The little company seemed to feel a kind of relief in submitting itself to Barbara's direction. Each doing as she was bid, they started down the wood road, leaving the car with all their baggage behind them.

Miss Sallie had recovered her composure. The necessity of moving quickly, had taken her mind off the situation for the present, and she walked at as brisk a pace as did the girls.

Barbara had directed Mollie to walk a little in front and to keep a sharp lookout, while Bab brought up the rear and watched the sides of the road as vigilantly as a guard in war time, her pistol c.o.c.ked, ready to defend and fight for her friends and sister to her last breath.

Presently curiosity got the better of Ruth.

"Bab," she asked, "where on earth did you get that pistol?"

"From your father," answered Bab. "That was the secret. Don't you remember? But we must not risk talking now. The quieter we are the better. Voices carry in these woods."

"You are quite right, Bab, dear," replied Ruth, under her breath, and not another word was spoken.

Each one was engaged in her own thoughts as the silent procession moved swiftly on.

Miss Sallie was wondering whether they would ever see morning alive.

Grace, who was very devout, was praying softly to herself.

Ruth, in the innermost depths of her mind, was secretly enjoying the whole adventure, dangerous as it was.

Mollie was feeling homesick for her mother, while Bab had no time for any thought than the one that the highwayman might appear at any moment, and from any direction. Who knew but that he had turned and doubled on them, and would spring at them from the next tree?

Presently Mollie, who was a few feet in advance of the others, paused.

"Look!" she whispered as the others came up. "I see the light of a fire through the trees. I hear voices, too."

Sure enough, through the interlacing branches of the trees, they could distinctly see the glow of a large fire.

"Wait," exclaimed Bah under her breath. "Stand here at the side of the road, where you will be hidden. Perhaps we may find help at last."

Creeping cautiously among the trees she disappeared in the darkness. It seemed an age to the others, waiting on the edge of the narrow woodland road, but it was only a few minutes, in reality, before Bab was back again.

"They are Gypsies," she whispered. "I can tell by their wagons and tents."

"Gypsies!" exclaimed Miss Sallie, with a tragic gesture of both hands.

"We shall all be murdered as well as robbed!"

"No, no," protested Mollie. "I have a friend who is a Gypsy. This may be her tribe. Suppose I go and see. Let me go. Now, Bab," as her sister touched her with a detaining hand, "I want to do something."

And little Mollie, with set lips and pale cheeks, her courageous heart throbbing with repressed excitement, stole off into the dense shadows of the forest.

It seemed another age before the stillness was broken again by the sound of crackling underbrush, and Mollie's figure was gradually outlined in the blackness.

"I couldn't tell," she said. "They seemed to be only men sitting around the fire smoking. I was afraid to get any nearer for fear one of them might be the robber. They say Gypsies can be very kind, but I think it would be better if we all went together and asked for help, if we go at all. The men looked very fierce," she added faintly, slipping her hand into her sister's for sympathy.

"Dearest little sister," whispered Bab, kissing her, "don't ever say again you are a coward."

Then two persons emerged from between the trees on the other side of the road.

The five women held their breath in fear and suspense as the figures approached, evidently without having seen these women standing in the shadow. They were close enough now for the automobilists to make out that they were two women, one young and the other old apparently.

Suddenly, with a cry of joy and relief, Mollie sprang upon the elder of the two women, threw her arms about the stranger's neck and burst into uncontrollable sobs.

"O Granny Ann, Granny Ann!" cried Mollie. "At the very time we needed your help most you have come to us. I hoped and prayed it was your tribe, but I couldn't tell. There were only men."

The old Gypsy woman patted Mollie's cheek tenderly, while the little girl sobbed out the story of their evening's adventure.

The others had been so surprised at Mollie's sudden outburst that they stood silently by without interrupting the story; but all felt that a light was beginning to break on what a short time before had looked like a hopeless situation.

Granny Ann, the sixty years of whose life had been spent in wandering over many countries, was as unperturbed as if they had met by appointment. Her companion, a young Gypsy girl, stood quietly by without speaking a word.

"The ladies will be safe with us," said the old Gypsy, taking them all in with a comprehensive sweep of her small beady eyes; "as safe as if they were in their own homes. I have had shelter and food from the young lady, and a Gypsy never forgets a kindness. Come with me," she added, with a commanding gesture, and led the way to the encampment.

The Gypsy girl brought up the rear and the others trailed along in between, Ruth and Grace still a.s.sisting Miss Sallie over the rough places.

When they reached the camp the four Gypsy men, picturesquely grouped around the fire, rose to their feet and looked curiously but imperturbably at the party of women.

Granny Ann called a grizzled old man from the fireside speaking rapidly in a strange language, her own Romany tongue, in fact. After conferring with him a few moments, she turned to Miss Sallie.

"My rom," she said (which in Gypsy language means husband), "thinks you had better stay here to-night. It would not be easy to find the gentleman's house on such a dark night, but we can make you comfortable in one of our tents. He and the other men will take the horses and draw the steam carriage down the road until it is near enough to be guarded-if one of the young ladies will show the way. There is no danger," she continued, sternly, as Miss Sallie began to protest at the idea of one of her girls going off with all those strange men. "A Gypsy does not repay a kindness with a blow. Come," she called to the men, "that young lady will show the way." And she pointed at Barbara, who had slipped the pistol into her belt, and was talking to Ruth in a low voice.

Miss Sallie explained to the girls what Granny Ann had decided was the best course for them to take, while the four men untethered the four lean horses and half-harnessed them, and the old Gypsy man gathered some coils of rope together.

Ruth insisted on accompanying Barbara, and the two girls led the way through the wood to the road, the men following with the horses.

They found the automobile exactly as it had been left, save in one particular. The murderous-looking dagger was gone. But the suit cases and numerous dress boxes were untouched.

The girls waited at one side while the Gypsies secured the ropes to the car and then to the collars of the horses. Two Gypsies walked on either side, holding the reins, while the other two ran to the back and began to push the machine. The horses strained at the ropes; then in an instant the automobile was moving easily, urged from the back and pulled from the front like a stubborn mule.

When the girls again reached that part of the road opposite the camp, the caravan came to a full stop.

Ruth directed that all the cushions be carried to the tent, together with the steamer rugs stored under the seats, the tea-basket and other luggage. The dismantled automobile was then left for the night.

Ruth and Bab found Miss Sallie waiting at the tent, a tragic figure in the darkness.

CHAPTER VII-A NIGHT WITH THE GYPSIES

"I think we shall be comfortable enough, Aunt Sallie," said her niece, after their belongings had been deposited in the tent. "We will fix you a nice bed, auntie, dearest, with steamer rugs and your rubber air cushion, and for the first time in your life you will be almost sleeping under the stars."

But poor Miss Sallie only smiled in reply. She was too weary and exhausted to trust the sound of her own voice, now that danger was over and they had found protectors.

While Grace and Ruth arranged three beds inside the tent (Ruth and Bab having joyfully elected to sleep just outside) the two sisters made tea and opened up boxes of tea biscuits and Swiss chocolate which were always kept in the provision basket for emergencies.

Granny Ann had offered them food, but they had courteously declined, remembering tales they had heard of the unclean Gypsy, and giving as an excuse that they had a light supper with them. "Very light indeed,"

commented Ruth later; "but I don't think we'll starve."