"Let's walk up that way ourselves," she suggested.
Climbing the school fence at the edge of the lake, they followed a little creek, which, though shallow in many places, could still be navigated by a canoe.
"Why didn't any of us ever think of this?" remarked Marjorie. "I've never had the canoe off the lake."
"Couldn't we try it to-morrow?" asked Alice, wondering whether it were quite the thing for her to suggest.
"Yes, I'd love to!" replied Marjorie. But her expression grew sad again, as she recalled the circumstances which led them on this walk of exploration.
The woods were wonderful now, dressed in their gorgeously colored foliage. Brown, orange, scarlet, with just enough somber evergreen to set off the brilliancy of the other trees by contrast, the scene was at the height of its splendor. But so intent were the girls upon watching the water, they hardly noticed the spectacle.
"Look! Look!" cried Alice suddenly. "There—around that bend! Isn't that the end of a canoe?"
Marjorie held her hand to her forehead, and shaded her eyes in an effort to distinguish the object in the distance. But, although she saw what Alice meant, it was too far off for identification. In their eagerness, the girls started to run.
Marjorie was the first to stop, realizing her mistake.
"It's a dead tree trunk!" she gasped, out of breath from the exertion.