both boys seemed to waken at the same instant next morning. the birds were singing all round them; the light was dancing on the river; the chase stood out before them framed in a cloudless blue sky, and the camp-fire was practically out!
but a little energy soon put that right. a few red-hot cinders still remained, and last night's heap of dead wood served as morning fuel. very soon the fire was crackling away merrily enough. "isn't this a1 and o.k.?" shouted peter, splashing in the river. "hurray and hurroosh! oh, isn't a night-camp grand? i could eat my breakfast, though, at any minute you like to name."
"we'll have to catch and cook it first," said his brother. but when, after a ten minutes' swim, the boys returned to the camp-fire it was to find jan, the good fairy, in charge. "breakfast at the cottage for me!" she repeated indignantly; "what an idea! i'm camping out as much as you are! i'm cook, too, aren't i? no,—if you'll only just go off for five minutes and fetch fuel or something, i'll have hot tea ready by then."
in five minutes she was as good as her word; a dixie full of hot tea for each awaited them, and the remains of the loaf and the butter. "there's not very much," jan announced to the approaching pair, "but i thought we wanted to be self-supporting now we've begun, so i just brought a few tea-leaves along, and——"
"right you are. so we will be"—the boys produced a pretty good cupful of wild raspberries. "if we can't make a good breakfast on these——!" they said. and the meal in the open air, of bread and butter and wild fruit, was not to be despised. hardly was it over when the horn sounded on the other side of the water. "there's mother. we'll tidy up the camp and make up to-day's arrangements when we've heard what she has to say," said robin as they raced off.
the morning bulletin was good. dick's attack was evidently slight—he had had a good night; and it seemed a very mild sort of scarlet fever, so the children's mother informed them. "he doesn't seem to have caught cold on the journey, for which i am thankful; but the queer thing is that donald hasn't got it, evidently, after all. his headache was a bilious attack. your aunt writes that he will travel to-morrow. i shall have to wire to put him off, of course, but it's just possible that he may escape altogether."
"i say, if he does, what a time he'll have! no dick; no us; no holiday; no nothing!" said peter commiseratingly. "poor chap, he's worse off than us."
"yes, indeed," mrs. vaughan smiled. "in fact you three look as though you were enjoying yourselves. how is the camp prospering, robin, and how did you all sleep?"
"jolly well." they were unanimous. "i saw your light, mother," added jan, "in the window."
"my light, dear!" mrs. vaughan looked surprised; "my room looks out on the other side. i put out no lamp," she added when jan had told her story; "you must have been mistaken."
"quite mysterious," said peter teasingly.
"something else happened that seemed a bit mysterious at the time, didn't it, old chap?" said robin, paying off jan's score. "what about the noise at midnight?"
"why, i'd forgotten all about it. so there was!" peter broke into his story, and the experience lost nothing in the telling: "bang, bang! thump, thump! ting, ting! it went," quoth he, "right through my head."
his mother laughed. "the effect of the late supper, my dear; probably both mysteries come from the same cause. well, i must go. robin, remember you're in charge."
"all right, mother, but everything's going spiffingly, really," her eldest son assured her.
the day was a busy one. first of all, the camp had to be cleared as the captain commanded. then came the making of the day's arrangements, and the procuring of supplies. potatoes could be bought from a neighbouring farm; eggs also; butter and bread and tea from the village shop over the river. jan was anxious to try her hand at a stew, and the meat for this had to be procured. mrs. brown's chores had to be put in hand too; old brown was away early and the boys were anxious, as scouts, to do as many good turns as they could for the kind old dame in return for her good services to them. her wood was collected, and her kindling was chopped; her stores were brought in from the neighbouring shop; half-an-hour's work was put in on mending up the fence of her little garden. "and we'll have a go at earthing up your potatoes, brownie, while we're on the island," said robin.
after dinner and a rest the making of the "regular" hut began; the bivouac was only to be used until better accommodation was ready. a solid piece of work the making of the "pioneer hut"—as the boys called it—promised to be. first of all, a framework of tough ash branches, each one carefully chosen, would be needed; the ends of each must be pointed and fixed into holes in the ground, dug opposite to each other in two parallel lines, so that the whole framework, when completed, would look like a line of steady deeply-driven half-hoops of ash. a very strong branch had to be lashed to the top of the half-hoops to hold the whole together, and this must all be tested and tried before the thatching was even begun.
"the whole thing will take some days at least," robin remarked to his fellow-campers as they sat round their fire.
"and when that's done, what'll we do next, i wonder?" remarked peter.
but a great many things were going to be done that no one among the campers had any expectation of whatever!
