The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest Part 27

Louise smiled wanly. Was it possible that any other question could be invented?

"It didn't exactly feel," she replied to Grace, "but I knew I had to do it. I had been watching the little speck of a boat as it took the rollers from the side, and I knew the next would toss it over. Then I saw Kitty--and I didn't think of the distance after that."

"You looked about as big as a fish hawk diving for his dinner," remarked Cleo, "and you nipped Kitty just as neatly as a hawk pecks his fish."

"I felt just like that--it is birdlike to dive from such a distance,"

Louise said, "and cutting through the air, free of everything--is--is wonderful."

"Even with the ocean as a backstop?" asked Helen shivering.

"Nice and soft," Louise said reflectively.

"But however did you hold on to Kitty, and cling to the canoe?"

persisted Grace, in spite of the promise to cease questioning.

"I don't know. It was black for awhile, and I just struggled to keep up, and to keep Kitty up. She was too scared to help herself, and she had swallowed a lot of water. I guess I managed to cling to the canoe--Girls, you don't know what you can do until you have to," she finished.

It was still early, but the visit to Kitty at the hospital had to be made early, according to promise. Louise and Margaret were to go, and the other scouts, especially Julia and Grace, were going in the car as far as the village, to be picked up there by the girl's car on the way back.

They found the patient dressed, and being forcibly detained, as the nurse put it. In fact, Kitty had been dressed since day break, and nothing short of force did detain her.

"Good thing you come now," she greeted Margaret. "Oh, there's my life-saver. h.e.l.lo, McGinty, how's the water to-day? I don't want to test it though," she shook her cropped head, and the girls noticed how much better that hair looked since its salt water shampoo.

"Don't hurry so, Kitty. You have plenty of time. Uncle Pete said he would be over at the landing at ten o'clock, and it's only nine now."

Louise told her.

"No matter what time," she retorted, "it's next year to me. This place is haunted sure. I was fishin' with ghosts all night."

"That was your bromide," Margaret a.s.sured her. "You were so excited and hysterical you simply had to be quieted down. Do you feel all right?"

"Don't know as I feel at all," Kitty answered, jerking herself up to make sure she had not grown fins. "I never want to read that Jonah story again. But I knew it! I knew it!" and she chewed her lips in repressed bitterness.

"Knew what?" Louise asked.

"That the old monster ocean would try to swallow me," she replied.

"Didn't I tell you I would never go on that water after what it done to me? But I did want to see that wig waggin' and I went out because--"

She stopped, and the sharp little black eyes were glistening.

"I know, Kitty. You wanted to see us beat the boys, didn't you?" asked Louise. "Well, we did it, and maybe if you hadn't--got spilled, I couldn't have won on the signalling. You see, the life boat was out there watching, and they caught my message, and just shot in--lucky for you and me."

"If I knowed Captain Dave's men were out there, I wouldn't have been so scared to death," Kitty said. "But anyhow, I'm goin' home," and she made for the door. "Good-by, nurse, you've been real good to me. I like your cookin' first rate, and I'll fetch you the first mess of clams I dig,"

she offered.

The nurse was amused and interested. Kitty had given her a new line on patients. From the time her wet clothes had been taken from her, Kitty had threatened to go out on the fire escape in the hospital robe, if they were not returned very early in the morning, and nurse knew very well, she intended to carry out the threat.

There was no bag or luggage to leave with Kitty, neither did she dally in her exit. Rather, she was in the car and waiting, before Margaret and Louise could possibly get down the stairs and reach the sidewalk.

"I love automobiles," said Kitty, as they climbed in, and Leonore touched the starter.

"Wish you would take a longer ride," Margaret remarked. "It would do you good."

"Can't, wish I could," the girl replied a bit wistfully. "Don't know what's happened since I've been away. Hope Bentley was there." Margaret then noticed an anxiety that seemed to make a woman out of the winsome child.

"You're not worrying about Uncle Pete?" asked Louise. "The girl said he was all right last evening."

"Oh no, it isn't Uncle Pete I'm worrying about," replied Kitty. But she did not attempt to explain further, and the girls noticed the omission.

Turning carefully into the little sand road that led to the landing, Leonore slowed down. A boy just stepped from the pavilion.

"Oh, there's Bentley!" shouted Kitty. "h.e.l.lo, Ben!" she called waving frantically. No wonder she was so delighted, thought her companions. It was almost like coming back from the grave.

"h.e.l.lo, Kitty," replied Bentley quickly as he could make out the figure in the back seat of the car. His face showed his pleasure. For Kitty to have been s.n.a.t.c.hed from the waves, and then spend the night in the hospital, was really an occurrence.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute," she rattled on. The "waits" were addressed one to Bentley and the other to Leonore. "I'm going over with Ben. Got your boat?"

"Yes, come on," called the boy, plainly glad to be of service to the heroine. "Uncle Pete is at the bend. I'll row you down to him."

"h.e.l.lo, Bentley," Louise called out. "Haven't we had a great time?"

"I should say you had," he answered, cap in hand. "You're the life saver, aren't you?"

"She's _it_," sang out Margaret gleefully.

"Oh, say, girls" (now Bentley's bashfulness was threatening him), "did any of you lose a bag?"

For a moment neither Margaret nor Louise remembered Elizabeth's lost bag with the shoes and stockings on the beach. Then it flashed on Margaret--

"Oh, yes with some other things," she stammered. "You know, Louise, Elizabeth left her bag with the things on the beach, moonlight bathing night--"

"Yes, that's so," said Louise. "Why, Bentley? Did you find a bag?"

"No, but I saw one in a shop, and I thought it might belong to some one of you girls. What sort did you lose?"

Neither girl knew much about the lost bag, but Louise thought it might be a blue crochet.

"Yes, that's it," said Bentley. "It has a ta.s.sel on it and it's blue.

I'll get it for you next time I go over to Jake's," he offered.

"Is it at Jake's?" exclaimed Kitty. "That's where I saw the dandy pumps with buckles on, and the swellest silk stockings. Louise, I'll get the bag for you, because I'm going over to Jake's to buy some of those things!"

"Oh," exclaimed Louise, in a gale of laughter. "Those are our pumps and stockings. They were taken off from the beach."

"You don't say?" and Kitty's tone allayed any possible suspicion.

"That's just like Jake. Buys everything the boys offer, and no questions asked, just like they say in the papers. I tell you, I'll come around when I can," this rather dubiously, "and I'll get you girls, and we'll go and raid Jake. It'll do him good."

When she raced off with Bentley and Leonore turned toward the village the scouts were still shaking with laughter.