"Then why didn't they say so, instead of telling such a tale about catching the echo?" Dorothy asked.
"They were saying that they wanted to find the hut, and hunt in it, and around it ter find things the old fellow may have hidden. They feared you or Miss Nancy might tell some other lad. They're wanting it all to themselves."
Having told this bit of information, the groom allowed the carriage to pass him, and once more rode behind it.
The two little girls talked of the long tramp that the boys would have before they would find the hermit's hut.
"And perhaps they won't find it at all, after all their hunting," said Nancy.
"Well, I hope they will," said Dorothy, "because it's so horrid to hunt and hunt, for nothing."
"Oh, look!" she cried a moment later. "See the lovely mosses! Let's take some back to mamma and Aunt Charlotte."
They were, indeed, beautiful. There was green moss that looked like velvet, and gray moss formed like tiny cups with scarlet edges, and other moss tipped with red.
On an old stump they found shell-like fungus, some a creamy white, others white, with soft brown markings.
Oh, a fine collection of rarely beautiful mosses and lichens they gathered, and heaped on the bottom of the phaeton.