"You are the pilgrims," he called, "you must brave the thorny places of the wilderness. Young Edward and I will hold our trusty bows in reserve. If you chance upon peril, give three piercing cries,—you'd better make them two shorts and a long so we won't be led astray on other adventure and fail you in your need,—three piercing shrieks, and we'll tumble to your assistance."
Laughingly Ronald took up his post of guide, with Nancy halfway between him and the twins, while Beresford kept his two young cubs in leash by the sheer interest of his talk, and hallooed cheerfully to Mrs. Ferris to make sure that she and her mountain chair were still pursuing.
"Though fa-int, yet pursuing, we go on our way,"
he would hum, and then break off, reproaching himself with a grimace for such irreverent use of a hymn. Meanwhile the twins, satisfied with the arrangement of the party, slowly widened the interval between themselves and Nancy, very cautiously, of course, not too quickly nor too far, lest the girl suspect, yet far enough so that her walking and talking with Ronald could become the habit of the day.
"Well, here's the grove," said Ronald, at last. Nancy had been taught to call him by his name, "the communism of the family," he had assured her. "Now what shall we do?"
They waited for the party to draw up.
"I smell water," exclaimed Mrs. Ferris.
"There is a stream in a ravine close by," offered Beresford, who had explored these mountains inch by inch with his friend.
"Splendid, just the place we need for tiffin. Tiffin before temples, my dears."
They arrived at the edge of the ravine and slipped down the gravelly path to the rocks below.