’t believe it.”

“Shucks!  Why, that’s life!  Gee, what rich pickings!  Me for the real estate business!”

“Kent, it’s stealing, just as my squaw said.  And it’s just the meanest, dirtiest kind of stealing!”

“It’s nothing of the kind.  The whites have got to have that land and if a lot of sentimental grannies won’t let us get it openly, we’ve got to get it quietly.”

They were nearing the camp now and Kent stopped and in the moonlight took Lydia by the shoulders.  “Look here, Lyd, don’t you tell a soul about what we saw.  Promise me!”

“I’ll do nothing of the kind,” snapped Lydia.

The two stood staring at each other.  The lad, tall and broad, his dark face tense; the girl, slender, her fair hair shimmering, her eyes clear in the moonlight.

“Promise!” repeated Kent.

“I will not!” returned Lydia.

Kent’s hold on her shoulders tightened.  He wanted to box her ears and yet, as he gazed at the wistful, sensitive lips, he felt a sudden desire to kiss her.

“Well, promise me, you’ll say nothing while we’re in camp, anyhow.”

Lydia hesitated.  After all, she thought, to whom could she tell the story and what could any one do!  “All right, I’ll promise that,” she agreed, slowly.

Kent took his hands from her shoulders.  “Come on then, old lady.  Gee, this beats hanging poor old Florence Dombey under the willows.  Give me your hand and I’ll tow you along.”

It was scarcely nine o’clock, after all, when they trudged into the camp.  Charlie and Gustus came in a moment later, having heard Miss Towne’s call.

“Oh, Lydia!  Lydia!  I’ve worried myself sick.”  And the cruel Miss Towne, the grouchy Miss Towne, threw her arms about Lydia, with a little murmur that was curiously like a sob.

“We were just going to the settlement for help,” said Charlie, “though we were pretty sure nothing serious could have happened.”

“Of course nothing serious!” protested Kent.  “We were too smart to follow the roads and got lost going and coming.  We waited for the moon to come up and we haven’t had anything to eat but chewing gum.”

“We saved your supper,” said Margery.  “Come on, Gustus, we’ll heat it for ’em.”

“Margery’d be a real human being, if she’d stay away from her mother,” observed Kent.  “For the love of Mike, let me sit down!”

“Here, get in the hammock and let me fix the cushions for you!” cried Olga, who had been eying Lydia closely.

“Thanks, I prefer the dining-room bench, right now,” returned Kent.  “Come on, Lyd.  Food!”

Lydia was tired the next day and elected to stay in camp with Miss Towne while the others, including even Margery and Gustus, went on an all day strawberry hunt.

Lydia lay in a hammock with a book all the morning, but the greater part of the time, Miss Towne observed, her eyes were fastened broodingly on the lake and not on the printed page.  The two went bathing alone, at noon, and afterward lay on the grassy shore, drying their hair.