"Oh, I am not at all anxious to be rid of you," laughed Stane, "but I cannot help wondering whether we have not taken the wrong turn. You see, if we have, every yard takes us further from your uncle's camp."
"But this is the way to Fort Winagog?" asked the girl.
"It is the only way I know."
"Then we must be going right, for I distinctly heard my uncle say we were within a day's journey of the place."
"The thing that worries me is that we have met no one looking for you."
"No doubt they will thoroughly search the neighbourhood of the camp and the beaver-dam before going further afield. Also, you must remember that it might be dinner-time last night before I was missed."
"Yes," he agreed, "that is very likely. On which bank of the river was the camp?"
"This bank—the left coming down."
"Then we will hug the shore this afternoon, and no doubt we shall find it before supper-time."
But in that anticipation he was mistaken. The long day drew to its close and the camp they sought had not appeared; nor had any search-party materialized. As they pitched camp for the night, the doubt which all day had been in Stane's mind became a certainty.