CHAPTER

     I The Man with the Green Goggles
    II Miss Elting’s Mysterious Caller
   III The Start that Came to Grief
    IV An Exciting Night
     V On the Burning Bridge
    VI Their Troubles Multiply
   VII Horses Give the Alarm
  VIII Crazy Jane’s “Find”
    IX Scaling the High Cliffs
     X A Slippery Climb
    XI The Tragedy of Chocorua
   XII Tommy Falls Out of Bed
  XIII Placing the Blame
   XIV Giving a Toboggan Points
    XV Leaving the Trail in a Hurry
   XVI “Such a Lovely Slide”
  XVII What Came of Shooting the Chute
 XVIII Face by a Fresh Mystery
   XIX The Story the Light Told
    XX Seeking a Desperate Revenge
   XXI The Ascent of Mt.  Washington
  XXII A Rout and a Capture
 XXIII A Mysterious Disappearance
  XXIV Conclusion

Illustrations

“I’m the guide, Janus Grubb.” . . . . . . Frontispiece

   “Green goggles!” cried Harriet excitedly.

   Up and up wound the trail.

The Meadow-Brook Girls in the Hills

CHAPTER I

THE MAN WITH GREEN GOGGLES

“I hear that Janus Grubb is going to take a passel of gals on a tramp over the hills,” observed the postmaster, helping himself to a cracker from the grocer’s barrel.

“Gals?” questioned the storekeeper.

“Yes.  There’s a lot of mail here for the parties, mostly postals.  Can’t make much out of the postals, but some of the letters I can read through the envelopes by holding them against the window.”

“Lemme have a look,” urged the grocer eagerly.

“Not by a hatful.  I’m an officer of the government.  The secrets of the government must be guarded, I tell ye.  There’s six of them——­”

“You don’t say!  Six letters?” interrupted the grocer.

“No, gals.  One’s name is Elting.  She’s what they call a chaperon.  Another is Jane McCarthy—­I reckon some relation of the party who wrote me a letter asking what I knew about Jan.  I reckon Jan got the job on my recommendation.”

“Who are these girls, and what do they think they’re goin’ to do up here?”

“Call themselves ‘The Meadow-Brook Gals.’  Funny name, eh?” grinned the postmaster, balancing a soda cracker on the tip of his forefinger, then deftly tossing it edgewise into his open mouth.  “They pay Janus ten dollars a week for toting them around,” he chuckled.  “Read it in the McCarthy party’s letter to Jan.”

“What are they going to do up in the hills?”

“Climb over the rocks for their health,” grinned the postmaster.

“Huh!  When they coming to town?”

“On the evening mail train to-day.  Hello!  There’s Jan now on his way to meet them.  Say!  Will you look at him!  Jan’s had his whiskers pruned.  And, I swum, if he hasn’t got on a new pair of boots.  Git them of you?”