“It’s diapason,” said Gladys, “die-a-pacin.”
“Really!” said Nyoda, falling back in astonishment.
“We knew it all the while!” cried Sahwah and Gladys. “We just kept you doing it over and over again because we liked to see you work.”
The laugh was on Nyoda and her team all the way around. “We do this to each other!” called Sahwah, using the Indian form of taunt when one has played a successful trick on another.
“Tie the villains to a tree, and let them perish of mosquito bites,” Nyoda commanded in an awful tone. “I’ll get even with you for that, Miss Sahwah,” she said, darkly, as the other side trooped off to cook up a new poser.
“Hadn’t you better stop playing now?” inquired Mrs. Gardiner. “You know we wanted to get home before dark.”
“Oh, let’s do one more,” pleaded Migwan. If they had only stopped playing when Mrs. Gardiner suggested it and gone home early they might have been in time to prevent the thing which occurred, but they were bent on seeing one side or the other go down, and Gladys’s side prepared another charade.
“We’ve played up to your own game,” said Gladys, who was introducing the new charade, “and have increased the number to five syllables.” The actors were Mrs. Gardiner, Betty and Tom Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner was scolding the children and emphasized her remarks by a sharp pinch on Tom’s arm. Betty, seeing the maternal hand also extended in her direction, promptly climbed a tree and sat in safety, while her mother shook her finger at her and cried warningly, “I’ll attend to you after awhile.”
“What on earth?” said Nyoda, scratching her head in perplexity. But scratch as she might, no answer came, and the rest of her team had nothing to offer either. After holding out for fully fifteen minutes they were compelled to give it up.
“It’s ‘manipulator,’” cried the winning side, in chorus. “‘Ma-nip-you-later!’” And they stood around to condole while Nyoda’s side prepared supper. Then it was that Calvin, basely deserting the team he had helped so far, went over to the side of the enemy and helped Migwan fetch wood for the fire. Both sides stopped often to jeer at each other, so it took them twice as long to get the meal ready as it would have ordinarily. They loitered and sang along the way home, letting the horses take their time, and it was quite late when they reached Onoway House.