THE NEW SHELL
The calamity had occurred!
Soulful were the wails of Purt Sweet. Not a crumb of food left in the
girls' hampers when the party set out through the cave for the middle of
Cavern Island was now left to appease Mr. Sweet's appetite.
"The lone pirate has done his fell work, sure enough," Laura Belding
declared. "And how hungry he must have been, Nellie! He took that pie
you made that none of us could eat."
They all laughed at this hit, for the doctor's daughter was not much of
a pastry cook and her lemon pie had been voted the booby prize at
luncheon.
"Ooh!" gasped Bobby. "Do you suppose it will kill him? Maybe it will
give him such a terrible case of indigestion that he will steal a boat,
raise the Jolly Roger again, and go to work making people walk the plank
and all that sort of thing--and it will be your fault, Nellie Agnew!"
"I'm only afraid he will eat it and die in terrible agony all alone
here," wailed Nellie, who could take a joke as well as give one. "And
then his ghost will haunt this end of the island----"
"And Otto will never come here again," said Eve Sitz, poking fun at her
brother, who had once been very much afraid of a supposed "haunt" in an
old house in Robinson's Woods.
"Never you mind," growled her brother. "There _iss_ ha'ants, undt you
will findt oudt so some day--yes!"
But Chet and Lance decided that there were altogether too many prowlers
at this end of the island for the party to remain longer. Had they been
alone, or with the other boys and no girls, they would surely have made
an attempt to find the bewhiskered man whom the Lockwood twins had twice
seen disappear into the far entrance of the caverns.
"We ought to report him to the park police," said Nellie Agnew. "He may
steal something more than food, next time."
"Leave that to us," said Chet, hastily. "Lance and I will report it in
proper time."
But to his chum he whispered: "We don't want any police fooling around
here. Suppose they found Short and Long?"
"Right--oh!" agreed Lance. "Hope they'll all forget it and not mention
the 'lone pirate' when they get home."
But as events proved, some member of the party mentioned the robbery of
the lunch--and in a quarter which brought a search of the eastern end of
Cavern Island by the police, a happening that Chet would have given a
good deal to avoid.
Now, however, Laura's brother was busy inventing something to interest
the party, and yet take them away from this end of the island. The twins
were discussing with Eve Sitz the advantages of paddling over rowing,
when Chet gave a shout which drew all attention to him instantly.
"Come on!" said the big lad. "Let's get into the boats. We'll have a
four-oared race. I'll choose a crew of boys and let Laura choose one of
girls. I bet we boys, using my boat, can row around that channel buoy
out yonder and back again, before Laura in Lance's boat can do it. And
Lance has the lightest boat."
"Done!" cried his sister. "And Lance's boat isn't so much lighter,
either. What do you say, girls?"
"Let's show 'em!" cried Bobby. "Let me steer, Laura."
"All right," said Laura.
"And Freddie Ackerman here will steer for us," said Chet.
The crews were quickly chosen. Laura took Eve and the twins with her.
Chet had Purt Sweet for Number 2 and pulled stroke himself. Lance
arranged the start and was referee.
"When I slap these two sticks together, you're to go," instructed Lance.
"The line is right between where I stand here on this rock and the
boulder at the far mouth of the cavern. I can see the whole course from
here. Now, no bumping at the turn. The boat that has the inside at the
buoy must be cleared by the other boat. Don't forget. Are you ready?"
"Oh, wait a minute!" squealed Purt Sweet.
"Yes, hold on!" grunted Chet. "Purt's back hair has come down."
"I weally will have to remove my waistcoat--if you will allow me?"
suggested the exquisite. "It might get splashed."
"Go as far as you like," said Lance. "Chuck it ashore here. I'll stand
on it so as to see better."
But Purt entrusted the precious waistcoat to one of the girls in another
boat, and then the two racing boats were brought into line. The referee
asked if they were ready again, and, receiving no contrary answer,
shouted:
"Go!"
Chet's crew certainly were a scrub lot, and he did not expect to get
much speed out of them; but Otto was a strong oar and had Purt been able
to keep the stroke the girls would have made a bad showing to the buoy.
Up to that turn the boys kept ahead. Laura set an easy stroke, and found
that Eve Sitz was not much inferior to either Dora or Dorothy.
"They're going to beat!" gasped Bobby, swinging with the rowers.
"Don't let them worry you," advised Laura, between her teeth. "The race
isn't done until we cross the line."
But in turning the buoy the boys came to grief. Or, rather, Purt Sweet
came to grief. He managed to catch a most famous crab, and went over on
his back, hitting his head a resounding crack upon the handle of Lance's
oar, and waving his long legs in the air.
"Now!" cried Laura, increasing her stroke, and the girls' boat went past
their opponents' at a fast clip.
The boys got together again after half a minute; but those thirty
seconds told the story of the race. The best the boys could do brought
them across the line several lengths behind. And the whole crowd were
shouting with laughter over Purt's mishap.
"I wish you'd kept your vest on, Purt," snarled Lance. "There'd been
some satisfaction in your getting it wet. My goodness! what a lubber you
are in a boat!"
"Weally, I couldn't help it, dear boy," sighed Pretty.
"Just the same, you crabbed the race," grunted Chet. "Now the girls have
put it all over us."
And the girls certainly did not spare the boys, and joked at their
expense all the way home. But the day was voted a very merry one and Eve
and Otto went home in the evening strongly of the opinion that the boys
and girls of Central High were a jolly company indeed. Eve promised
Laura before she went home that, if she could pass the exams, for junior
classes under Principal Sharp, she would surely attend Central High in
the fall.
"We've got a splendid bit of athletic timber in Eve Sitz," Laura said,
discussing the matter with Jess and the Lockwood twins.
"I hope she'll take up rowing. We can put her into Celia's place on the
eight for next year, and then there will be no danger of Hester Grimes
getting it," said Jess, who was very outspoken.
"She is better material for stroke than Hester," admitted Laura.
"And enough sight better tempered," Dora observed.
"You know what Hester is doing now?" demanded Jess, in anger.
"What is it?" asked Dorothy.
"She is trying to make the other girls think that the Executive
Committee only cares about the eight-oared boat race, and that we'll put
up no fight for Central High's entries in the other events."
"She is going to make trouble if she can," declared Dora.
"It isn't so," Laura said, firmly. "There is going to be a fine canoe
race--we look to you twins to make good for Central High in that."
"We'll do our best," said the twins together, nodding.
Aunt Dora did not approve of the twins being on the lake so much; in her
girlhood "young ladies" of the twins' age did not row, and paddle, and
swim, and otherwise imitate boys.
"And I remember that you never were any fun, as a girl, Dora," observed
Mr. Lockwood, at the supper table that night, when his sister uttered
her usual criticisms of the twins' conduct. "You squealed if you came
across a caterpillar, and a garter snake sent you into spasms, and it
tired you to walk half a mile, and----"
"Thanks be! I was no tomboy," gasped Aunt Dora.
"Far from it," said the flower lover. "And mother was always having the
doctor for you, and you got cold the easiest of any person I ever
saw--and do to this day----"
"That is perfectly ridiculous, Lemuel."
"I believe you're sitting in a draught now, Dora," said Mr. Lockwood,
quickly.
"Well--I----Achoo! I believe you! I never did see such a draughty place
as this house, Lemuel. Ahem! Dora! get me my little knit shawl, will
you, child?"
"Oh, yes, Auntie," said one of the twins, as they both rose.
"We're both through our suppers, Auntie," said the other. "We'll bring
the shawl."
"Now!" exclaimed the exasperated old lady, when the twins were out of
the room. "Which of 'em went for it?"
Her brother shook his head sadly, but his eyes were a-twinkle. "I could
not undertake to say, Sister."
It annoyed Aunt Dora very much to hear the girls talk continually of the
coming Big Day on Lake Luna and the part the girls of Central High would
take in the races. And that next week Dora and Dorothy certainly were
full of the new eight-oared shell.
It arrived at the boathouse early in the week, and proved to be the
handsomest shell that had ever been launched in Luna waters. Even the
wealthy Luna Boat Club did not own a shell like it.
Every other afternoon Mrs. Case allowed the crew to go out for a spin,
and Professor Dimp, who coached the boys' crews, looked after the girls'
rowing, as well. Some of the girls' parents went down to the shore in
the early evening to watch the practice work off Colonel Richard
Swayne's estate; but would Aunt Dora go? Only once!
By some inquiry she learned that each member of the crew of eight girls
had her own particular seat in the big shell. Dorothy was supposed to
row Number 2 and Dora Number 6. But the twins sometimes changed
seats--and who was to know the difference?
Not the coach, for Professor Dimp could tell them apart no better than
other people. Had Aunt Dora been sure that her namesake rowed in her
right place on the evening when she viewed the practice, she would have
met the shell at the landing, seized Number 6 oar, and marched her home
and locked her into her own room until tickets could be bought for Aunt
Dora's home city.
But in their natty-looking costumes the twins looked more alike than
ever--were that possible!