from a hammock, and seating herself on a mossy stump. From the limpness of her attitude and the pathetic expression of her eyes, I fear Polly was reviewing former happy nights spent on spring-beds; and at this particular moment the realities of camping-out hardly equalled her anticipations. Whatever may have been her feelings, however, they were promptly stifled when a certain insolent head reared itself from its blanket-roll, and a hoarse voice cackled, ‘Pretty Polly! Polly want a cañon?’ At this insult Miss Oliver wrapped her drapery about her and strode to her hammock with the air of a tragedy queen.
Chapter III.
Life in the Cañon—The Heir Apparent Loses Himself
‘Know’st thou the land where the lemon-trees bloom,
Where the gold orange glows in the green thicket’s gloom;
Where the wind, ever soft, from the blue heaven blows,
And groves are of myrtle, and olive, and rose?’
On the next morning, as we have seen, they named their summer home Camp Chaparral, and for a week or more they were the very busiest colony of people under the sun; for it takes a deal of hard work and ingenuity to make a comfortable and beautiful dwelling-place in the forest.
The best way of showing you how they accomplished this is to describe the camp after it was nearly finished.
The two largest bedroom tents were made of bright awning cloth, one of red and white, the other of blue and white, both gaily decorated with braid. They were pitched under the same giant oak, and yet were nearly forty feet apart; that of the girls having a canvas floor. They were not quite willing to sleep on the ground, so they had brought empty bed-sacks with them, and Pancho’s first duty after his arrival had been to drive to a neighbouring ranch for a great load of straw.
In a glorious tree near by was a ‘sky parlour,’ arranged by a few boards nailed high up in the leafy branches, and reached from below by a primitive ladder. This was the favourite sitting-room of the girls by day, and served for Pancho’s bedroom at night. It was beautiful enough to be fit shelter for all the woodland nymphs, with its festoons of mistletoe and wild grape-vines; but Pancho was rather an unappreciative tenant, even going so far as to snore in the sacred place!
Just beyond was a card-room,—imagine it—in which a square board, nailed on a low stump, served for a table, where Dr. Paul and the boys played many a game of crib, backgammon, and checkers. Here, too, all Elsie’s letters were written and Bell’s nonsense verses, and here was the identical spot where Jack Howard, that mischievous knight of the brush, perpetrated those modern travesties on the ‘William Henry pictures,’ for Elsie’s delectation.
The dressing-room was reached by a path cut through bushes to a charming little pool. Here were unmistakable evidences of feminine art: looking-glasses hanging to trees, snowy wash-cloths, each bearing its owner’s initials, adorning the shrubs, while numerous towels waved in the breeze. Between two trees a thin board was nailed, which appeared to be used, as nearly as the woodpeckers could make out, as a toothbrush rack. In this, Philip, the skilful carpenter, had bored the necessary number of holes, and each one contained a toothbrush tied with a gorgeous ribbon.
In this secluded spot Bell was wont to marshal every morning the entire force of ‘the toothbrush brigade’; and, conducting the drill with much ingenuity, she would take her victims through a long series of military manœuvres arranged for the toothbrush. Oh, the gaspings, the chokings and stranglings, which occurred when she mounted a rock by the edge of the pool, and after calling in tones of thunder,
‘Brush, brothers, brush with care!
Brush in the presence of the commandaire!’
ordered her unwilling privates to polish their innocent molars to the tune of ‘Hail, Columbia,’ or ‘Auld Lang Syne’! And if they became mutinous, it was Geoffrey who reduced them to submission, and ordered them to brush for three mornings to the tune of ‘Bluebells of Scotland’ as a sign of loyalty to their commander.
As for the furnishing of the camp, there were impromptu stools and tables made of packing-boxes and trunks, all covered with bright Turkey-red cotton; there were no less than three rustic lounges and two arm-chairs made from manzanita branches, and a Queen Anne bedstead was being slowly constructed, day by day, by the ambitious boys for their beloved Elsie.
One corner of each tent was curtained off for a bath-room, another for a clothes-press, and there were a dozen devices for comfort, as Dr. Winship was opposed to any more inconvenience than was strictly necessary. Dr. and Mrs. Winship and little Dicky occupied one tent, the boys another, and the girls a third.
When Bell, Polly, and Margery emerged from their tent on the second morning, they were disagreeably surprised to see a large placard over the front entrance, bearing the insolent inscription, ‘Tent Chatter.’ They said nothing; but on the night after, a committee of two stole out and glued a companion placard, ‘Tent Clatter,’ over the door of their masculine neighbours. And to tell the truth, one was as well deserved as the other; for if there was generally a subdued hum of conversation in the one, there never failed to be a perfect din and uproar in the other.
Under a great sycamore-tree stood the dining-table, which consisted of two long, wide boards placed together upon a couple of barrels; and not far away was the brush kitchen, which should have been a work of art, for it represented the combined genius of American, Mexican, and Chinese carpenters, Dr. Winship, Pancho, and Hop Yet having laboured in its erection. It really answered the purpose admirably, and looked quite like a conventional California kitchen; that is, it was ten feet square, and contained a table, a stove, and a Chinaman.
The young people, by the way, had fought bitterly against the stove, protesting with all their might against taking it. Polly and Jack declared that they would starve sooner than eat anything that hadn’t been cooked over a camp-fire. Bell and Philip said that they should stand in front of it all the time, for fear somebody would ride through the cañon and catch them camping out with a stove. Imagine such a situation; it made them blush. Margery said she wished people weren’t quite so practical, and wouldn’t ruin nature by introducing such ugly and unnecessary things. She intended to point the moral by drawing a picture of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden,—Eve bending over a cook-stove and Adam peeling apples with a machine. Geoffrey scoffed at Margery’s sentimentalism, put on his most trying air, and declared that if he had his pork and onions served up ‘hot and reg’lar,’ he didn’t care how she had her victuals cooked.
They were all somewhat appeased, however, when they found that Dr. Winship was as anxious as they for an evening camp-fire, and merely insisted upon the stove because it simplified the cookery. Furthermore, being an eminently just man, he yielded so far as to give them permission to prepare their own meals on a private camp-fire whenever they desired; and this effectually stopped the argument, for no one was willing to pay so heavy a price for effect.
The hammocks, made of gaily-coloured cords, were slung in various directions a short distance from the square tent, which, being the family sitting-room, was the centre of attraction. It was arranged with a gay canopy, twenty feet square. Three sides were made by hanging full curtains of awning cloth from redwood rods by means of huge brass rings. These curtains were looped back during the day and dropped after dark, making a cosy and warm interior from which to watch the camp-fire on cool evenings.
As for the Cañon de Las Flores itself, this little valley of the flowers, it was beautiful enough in every part to inspire
