We lay on the bank of the tiny lake, our backs against a huge pine-tree,
watching the last traces of colour fading from peak and tree-top.
"Isn't it queer," I said, "that not a trout has splashed? It can't be
that there are no fish in the lake."
"There _are_ such lakes."
"Yes, very deep ones. I wonder how deep this is."
"We'll be out at sunrise with our reel of piano wire and take soundings,"
he said. "The heavy artillery won't wake until they're ready to be loaded
with flap-jacks."
I shuddered:
"They're fearsome creatures, Brown. Somehow, that resolute and bony one
has inspired me with a terror unutterable."
"Mrs. Batt?"
"Yes."
He said seriously:
"She'll make a horrid outcry when she asks for her knitting. What are you
going to tell her?"
"I shall say that Indians ambuscaded us while she was asleep, and carried
off all those things."
"You lie very nicely, don't you?" he remarked admiringly.
"_In vitium ducit culpae fuga_," said I. "Besides, they don't really need
those articles."
He laughed. He didn't seem to be very much afraid of Mrs. Batt.
It had grown deliciously dusky, and myriads of stars were coming out.
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