We said good-by and started for the door, but she came running after us. “Mark,” she says, “you take these gray blankets, and, mind you, bring them back again or you’ll hear from me.” Then she kissed him and flew back to her dusting again.
We had all of our things in the front yard, and it didn’t take us any time to get them packed on our backs and start for the river. It was only about half an hour’s walk, but it took us a little longer to get there on account of Mark, who wanted to rest every little while; but it wasn’t really resting he wanted; it was a piece of his mother’s cake. We ate it all up before we got to the cave at all.
We got at the cave from the top of the hill and threw our things down on the slope in front. It was a little chilly in the shade, so Mark told us to gather wood for a fire while he packed things away the way they ought to be. I guess we were gone twenty minutes. When we came back everything was just where we left it, and Mark was standing looking into the cave with his face wrinkled up like it gets when he’s puzzled.
“Been workin’ hard, ain’t you?” sings out Plunk.
Usually Mark would have said something back, but this time he didn’t. He turned around and asks, “Have any of you been here since last Saturday?”
Nobody had.
“S-somebody’s been in the cave.”
“How do you know?” I asked him.
“Things been moved around, and some p-p-potaters is gone,” he stuttered.
“Let’s look,” says Binney; and we all crowded in. Mark knew where everything ought to be, even if we didn’t, and he told us just what had been touched and what hadn’t. “He used the f-fryin’-pan,” he grumbled. “Look!”