The on the March Part 5 (2/2)
Tired as the girls of the Camp Fire had been the night before, they were wonderfully refreshed by their night's sleep. The weather was much more pleasant than it had been, and a brisk wind had driven off much of the smoke that still remained when they reached the Pratt farm as a reminder of the scourge of fire. So the conditions for walking were good, and Eleanor Mercer set a round, swinging pace as they started off.
”I'll really be glad to get out of this burned district. It's awfully gloomy, isn't it, Bessie?” said Dolly.
”Yes, especially when you realize what it means to the people who live in the path of the fire,” answered Bessie. ”Seeing the Pratts as they were when we came up has given me an altogether new idea of these forest fires.”
”Yes. That's what I mean. It's bad enough to see the forest ruined, but when you think of the houses, and all the other things that are burned, too, why, it seems particularly dreadful.”
”Tom Pratt told me that a whole lot of animals were caught in the fire, too--chipmunks, and squirrels, and deer. That seems dreadful.”
”Oh, what a shame! I should think they could manage to get away, Bessie. Don't you suppose they try?”
”Oh, yes, but you see they can't reason the way human beings do, and a lot of these fires burn around in a circle, so that while they were running away from one part of the fire they might very easily be heading straight for another, and get caught right between two fires.”
Soon, however, they pa.s.sed a section where the land had been cleared of trees for a s.p.a.ce of nearly a mile, and, once they had travelled through it, they came to the deep green woods again, where no marring traces of the fire spoiled the beauty of their trip.
”Ah, don't the woods smell good!” said Dolly. ”So much nicer than that old smoky smell! I never smelt anything like that! It got so that everything I ate tasted of smoke. I'm certainly glad to get to where the fire didn't come.”
Now the ground began to rise, and before long they found themselves in the beginning of Indian Gap. The ground rose gradually, and when they stopped for their midday meal, in a wild part of the gap, none of the girls were feeling more than normally and healthfully tired.
”Do many people come through here, Miss Eleanor?” asked Margery.
”At certain times, yes. But, you see, the forest fires have probably made a lot of people who intended to take this trip change their minds. In a way it's a good thing, because we will be sure to find plenty of room at the Gap House. That's where we are to spend the night. Sometimes when there's a lot of travel, it's very crowded there, and uncomfortable.”
”Is it a regular hotel?”
”No, it's just a place for people to sleep. It's where the trail starts up Mount Sherman, and it's the station of the railroad that runs to the top of the mountain, too, for people who are too lazy to climb. There's a gorgeous view there in the mornings, when the sun rises. You can see clear to the sea.”
”Oh, can't we stop and see that?”
”We haven't time to climb the mountain. If you want to go up on the incline railway, though, we can manage it. You get up at three o'clock in the morning, and get to the top while it's still dark, so that you can see the very beginning of the sunrise.”
There was not a dissenting voice to the plan to make the trip, and it was decided to take the little extra time that would be required.
”After all,” said Eleanor, ”we can get such an early start afterward that it won't take very much time. And to-morrow we'll finish our tramp through the gap, and stop at Windsor for the night. Then the next day we'll take the train straight through to the seash.o.r.e. I think really we'll have more fun, and get more good out of it if we spend the time there than if we go through with our original plan of doing more walking before getting on the train.”
”Yes. We've lost quite a little time already, haven't we?” said Margery.
”Two whole days at Lake Dean, and two days more staying with the Pratts,” said Eleanor. ”That's four days, and one can walk quite a long distance in four days if one sets one's mind and one's feet to it.”
”Well, we certainly couldn't help the delay,” said Margery. ”At Lake Dean the fire held us--and I wouldn't think very much of any crowd that could see the trouble those poor people were in and not stay to help them.”
They slept well in the early part of that night in the rough quarters at the Gap House, and, while it was still dark, they were routed out to catch the funicular railway on its first trip of the day up Mount Sherman.
At first, when they were at the top of the mountain, there was nothing to be seen. But soon the sky in the east began to lighten and grow pink, then the fog that lay below them began to melt away, and, as the sun rose, they saw the full wonder of the spectacle.
”I never saw anything so beautiful in all my life!” exclaimed Bessie with a sigh of delight. ”See how it seems to gild everything as the light rises, Dolly!”
”Yes, and you can see the sea, way off in the distance! How tiny all the towns and villages look from here! It's just like looking at a map, isn't it?”
”Well, it was certainly worth getting up in the middle of the night to see it, Bessie. And I do love to sleep, too!”
”I'd stay up all night to see this, any time. I never even dreamed of anything so lovely.”
”We were very fortunate,” said Eleanor, with a smile. ”I've been up here when the fog was so thick that you couldn't see a thing, and only knew the sun had risen because it got a little lighter. I've known it to be that way for a week at a time, and some people would stay, and come up here morning after morning, and be disappointed each time!”
”That's awfully mean,” said Dolly. ”I suppose, though, if they had never seen it, they wouldn't mind so much, because they wouldn't know what they were missing.”
”They never seemed very happy about it, though,” laughed Eleanor. ”Well, it's time to go down again, and be off for Windsor. And then to-morrow morning we'll be off for the seash.o.r.e. We're to camp there, right on the beach, instead of living in a house. That will be much better, I think.”
CHAPTER IX.
A STARTLING DISCOVERY.
”Bessie, why are you looking so glum?” asked Dolly, as they started on the last part of their walk, taking the Windsor road.
”Am I? I didn't realize I was, Dolly. But--well, I suppose it's because I'm rather sorry we're leaving the mountains.”
”I think the seash.o.r.e is every bit as nice as the mountains. There are ever so many things to do, and I know you'll like Plum Beach, where we're going. It's the dandiest place--”
”It couldn't be as nice as this, Dolly.”
”Oh, that seems funny to me, Bessie. I've always loved the seash.o.r.e, ever since I can remember. And, of course, since I've learned to swim, I've enjoyed it even more than I used to.”
”You can't swim much in the sea, can you? Isn't the surf too heavy?”
”The surf's good fun, even if you don't do any swimming in it, Bessie. It picks you up and throws you around, and it's splendid sport. But down at Plum Beach you can have either still water or surf. You see, there's a beach and a big cove--and on that beach the water is perfectly calm, unless there's a tremendous storm, and we're not likely to run into one of those.”
”How is that, Dolly? I thought there was always surf at the seash.o.r.e.”
”There's a sand bar outside the cove, and it's grown so that it really makes another beach, outside. And on that there is real surf. So we can have whichever sort of bathing we like best, or both kinds on the same day, if we want.”
”Maybe I'll like it better when I see it, then. Because I do love to swim, and I don't believe I'd enjoy just letting the surf bang me around.”
”Why, Bessie, you say you may like it better when you see it? Haven't you ever been to the seash.o.r.e?”
”I certainly never have, Dolly! You seem to forget that I've spent all the time I can remember in Hedgeville.”
”I do forget it, all the time. And do you know why? It's because you seem to know such an awful lot about other places and things you never saw there. I suppose they made you read books.”
”Made me! That was one of the things Maw Hoover used to get mad at me for doing. Whenever she saw me reading a book it seemed to make her mad, and she'd say I was loafing, and find something for me to do, even if I'd hurried through all the ch.o.r.es I had so that I could get at the book sooner.”
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