The Motor Girls on Cedar Lake Part 11

She turned and hurried in the direction from which she had heard voices. "If they have not seen him," she reflected, "I will not say anything until we get back to camp."

"I have ten different kinds of ferns," suddenly called Belle, in a voice which plainly said that no wild man had crossed her path.

"I've got eight," said Hazel. "How many have you, Cora?"

Cora glanced at her empty hands. She had dropped her ferns.

"I have tossed away mine. I was afraid of black spiders," she said evasively.

"Isn't that too bad," wailed Bess, "and none of us picked any maiden hair because we thought you had it. Let us go and get some."

"Oh, I think we had best not this time," said Cora quickly. "I really want to get to the post office landing before the mail goes out. We can come another time when I have something to kill spiders with. I never saw such huge black fellows as there are around here." This was no shading of the truth, for indeed the spiders around Cedar Lake did grow like 'turtles', Jack had declared.

"Oh, all right," agreed Belle. "But this is the most delightful island and I am coming out here again. I hope the boys will come along, for there are such great bushes of huckleberries over there that we simply couldn't climb to them alone."'

"We will invite them next time," said Cora, and when she turned over the fly wheel of her boat her hands that had held the ferns were still trembling. She looked uneasily at the sh.o.r.e as they darted off.

"What's the matter, Cora?" asked Hazel. "You look as if you had seen the ghost of Fern Island."

"I have," said Cora, but the girls thought she had only agreed with Hazel to avoid disagreeing.

"What boat is that?" asked Bess a moment later, looking at a small rowing craft just leaving the other side of the island.

"It's Jim Peters'" replied Cora, "we were lucky to get back into ours before he saw it. I wouldn't wonder but what he might like to take a motor boat ride in the Petrel."

"Do you suppose he really would steal a boat?" exclaimed Belle.

"He might like to try a motor, I said," replied Cora. "They say that Jim Peters tries everything on Cedar Lake, even to running a shooting gallery. But see! He is reading a letter! Where ever did he get a letter on this barren island?"

"Maybe he carries the mail for the ghost," said Hazel, with a laugh.

CHAPTER IX

JACK AND CORA

"Cora, where is your ring?"

The sister looked at her finger. "Oh Jack," she replied, "I will get it--but not just now. Why?"

"I thought you always wore that ring when you put on your frills, and I haven't seen you so dressed up since you came to camp.

Somehow, Cora, I feared you might have lost it."

"I did," she said simply.

"Your new diamond!"

"Yes, but I feel sure of finding it. Now, Jackie dear, please don't cross question me. I shouldn't have taken it off, but I did, so and that is how I came to lose it. But I want to tell you something while we are alone. I saw the ghost of Fern Island to-day."

"Nonsense! A ghost?" sneered Jack. "Why, Cora, if the other girls said that I should laugh at them."

"Well I want to tell you. We were on the island-the girls and I--and I got a little away from them when suddenly the wildest looking man rushed across the path. He had a beard like Rip Van Winkle and looked a lot like him too."

"Rip might be summering out this way, though I rather thought he had taken a trip in an airship," said Jack. "But honestly, Cora, what was the man like? Paul had a story of that sort. He declares he, too, saw this famous ghost."

"Do you suppose he might have taken the canoe? The wild man I mean.

We saw a strange looking girl in a canoe and somehow she vanished.

We could see her boat and then we couldn't, although we could not make out where she went to. It was the queerest thing. There must be some strange curves on those islands."

"Oh there are, lots of them. They are as curvy as a ball-twirler's best pitch. But the ghost. That is what interests me, since--ahem--since he has a daughter. Was she pretty?"

"I should say she was rather pretty," replied Cora, quite seriously, "but she did have a wild look too. I do believe she is a daughter to the wild man, whoever he may be."

"Well, everyone around here declares that is land is haunted, but fisher-folk are always so superst.i.tious. Yet we must hunt it up. I will go out with you the next time you go. Did the other girls see him?" went on the brother.

"No, and I decided not to tell them. You know how timid Bess and Belle are, and if they thought there was such a creature about the island I would never get them to put foot on sh.o.r.e there again, and I do so want to investigate that matter. I believe Jim Peters has something to do with it for I saw him coming away from there with a letter. Now what would he be doing with a letter out on a barren island?"

"Oh Jim is a foxy one. I wouldn't trust him as far as the end of my nose. But here come the others. Will you go over to the Casino this evening."

"Yes, we had planned to go. That is why I am dressed up. Hazel may have to go to town to-morrow, and I want her to see something before she goes," replied Cora, just as the girls, and Walter, Ed and Paul strode up to the bungalow.

"Oh! we have had the greatest time," blurted out Bess. "Cora, you should have been with us. Ben got angry with Jim Peters, and he and Dan threatened to throw Jim overboard, and--"

"Jim seems to have a hankering after fights," put in Ed. "I haven't settled with him yet."

"Ed, you promised me you would call that off," Cora reminded him.

"You know it was all about me, and you have given me your promise not to take it up again. That Jim Peters is an ugly man."

"All the same we heard that you were not afraid of him," said Walter with a tug at Cora's elbow. "Didn't you beard the lion in his den?"

"Who said I did?" asked Cora flushing.

"I promised--crossed my heart not to tell," said Walter. "But all the same the folks at the landing are talking about the pretty girl who went all the way up the cove, and stopped at the place where Peters and his pal land. I would advise you to be careful. They say that tribe is not of the best social standing," went on Walter quite seriously.

"I won't go there again," put in Bess.

"What! Were you along?" demanded Jack. "Then you must have been the pretty girl referred to at the landing."

"I was a pretty scared girl," declared Bess. "I tell you, I don't want to meet any more Peters or Joneses or Kates," she finished.

"But what was the trouble between Jim and Ben?" asked Cora.

"Let me tell it," Belle exclaimed. "We were just standing by the boathouse, watching some men fish, when Jim Peters, came along. He stopped and took a paper out of his pocket. The wind suddenly blew up--"

"And took the paper out of his hand," interrupted Hazel. "It blew across to where Dan was standing, and what was more natural than that Dan should pick it up?"