can’t fix it up now.”
Laughing and joking, as gay as the spring all around them, they swung briskly along the state road until they reached Tretton Woods; then they plunged in among the feathered trees.
“Oh!” cried Patricia. “Arbutus! The darlings!” Sinking down upon a bed of last year’s leaves, she tenderly plucked a couple of sprays. “It always seems a pity to tear up a whole lot of it,” she observed, handing one piece to Jack, and fastening the other in her own buttonhole.
A little deeper in the woods they came upon a merry little stream.
“Look, Pat,” exulted Jack, “at that brook. Let’s make a dam—”
“And a lake?” concluded Patricia, eagerly.
Like two children they worked happily until a wide pond spread out in a fern bordered hollow.
“Isn’t that lovely?” rejoiced Patricia, gazing proudly at the result of their labor.
“It sure is! Gosh, Pat, look!” holding out his watch.
“Half past five? It can’t be. How I wish now I’d brought the car.”
“No, you don’t, young lady!” contradicted Jack masterfully. “A hike’s made on two feet, not on four wheels.”
“We’ll be late for dinner—”
“Never mind. I’ll take you somewhere to eat.”
“Like this?” looking down at her soiled hands and muddy skirt.
“Sure.”
On the way out of the woods, Patricia’s attention was caught by a cluster of cup-like white flowers. “Aren’t those pretty, Jack? Let’s take them home as a souvenir. We’ve lost our arbutus.”
Both stooped to gather a handful as quickly as possible.
“Oh, the nasty things!” cried Patricia. “Their stems are just full of red juice.”
“Looks for all the world like blood,” commented the boy, dropping his flowers into the stream, which quickly whirled them away, and wiping his hands on his handkerchief. Patricia followed his example.
“It’s awful stuff to get off,” complained Patricia, still rubbing her hands vigorously, as they stepped out upon the state road almost under the wheels of a motorcycle.
“Good Heavens, girl! Watch your step. That was a narrow shave.”
“I’ll say it was. Why, it’s coming back,” added Patricia, as the car wheeled about and approached them again.
“They’re troopers,” breathed Jack, as the car stopped beside them.
Two young men gazed searchingly at the two disheveled figures before them.
“What have you been doing?” demanded the man in the side car.
“Gathering wild flowers in the woods,” replied the girl promptly.
“Then where are they?” asked the other trooper, fixing his eyes on the red-stained handkerchiefs.
“Some we lost, and some we threw away,” said Jack.
“Give me those handkerchiefs,” ordered the red-haired trooper, hopping nimbly out of the side car.
In speechless astonishment the hikers handed the crumpled rags to the man, who took them to the driver of the motorcycle, and both troopers examined them carefully.
“Blood, without a doubt,” stated the auburn-haired man. “Guess we’ve made our catch. They certainly answer to the description of Crack Mayne and his pal, Angel. You’re under arrest,” he continued, turning toward the couple.
“What utter nonsense!” exploded Jack angrily, but Patricia laid her hand on his arm.
“We got those stains from flower stems,” she stated calmly.
“You’ll have to show us.”
“We can’t, now.”
“Why not?”
“Because we picked them all, and when we found that our hands were stained we threw the flowers away.”
“Oh, yeah? Where did you throw them?” asked the driver, getting off and starting towards the woods.
“They’ve gone down the stream,” giggled Patricia, her sense of humor unwisely getting the upper hand.
In later days, when Jack wanted to tease her, he always said that Patricia’s giggle sealed their fate.
“Quite clear they’ve been up to something,” muttered the red-haired trooper; “maybe a murder. You take ’em in, and I’ll poke about in there to see what I can find. Send Murphy out for me as soon as you get in.”
Patricia and Jack were hustled into the side car, and rushed off toward town. Soon Jack took from his pocket a pencil and an envelope.
“Better give middle names at the station,” he scribbled rather illegibly, due to the motion of the car. “Keep college out of it.”
Patricia nodded; then Jack tore the envelope into little pieces, which the wind eagerly snatched from his hand and bore away.
At the station, they registered as Peter Dunn and Alice Randall. The stained handkerchiefs were laid aside for expert examination, and the charges recorded.
“Now may we go?” asked Jack, with elaborate innocence.
“Why, sure,” replied the sergeant sarcastically. “Just walk right out.”
“Hullo, Mac,” drawled an exceedingly tall, solemn-looking youth, letting the street door close with a bang. “What have you for me tonight?”
“Only a couple of—” he began.
The newcomer took one look at the pair; then announced without a trace of surprise: “You’re Jack Dunn, the football player.”
“Twin cousin,” corrected Jack gravely.
“Oh, yeah!”
“Haven’t you ever seen cousins who looked just alike?” inquired Jack, raising his eyebrows in astonishment. “I have.”
“That may be, but I didn’t see you on the field and off of it last fall for nothing. What’s the racket?”
Before Jack could reply, the sergeant irritably gave the desired information, the last of which was drowned by a bark of laughter from the human bean pole.
“This is rich! This is just too rich!” he chortled. “Brave troopers arrest couple of college students for gathering bloodroot. Oh! Oh!”
“So that’s what it was!” exclaimed
