"I'm going to find him!" declared Bert. "Those old gypsies sha'n't have our trick dog!"
Blueberry Island was, indeed, a fine place for a camp. In the winter no one lived on it, but in the summer it was often visited by picnic parties and by those who liked to gather the blueberries which grew so plentifully, giving the island its name.
In fact, so many people came to one end of the island in the berry season that a man had set up a little stand near the shore, where he sold sandwiches, coffee, candy, and ice-cream, since many of the berry-pickers, and others who came, grew hungry after tramping through the woods.
But where Mr. Bobbsey was going to camp with his family, the berry-pickers and picnic parties seldom came, as it was on the far end of the island, so our friends would be rather by themselves, which was what they wanted.
Mr. Dalton, the man who kept the little refreshment stand, had his horse and wagon on the island, and he had agreed to haul the Bobbsey's trunks and other things to where their tents, already put up, awaited them.
"And can't we ride there in the goat wagon?" asked Freddie of his mother, as he saw Bert get up behind Whisker in the little cart.
"Yes, I think you and Flossie may ride now that we are on the island," said Mrs. Bobbsey. "Do you want to go, Nan?"
"No, I'll walk with you and daddy. I'll get enough goat rides later."
"Oh, how nice it is!" cried Mother Bobbsey when she and Nan came in sight of the tents of the camp. "I know we shall like it here!"
"I hope you will," said her husband. "And now we must see about something to eat. I suppose the children are hungry."