“A what?” cried Lil, dropping the fishpole.
“A snapping turtle,” explained Bobby. “Now you have caught it! I’ll lose hook and all, like enough.”
She jerked the turtle ashore. Lil had seen only its reptilian head. The beast proved to be more than a foot across.
“Makes bully soup,” said the practical Bobby. “But he won’t willingly let go of that bait and the hook in a month of Sundays.”
She ran up to the camp and came flying back in a minute with the camp-hatchet. Lil grew bold 107 enough to hold the line taut. The turtle pulled back, and Bobby caught it just right and cut its head off!
Although Lonesome Liz had never seen a turtle before, she managed to clean it and with Mrs. Morse’s advice made a pot of soup. Lizzie was getting bolder as the hours passed; but she announced to Laura that she believed there must be “ha’nts” in the woods.
“What is a haunt?” asked Laura, curiously.
“Dead folks that ain’t contented in their minds,” declared the queer girl.
“And why should the spirits of the dead haunt these woods?” asked Laura. “Seems to me it’s an awfully out of the way place for dead people to come to.”
But Lizzie would not give up her belief in the “spooks.”