“Well, I give up!” exclaimed Nat, the first to alight from the panting car. “If you haven’t given us a merry chase, Dorothy! We got worried after you left us and we traced you from place to place. Thought sure we’d lost you here. Oh, it was a merry chase.”
“Glad it was merry,” exclaimed Tavia, forgetting that Dorothy was to do all the talking.
“Yes, I should say it was,” put in Ned, “and she skipped off to meet you without giving us a hint—”
“Now, Ned, don’t be cross,” said Dorothy sweetly. “See what a large party you have to take home. And you must not scold the girls, for we have as much right as you boys have to take little trips together.”
The boys were too well pleased to argue or be angry. In fact, they had had a very miserable time of it since Dorothy “escaped,” as they called it. Now, they wanted nothing better than to get into the machine with the girls and make all speed for home.
“Have you room for Urania?” asked Dorothy. “Can she stand up between the seats?”
“Why, of course,” assented Ned. “Plenty of room. Get aboard everybody.”
“Let me get under the seat,” protested the Gypsy girl. “That was the way I came out.”
“So it was!” said Nat. “I’d almost forgotten about you, young lady. She’s the girl,” he went on, turning to the others, “who stole a ride with me the day I went into Dalton, Dorothy. She actually rode under the back seat where she’d hidden in the night. She made the noise we thought was a burglar, you know. She gave me the slip, though, when I went to take her back, so now she must ride in the open, where I can keep my eye on her.”
“Oh, Urania! You said—” began Dorothy, thinking of what the Gypsy girl had said about Nat taking her away.