bees were, however, they could not keep her thoughts from turning to the Winnebagos afloat on the river, and it was a very doleful face that bent over the flowers. Her dismal reflections were interrupted by the sharp voice of Aunt Phoebe calling her to come in. "What is it?" she asked listlessly, as she came up on the porch.

"Mrs. Evans is here," said her aunt in the doorway, "and she has asked to see you." Hinpoha was very glad to see Mrs. Evans, who rose smilingly and took her hands in hers.

"How thin you are getting, child!" she exclaimed, smoothing back the red curls. "I don't believe you get out enough. By the way," she said to Aunt Phoebe, "may I borrow this girl for to-day? I have considerable driving about to do and it is rather tiresome going alone. Gladys has gone on an all-day boat ride."

Aunt Phoebe could not very well refuse, for driving about in a machine with an older woman was a very proper form of recreation indeed, in her estimation.

Hinpoha flew upstairs and deposited her bottle of bees on the table in her room for future observation and started off with Mrs. Evans. "We will not be back for lunch, and possibly not for supper," said Gladys's mother as she bade Aunt Phoebe a gracious good-bye, "but it will not be long after that."

"And now for a grand spin," she said, as she started the car and sent it crackling through the dry leaves on the pavement.

"Now I see why the Indians named this river 'Cuyahoga,' or 'Crooked,'" said Migwan, as they rounded bend after bend in the stream. "It coils back on itself like a snake, and I have already counted seven coils within the city limits. I didn't believe it when the captain of a freighter told me that there was a place in the river which his boat couldn't pass because two sharp turns came so near together, but now I see how that could easily be possible."

As the launch putt-putt-putt-ed steadily up the river the water gradually became less black, and the factories along the shore gave way to open stretches of country. By noon they reached the dam and went ashore to look for a place to build a fire. They were in a deep gorge, its steep sides thickly covered with flaming maples and oaks, and brilliant sumachs, stretching on either side as far as they could reach. "It's too gorgeous to seem real," said Nyoda, shading her eyes and looking down the valley; "where does Mother Nature keep her pot of 'Diamond Dyes' in the summer time?"

High up along the top of one of the cliffs a narrow road wound along, and as Nyoda stood looking into the distance she saw an automobile coming along this road. When it was directly above her it stopped and two people got out, a woman and a girl. The sunlight fell on a mass of red curls on the girl's head. "Hinpoha!" exclaimed Nyoda in amazement. From above came floating down a far-echoing yodel—the familiar Winnebago call. The girls all looked up in surprise to see Hinpoha scrambling down the face of the cliff, and aiding Mrs. Evans to descend.

"Why, mother!" called Gladys, running up to meet her.

The surprise at the meeting was mutual. Mrs. Evans, spinning along the country roads, had no idea she was hard on the trail of her daughter and the other Winnebagos until she came suddenly upon them after they had gotten out of the launch. "Can't you stay and spend the day with us, now that you're here?" they pleaded.

Hinpoha's longing soul looked out of her eyes, but she answered, "I'm afraid not. Aunt Phoebe wouldn't approve."

"Did she say you couldn't?" asked Sahwah.

"No," said Hinpoha, "for I never even asked her if I might go along with you in the launch. I knew it would be no use."

"Oh, please stay," tempted some of the girls; "your aunt'll never know the difference."

"Oh, I couldn't do that," said Hinpoha in a tone of horror. A little approving smile crept around the corners of Nyoda's eyes as she heard Hinpoha so resolutely bidding Satan get behind her. Mrs. Evans was genuinely sorry they had encountered the girls, because it made it so much harder for Hinpoha.

"I wonder," she said musingly, "if I drove on to a house in the road and telephoned your aunt that she would let you stay?"

"You might try," said Hinpoha doubtfully. Mrs. Evans thought it was worth trying. She found a house with a telephone and got Aunt Phoebe on the wire. With the utmost tact she explained how they had met the girls accidently, and that she had taken a notion that she would like to spend the day with them, but of course she could not do so unless Hinpoha would be allowed to stay with her, as she had charge of her for the day. What was Aunt Phoebe to do? She was not equal to telling the admired Mrs. Evans to forego her pleasure because of Hinpoha, and gave a grudging consent to her keeping her niece with her on the condition that she would bring her home in the machine and not let her come back in the launch with the Winnebagos. Jubilant, they returned to the girls in the gorge and told the good news.

"Cheer for Mrs. Evans," cried Sahwah, and the Winnebagos gave it with a hearty good will.

Hinpoha, with Sahwah close beside her, began I searching for firewood industriously. "It seems just like last summer," she said, chopping sticks with Sahwah's hatchet. The two had wandered off a short distance from the others, following a tiny footpath. Suddenly they came upon a huge rock formation, that looked like an immense fireplace, about forty feet wide and twenty or more feet high. Under that great stone arch a dozen spits, each big enough to hold a whole ox, might easily have swung. Sahwah and Hinpoha looked at it in amazement and then called for the other girls to come and see.

"Why, that's the 'Old Maid's Kitchen,'" said Mrs. Evans, when she arrived on the scene. "I've been here before. Just why it should be called the Old Maid's Kitchen is more than I can tell, for it looks like the fireplace belonging to the grand-mother of all giantesses."

"Let's build our fire inside of it," said Nyoda.

"The original 'Old Maid' had a convenience that didn't usually go with open fireplaces," said Gladys, "and that is running water," and she held her cup under a tiny stream that trickled out between two rocks, cold as ice and clear as crystal.

"Wouldn't this be a grand place for a Ceremonial Meeting?" said Migwan, as they all stood round the blazing fire roasting "wieners" and bacon. The Kitchen had a floor of smooth slabs of rock, and the arch of the fireplace formed a roof over their heads, while its wide opening afforded them a wonderful view of the gorge.

"Whenever you want to come here again, just say so," said Mrs. Evans, "and I'll bring you down in the machine." Mrs. Evans was enjoying herself as much as any of the girls. It was the first time she had ever cooked wieners and bacon over an open fire on green sticks, and she was perfectly delighted with the experience. "If my husband could only see me now," she said, laughing like a girl as she dropped her last wiener in the dirt and calmly washed it off in the trickling stream. "How good this hot cocoa tastes!" she exclaimed, drinking down a whole cupful without stopping. "What kind is it?"

"Camp Fire Girl Cocoa," answered the girls.

"What kind is that?" asked Mrs. Evans.

"It is a brand that is put up by a New York firm for the Camp Fire Girls to sell," answered Nyoda.

"Why have we never had any of this at our house?" asked Mrs. Evans, turning to Gladys.

"You have always insisted that you would use no other kind than Van Horn's," replied Gladys, "so I thought there would be no use in mentioning it."

"I