“We couldn’t have had less,” came from Grace. “Then, often an animal will hesitate to go in any place it isn’t familiar with. Anyway, the tent was all the protection we had.”
“I suppose so,” said Mollie, wearily. She was beginning to feel dreadfully drowsy again and, if it had not been for the fact that Grace had seen exactly what she had seen, she might almost have been able to persuade herself that once more her imagination had been playing her tricks.
At the thought her eyes sprang wide open again and she stared at Grace.
“Then,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper, “I bet I did hear some one moving in the woods this morning.”
“I bet you did, too,” said Grace, moving a little further away from the flap of the tent. “Mollie, do you suppose there are tramps around here after all?”
“Looks like it,” answered Mollie, grimly, adding, with an attempt of lightness: “Just now, I wish Betty’s fake pistol were a real one.”
“Sh-h,” warned Grace. “Somebody might be listening. I thought I heard——” She drew back the tent flap ever so cautiously, but there was nothing visible. Only the mournful drip, drip of the rain from the trees came to them.
“What do you suppose they want?” whispered Grace, drawing nearer to Mollie as though for protection. “What do they mean by hanging around?”
“Oh, how do I know any better than you do?” snapped Mollie, for her nerves were beginning to show the strain they had been under. “And I don’t see why you speak in the plural, anyway. We saw only one man, didn’t we?”
“Where there’s one, there’s probably more,” remarked Grace, gloomily, at which Mollie gave a little impatient toss of her head.