“She wants to get us out of the way, Miss Lizzie,” she said.  “Can you imagine what mischief she’s up to?”

“That is not a polite way to speak of Miss Tish, Hutchins,” I said coldly.  Nevertheless, my heart sank.

Hutchins and I carried the canoe.  It was a hot day and there was no path.  Aggie, who likes a cup of hot tea at five o’clock, had brought along a bottle filled with tea, and a small basket containing sugar and cups.

Personally I never had less curiosity about a lake.  As a matter of fact I wished there was no lake.  Twice—­being obliged, as it were, to walk blindly and the canoe being excessively heavy—­I, who led the way, ran the front end of the thing against the trunk of a tree, and both Hutchins and I sat down violently, under the canoe as a result of the impact.

To add to the discomfort of the situation Aggie declared that we were being followed by a bear, and at the same instant stepped into a swamp up to her knees.  She became calm at once, with the calmness of despair.

“Go and leave me, Lizzie!” she said.  “He is just behind those bushes.  I may sink before he gets me—­that’s one comfort.”

Hutchins found a log and, standing on it, tried to pull her up; but she seemed firmly fastened.  Aggie went quite white; and, almost beside myself, I poured her a cup of hot tea, which she drank.  I remember she murmured Mr. Wiggins’s name, and immediately after she yelled that the bear was coming.

It was, however, the detective who emerged from the bushes.  He got Aggie out with one good heave, leaving both her shoes gone forever; and while she collapsed, whimpering, he folded his arms and stared at all of us angrily.

“What sort of damnable idiocy is this?” he demanded in a most unpleasant tone.

Aggie revived and sat upright.

“That’s our affair, isn’t it?” said Hutchins curtly.

“Not by a blamed sight!” was his astonishing reply.

“The next time I am sinking in a morass, let me sink,” Aggie said, with simple dignity.

He did not speak another word, but gave each of us a glance of the most deadly contempt, and finished up with Hutchins.

“What I don’t understand,” he said furiously, “is why you have to lend yourself to this senile idiocy.  Because some old women choose to sink themselves in a swamp is no reason why you should commit suicide!”

Aggie said afterward only the recollection that he had saved her life prevented her emptying the tea on him.  I should hardly have known Hutchins.

“Naturally,” she said in a voice thick with fury, “you are in a position to insult these ladies, and you do.  But I warn you, if you intend to keep on, this swamp is nothing.  We like it here.  We may stay for months.  I hope you have your life insured.”

Perhaps we should have understood it all then.  Of course Charlie Sands, for whom I am writing this, will by this time, with his keen mind, comprehend it all; but I assure you we suspected nothing.