“I think this is the way,” said Mabel.
“Can’t you be sure?” asked Mrs. Bonnell, a bit testily.
“Well, it looks just like it, but why don’t we see some of the trees you scratched?”
“That’s what I want to know,” put in Natalie. “Let’s sit down and rest. Then we can think better.”
She fairly “slumped” down on the grass.
“It’s damp there,” warned Mrs. Bonnell.
“I can’t help it—I’m dead tired!”
Marie walked off a little way. She went forward on the path, and then retraced her steps. When she rejoined her now silent chums there was the flush of anxiety on her cheeks.
“I—I don’t seem to remember this place,” she began. “I guess we must have taken the wrong turn some time ago. Let’s go back until we come to two paths, and then take the other.”
They retraced their steps, no one speaking much. But they came to no divergence of the path. It seemed to lead endlessly on through the woods, as though generations of patient cows had plodded their way along it. Marie who was in the advance, halted.