She tendered her utmost thanks as she landed, again with damage to her shoes, on the rushy bank opposite.
Their friends in need, having successfully punted over Beatrice and Verity also, bade them a laughing good-bye, and resumed their easy course down stream, leaving three very grateful girls behind them.
[Illustration: A FRIEND IN NEED] "That's helped us out of a fix! Don't say again we've no luck!" cried Beatrice, wiping her boots carefully on the grass.
"They were angels in disguise!" sighed Ingred.
"Rather stout angels!" chuckled Verity.

"Now, how are we going to get out of this field ?" "Over the hedge, I suppose.

There's a piece of fence that looks climbable!" returned Beatrice, swinging herself up with elephantine grace, and dropping with a heavy thud on the other side.

"Oh! good biz! We're on a cinder path!" They were indeed in a back lane which led at the bottom of some gardens, then behind a row of stables, and finally through a gate on to the high road.
"I know where we are now!" exclaimed Beatrice gleefully.

"It's only quite a short way to the Morton's.