It was in the third volume, “The Meadow-Brook girls afloat,” that Harriet Burrell and her friends were shown as encountering a considerable amount of adventure.  The girls led an eventful life on the old houseboat on one of the New Hampshire lakes, and also encountered a mystery which, with the help of the Tramp Club, was run to earth, but the solving of it entailed the loss of the “Red Rover,” their houseboat.

And now the Meadow-Brook Girls were about to spend a few weeks among the “Marvelous Crystal Hills,” as the White Mountains in New Hampshire have been aptly termed.

Much time and thought had been spent in preparing properly for this long vacation jaunt.  Camp equipage had all been overhauled, and much that would serve excellently where there was transport service had been discarded for this journey into the hills.

Resting for a while after finishing supper, the girls began to make up neat packs containing such bare equipment and food supplies as they believed to be indispensable.  Then there were the tent, blankets and cooking utensils to be looked after.  Of course, the guide would carry much of this dunnage, yet our girls were no weaklings, and no one of them expected to shirk carrying her fair share of the load.

It was after nine o’clock when Harriet and her chums finished the making-up of the packs.  Soon after a clerk knocked on the door of Miss Elting’s room.

“There’s a man below who wishes to speak with you,” the clerk informed her.

“It must be Mr. Grubb,” guessed the guardian, and left her packing to go downstairs.  She glanced into the lobby of the hotel; then, not seeing Janus there, stepped into the parlor.  A man, a stranger, was sitting near a door that led out to the hotel veranda.  In the light of the kerosene lamp that hung suspended from the ceiling she was not able to make out his features at first.  She saw that he wore a heavy black beard, that he was rather roughly dressed, but that his hands were white.

“Are you the man who wished to speak with Miss Elting?” she asked, confessing to herself that she did not wholly like the appearance of the man.

“Yes,” he answered, rising.  Now that the light fell on his face she noted that he had a low, receding forehead.  His beard covered the greater part of his face.

“About what do you wish to speak with me?”

“Well, it’s rather a delicate matter, Miss,” the man made reply, gazing down at the carpet, twisting his soft felt hat awkwardly.  “I—­I wanted to ask if you needed any assistance.”

“What do you mean?”

“You are going into the mountains?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You will need to have some one to show you the way and look after you and your party.”

“We already have engaged some one to do that.  You mean a guide, I suppose?”

He nodded.

“May I ask your name?”