Chapter I.

       Preparation and Departure

       Table of Contents

      ‘One to make ready, and two to prepare.’

      It was nine o’clock one sunny California morning, and Geoffrey Strong stood under the live-oak trees in Las Flores Cañon, with a pot of black paint in one hand and a huge brush in the other. He could have handled these implements to better purpose and with better grace had not his arms been firmly held by three laughing girls, who pulled not wisely, but too well. He was further incommoded by the presence of a small urchin who lay on the dusty ground beneath his feet, fastening an upward clutch on the legs of his trousers.

      There were three large canvas tents directly in front of them, yet no one of these seemed to be the object of dissension, but rather a redwood board, some three feet in length, which was nailed on a tree near by.

      ‘Camp Frolic! Please let us name it Camp Frolic!’ cried Bell Winship, with a persuasive twitch of her cousin’s sleeve.

      ‘No, no; not Camp Frolic,’ pleaded Polly Oliver. ‘Pray, pray let us have Camp Ha-Ha; my heart is set upon it.’

      ‘As you are Strong, be merciful,’ quoted Margery Noble, coaxingly; ‘take my advice and call it Harmony Camp.’

      At this juncture, a lovely woman, whose sweet face and smile made you love her at once, came up the hill from the brookside. ‘What, what! still quarrelling, children?’ she asked, laughingly. ‘Let me be peacemaker. I’ve just asked the Doctor for a name, and he suggests Camp Chaparral. What do you say?’

      Bell released one coat-tail. ‘That isn’t wholly bad,’ she said, critically, while the other girls clapped their hands with approval; for anything that Aunt Truth suggested was sure to be quite right.

      ‘Wait a minute, good people,’ cried Jack Howard, flinging his fishing-tackle under a tree and sauntering toward the scene of action. ‘Suppose we have a referee, a wise and noble judge. Call Hop Yet, and let him decide this all-important subject.’

      His name being sung and shouted in various keys by the assembled company, Hop Yet appeared at the door of the brush kitchen, a broad grin on his countenance, a plucked fowl in his hand.

      Geoffrey took the floor. ‘Now, Hop Yet, you know I got name, you got name, everybody got name. We want name this camp: you sabe? Miss Bell, she say Camp Frolic. Frolic all same heap good time’ (here he executed a sort of war-dance which was intended to express wild joy). ‘Miss Pauline, she say Camp Ha-Ha, big laugh: sabe? Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!’ (chorus joined in by all to fully illustrate the subject). ‘Miss Madge, she say Camp Harmony. Harmony all same heap quiet time, plenty eat, plenty drink, plenty sleep, no fight, no too muchee talk. Mrs. Winship, she say Camp Chaparral: you sabe? Chaparral, Hop Yet. Now what you say?’

      Hop Yet seemed to regard the question with mingled embarrassment and amusement, but being a sharp and talkative Chinaman gave his answer promptly: ‘Me say Camp Chap-lal heap good name; plenty chap-lal all lound; me hang um dish-cloth, tow’l, little boy’s stockin’, on chap-lal; all same clo’se-line velly good. Miss Bell she folic, Miss Polly she ha! ha! allee same Camp Chap-lal.’

      And so Camp Chaparral it was; the redwood board flaunted the assertion before the eyes of the public (which was a rather limited one, to be sure) in less than half an hour, and the artist, after painting the words in rustic letters a foot long, cut branches of the stiff, ungracious bushes and nailed them to the tree in confirmation and illustration of the fact. He then carefully deposited the paint-pot in a secret place, where it might be out of sight and touch of a certain searching eye and mischievous hand well known and feared of him; but before the setting sun had dropped