liank B. Adonvr
 
 fiowvirv 
 
 When I had caught her and punished her as she deserved for 
 
 desertion I still held her tight in my arms for fear 
 
 she would escape me again. See page 338
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANK R. ADAMS 
 
 Illustrated by 
 
 FRANK GODWIN 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 Copyright, 1915 
 
 BY SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 
 (Incorporated) 
 
 8, J. I'AXKBILI, A Co., BOSTON, U.S.A.
 
 In Order 
 To Divide the Responsibility 
 
 For This 
 
 I Dedicate it to Her 
 Who is Responsible for Me 
 
 2134097
 
 "Fasti et nefasti dies."
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I FAST ASHORE i 
 
 II MAROONED 29 
 
 III THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN .... 55 
 
 IV MYSTERY 77 
 
 V ALONG CAME ROSALIND 93 
 
 VI LIPTON S. CLAIR 103 
 
 VII FIVE FRIDAYS 115 
 
 VIII ENGAGED, IF 139 
 
 IX FOUND BY 'PHONE 147 
 
 X THE CLAM HUNTER 157 
 
 XI Miss DUNMORE Is CONCERNED . . . 175 
 
 XII "On, MY POOR TOOTLES!" .... 183 
 
 XIII FURTHER MYSTERY 195 
 
 XIV THE SECRET OF THE SOUP 203 
 
 XV THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE . . . 213 
 
 XVI THE VOYAGE OF THE "MERRY WIDOW" . 227 
 
 XVII A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 241 
 
 XVIII BACK TO GREEN'S ISLAND 257 
 
 XIX A FIRE AND A RESCUE 265 
 
 XX "THE ONLY WAY" 287 
 
 XXI WHERE Is LIPTON S. CLAIR? . . . . 301 
 
 XXII A WEDDING INVITATION 309 
 
 XXIII "THE HONOR OF THIEVES" . . . .319 
 
 XXIV THE FOREST OF ARDEN 329
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FAGS 
 
 When I had caught her and punished her as 
 she deserved for desertion I still held her 
 tight in my arms for fear she would escape 
 me again. See Page 338 Frontispiece 
 
 "Oh, Frank," she exclaimed, "would it make 
 any difference if this wire were fastened to 
 something?" .,'... 40 
 
 The old lady eyed me with evident suspicion. 
 "Is he going to kiss me good-night?" she 
 demanded 64 
 
 "I hope you are not angry with me," Mrs. 
 Green murmured, overawed by the disap- 
 proval of the men. " I can't see that I've 
 done anything." 
 
 "Madame," the sheriff said, with gloomy 
 politeness, "you have spoiled the only 
 murder case we ever had in Maskaloon 
 County, that's what you have done. Come 
 on, boys." 254
 
 CHAPTER ONE 
 FAST ASHORE
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 CHAPTER ONE 
 
 E eat too much," stated Lucile definitely 
 while we were having tea on the front porch. 
 
 "We certainly do," I assented idly, thinking 
 how much clearer the air was over the lake 
 than in the city I had just left. 
 
 "Why not give our digestive apparatus a 
 rest?" she propounded. 
 
 "Why not?" I rushed to my doom. I was 
 having my two weeks' vacation and was too 
 happy at being able to spend it on the island 
 to care anything about an argument. 
 
 "I suggest that we fast for a week." 
 
 A suggestion like that put me in a nice fix. 
 I don't mind stating that at that time I was 
 about two hundred and ten pounds of eligible 
 bachelor, aged thirty-five, comfortably in love 
 
 3
 
 4 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 with Lucile but too old and set in the com- 
 placent selfishness of single blessedness ever to 
 pretend to be a Romeo. The idea of fasting 
 gave me a sinking sensation right where there 
 was the most room to sink. 
 
 "What?" I ejaculated, forgetting for the 
 moment that I had a reputation for ready 
 repartee. 
 
 "I said, Why not fast for a week?' I read 
 an article by Lipton S. Clair about it just this 
 morning. He claims that fasting thoroughly 
 rebuilds the system, gets rid of all toxins and 
 increases the mental efficiency fifty per cent." 
 
 She picked up a magazine which was 
 propped open face downward on the lower 
 shelf of the porch table. 
 
 "Listen to this," she continued. " 'Eating 
 three meals a day is simply a habit. We have 
 made tyrants of our stomachs. They demand 
 to be fed every few hours and if we answer 
 that demand we are slaves/ There, that 
 sounds like the reasoning of a thinker, doesn't 
 it?" 
 
 "It sounds more like the reasoning of a 
 thinker than of an eater."
 
 FAST ASHORE 5 
 
 Lucile reproved my flippancy with a glance. 
 "I think it would do us all good." 
 
 "But I feel all right now." I called her at- 
 tention to an obvious fact. 
 
 She dismissed my objection. "You can't be 
 healthy unless you fast for a week at least 
 once a year. Lipton S. Clair says so. Mother, 
 you'll try it, won't you?" 
 
 "Try what?" Her mother at the other end 
 of the porch laid down her book. 
 
 "Fasting for a week." 
 
 "Why, yes, if you want to." She picked up 
 her book again as if she had decided nothing 
 more momentous than a question as to whether 
 she preferred cream or lemon in her tea. She 
 had been used as an experiment station for so 
 many years that nothing surprised her. 
 
 I got up casually and tried to slip indoors, 
 but Lucile stopped me. "Don't you think it 
 will be lovely, Montmorency ?" 
 
 I collapsed into a chair which collapsed im- 
 mediately after I did. She had called me by 
 my first name ! Yes, Montmorency is my first 
 name. It sounds like several names but it is 
 only my first. That first name thing made it
 
 6 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 very hard to refuse. As I sat there on the 
 porch surrounded by legs, rungs and other 
 component parts of a chair, a terrific struggle 
 went on in my being between my heart and 
 my stomach and the weaker party won. Pos- 
 sibly my mind was stunned by my fall, al- 
 thought I have no recollection of hitting my 
 head. I felt that Lucile was putting me to the 
 test. From the look in her eye I knew that she 
 was asking me to choose between love and 
 beefsteak. So rising phcenixlike, and care- 
 fully concealing the place where I strongly sus- 
 pected that the fabric of my trousers had been 
 pierced by a splinter, I answered bravely, "Yes, 
 I think fasting would be delightful." 
 
 So that was how we began. 
 
 As you can easily see, the cause of the trouble 
 was that Lucile is one of those persons who take 
 the magazine health and hygiene writers in 
 good faith. It is impossible to convince her 
 that those fellows have to make a living by their 
 pens the same as other human authors and that 
 every bizarre idea they can pounce on means 
 just so much more copy at a regular rate per 
 word. No, Lucile must needs try by experi-
 
 FAST ASHORE 7 
 
 ment every new theory, using herself or any 
 convenient relative or friend as a laboratory. 
 
 The absurdity of Lucile's attempt to im- 
 prove upon her health and looks is apparent to 
 anyone who has ever been blessed with a sight 
 of her. You can't make a slim young body 
 like hers by simply rolling on the floor for an 
 hour every day nor are soft brown eyes with 
 long curly lashes the result of chewing any par- 
 ticular number of times upon a piece of steak. 
 Nature must have been experimenting a good 
 many centuries before she got just that par- 
 ticular texture for hair and that peculiar shade 
 of cream velvet for complexions. To attain 
 her sort of perfection it is necessary to have a 
 set of perfectly good ancestors combined with 
 a lucky star and the gifts of at least seven or 
 eight gods and goddesses, but Lucile thinks 
 that she has done it all herself and acts as if she 
 expected to become a sort of crippled hippo- 
 potamus if she relaxed for a moment from the 
 pursuit of health. 
 
 At this particular time, for nearly twenty- 
 five years she and nature had been uninter- 
 rupted by matrimony in their job of decorating,
 
 8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 so that it is not to be wondered at that they had 
 turned out a well nigh perfect product. There 
 is nothing- unfinished about her. She looks 
 equally well in an evening gown or a bathing 
 suit, a blessing denied to most women whose 
 beauty goes either to one extreme or the other. 
 
 As you may have gathered, I thoroughly ap- 
 prove of Lucile as an exhibit in pulchritude. 
 I cannot say that I so fully endorse her mental 
 equipment. For some reason or other we al- 
 most never agree on any subject. In some re- 
 spects this is an ideal state of affairs to keep 
 alive interesting relations between a man and 
 a girl. The man who finds himself liking the 
 same things that his wife does is doomed. The 
 fact that you almost always disagree with those 
 nearest and dearest to you is nature's own de- 
 vice for preserving individuality. 
 
 Lucile thinks she is a Republican in politics, 
 but likes Mr. Roosevelt because he plays ten- 
 nis, while my family has always been Demo- 
 cratic since before the war. We never agreed 
 on any play we ever saw. I suspect her opin- 
 ion of being influenced almost entirely by the 
 profile of the handsome hero, while I I am
 
 FAST ASHORE 9 
 
 a dramatic critic and my opinion wouldn't be 
 influenced by anything (so my enemies say) 
 but dynamite or slow poison. 
 
 She sleeps out of doors on a porch even in 
 the coldest weather. I prefer to woo Mor- 
 pheus in a steam-heated interior. I, too, like 
 air, and plenty of it, in some places, for in- 
 stance in automobile tires. It makes travel- 
 ling more comfortable. In my bedroom, how- 
 ever, when the thermometer is flirting with 
 zero, I can get along all right -if the window is 
 open only just far enough to wedge in a dime. 
 
 The point where Lucile and I find the widest 
 variant in our opinions and tastes is in the mat- 
 ter of food. I like mine the way you do yours, 
 but she is a food faddist. She invites indiges- 
 tion with all kinds of punk provender. Her 
 stomach is resigned to its fate. It has suffered 
 so much that it is grateful for any little thing 
 that is dropped into it and is not surprised, no 
 matter what it finds in its midst, so to speak, 
 from horse feed to automobile sundries. 
 
 One of her early spasms was Fletcherism; 
 then she struck the nuts-and-berries idea. I 
 was a guest at her home the summer she tried
 
 io FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 both of these things out. If you are going to 
 Fletcherize, a piece of old boot tastes just as 
 good as a steak and it is more economical. 
 The adherents of the nuts-and-berries diet 
 claim that it is a good food schedule because 
 grizzly bears live on it. As far as I am con- 
 cerned, being like a grizzly bear is a doubtful 
 advantage, and besides, I don't believe it is 
 possible for a bear to shell enough peanuts to 
 live on. 
 
 You have to admit that the picture of a griz- 
 zly bear weighing about half a ton, sitting back 
 on his haunches delicately nibbling at a goose- 
 berry or a filbert is a foolish spectacle. It's 
 like playing an exhibition game of chess in the 
 Hippodrome. If I ever have any leisure time, 
 I'm going to educate one grizzly bear to eat 
 nourishing food. Can you imagine the grati- 
 tude of a beast that has been going through life 
 on a diet of peanuts fed to him by small boys 
 through the bars of his cage, when for the first 
 time he gets his teeth into a roast turkey with 
 cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie on the side. 
 For the rest of his life that bear is going to be 
 for me strong.
 
 FAST ASHORE n 
 
 Lucile called a meeting to discuss ways and 
 
 means. 
 
 M 
 
 First of all," she said, "when the supply 
 boat comes today we'll make them take back 
 every edible thing they have brought, together 
 with what we have on hand, so that we won't 
 be tempted. Isn't it lucky our cottage is on 
 an island all by itself so that it won't be possi- 
 ble for one of us to cheat by going to a hotel 
 somewhere." 
 
 "Don't you think it would be a greater vic- 
 tory for us if we conquered the demon food 
 with some supplies within easy reach?" I sug- 
 gested, with a painful recollection of that sup- 
 ply boat which came only twice a week but 
 carried delicacies of which Lucullus never 
 dreamed. 
 
 "No, it's best to take no chances." 
 
 "There's the motor boat anyway. We could 
 run over to the mainland." 
 
 "No, we couldn't." Lucile smiled. "Fa- 
 ther is the only one who can run it and he won't 
 be here until Sunday." 
 
 Thus another ray of sunlight flickered out. 
 A man of my build does not crank up a marine
 
 12 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 engine located near the floor of a boat. I 
 might say he could not, but it is truer to say 
 that he does not; if he is the least bit wise he 
 does not even try it. 
 
 "I'll give the maid a week off," Lucile con- 
 tinued gaily. "As we're not going to eat any- 
 thing we shall not really need her and she has 
 been wanting to go home for some time. I'll 
 let her go back with the supply boat. We'll 
 begin our fasting tomorrow by going without 
 breakfast." 
 
 She consulted the magazine again. "We 
 have to drink plenty of good, pure water and 
 think high thoughts all the time and we'll 
 hardly notice the absence of food at all. Then 
 next Monday we'll break our fast by drinking 
 the juice of an orange and eating a handful of 
 popcorn, just one handful so as not to shock 
 our digestive apparatus by introducing any- 
 thing solid into it." 
 
 But why harrow the reader with the rules 
 and regulations which Lucile framed for us. 
 Suffice it to say that they went into effect the 
 next morning according to schedule. 
 
 We met at breakfast. I am never at my
 
 FAST ASHORE 13 
 
 best before I drink my first cup of coffee in the 
 morning and the thought of the inhuman way 
 I was about to treat my "tummie" depressed 
 me more than usual. The table was ghastly 
 white, unbroken by the usual cheerful array 
 of steaming hot dishes. At each place was a 
 large glass of water and a napkin. What the 
 napkin was for I failed to discover. I imagine 
 it was what the anthropologists would call "a 
 survival of culture." 
 
 "We have fifty-eight five-gallon bottles of 
 distilled water," Lucile informed us. "I won- 
 der if that will be enough. It amounts to 
 nearly one hundred gallons apiece." 
 
 I made a hasty mental calculation and de- 
 cided that a hundred gallons of drinking water 
 would last me the rest of my life. 
 
 Mrs. Green, Lucile's mother, was patiently 
 cheerful and drank three glasses of water like 
 a sponge. I didn't care much for mine. I had 
 previously had no idea that water was so flat 
 and tasteless. It is also an extraordinarily 
 elusive and clammy thing to put into an empty 
 stomach which is eagerly expecting bacon and 
 eggs, muffins and coffee.
 
 14 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I feel better already," Lucile said gaily, as 
 we left the table. "My mind is clear I have 
 wasted none of my vital energy in merely di- 
 gesting food." 
 
 I knew that she was quoting Lipton S. Clair, 
 whom I was beginning to regard with disfa- 
 vor, to say the least, but I refrained from voic- 
 ing my opinion of a man who will help women 
 to get even more fool ideas than they can think 
 up by themselves. 
 
 I took a cigar from my pocket, cut the tip 
 end off carefully with a silver cutter Lucile 
 had given me the previous Christmas and was 
 about to light it when she stopped me. 
 
 "No no no, you mustn't. Did I forget 
 to tell you that while we are fasting we have 
 to give up all stimulants and narcotics such as 
 alcohol and tobacco?" 
 
 "What? Cut out smoking for a week?" 
 
 "Certainly," she replied firmly. "In the 
 first place, if you don't you will be deathly ill. 
 In the second place, the whole object of the fast 
 is to rid the body of all toxic poisons, such as 
 nicotine, alcohol and so forth. By the time 
 you have done without tobacco for a week I
 
 FAST ASHORE 15 
 
 should not be surprised if you never smoked 
 again." 
 
 "Nor me either/' I reflected gloomily, out 
 loud. "I'll be dead." 
 
 "Of course, if you don't care to make the ex- 
 periment," Lucile said icily, "I'll put off the 
 fasting for another week until Frank Bopp is 
 here. I'm sure he will be willing to try it." 
 
 This was waving a red rag at me. Frank 
 Bopp was my rival. After her reference to 
 him I would have gone without breathing for 
 a week if she had suggested it. Bopp is a 
 thin, conversational insect who can perch on the 
 arm of a girl's chair and chirp by the hour. 
 Sometimes I regret that for architectural and 
 educational reasons I can't do that, and then I 
 remember what other men would think of me 
 if I could and I am solaced. I refrain from 
 saying what I think of the name "Bopp." 
 
 Thus through my love and jealousy I was led 
 into deeper water, or shall I say more water, 
 because somebody handed me a glass of the 
 stuff every few minutes. I drank it in the 
 vain hope that I could drown the inner man 
 who seemed to be yelling for help all the time
 
 16 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 and kicking me just below the belt buckle when 
 he didn't get it. 
 
 That morning we went for a walk. 
 
 "Walking is the best exercise in the world," 
 Lucile stated. "It is excellent for reducing 
 surplus flesh around the abdominal region." 
 
 Invariably she had a little stinger for me 
 concealed in any remark she might make. I 
 have since learned that this is a sign that a 
 woman takes a proprietary interest in a man. 
 
 Before we went she fed Tootles, her long- 
 haired pup. Tootles is one of those dogs so 
 constructed by nature that when you want to 
 look her in the face you don't know where to 
 look. I often wonder if Tootles herself isn't 
 in doubt as to which end to wag. 
 
 "Isn't Tootles going to fast too?" I pro- 
 tested. "Can't she stand it as well as I can?" 
 
 "Possibly she could do it," Lucile said as she 
 gave her a dog biscuit, "but she hasn't intelli- 
 gence enough to understand why she should go 
 without food." 
 
 "I'm not far above Tootles in intelligence 
 then," I remarked, but under my breath this 
 time, so she could not hear.
 
 FAST ASHORE 17 
 
 After watching Tootles eat we went walk- 
 ing. Whenever I go walking in the city I hire 
 a taxicab. If I want to see nature in all her 
 grandeur, do I go tramping through the woods ? 
 I do not. I buy a seat at a moving picture 
 show where they are running a western out- 
 law film. "Nature for a nickel" is my motto. 
 Fatigue is eliminated and the sum total of 
 knowledge is advanced several thousand feet. 
 
 After we had covered several miles, as it 
 seemed to me, I suggested that we had better 
 not get much farther away from home. 
 
 "Why not?" Lucile queried. 
 
 "We might not get back in time for lunch." 
 
 "I brought our lunch," she said, and pro- 
 duced a flask of water. 
 
 I groaned. I had nearly forgotten that 
 there was to be no lunch. It's curious how 
 much you depend on meals to break up the day. 
 All the morning long you keep thinking, "I 
 must get so much done before lunch," and then 
 in the afternoon you spur yourself on to an 
 extra effort with the thought of a better dinner 
 than usual when you get through. Take these 
 meal landmarks out of your day and what is
 
 i8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 left? Nothing but a dreary, dead level desert 
 of time, a day whose limits seem interminable. 
 
 "How many days is it until we eat again?" 
 I asked hopelessly. 
 
 "Six and a half," Lucile computed. "Then 
 we get some orange juice and a few kernels of 
 popcorn." 
 
 "Then what?" 
 
 'That's all for the first day." 
 
 A few kernels of popcorn ! Can you imag- 
 ine a kernel of popcorn floating hither and yon 
 in all that sea of water and finally giving up 
 with a despairing shriek when it finds there is 
 no place to land? 
 
 "You mustn't think of things to eat; you're 
 not really hungry it is your imagination. 
 Tighten your belt and you won't know that 
 you haven't eaten." 
 
 I followed her advice. True enough, the 
 belt was quite loose. A terrible thought 
 struck me a few days of fasting and I would 
 have to wear suspenders ! I had always prided 
 myself on a self-supporting figure, as it were, 
 and had jeered at the fence-rail build which is 
 obliged to hang all its garments from its shoul-
 
 FAST ASHORE 19 
 
 ders. Already with one meal missing I was 
 up to the last notch in my belt. 
 
 Along toward noon I noticed a distinct head- 
 ache. 
 
 "That will pass away," Lucile assured me. 
 "Lipton S. Clair says so, and he ought to 
 know." 
 
 "Why ought he to know ?" I snapped. "Did 
 he invent headaches or is he just generalizing 
 from reading about somebody else's headache ? 
 This pain I've got here has settled in my region 
 of thought for a long run, and I defy any Lip- 
 ton S. Clair to drive it out." 
 
 "Don't be cross," Lucile soothed. "Let me 
 dip my handkerchief in this spring here and 
 wet your forehead with it." 
 
 She did, and while it didn't do any good, I 
 always like to have her fussing around me. 
 
 The spring is one that everyone visits who 
 comes to the island, and there is a tin cup sit- 
 ting on a rock nearby. I started to get a drink. 
 
 "You mustn't drink that water." Lucile 
 stopped me. "You must not drink anything 
 but distilled water while you are fasting." 
 
 "Why not?"
 
 20 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Because when there is nothing else in it the 
 stomach is particularly susceptible to dis- 
 
 ease." 
 
 That was more of L. S. Clair's magazine 
 stuff. I knew it. Probably he got about five 
 cents a word for it, too. 
 
 "That water, pure as it is, may have mi- 
 crobes in it," she continued. 
 
 "What chance would a microbe have against 
 my stomach?" I returned bitterly, but I re- 
 frained from drinking the water. In those 
 days that woman had me under her thumb. 
 
 At nightfall we sat around that white table 
 once more. I think even Lucile's enthusiasm 
 was wavering. It seemed distinctly more of 
 an effort to be cheerful than it had at break- 
 fast. Her mother was frankly miserable and 
 eyed me with a glance which warned me that 
 were we cannibals the laws of hospitality would 
 hardly protect one of my build. 
 
 "Have some water, Mr. Blainey," Lucile 
 said. 
 
 "I won't drink another drop tonight," I de- 
 clared, "unless I can have some flavoring ex- 
 tract in it."
 
 FAST ASHORE 21 
 
 After that we sat around thinking about 
 sweet potatoes and hash and steaks, but talk- 
 ing about the latest books and the moonlight 
 through the trees. But what is moonlight on 
 an empty stomach ? Merely moonlight noth- 
 ing more. It is curious how fasting exagger- 
 ates the ego of the digestive apparatus. It be- 
 comes more important than any other part of 
 the body. It demands attention and gets it. 
 For instance, if Congress should start fasting 
 the affairs of the nation would come to a stand- 
 still. 
 
 "What's that?" demanded Lucile, straining 
 her ears to catch some sound out on the water. 
 
 We all listened. There was a faint "put 
 put" out there somewhere. 
 
 "It's Johnson's launch," said Mrs. Green. 
 "I can tell because it misses every tenth ex- 
 plosion." 
 
 "Lipton S. Clair says that fasting makes all 
 the senses extraordinarily acute," Lucile ex- 
 plained. 
 
 I know Mrs. Green said, "Damn Lipton S. 
 Clair !" under her breath, but I did not hear it. 
 
 "I wonder what Johnson's boat can be doing
 
 22 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 out here at this time of night," Lucile specu- 
 lated. 
 
 "He must be bringing someone over here," 
 said her mother. "Ours is the only island for 
 miles which is inhabited as late as this in the 
 season, and he certainly isn't out for a pleasure 
 trip." 
 
 "It can't be father," Lucile mused. "He 
 said he wouldn't be home until Sunday." 
 
 So we went down to the dock. It was moon- 
 light and the old launch coming in looked some 
 way romantic. What was she bringing us? 
 Something within me suggested food, but the 
 suggestion echoed hollowly through vast spaces 
 otherwise unbroken by any sound save the lap- 
 ping of water. 
 
 The launch came alongside, a man with a 
 couple of grips jumped ashore, then the boat 
 backed away and limped off again into the dark- 
 
 ness. 
 
 u 
 
 Why, Frank Bopp!" exclaimed Lucile, 
 greeting the newcomer. "We weren't expect- 
 ing you until next week." 
 
 "I know it," he said, "but I got two weeks' 
 vacation instead of one, and I thought I'd be
 
 FAST ASHORE 23 
 
 welcome, so I grabbed the first train and here 
 I am." 
 
 "Of course you are welcome." Lucile was 
 wondering how she was going to break the 
 news of the fasting to him. 
 
 "How are you, Monty ?" He hailed me with 
 the nickname I most detest and slapped me on 
 the shoulder-blade where the sunburn was the 
 worst. 
 
 I assured him politely, but untruthfully, that 
 I had never felt better. 
 
 Then we went back to the house. All I had 
 needed was the presence of this mosquito to be 
 absolutely miserable. He knew more different 
 ways of getting on my nerves, even when I was 
 well fed, than any other individual in the world. 
 I hated to think what the next few days would 
 be like with Bopp and hunger for my compan- 
 ions. 
 
 Just at that time he was smoking a cigar. 
 I'll bet it really was a poor one, but to me it pos- 
 sessed an aroma for which I would cheerfully 
 have strangled him. I carefully stood to lee- 
 ward of him so that the smoke would blow my 
 way.
 
 24 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Believe me," Bopp was saying, "I had some 
 dinner on the dining car this evening. There 
 was some fried chicken with biscuit and gravy, 
 mashed potatoes, corn on the cob " 
 
 "Isn't the moon beautiful?" interrupted 
 Lucile. Even she could stand no more. 
 
 "Looks like a great big pumpkin, doesn't it?" 
 Bopp blundered. 
 
 I am going to put a new verb in the diction- 
 ary, namely: "to Bopp," meaning to speak at 
 length on any annoying subject. 
 
 Finally Lucile took him one side and ex- 
 plained about the fasting. The idea fascinated 
 him, especially in its application to me. He 
 offered to wager me huge sums of money which 
 neither of us possessed, that I couldn't last for 
 a week, and if I did he wanted to open a pool on 
 my probable weight and waist measurement at 
 the finish. You can imagine how much his talk 
 amused me. 
 
 When we got back to the house Lucile passed 
 everyone a glass of water. Bopp, with mock 
 alarm, would not let me drink mine. 
 
 "Wait till I get a tire-gauge," he said, "and
 
 FAST ASHORE 25 
 
 see if Monty can stand another glass without 
 bursting an inner tube." 
 
 "Don't be funny," interposed Lucile. 
 "About tomorrow you'll feel the way Mr. 
 Blainey does now." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Anyone does after fasting the first day." 
 
 "Me? Fast?" Bopp laughed a clear ring- 
 ing laugh. "No, thank you. I don't go in for 
 those fads. I think I can have more fun 
 watching Monty do a gradual disappearing 
 act." 
 
 Lucile didn't tell him then that there was no 
 food in the house, and I joyfully refrained, for 
 fear of spoiling one little jot of the pleasure I 
 would have in watching him when he discov- 
 ered it for himself the next morning at break- 
 fast. 
 
 "I'm going to bed," I announced stiffly. 
 
 "Are you sleepy so soon?" asked Lucile, 
 kindly. 
 
 "Not sleepy, but very tired," said I, looking 
 pointedly at Bopp. "I think I may read a while 
 in bed."
 
 26 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I started to get a glass of -water. 
 
 "Pass Monty the boiler compound," said 
 Bopp. "He's getting full of lime." 
 
 "Good night, Mr. Blainey," said Lucile 
 sweetly, to make up for the boor's rudeness. 
 
 I held her hand for an instant. "Good 
 night, Miss Green." Then as I turned to go 
 up the stairs I mumbled, "Good night, Bopp." 
 
 "Good night, Monty," he returned. "Gee, 
 for your sake I hope we don't have a frost to- 
 night or you are apt to burst." 
 
 I went upstairs and slammed my bedroom 
 door. At last I could be alone with my misery. 
 After I got into bed I tried lying on my back, 
 on my side and on my stomach. It was no use : 
 I could not sleep. 
 
 At last I heard the others coming upstairs 
 to bed. I wondered if he had kissed her good 
 night in the hall. 
 
 Someone knocked at my door. 
 
 I growled, "Come in." 
 
 Bopp stuck his head in at the door. 
 
 "Excuse me, Monty," he said, "I saw a light 
 under your door and thinking you might be 
 awake I brought you a book to read."
 
 FAST ASHORE 27 
 
 He tossed a volume on my bed. 
 
 "Thanks," I murmured. 
 
 He withdrew and shut the door. 
 
 I wondered if I had misjudged the man. It 
 certainly was decent of him to bring me a book. 
 I picked up the volume, read the title and threw 
 it at the door he had just closed. 
 
 It was "The White House Cook Book"!
 
 CHAPTER TWO 
 MAROONED
 
 CHAPTER TWO 
 
 IN an seon or two it was daylight once more 
 and I dressed my emaciated figure with care, 
 inserting a precautionary safety pin hither and 
 yon in the folds which were once the waist line 
 of my garments. I took a melancholy pleasure 
 in surveying the ravages which want and sleep- 
 lessness had wrought in my one time plenitude. 
 
 Early as I had risen, Lucile was downstairs 
 almost as soon as I was. She wanted to get all 
 the benefits of a glorious long day, she ex- 
 plained. Tacitly we avoided the subject of 
 breakfast, and neither of us made any move to 
 sit down at the dining-room table to fill up on 
 water. We had our tipple standing and at 
 separate times. When man feeds silently and 
 alone he is approaching a state of savagery. 
 
 "Shall we waken Mr. Bopp?" I asked. "I 
 should hate to have him miss any of this glori- 
 ous day." 
 
 . "No," vetoed Lucile, who suspected my mo- 
 
 31
 
 32 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 tive. "The beauty of fasting is that it relieves 
 one from all the restraint of convention. We 
 are not tied down to meals, to regular rising 
 and retiring. Everyone may consult his own 
 convenience in the matter. You choose to 
 arise and glory in nature, he prefers to dream." 
 
 I surmised that Lucile was guying me, but I 
 let it go at that because I didn't want to quarrel 
 with her. Not while Bopp was in the house. 
 I wanted to save up all my fighting temper for 
 him. 
 
 After I had revelled in the glories of nature 
 for a while the entertainment palled on me and 
 I picked up Sunday's newspaper. It's curious 
 how much space is given in our press to the 
 discussion of food. I opened the sheet to the 
 market report and turned that page over in dis- 
 gust only to run into an article labelled "Menus 
 for the Week." 
 
 There were sounds of someone stirring up- 
 stairs. 
 
 "Frank is up," announced Lucile with relief. 
 I think she knew there was a storm coming and 
 was glad to get the suspense over with. 
 
 Bopp sang as he dressed. I never care for a
 
 MAROONED 33 
 
 person who is cheerful before breakfast. It 
 always seems to me as if they put it on to irri- 
 tate others. The melody which Bopp dressed 
 himself by was "Drink to Me Only with Thine 
 Eyes," and then as an encore he favored him- 
 self with 'The Old Oaken Bucket," and "Su- 
 wanee River." After that he was entitled to 
 all that was coming to him. 
 
 He came downstairs smiling and asked pleas- 
 antly, "Have you been out to pump your break- 
 fast yet, Monty?" 
 
 When he noticed that Lucile was in the room 
 he made no further allusions to eating or water. 
 After a few moments of desultory conversation 
 he went out into the kitchen. When he re- 
 turned his face wore a puzzled expression. 
 
 "Do you know where the maid is?" he en- 
 quired. "I thought I'd ask her to make me a 
 cup of coffee." 
 
 "The maid is taking a vacation," I answered 
 hastily, for fear Lucile would rob me of the 
 pleasure of telling him. "She won't be back 
 for a week." 
 
 "Oh." He received the blow with open 
 mouth. After a moment he recovered. "You
 
 34 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 won't mind, will you, Lucile, if I get myself a 
 bite?" 
 
 "I wouldn't mind in the least," she answered, 
 "but there isn't a thing to eat in the house." 
 
 "Nothing to eat?" 
 
 "No. That's so we wouldn't be tempted to 
 break our fast." 
 
 I sauntered casually over to the piano and 
 with one finger picked out "I'm on the Water 
 Wagon Now." Bopp was too stunned to no- 
 tice it much. 
 
 "What shall I do?" he yelled, with all the 
 rage of a regular man deprived of his break- 
 fast. 
 
 "Why, you'll have to fast, too," said Lucile 
 placidly. "It will make you feel better and will 
 put flesh on your frame." 
 
 "But you said that it would make me thin," 
 I interrupted. 
 
 "It works both ways," supplied Lucile. 
 
 "Me fast?" snorted Bopp. "I guess not. 
 Not while I'm within two miles of the main- 
 land. Is the motor boat in running order ?" 
 
 "Why, yes, I guess it is," Lucile replied 
 doubtfully. It is always well to be doubtful
 
 MAROONED 35 
 
 about a motor boat. "But there is no one here 
 who can run it." 
 
 "Huh," grunted Bopp unpleasantly, "I guess 
 I can run it. I don't like to talk about myself 
 but I have yet to meet the gasoline engine that 
 does not cower at my approach. If there's a 
 spark and if there's any juice in the gasoline 
 tank, she's got to go." 
 
 Curiously enough I've heard that same state- 
 ment made many times before by a person about 
 to attack a gasoline engine. And fifty per cent, 
 of those times the motor has not had to go. 
 We all went down to see him off and sat on the 
 dock until he got everything ready; all of us, 
 that is, except Mrs. Green, who complained of 
 a headache, poor old lady, and decided to stay 
 in bed. 
 
 I did not help Bopp on his way much, as I 
 should have liked to, because I know my limita- 
 tions when it comes to motor boats. Now 
 with an automobile I am right at home. When 
 a car refuses to do what the advertisements 
 claim for it all you need to do is to get out the 
 tool kit, jack up one of the axles and telephone 
 the nearest garage. Sometimes it isn't even
 
 36 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 necessary to use the jack, but it looks more pro- 
 fessional and impresses your passengers with 
 your mechanical skill. With launches the per- 
 sonal equation enters more considerably, espe- 
 cially if the difficulty occurs in the middle of a 
 large, restless lake. There is a peculiar wal- 
 lowing motion about a motor boat which has 
 ceased to mote in among a lot of unsettled 
 waves. This motion makes me unable to dis- 
 tinguish an S wrench from a bilge pump with 
 any degree of certainty and also causes me to 
 care very little about life and other trivial mat- 
 ters. 
 
 Bopp looked the engine over and sniffed. 
 "Looks like it was built by a one-armed plumb- 
 er's assistant with the St. Vitus' dance. How- 
 ever, it's very simple. A child could under- 
 stand this." 
 
 He pulled a few levers, set the steering wheel 
 just so, and started to get down to crank it. 
 Then he straightened up again. 
 
 "Monty," he commanded, "loosen that line 
 there, and when the engine starts, throw it 
 aboard so I won't have to leave the steering 
 wheel."
 
 MAROONED 37 
 
 I did as he asked. 
 
 He turned the fly wheel over painfully. 
 There was a sort of wheezing sound, but noth- 
 ing resembling the regular explosion of a ma- 
 rine motor in the flush of perfect health, feeling 
 its oats. 
 
 "The engine is cold," he announced briefly, 
 and bent his back to greater efforts. 
 
 "The principle of the gasoline engine," I lec- 
 tured glibly to Lucile, "is easily comprehensible 
 to the intellect of a boy of ten. It consists sim- 
 ply of mixing gasoline in the thing-a-ma-jig 
 which is drawn into a what-d'-you-call-it in 
 the engine, and then when an electric spark is 
 applied from the ding-bat there is an explosion. 
 See he turns the wheel over this draws the 
 charge of gas into the engine now the ec- 
 centric trips the sparking device now listen 
 intently for the explosion. You can't hear it 
 because there is a very good muffler on the 
 boat." 
 
 Bopp expressed what he thought of me by 
 hitting the engine a smart rap with the monkey 
 wrench. 
 
 "What's the matter?" enquired Lucile
 
 38 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 sweetly, wishing to smooth matters over. 
 "Won't the engine run?" 
 
 That is always the prize question to ask the 
 operator of a gasoline engine. Next time you 
 see an auto stalled beside the road, with the 
 driver dripping perspiration and tearing his 
 heart out at the crank, ask him that, and you 
 will hear him pour out his innermost soul in 
 words of one syllable. 
 
 Bopp seemed disinclined to answer, so I did 
 it for him. "You see, he could make the en- 
 gine go, any child could, but he wants to get it 
 all warmed up before he starts it. It is really 
 kindness on his part. No humane man would 
 want to make a poor, cold, gasoline engine run 
 fast right at first. See ! Mr. Bopp is going to 
 hold it in his lap until it gets warm." 
 
 "Oh, dry up !" snapped Bopp impolitely. 
 
 "That's impossible," I retorted. "The earth 
 itself is over two-thirds water and I stack up 
 considerably higher than that." 
 
 Bopp now had a smudge of dark grease on 
 his light trousers, had worn a blister on the 
 palm of his hand and had used up a collar com- 
 pletely. Manipulating a gasoline engine with-
 
 MAROONED 39 
 
 out cuss words, scientifically speaking, gener- 
 ates poison in the inner being of man, a noxious 
 distilled profanity, and Bopp had some fer- 
 menting inside of him that would have killed 
 a rabbit instantly. He opened a valve on top 
 of the engine, sniffed suspiciously, and looked 
 wise. 
 
 "It's flooded," he remarked, with an air of 
 finality. 
 
 "I can sympathize with it," I said, feelingly. 
 
 After rummaging around in the locker for a 
 while he got out a collection of tools and began 
 to remove a steel plate from the side of the 
 engine. 
 
 "In order to make it easier to understand the 
 inner workings of the engine," I explained to 
 Lucile, "he is going to take it apart so that you 
 may see each piece distinctly. I wonder if he 
 knows that he spilled some cylinder oil in that 
 place where he is now sitting. No matter. 
 To resume our lecture, that thin piece of tubing 
 covered with black grease is the crank-shaft. 
 No I am mistaken. That is the man's leg. 
 The crank-shaft is that other thing not quite so 
 thin and shapeless. Move your leg a little, will
 
 40 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 you, Bopp, so that Lucile can tell which is the 
 crank-shaft?'' 
 
 There was no reply save a growl of rage 
 from below, where the young man was stand- 
 ing on his head peering into the gizzard of the 
 machine. 
 
 "Don't forget to tell me when to let go of 
 the rope," I reminded him. 
 
 Lucile suddenly scrambled down into the 
 launch. 
 
 "Oh, Frank," she exclaimed, "would it make 
 any difference if this wire were fastened to 
 something?" 
 
 He arose from his imitation of a kangaroo 
 about to jump down a mine shaft, and took the 
 wire from her fingers without comment. His 
 feelings, whatever they were, he did not dare 
 trust to speech. There was something majes- 
 tic about the repression of the man that for- 
 bade comment. In palpitating silence he at- 
 tached the wire to a place which seemed to be 
 made for it, reassembled the engine, wiped off 
 his hands and grasped the crank. He turned 
 it once easily, and "zing" the motor got down 
 to business like a clock.
 
 'Oh, Frank," she exclaimed, "would it make any difference 
 if this wire were fastened to something?"
 
 MAROONED 41 
 
 Lucile hastily scrambled out of the boat. 
 
 "Let her go," Bopp yelled, taking hold of the 
 wheel in a pose a good deal like a Viking save 
 for the grease on his trousers. (Did Vikings 
 wear trousers? My memory is at fault.) 
 
 I threw the line on board with a feeling of 
 envy for one who was speeding to a square 
 meal. 
 
 "Keep to starboard!" Lucile yelled. "Keep 
 to starboard! There's shallow water on the 
 port side!" 
 
 Bopp spun the wheel and the launch turned 
 abruptly to the left. 
 
 "The other way," screamed Lucile. "Star- 
 board is on your right side !" 
 
 She was too late. The boat stopped sud- 
 denly. Bopp hastily took an impression of the 
 steering wheel on the pit of his stomach, the 
 engine threshed wildly for a few moments and 
 finally expired with a snort. 
 
 I yelled to Bopp, "Do you want any help?" 
 
 "No," he replied, bowing to me unintention- 
 ally from pain, holding one hand on his belt 
 line where the wheel had struck him. "I'll 
 start the engine and pull her off in a jiffy."
 
 42 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 To Lucile I explained in as loud a tone of 
 voice as I could command, "It is a curious thing 
 about many deep water sailors that they cannot 
 tell their left and right hands apart. Say 
 'port' or 'starboard' to them and they get you 
 at once." 
 
 Bopp managed to make the engine run again 
 and started to back off from the bar when the 
 propeller wheel struck something and proceed- 
 ings ended then and there. 
 
 That was the absolute finish of the perform- 
 ance for that day. There was no encore. He 
 couldn't turn the engine over again even by 
 hand, and a little investigation disclosed the 
 fact that the propeller shaft was hopelessly tan- 
 gled in some heavy wire which the propeller 
 had picked up out of the sand. Bopp discov- 
 ered all this by sticking his head under water 
 over the side of the boat. 
 
 "You might as well come ashore now," sug- 
 gested Lucile. "We'll have to get a mechanic 
 over from town next week to fix the boat." 
 
 So Bopp came ashore, by wading in rather 
 chilly water up to his waist. Considerable of 
 the bloom was rubbed from his usual natty ap-
 
 MAROONED 43 
 
 pearance when he clambered on the dock, be- 
 smudged and dripping. 
 
 "Welcome to the Pasters' Club," I greeted 
 him. "I would baptize thee as a brother in 
 the Aqua Pura Fraternity, but I see there is 
 no need. We'll go up to the house and give 
 you a nice drink of water to warm you up after 
 your chill." 
 
 "Where's the telephone?" demanded Bopp 
 briefly, ignoring me. 
 
 "What's the matter?" asked Lucile. 
 
 He endeavored to be pleasant to Lucile. "I 
 am going to telephone to town to have a boat 
 come over to take me to breakfast." 
 
 "In the meantime," I requested, "would you 
 mind moving over here a moment and drip- 
 ping on these flowers which need water?" 
 
 Lucile took him to the telephone. I followed 
 at a leisurely pace and by the time I got to the 
 house I found Bopp whirling the lever of the 
 telephone with exasperated energy. It was 
 one of those country telephones where you have 
 to grind a little business on the side of the box 
 until Central happens to hear you swearing at 
 the transmitter. The operator seemed more
 
 44 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 oblivious than usual, and Bopp remarked 
 "Hello" in every possible tone of voice from 
 wheedling to a threat. 
 
 "I wonder," Lucile murmured vaguely, "if 
 maybe it wasn't the telephone cable which you 
 dug up with the propeller of the launch." 
 
 "What's that?" Bopp demanded. 
 
 "I said, 'It must have been the telephone 
 cable you got mixed up in when you ran the 
 launch aground.' That's why it won't work." 
 
 Bopp hurled the receiver into the hook which 
 is designed to hold it. 
 
 "Don't be cross," she said soothingly. 
 "Think pleasant things. You've got to stay. 
 Make the best of it." 
 
 "Think pleasant things! I do! I think of 
 ham and eggs. Can you suggest something 
 pleasanter? How far is it to the mainland?" 
 
 "Two miles." 
 
 "And I can only swim a mile and a half." 
 
 "Why don't you start anyway ?" I suggested 
 helpfully. 
 
 "Hush," warned Lucile. Then turning to 
 Bopp, who was headed for the door, "Where 
 are you going?"
 
 MAROONED 45 
 
 "Out in the woods to eat the leaves off the 
 trees." 
 
 He slammed the door. 
 
 After he had gone a blessed calm reigned for 
 a few minutes. All at once Lucile started. 
 
 "Suppose he should eat some poison ivy!" 
 she exclaimed. "He's a city bred man and I 
 don't suppose he knows what it looks like. 
 Don't you think you had better go and show 
 him where it is?" 
 
 "Sure, I'll be glad to go. I'll not only show 
 him where it is I'll feed it to him." 
 
 "No I'll go," she said; "you two might 
 quarrel." 
 
 Right there I made my mistake. I let her go 
 after him. So she spent the day with him in- 
 stead of with me. Watching Bopp's discom- 
 fort had made me forget my own, but now that 
 I was alone I became more oppressed than ever. 
 I got up and sat down again. I couldn't get 
 comfortable. There was nothing to do. My 
 head did not feel in a condition to allow me to 
 fc read and there was no work to occupy me as 
 k there would have been at home. 
 
 While roaming about the empty rooms I
 
 46 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 heard a whine and looking for its source found 
 Tootles in the kitchen trying to reach the shelf 
 where the dog biscuit were kept. In the ex- 
 citement Lucile had forgotten to feed her. 
 With melancholy pleasure in sparing some liv- 
 ing creature the pangs I felt myself I got down 
 the box of biscuit and gave the dog one. 
 
 There were twelve of the little cakes left in 
 the box. The dog seemed very fond of them. 
 One would not be missed. I hope I never have 
 to go through such temptation again. I 
 weighed a biscuit in my hand, I sniffed its fra- 
 grance and then I put it aside. I would stick 
 to my promise. But the memory of that bis- 
 cuit haunted me the rest of the morning. 
 Every time I thought of it I had to cut a new 
 hole in my belt. I went back to the shelf a 
 hundred times and looked longingly at the box, 
 but always tore myself away with a sigh. 
 
 Some time during the late afternoon Mrs. 
 Green dressed and came downstairs. She said 
 she was feeling better, but she was pale and 
 seemed a trifle unsteady on her pins. 
 
 Clouds began to obscure the sky about sun- 
 down and Mrs. Green fretted a good deal be-
 
 MAROONED 47 
 
 cause Lucile was away from home. In order 
 to ease her mind I volunteered to find the cou- 
 ple and take them raincoats and umbrellas. 
 Just as I opened the door to saunter forth the 
 storm burst. 
 
 There was a deafening roar of wind which 
 whipped the branches of the trees in sudden 
 fury, then a quick rattle of hail driven like bul- 
 lets against the eaves-troughs. Just as I 
 turned back to avoid the stinging fusillade of 
 hail, the sky appeared to split in the middle 
 with a blinding light and a ripping crash of 
 thunder which fairly made my heart stop beat- 
 ing. The lightning had obviously struck some- 
 where in the vicinity. 
 
 The crash of thunder outside was echoed by 
 a thud inside. I looked around. Mrs. Green 
 was lying at full length on the floor. From 
 having seen it done on the stage I knew that she 
 had fainted. 
 
 I dropped the bundle of raincoats and ran to 
 her assistance. First I held her head on my 
 lap but couldn't seem to get any further toward 
 reviving her. Somewhere I had read direc- 
 tions for reviving fainting ladies. One of the
 
 48 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 first things recommended was to loosen the cor- 
 set, but this seemed to be an unpardonable lib- 
 erty to take with a lady I had only met a few 
 times. Besides I didn't know how to locate a 
 corset and wouldn't have been able to loosen it 
 if I had found it. It would be a godsend if 
 someone would get out a book on "How to Re- 
 vive Fainting Ladies Although a Bachelor." 
 
 I looked up to find a strange man in the room. 
 He was clad in overalls and carried a satchel. 
 
 "Are you married?" I demanded. 
 
 "I don't know why it's any of your business," 
 he responded, "but I am. Further than that 
 I'm an Elk and belong to the union." 
 
 "If you're married, tell me what to do with 
 a lady who has fainted." 
 
 "Give her some of this." 
 
 He produced a flask from his pocket and 
 poured a large portion of its contents down 
 Mrs. Green's throat. 
 
 "The dame will be all right in a minute. I 
 always carry this just on purpose for ladies 
 when they pull a fadeaway." He sampled the 
 Lady Reviver himself reflectively and returned
 
 MAROONED 49 
 
 the flask to his pocket. "I'm the telephone re- 
 pair man. What ye been doing to the wires 
 over here ? They been trying to get you from 
 the main office all day." 
 
 I told him where the trouble lay and he de- 
 parted in the rain to patch it up. 
 
 Shortly afterward Mrs. Green opened one 
 eye. She looked at me for a moment and then 
 smiled. 
 
 "Hoi' your head steady a minute," she re- 
 quested gravely. "Wanna see who y'are." 
 
 "I'm Mr. Blainey," I explained. "Every- 
 thing is all right." 
 
 "Course it's a' right. But I don't think I'll 
 get up till the boat stops rockin'." 
 
 "You're not in a boat, Mrs. Green. This is 
 your own home." 
 
 "It's a boat, I tell you. I guess I know when 
 I'm seasick. Besides, at home, ain't got so 
 many pictures of purple sunsets." 
 
 "But there aren't any pictures of purple sun- 
 sets, here," I protested. 
 
 "You're mistaken, my fren', there's two of 
 'em over there." She pointed limply in the arc
 
 50 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 of a circle which took in the entire opposite side 
 of the room. "I'll show you. Hoi' this board 
 steady while I step on it." 
 
 She gravely made an effort to rise, but fail- 
 ing in that fell back limply into my arms. 
 
 "It's no use. Ship rocks so I can't stan' up. 
 Have to roll over there." 
 
 I tried to prevent her but it was useless. 
 She insisted on rolling on the floor. She was 
 engaged in that pleasant pastime when her 
 daughter and Mr. Bopp entered, dripping from 
 the rain storm. 
 
 I tried to pick Mrs. Green up. 
 
 With a cry of alarm Lucile rushed to her 
 mother's side, then started back, sniffing the 
 air. 
 
 "Mr. Blainey," she cried in horror stricken 
 tones, "you've been drinking!" 
 
 I shook my head. 
 
 "Don' scol' my lil' fr'en'," Mrs. Green pro- 
 tested, patting my arm. "He's mos' beautiful 
 fr'en' I got." 
 
 A light of understanding began to dawn in 
 Lucile's eye. 
 
 "She fainted," I explained, "and a man who
 
 MAROONED 51 
 
 was here to repair the telephone gave it to her 
 to revive her. It was too much on an empty 
 stomach." 
 
 "Is the telephone fixed?" demanded Bopp, 
 springing up. "Maybe I can get a launch to 
 come for me yet." 
 
 The look which Lucile gave him warmed my 
 heart and made up to me for the hours I had 
 spent alone that day. He sank back into his 
 chair. 
 
 "Will you call up Dr. Stone, Montmorency," 
 she requested sweetly, "and ask him to come 
 over to see mother." 
 
 "Surely," I replied. 
 
 "You won't need any number. Just tell the 
 girl to ring Dr. Stone's residence." 
 
 I did and soon had the doctor on the wire. 
 I told him that we wanted him to come over. 
 
 "I don't believe that it is possible," came the 
 answer over the wire. 
 
 "Not possible ?" I echoed. "Why not ?" 
 
 "Haven't you seen the sea that is running? 
 It wouldn't be safe for any kind of a boat to 
 land at Green's Island the way it is blowing 
 now. You know the shore is very rocky there
 
 52 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 and if you miss the entrance to the cove, you'd 
 be dashed to pieces sure." 
 
 I told that to Lucile. 
 
 "Ask him what we should do for mother our- 
 selves," she instructed. "Tell him she has 
 some fever and seems very weak." 
 
 I told the doctor what she had said and asked 
 what we could do for the old lady until the sea 
 quieted down enough so that he could come 
 over. He told me and I hung up the receiver. 
 
 "Well," Lucile interrogated, "what did he 
 say?" 
 
 "He said," I repeated carefully, "he said, 
 'tell her to give her digestive apparatus a rest. 
 Don't eat anything for twenty-four hours and 
 drink plenty of water.' ' 
 
 Bopp laughed derisively. 
 
 The elder lady showed signs of interest. 
 "Thass what I want water," she declared, 
 "plenty o' water. Blainey, beautiful fr'en', 
 gimme some water. Have some yourself." 
 
 I gave her a glass of water which she drank 
 with enviable relish. I poured her a second 
 glass. 
 
 "Bes' water I ever tasted," said Mrs. Green,
 
 MAROONED 53 
 
 attempting to put some in her eye under the 
 mistaken impression that it was her mouth. 
 "Blainey, be like me. Never drink anything 
 stronger than this water an' you'll always be 
 blithe an' gay, jus' like me. There's on'y one 
 thing bothers me. It's whether those stairs 
 are goin' up or comin' down. I wanna go up 
 but I'm 'fraid th' stairs are comin' down." 
 
 "The stairs are just the way they always are, 
 mother," Lucile said reprovingly, "and you are 
 going up to bed." 
 
 "Go to bed?" echoed her mother. "I don' 
 wanna go to bed. I wanna change my clothes. 
 I'm gonna put on my red dress." 
 
 Mother and daughter started up the stairs. 
 On the landing Mrs. Green halted, turned and 
 waved her hand limply at me. 
 
 "Goo' bye, beaut'ful Blainey. Most beaut'- 
 f ul man I ever met. Goo' bye." 
 
 After she had been dragged around a bend 
 of the stairway by her scandalized daughter, 
 there drifted down to the living room a grum- 
 bled fragment of indignant protest: "Well, he 
 is beaut'ful. He's more beaut'ful than th' 
 Methodis' minister an' you know it."
 
 CHAPTER THREE 
 
 WHEN we were left alone together I could 
 tell by the scowl on Bopp's face that he had 
 fallen heir to the headache I had possessed the 
 day before. Only I think his may have been 
 worse because he had been smoking all day 
 long. 
 
 "Cheer up, Bopp," I admonished, more to 
 make conversation than anything else. "I am 
 just as hungry as you are." 
 
 "That isn't possible," he declared. "No one 
 has ever been as hungry as I am." 
 
 "Probably I am more hungry than you are," 
 I insisted. "I have more room to be hungry 
 
 in." 
 
 Tootles came romping in, barking vocifer- 
 ously. 
 
 "Poor pup," commiserated Bopp. "I sup- 
 pose she is starved, too." 
 
 "No, that isn't the reason she's barking. 
 She has been fed." 
 
 57
 
 58 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Fed? What?" 
 
 "Dog biscuit." 
 
 "Where are they?" 
 
 "In the kitchen," I replied, unthinkingly. 
 "From the way she is behaving there must be 
 someone outside." 
 
 It was almost dark. I went to the door and 
 peered out. There was a man coming up the 
 path. 
 
 "Who is it?" Bopp demanded. 
 
 "I can't make out." 
 
 "Maybe it's a man off the supply boat." 
 
 "Impossible," I explained. "The supply 
 boat isn't due until tomorrow, and even if she 
 were here they couldn't land from her in this 
 storm." 
 
 By this time the man had reached the porch. 
 The wind blew his wet garments around his 
 lean figure and the water was dripping dis- 
 consolately from the peak of his cap. 
 
 It was the telephone repair man. 
 
 I opened the door and admitted him. 
 
 "I guess I got to stay here all night," he an- 
 nounced. "The storm is getting so bad I don't 
 dare try to row back to town. I don't care
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 59 
 
 much for water unless it's mixed with some- 
 thing else." 
 
 Lucile came downstairs. I explained the 
 situation to her. 
 
 "Of course you can stay all night, but it will 
 be impossible to give you anything to eat/' she 
 said. 
 
 "Why not?" he asked. "I don't expect to 
 go to the trough with the family. I'll feed 
 with the help in the kitchen without a murmur. 
 As far as that goes, though, I'm a union man 
 and as good as anybody." 
 
 "Certainly," agreed Lucile. "You are wel- 
 come to anything we have, but we have noth- 
 ing." 
 
 "No grub?" he queried incredulously. 
 
 "None whatever," she explained. "We are 
 all fasting. We decided not to eat anything 
 for a week." 
 
 "Bugs," he decided briefly. Then turning 
 to Bopp and myself, "Gents, put me right. Do 
 I or do I not coal at this station ?" 
 
 "The lady has told you correctly," I assured 
 him. "There is no food in the house." 
 
 "And you're doing it, too?" He laughed
 
 60 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 sarcastically. 'When I come here the old lady 
 was pulling a Brodie on the floor and now the 
 fat guy ain't eating anything. A bunch of 
 dips all right." 
 
 "You had better go upstairs and change your 
 clothes," said Lucile. 
 
 "What will I change 'em into? A nickel- 
 plated wash-boiler or a pair of diamond ear- 
 rings?" 
 
 "I mean, put on some dry things. Frank, 
 you and he are about the same size. You'll 
 lend him a suit of yours, won't you ?" 
 
 Sure he would. He had to. Lucile has a 
 way of making a request that leaves you with 
 no other course open. 
 
 When they were at the top of the stairs Bopp 
 yelled down, "Monty, Mrs. Green wants you to 
 come up." 
 
 I started to go but Lucile stopped me. 
 
 "Ask her what she wants," she instructed 
 Bopp. 
 
 In a minute he returned with the answer. 
 
 "She says she isn't going to sleep until she 
 sees her beautiful friend Monty. If he doesn't 
 come up she'll come down."
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 61 
 
 Lucile, blushing, went up to explain to her 
 mother that her request was impossible. From 
 behind the closed door of Mrs. Green's room 
 there issued sounds of an argument, supple- 
 mented by weeping. 
 
 Eventually Lucile came to the top of the 
 stairs and called, "Monty." 
 
 How different that name sounded when she 
 used it. I bounded up the stairs. When I say 
 "bounded," I mean it. It was the first time 
 that I had done anything like that in years. I 
 don't know whether to give the credit to fasting 
 or to Lucile. I'd prefer to blame her for it. 
 
 She stood leaning over the bannister, per- 
 plexed and troubled, her face flushed and her 
 hair becomingly disarranged as if she had been 
 engaged in a physical contest of some sort. I 
 stopped on the stairs below her. 
 
 " 'The blessed damozel leaned out 
 From the gold bar of heaven ;' ' 
 
 I quoted. 
 
 "Don't be silly," she said in a tone of voice 
 that told me she liked it. "I have to ask you 
 a dreadfully embarrassing question."
 
 62 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "All right," I commanded. "Shoot." 
 
 "Would you mind very much kissing a lady 
 who is not as young as she was once ?" 
 
 "Would I mind?" I said, taking her hands. 
 "I've been thinking of nothing else for two 
 years." 
 
 "I meant," disengaging her hands gently, 
 "would you mind kissing mother good night. 
 She is acting very peculiarly this evening, as 
 you know, and she says she won't go to sleep 
 until you kiss her. I had no idea that she could 
 be so stubborn." 
 
 I was touched at the old lady's fondness for 
 me. We went in. She was lying tucked up 
 in bed, with a night-cap tied firmly under her 
 chin. 
 
 "Lucile made me come to bed," Mrs. Green 
 yolunteered, her bright eyes snapping with 
 wakefulness. "It's all nonsense. Don' wanna 
 be in bed. I wanna get up and go somewhere 
 with you and eat." 
 
 "There, there," said Lucile, "the doctor says 
 not to eat anything." 
 
 "Yes," snapped her mother, "and I'll bet he 
 had just had his dinner when he said it.
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 63 
 
 I know a place to eat over in town, Beautiful 
 Blarney lots of fine steaks, chops and roas' 
 beef. Guess I'll get up." 
 
 She started to throw back the covers, but 
 Lucile forcibly restrained her. 
 
 "You said you would go to sleep if I brought 
 Mr. Blainey in to see you," she said. 
 
 The old lady eyed me with evident suspicion. 
 "Is he going to kiss me good night?" she de- 
 manded. 
 
 I assured her that I was there for no other 
 purpose. 
 
 "A' right," she sighed, "then I'll go to sleep." 
 
 And she did. Or at least we didn't hear an- 
 other sound from her that evening. 
 
 When we left the room and closed the door 
 softly, Lucile put her hand on my arm and said, 
 "Thanks, Monty. It was awfully silly, but I 
 didn't know how else to quiet her. You won't 
 think anything of it, will you?" 
 
 "Of course not. It's all in the family any- 
 how, or if it isn't I wish it were," I hazarded, 
 emboldened by the pressure on my arm. For 
 the moment I could not have been any happier 
 if I had been fed.
 
 64 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 After a while the telephone man came down- 
 stairs in a suit of Bopp's clothes; light flannel 
 trousers, outing shoes, fancy shirt, soft collar, 
 tie, and blue serge coat. The togs fitted him 
 remarkably well and except for a vernacular 
 line of conversation the man did not seem ill- 
 suited to the clothes. At any rate I liked him 
 better than I did Bopp. What to do with him 
 seemed to be puzzling Lucile. It didn't seem 
 right to ask him to go out in the kitchen and 
 drink water all by himself, and there was no 
 other place to put him unless he stayed in the 
 living-room with us. Before she could decide 
 one way or the other he seated himself com- 
 fortably and proceeded to entertain us with 
 considerable conversation about himself. 
 
 "I ain't a rube," he volunteered. "I've been 
 near enough Fifth Avenue to know good 
 clothes when I see 'em, and I have to admit 
 that Mr. Bopp is a swell dresser. I only work 
 here in the summer time. In the winter I stick 
 around within sight of the Statue of Liberty. 
 I'm a wire-tapper." 
 
 "A wire-tapper?" repeated Bopp. "Isn't a 
 wire-tapper a sort of a crook?"
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 65 
 
 "Not compared to a burglar. Wire tapping 
 is just high finance." 
 
 While the storm yelped and howled without 
 he rattled on. Having missed only one meal 
 as yet, his mind was less occupied with food 
 than ours, and he was able to speak of other 
 things. His name, it appeared, was Harold 
 Kent, he was married, was a Socialist in feel- 
 ing if not in theory, had been a jockey, a tout, 
 a telegraph operator, and hoped to learn to fly 
 an aeroplane. Otherwise, his was an unevent- 
 ful history. 
 
 All the time I was listening my mind was 
 occupied with trying to account for the thrill 
 which had jolted me when I had taken Lucile's 
 hands in mine at the top of the staircase. 
 Being a dramatic critic by profession I had 
 seen so much love from an aisle seat about six 
 rows back, that I had outgrown my childish 
 belief that there was "any sich a animile." 
 Maybe my sensation came simply from lack of 
 food. If it did it was almost worth while to 
 go on fasting for the rest of my life to see if it 
 would not happen again. 
 
 J decided to put my fortunes to the test. I
 
 66 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 would sit up until Bopp went to bed and then 
 ask her to marry me. 
 
 Kent, the telephone man, retired first, prom- 
 ising himself out loud to be up and off break- 
 fastward at daybreak. 
 
 "I think I'll sit up a while," I said, stealing 
 a look at Lucile and hoping that she would com- 
 prehend my intention. 
 
 "If you're going to sit up, I'll stick," said 
 Bopp, with Machiavellian cordiality. "I'll split 
 a gallon of water with you." 
 
 There we sat, and we drank glass after glass 
 of water until eleven o'clock. Then Lucile de- 
 cided to retire and spoiled the whole game. 
 
 "I guess I'll turn in now, too," I suggested 
 tentatively, hoping at least that I would get a 
 chance to speak to her on the stairs. 
 
 But no, Bopp developed a sudden fondness 
 for my society and accompanied me to my room 
 and sat on my bed for a while, talking about 
 affairs theatrical, assuming that I was inter- 
 ested in them, which I was not. 
 
 When he finally departed the house was dark 
 and the wind of the storm made unearthly 
 noises around the eaves. I was more tired than
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 67 
 
 I remembered to have been for years, but not 
 sleepy. I don't know whether it was actual 
 hunger or merely the idea that I had not eaten 
 anything for forty-eight hours which haunted 
 me. At any rate, every time that I closed my 
 eyes I'd have a vision of those dog biscuit. I 
 might just as well have pictured a chocolate 
 cake or a doughnut to myself, but no, it was a 
 dog biscuit. It was their nearness that lent 
 enchantment to their quality. 
 
 After an hour or so of that kind of torture 
 I at last decided to satisfy my fool imagination 
 by showing it a dog biscuit in the life and prov- 
 ing that it was not desirable at all. That was 
 the only reason that I went downstairs. 
 
 It is rather ticklish business roaming around 
 a strange house wearing no other padding than 
 a suit of pajamas. I banged my shins unmer- 
 cifully against several hundred pieces of furni- 
 ture, but I toned my remarks thereat to a pitch 
 below the howling of the storm. An occa- 
 sional flash of lightning helped me momentarily 
 from time to time, but left me floundering in 
 the intervals. 
 
 Finally, in the kitchen, I groped my way to
 
 68 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 the shelf and the box of dog biscuit was in my 
 hands. Furtively I took one out, fondled it 
 and sniffed it. Being alone there with that un- 
 protected dog biscuit was too much for my 
 moral courage. I decided to throw honor to 
 the winds. There was so much wind and so 
 little honor that no one would notice it. 
 
 I set my teeth in the dog biscuit ! 
 
 Suddenly there was a sound on the stairway, 
 a noise apart from that made by the storm. I 
 listened intently. It came again the creaking 
 of a stair. 
 
 Who could it be? 
 
 Possibly it was Kent, the ex-wire tapper. 
 His early training might have proved too much 
 for him and he had decided to loot the place 
 and make his escape. Maybe he would not 
 stop at murder if balked of his design. I made 
 up my mind to behave valiantly, and grasped 
 a dog biscuit firmly in one hand, determined to 
 sell my life as dearly as was consistent with the 
 high cost of living. The box containing the 
 rest of the biscuit I put back on the shelf and 
 crouched behind the stove ready to spring at 
 the intruder unawares as soon as he entered.
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 69 
 
 There is an awful moment in the life of the 
 average man when he hears burglars in his 
 house and decides to put them to flight single 
 handed. He, the householder, knows that 
 burglars are armed and expecting trouble, and 
 that in a fight the wide-awake thief has the ad- 
 vantage over the suddenly aroused inmates. 
 Knowing that it is foolhardy he goes on just 
 the same. Why? Brave? Maybe, but usu- 
 ally because of Public Opinion. It is the cor- 
 rect thing to defend your house against thieves. 
 It has been so ever since Magna Charta and 
 before that, when burglar insurance and auto- 
 matic revolvers were not invented. A man 
 who does not defend his own property even 
 when it is fully insured is regarded as a pol- 
 troon. There isn't any sense to it, but it is so. 
 Haven't you done it yourself ? 
 
 At any rate I had one of those flashes of in- 
 sane bravery which is nine-tenths fear when I 
 saw the light of a pocket lantern straggling 
 along the wall at the foot of the stairs. 
 
 I jumped four feet straight up in the air 
 when something wet touched the sole of my 
 bare foot which was extended behind me as I
 
 70 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 knelt behind the stove. My exclamation was 
 drowned in a crash of thunder. Burglar or no 
 burglar, I was about to run to him for protec- 
 tion from that clammy thing which had touched 
 me when a second flash of lightning showed 
 Tootles frisking around my feet. She was 
 frightened by the storm and had touched my 
 foot for companionship. 
 
 Somewhat shaken I crouched behind the 
 stove again in time to see a dim figure enter 
 the kitchen. Before it came near enough for 
 me to spring the lightning revealed Lucile in a 
 dressing-gown with her hair over her shoul- 
 ders. I can't remember details, but I do know 
 that in the single flash of light she appeared 
 to be the most beautiful thing that I had ever 
 seen. 
 
 She turned the flashlight on the wall and 
 finally rested its ray on the box of dog bis- 
 cuit! She went over to it, picked up one of 
 the biscuit, pressed it to her cheek and was 
 about to bite it, when she hastily dropped it 
 back into the box, put out the light and stood 
 perfectly still, listening. 
 
 There was another sound on the stairs !
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 71 
 
 When I looked to see what Lucile was doing 
 she had disappeared. Probably she, too, was 
 hiding somewhere near, I reasoned. 
 
 This time there was less delay. Whoever 
 was coming downstairs was carelessly assured 
 and was scratching matches on the wall as he 
 went along to guide his progress. 
 
 He entered the kitchen. 
 
 It was Bopp, clad in the sort of pajamas I 
 thought he wore. 
 
 He was laughing to himself as he came in 
 and went straight to the box of biscuit. He 
 took one out of the box. 
 
 And he ate it! 
 
 Before that I may have disliked the man, but 
 now 
 
 A smile of enjoyment spread over his fea- 
 tures plainly discernible when the lightning 
 flashed. Evidently the dog biscuit were de- 
 licious. 
 
 At last he finished and started to leave. I 
 was about to breathe a sigh of relief when I 
 happened to glance toward the shelf where the 
 biscuit were kept. 
 
 The box was gone. The fiend was taking
 
 72 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 them with him. Without a thought for poor 
 Tootles, who would doubtless starve to death, 
 he was going to eat all her food. 
 
 With one bound I was upon him. The 
 thought of that poor dog steeled my heart. I 
 grabbed him by the throat and we swayed back 
 and forth in a rough and tumble fox-trot move- 
 ment to the tune of the rolling thunder. Bopp 
 did not know as I did that Lucile was watching 
 somewhere there in the darkness, and on that 
 account he was able to use more forcible lan- 
 guage than I, but I had superior weight and I 
 was slowly bearing him back when all at once 
 he dropped the box of dog biscuit and with his 
 free hand landed a wallop in my stomach ! It 
 would have been a foul under any circum- 
 stances, but with my inner workings resem- 
 bling those of a vacuum cleaner it was posi- 
 tively inhuman. 
 
 Maddened by that blow, I growled between 
 my clenched teeth, "If you hit me below the 
 belt again I'll tear your pajamas !" 
 
 He growled back, "Let 'er rip," and swung 
 on me twice more in the same place. 
 
 With mad fury I picked him up and hurled
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 73 
 
 him from me. There was a terrific crash of 
 glass and then, save for the disturbance out- 
 side, all was still. 
 
 I lit the light acetylene gas. 
 
 The wreckage of that kitchen was beyond the 
 descriptive powers of a mere dramatic critic. 
 Bopp lay sprawled on the kitchen floor near 
 the table where he had struck when I threw 
 him. The table itself had overturned on to the 
 week's supply of water in glass bottles, and 
 had apparently broken most of them. Lucile 
 was standing, pale and dishevelled, but still 
 beautiful, in the doorway of the pantry where 
 she had been hiding. 
 
 After an interval Bopp laboriously picked 
 himself up and waded toward the stairway 
 through the torrent of distilled water which 
 was streaming across the floor. 
 
 "There's your dog biscuit," he sneered, 
 pointing to Tootles, who had discovered the 
 box and was gulping down the contents as fast 
 as she could. "Fasting for a week! Ha! 
 Ha!" 
 
 Then he disappeared upstairs. 
 
 I turned to Lucile. She had dropped into a
 
 74 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 chair and had buried her face in her hands. 
 She was crying. 
 
 "What's the matter, Lucile?" I asked ten- 
 derly. 
 
 "I don't know," she sobbed; "just nerves, I 
 guess." 
 
 "You ought not to be about at this time of 
 night," I said sternly. 
 
 "I know," she replied. "I just came down 
 to to feed Tootles." 
 
 I would have believed her if I had not seen 
 the biscuit in her mouth. But what man 
 would not forgive a small fib on the part of the 
 woman he loves? 
 
 "Listen to me, Lucile dear," I said authori- 
 tatively, taking her hand, "we are not going to 
 fast any more. If your father were here he 
 would call a halt. Here your mother is sick, 
 you are hysterical, and hardly any one of us is 
 on speaking terms with the others. Besides, 
 we have got to stop. Our water supply is 
 gone." 
 
 Lucile looked up. "Then it won't really be 
 our fault, will it?" she asked hopefully. "If
 
 THE RAID ON THE KITCHEN 75 
 
 we haven't pure water we can't go on fasting. 
 Lipton S. Clair says so." 
 
 "And that's the best thing he ever said, too," 
 I agreed heartily. 
 
 So it was decided that the next day we'd 
 have a new stock of groceries come on the sup- 
 ply boat and telephone the cook to come back. 
 I think the prospect cheered us wonderfully. 
 I know I felt better immediately and I per- 
 suaded Lucile to go back to bed and get some 
 rest before daylight. 
 
 She went in to see how her mother was be- 
 fore retiring. 
 
 There was a cry from Mrs. Green's room and 
 I rushed in. 
 
 Mrs. Green had disappeared!
 
 CHAPTER FOUR 
 MYSTERY
 
 CHAPTER FOUR 
 
 You have guessed correctly that this is 
 where the element of mystery enters the story. 
 You doubtless wonder, as we did, if Kent, the 
 wire tapper, had made away with Mrs. Green, 
 or if Bopp, balked of his dog biscuit, had be- 
 come a villain of the deepest dye. 
 
 We did not come to any such conclusions at 
 first, of course. That was after we had looked 
 all over the house, up in the attic and down in 
 the cellar. Then I went to Kent's room. He 
 was snoring peacefully. I mistrusted that he 
 might be shamming and poured a pitcher of 
 water on him to see how he would react to the 
 shock. Judging as well as I could without 
 scientific instruments I should say that his re- 
 actions were perfectly normal albeit some- 
 what picturesquely abusive. 
 
 Next, we haled Bopp from his room. He 
 was inclined to be suspicious at first until we 
 told him about Mrs. Green's disappearance. 
 
 79
 
 8o FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 Then he was all sympathy and joined our 
 lightly clad searching party in the hallway. 
 
 Naturally, Lucile feared the worst, while 
 the rest of us with masculine optimism dis- 
 counted any danger which might befall the old 
 lady. 
 
 "But she wasn't herself," wailed Lucile. 
 "She's been acting funny all the evening." 
 
 "Never mind about her," comforted Kent. 
 "A man with a jag can fall off the roof and 
 never hurt himself a bit. A bit of a bun makes 
 anybody lucky." 
 
 "Suppose she is out in all this rain ?" 
 
 "A little water, more or less, won't make any 
 difference to her after the last two days," I 
 observed gloomily. 
 
 "Let's not stand here any longer," said Bopp, 
 in businesslike fashion. "It won't do much 
 good to try to guess where she is. Let's begin 
 a systematic hunt." 
 
 "Let's get on some regular clothes first," I 
 suggested. 
 
 "All right," in chorus. 
 
 Lucile dressed faster than she ever had be- 
 fore or has since, and we men with the usual
 
 MYSTERY 81 
 
 celerity of the bifurcated sex, were ready as 
 soon as she was. 
 
 As soon as we had assembled in the living- 
 room once more, Bopp, by reason of his supe- 
 rior nerve, elected himself commander of the 
 expedition. 
 
 "Monty," he directed, "you take Jesse James 
 with you and explore the north half of the 
 island. Lucile and I will search the southern 
 portion. As soon as either party discovers 
 Mrs. Green, come back to the house and fire off 
 this revolver." He laid a large caliber six- 
 shooter on the table. 
 
 I might have disputed his arrangement and 
 calm appropriation of Lucile's society, but I 
 judged that it would be a poor time to argue 
 about anything so purely social. Besides, I 
 figured out that the man who was with Lucile 
 was going to have no cinch reassuring her that 
 her mother had not met with some terrible tak- 
 ing-orT. So they went one way, and we de- 
 parted the other, everybody sloshing internally 
 and externally on account of the large amount 
 of distilled water and rain. 
 
 The actual downpour had settled into a
 
 82 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 steady drizzle which the wind hurled into our 
 faces stingingly. 
 
 "How are we going to hunt this skirt, any- 
 way?" demanded Kent, after we had trudged 
 northward for a few moments. 
 
 "Just hunt," I replied vaguely, too busy with 
 my thoughts to consider the question seriously. 
 
 "This ain't regular," objected Kent, slacking 
 up his pace. "We ought to trail the old dame 
 by her footprints. Did you notice any foot- 
 prints around the house ?" 
 
 "No. I didn't think to look." 
 
 "Well, let's go back and have a peek." 
 
 As that coincided with the methods of rea- 
 soning adopted by the detectives in the best 
 sellers, I agreed and we retraced our footsteps 
 to the house. 
 
 "You seem to know a good deal about detec- 
 tive methods," I said, with mock admiration. 
 
 "Yeh," he responded seriously, "I ought to. 
 I've been chased by some of the best detectives 
 in New York." Then he added proudly, "I 
 had Burns after me once." 
 
 We found ourselves at the house once more. 
 
 "Under her window is the first place to look,"
 
 MYSTERY 83 
 
 said Kent, alive with interest now in the 
 scheme. "Where did she sleep?" 
 
 I picked out the window of Mrs. Green's 
 room and we carefully searched the wet ground 
 underneath by lighting matches and kneeling 
 in the mud. 
 
 "Isn't it more probable that she would come 
 out by the door?" I suggested. "She could 
 never climb from that second story window." 
 
 "Sure she could," he asserted. "See that 
 rain pipe here ? It goes alongside her window. 
 A lady like her could shin up and down that 
 like a mice." 
 
 Someway the picture of my future mother- 
 in-law (I hoped) frisking up and down a nar- 
 row water pipe was beyond my imagination. 
 
 "Look here," exclaimed my companion, 
 pointing to the ground in front of him. "Is 
 that, or is it not, the print of a lady's shoe?" 
 
 I looked. There was certainly a footprint 
 there and it was small and narrow. 
 
 "It's fresh, too. You can tell by the mud 
 that it's been made since the heavy rain. Old 
 footprints would have been washed out any- 
 how."
 
 84 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 This was sure enough reasoning so I did not 
 dispute it. 
 
 Kent started to walk in the direction that 
 the footprints led and I followed, being careful 
 not to step on the marks in the soft mud. All 
 at once Kent stopped and lit several matches 
 all in one place. 
 
 "What's the matter?" I enquired. 
 
 "I think I've solved the mystery," he said, 
 bending over the mud. "But it looks bad for 
 the doll." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "There's a guy following her. Look at 
 these marks." 
 
 With a shudder I verified his statement. 
 Larger footprints were in the mud with the 
 small ones. The owner of the large shoes had 
 evidently followed the lady, because in many 
 cases the small footprints were partially ob- 
 literated by the larger ones. 
 
 Kent echoed my own thought. "Gee, I wish 
 we had brought the 'gat' with us." 
 
 "Let's hurry on before it's too late," I urged. 
 
 So we pressed forward at a killing pace, only 
 stopping once in a while to assure ourselves
 
 MYSTERY 85 
 
 that we were on the right track. At one place 
 the ground was trampled over a considerable 
 area. 
 
 "He caught up with her here," Kent inter- 
 preted. "They struggled. Look, she dropped 
 this." 
 
 He picked up a handkerchief. By the light 
 of a match I discovered that it was marked 
 "G." There could be no doubt; we were on 
 the right track. 
 
 "She got away from him, though," exulted 
 Kent. "See here, just beyond her footsteps 
 are ahead again." 
 
 We hurried on. I had left my breath miles 
 behind and made no attempt at speech. I was 
 terribly tired, but the thought of what Lucile 
 would think of me if I did not strain every 
 nerve to save her mother urged me on. 
 
 A quick spurt of flame ahead halted us. We 
 heard an indistinct murmur of voices, the 
 sound of twigs being broken, then absolute 
 silence. 
 
 "Sh!" Kent whispered. "As we are not 
 armed, we must creep up as close as we can, 
 then when the son-of-a-gun pipes us off we can
 
 86 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 spring on him before he can wing us. Do you 
 get me?" 
 
 I admitted that his plan was good. 
 
 "Then on your knees and be careful," he 
 commanded. 
 
 I dropped to my knees with a feeling of fa- 
 tigue which warned me what an effort I should 
 have to make when it came to rising to a stand- 
 ing posture again. We crept through mud 
 puddles without noticing them. 
 
 There was no sound, but all at once I felt 
 someone to be near. I held my breath and 
 crouched ready to hurl myself at whatever man 
 or thing stood before me. I heard the sound 
 of a safety match being scratched unsuccess- 
 fully against a box. When it finally lighted 
 what would be revealed? I hated to look, yet 
 dreaded more the intolerable suspense. 
 
 At last the match sputtered and flared. A 
 jagged circle of yellow light flickered a moment 
 while I crouched ready to spring, then burned 
 dimmer and went out. Still I remained un- 
 sprung. 
 
 The silence was unbroken until the light dis- 
 appeared, then Bopp's laugh rang out loud and
 
 MYSTERY 87 
 
 clear, followed a moment later by a hysterical 
 giggle which I recognized as Lucile's. 
 
 While I scuttled away as hastily as possible 
 in order to be out of range before he could 
 light another match, I heard him say in a child- 
 ish falsetto, "One two three for Monty !" 
 
 I did not hear what else he had to offer be- 
 cause I got out of ear shot as soon as possible. 
 A few hundred yards on the trail back to the 
 house Kent joined me. We proceeded Indian- 
 fashion silently for a while. 
 
 Finally he ruminated, "It's damn queer how 
 I forgot about her and him being on the island. 
 If it hadn't been for them we was doing fine. 
 I suppose we'll have to go back to the house and 
 begin all over again." 
 
 "No more footprints," I insisted hastily. 
 "We'll just hunt as plain amateur hunters and 
 cut out the detective stuff." 
 
 Kent was visibly crestfallen. I don't think 
 he cared particularly whether Mrs. Green was 
 found or not, but he had derived a great deal 
 of pleasure out of picturing himself as a sleuth 
 hound, and just plain searching for an old lady 
 lost in the woods did not appeal to him as being
 
 88 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 much of a pastime for a damp drizzly morning. 
 
 It was beginning to get light not bright 
 enough to see anything, but that sort of a green 
 mist which gives you a chill just to look at it. 
 The cold of that morning will linger with me 
 when I am broiling in the nethermost inferno. 
 No sleep, no food, wet and cold. I tried to 
 warm myself by thinking of how mad I was at 
 Bopp, but even that was unsuccessful. 
 
 The sky had progressed in colour from gray 
 to steel blue, also a nice frost-bitten colour, and 
 we were splashing around the north shore of 
 the island, when the muffled report of a gun 
 reached our ears. 
 
 'They've found her," said Kent without en- 
 thusiasm. 
 
 I assented. 
 
 "Let's go back," he suggested. 
 
 I hesitated. I hated to face Lucile after the 
 ridiculous scene of a short time before, yet I 
 could not leave her with the enemy continu- 
 ously without admitting defeat. Besides, I 
 had done and suffered as much for Mrs. 
 Green's sake as if I had been successful in 
 finding her.
 
 MYSTERY, 89 
 
 So we went back. 
 
 When we reached the house no one was in 
 sight. 
 
 ' 'Probably upstairs putting the old dame to 
 bed," Kent said. 
 
 I went to the foot of the stairs and called 
 softly, "Lucile." 
 
 There was no answer and I went up. I 
 rapped on Mrs. Green's door and then entered. 
 There was no sign of her. Somewhat puz- 
 zled, I went downstairs. 
 
 "Nobody there," I announced to Kent. 
 
 "That's funny. Must be around some- 
 where." 
 
 Just at that moment there was a sound out- 
 side and I looked out, to see Lucile and Bopp 
 approaching. Lucile was pale and her eyes 
 were sunken. Both she and Bopp were appar- 
 ently dead tired and only just able to drag 
 themselves up the steps and into the house. 
 
 "Well," sighed Lucile, "where's mother? 
 In bed?" 
 
 "Where did you put her?" I countered. 
 
 "I?" exclaimed Lucile. "I haven't seen 
 her."
 
 90 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Haven't seen her?" Kent interjected. 
 "Then who fired the revolver?" 
 
 "Didn't you ?" interposed Bopp. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Who did then ?" with sudden apprehension. 
 
 Kent picked up the gun from the table and 
 broke it. Six loaded cartridges dropped out. 
 
 "This cannon ain't been fired," he said, 
 sniffing the barrel. 
 
 We looked at one another with frightened 
 eyes. What unseen force was playing pranks 
 on us ? First the disappearance of Mrs. Green, 
 then the revolver shot coming out of the air. 
 It seemed too much to account for by natural 
 means. 
 
 When the telephone bell rang, our nerves, all 
 on paper edge, gave one united leap. I an- 
 swered the summons. 
 
 "Hello," I said. 
 
 "This is the telegraph operator at Fair 
 View," said a masculine voice. "Have you 
 got a party at your place named N. Blainey or 
 something like that?" 
 
 "Yes, I am Mr. Blainey." 
 
 "Probably it's for you, then. We got a rush
 
 MYSTERY 91 
 
 message for N. Blainey which we can't deliver 
 to you on account of the storm. Are you ex- 
 pecting anything?" 
 
 "Yes," I assented, "I am always getting tele- 
 grams. Read it to me over the telephone." 
 
 "I can't do that. I don't know you. You'll 
 have to get Mr. Green or one of his family to 
 take the message for you." 
 
 "Very well, hold the wire," I requested, put- 
 ting my hand over the mouthpiece. "Lucile, 
 will you take this telegram? It's for me, but 
 they say they'll have to read it to some member 
 of the family because they don't know me." 
 
 Lucile took the receiver, picked up a pencil 
 hanging by a string to the telephone and wrote 
 down the telegram on a scratch pad on the wall 
 as the operator read it over the wire. When 
 it was done, without comment she handed it to 
 me. 
 
 It read as follows: 
 
 "N. Blaney: 
 
 "Coming to you at last. Arrive today. 
 Have marriage license ready. 
 
 "VlDA DUNMORE."
 
 92 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Wait," I exclaimed, "this can't be for me. 
 Call up that operator again." 
 
 "Don't try to explain," said Lucile coldly. 
 "I suppose you don't even know who Vida 
 Dunmore is?" 
 
 I debated a moment as to whether I should 
 lie or not, but what was the use ? I did know 
 a Vida Dunmore, an actress. In fact I had 
 seen and criticized her work only the week be- 
 fore. 
 
 "Yes," I said slowly, "I know her, or I know 
 a girl by that name, but we are not friends. 
 This telegram is a mistake." 
 
 I saw that she did not believe me, but I had 
 no chance to explain, because in an instant we 
 had all jumped to our feet and were straining 
 our overwrought nerves to catch a sound which 
 punctuated the roar of the storm. 
 
 Somewhere near a revolver shot had been 
 fired.
 
 CHAPTER FIVE 
 ALONG CAME ROSALIND
 
 CHAPTER FIVE 
 
 EVEN Kent's flagging interest revived. Un- 
 explained revolver shots were more like the 
 regular thing. 
 
 We all hastened out of doors. 
 
 "Do you suppose someone is shooting at 
 mother?" Lucile worried. 
 
 I tried to reassure her, but my efforts were 
 politely repulsed. Apparently the matter of 
 the telegram had erected a wall of ice between 
 us. Fortunately, that could easily be explained 
 away as soon as I had time to get the telegraph 
 operator on the wire again and discover for 
 whom the message really was intended. 
 
 "It sounded as if it came from the beach." 
 Kent pointed in the direction of the dock. 
 
 "No, I am sure it was inland," argued Bopp. 
 
 At heart I was inclined to agree with my 
 rival, but rather than appear to do so I started 
 for the water front. 
 
 Around a bank of bushes I came in full sight 
 
 95
 
 96 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 of the lake. There was a comparatively quiet 
 cove where the dock was, but just beyond a 
 headland which sheltered the cove the waves 
 were piling over themselves in boiling torrents 
 where a sharp-toothed reef was hidden a couple 
 of feet below the surface. 
 
 The explanation of the revolver shots was 
 obvious. A small steamboat was jammed hard 
 and fast on the rocks, and was pounding her- 
 self with a violence which prophesied a short 
 life for her hull. Just as I appeared a man 
 forward of the pilot house fired a revolver in 
 the air. As soon as he saw me he began to 
 wave his arms violently and pointed to three 
 other figures crouched on the deck. 
 
 By this time the rest of our party had caught 
 up with me. 
 
 "He seems to be signalling," Bopp inter- 
 preted sagely. "Wonder what he wants." 
 
 "What would you want if you were in a boat 
 aground in the lake with every chance of going 
 to pieces in ten minutes?" I yelled so as to be 
 heard above the sea. "I suppose you would be 
 wishing for some poached plover's eggs on a 
 strip of toast."
 
 ALONG CAME ROSALIND 97 
 
 "They can't expect us to come out there and 
 get them," he decided. "No boat could live in 
 that sea. It would be suicide to attempt to 
 reach them." 
 
 "We must do something," Lucile decided, 
 with ready sympathy. "I'm very fond of the 
 captain. He's been bringing our supplies for 
 ten years." 
 
 "Is that the supply boat?" Bopp demanded. 
 
 "Why, yes, certainly." 
 
 "We must do something at once." Bopp 
 began to run around in busy circles in the sand. 
 "We must attempt to reach the poor devils. 
 Kent, where's that boat of yours ?" 
 
 "I drew it up on the shore here, right along- 
 side the dock why, where is it?" 
 
 "Gone, eh?" Bopp shook his head know- 
 ingly. "Probably the heavy sea washed it off." 
 
 "Yes, but no sea ever untied the knot I had 
 in her painter around this post here." Kent 
 would have seen a mystery in Utopia. His 
 mind insisted upon being pitted against the 
 unknown. 
 
 "Well, what are we going to do?" Bopp said 
 helplessly. "Those poor devils out there are
 
 98 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 counting on us. Think of being on a vessel 
 loaded with bread, butter, eggs, vegetables and 
 meat, and having it break up under your feet. 
 What shall we do?" 
 
 "I'm afraid we won't have time to do any- 
 thing," I decided. "Her back is broken. It's 
 only a question of seconds, now." 
 
 The people on board realized it too. They 
 hastily launched a life raft over the side and 
 scrambled on to it as the decks crumpled be- 
 neath them and became a twisted mass of tim- 
 bers that writhed for a moment and fell back 
 into the waves to become driftwood. 
 
 The raft, fortunately, had cleared the wreck 
 in plenty of time and was now drifting past 
 our cove toward the mainland. The men on 
 board seemed busy arranging a sort of mast 
 and sail made out of an oar and a couple of 
 oilskins. When they got that rigged up, two 
 of them held it up while a third attempted to 
 steer with a second oar. 
 
 "They're going to try to land on the other 
 point of the cove," Lucile said. "We must be 
 there to help them when they come ashore. 
 There are rocks about a hundred yards out
 
 ALONG CAME ROSALIND 99 
 
 where the raft will strike if it isn't driven 
 past." 
 
 She led off on a dog-trot which took the last 
 tuck out of me when I attempted to follow. I 
 got there some way, however, but minus the 
 power of speech. 
 
 "Don't land here!" shouted Lucile into the 
 teeth of the gale. "Dangerous rocks !" 
 
 She might as well have been whispering for 
 all they could hear out there on that bobbing 
 raft, besides, I imagined they would gladly 
 have welcomed a rock or anything else fairly 
 solid and substantial. 
 
 They discovered the rocks for themselves 
 almost immediately and slid off from the raft 
 in a compact group. The next few minutes 
 passed rather rapidly. Under the direction of 
 Kent, who had read a book about it somewhere, 
 we formed ourselves into a life line by holding 
 on to one another's hands and wading out into 
 the surf. The sea was not running so high in 
 the cove as it was outside or we could not have 
 done this, but it was bad enough, besides being 
 decidedly subnormal in temperature. 
 
 One by one the shipwrecked victims strug-
 
 ioo FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 gled to us and were passed on up to the shore. 
 Three were landed in this way, but the fourth 
 failed to make it. I could see a head bobbing 
 up and down a hundred feet from where I 
 stood, but not coming nearer very rapidly. 
 
 All at once a particularly ugly little wave 
 slapped me in the face. When I had shaken 
 the water from my eyes I looked out to sea, but 
 the head had disappeared altogether. 
 
 "That man can't swim. He's drowning!" 
 Lucile shouted. 
 
 'Til get him," I volunteered briefly. 
 
 "You'll be drowned yourself," Lucile pro- 
 tested. 
 
 "No, he won't," Bopp assured her. "Monty 
 can swim like a turtle. I've often seen him in 
 the tank at the Athletic Club." 
 
 I disengaged my hand from Kent, who was 
 next to me in the line, and struck out for the 
 spot where I had last seen the head. I am not 
 a spectacular swimmer, but on account of my 
 buoyancy I can keep up easily. So I take no 
 credit for starting out after the fourth sur- 
 vivor. I was sure of getting back. 
 
 Fortunately I was in time. By a freak of
 
 ALONG CAME ROSALIND 101 
 
 luck the body rose to the surface just in front 
 of me and I grabbed it before it could sink 
 again. It was a woman and I towed her easily 
 by her hair. In a matter of five minutes I was 
 again where I could stand. I turned and 
 picked her up. She was still insensible. 
 
 It was not until I had almost reached shore 
 that I noticed anything peculiar about the 
 young woman who rested limply in my arms. 
 I almost dropped her when I happened to glance 
 down and discovered that she was clad in the 
 silk tights, doublet and boots of Rosalind in 
 "As You Like It."
 
 CHAPTER SIX 
 LIPTON S. CLAIR
 
 CHAPTER SIX 
 
 LUCILE'S gasp of astonishment when she 
 saw what I had rescued was followed by an 
 exclamation of womanly concern as she no- 
 ticed the unconscious condition of my fair- 
 haired burden. 
 
 "Is she drowned ?" she asked. 
 
 I shook my head in answer. Explanations 
 were not in order from me; I had less than a 
 pint of wind left and I had to use it for breath- 
 ing purposes. 
 
 "Just swallowed a little too much water, I 
 guess," explained one of the men from the 
 boat. "She'll be all right as soon as she gets 
 a cup of hot coffee in her." 
 
 "Who is she, Captain Perkins, and why is 
 she dressed that way?" asked Lucile, ignoring 
 the reference to coffee. 
 
 "I dunno who she be," said the captain. 
 "She come aboard at Buena Vista and said she 
 
 was going to Fair View." 
 
 105
 
 io6 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Dressed like that?" 
 
 "No, sir, she was dressed swell. When we 
 struck the rock over yonder I told her we might 
 have to swim and she'd orter dress just as light 
 as possible. She went into the cabin with her 
 grip and when she came out she was like this, 
 and asked me if I calculated that was light 
 enough. I 'lowed it was, and we didn't have 
 no time for explanations, because just then we 
 broke in two." 
 
 We made a rough stretcher and carried the 
 unconscious girl to the house. Even wet and 
 draggled, she was undeniably beautiful, and 
 there was a soft line about the mouth that gave 
 the lie to the absurd costume she had on. 
 There was something about the face that I 
 racked my brains to associate with a familiar 
 name. 
 
 When we had placed her in an upstairs room 
 we left her to Lucile's care and had a stag party 
 in my bed-chamber. There were now six men 
 of us. 
 
 Of the newcomers the captain was a tall, 
 wiry old man with sharp, ferret, black eyes and 
 a set of whiskers correctly trimmed for one
 
 LIPTON S. CLAIR 107 
 
 of the "natives" in "Shore Acres." I after- 
 wards found out that he was not born to the 
 sea, but had been a rural real estate agent most 
 of his life. The steamer Mary Bell had be- 
 come his property on a foreclosed mortgage 
 and as he couldn't sell it to any advantage he 
 had been obliged to operate it himself as a sort 
 of ferry and supply boat for various places on 
 the lake. 
 
 One of the other men, a green, lanky young- 
 ster, was obviously an employee on the boat. 
 The other was just as obviously a passenger. 
 The boatmen were inclined to take things philo- 
 sophically and regard their escape as part of 
 the day's work. The passenger was annoyed 
 and uncomfortable under the indignities and 
 inconveniences he had been made to suffer. 
 He was not a fat man, but he had a build simi- 
 lar to mine before I started fasting. We like 
 our comforts, we men of curves, and going 
 without them makes us peeved. 
 
 I offered the passenger a suit of my clothes. 
 "You're about my build," I suggested. 
 
 He looked at me with disfavor as if to say, 
 "I hope not," but accepted just the same.
 
 io8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I told the captain and the other man I would 
 outfit them with some of Mr. Green's old 
 clothes. I rummaged the closets, but all I 
 could find was a slightly moth-eaten suit of 
 evening clothes and a red and white blazer. I 
 had never suspected Mr. Green of owning any- 
 thing as frivolous as that. 
 
 The captain possessed himself of the even- 
 ing clothes and while he was putting them on 
 I asked what had happened. 
 
 "I didn't have no business putting out," he 
 replied, "but that good-looking girl there 
 seemed in an awful sweat to get to Fair View, 
 and old as I be, I let her hornswoggle me. My 
 biler were not in first-class shape, in fact I 
 may say that some of her flues was constructed 
 on the general principle of a doughnut, which 
 is more hole than anything else. Jim, here, my 
 engineer, ain't a regular engineer, being as 
 how he learned by correspondence, but I hired 
 him because he's one of the best cooks in 
 the State. He must have done something 
 wrong " 
 
 The other man tried to interrupt. 
 
 "I know," the captain brushed him verbally
 
 LIPTON S. CLAIR 109 
 
 one side, "but you must have done something. 
 Anyhow we plumb lost our steam completely. 
 Drowned the fires too. Afore we could do 
 anything we straddled the rocks out here and 
 you know the rest. Now if you want a rat- 
 tling good cup of coffee and some bacon and 
 eggs just turn Jim loose in the kitchen even 
 with them star spangled clothes on and set back 
 with a napkin tucked under your chin." 
 
 I looked at Bopp and Bopp looked at Kent, 
 who grinned. 
 
 "There ain't any coffee," he announced, "and 
 there ain't any bacon and eggs." 
 
 "Well, anything will do, even tea." 
 
 "There ain't anything." 
 
 "What ?" The passenger was on his feet in 
 an instant. "Nothing to eat?" 
 
 "Not a thing." 
 
 "Good heavens," he raved, "we'll all starve. 
 I am positively faint with hunger now. What 
 shall I do?" ' 
 
 "Why don't you try; fainting?" suggested 
 Bopp amiably. 
 
 "Besides I have an important engagement in 
 Fair View," continued the passenger. "A
 
 no FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 friend of mine wired me that he was going to 
 be married there this morning and I must pre- 
 vent him." 
 
 "Prevent him?" I said enquiringly. 
 
 "Yes, marriage as an institution may be all 
 right for the average intellect, but a man like 
 Ned Blaney must not tie his genius down to 
 the height attainable by a woman." 
 
 "Ned Blaney," I repeated. "That telegram 
 must have been for him." 
 
 "Is there a telephone?" enquired the passen- 
 ger. 
 
 "There is." 
 
 We escorted him to it in a body. 
 
 Over the wire he asked for the best hotel in 
 Fair View. That was a cinch for the operator. 
 In New York it might have been harder. 
 
 "Hello." 
 
 'Is Mr. N. Blaney registered there ?' 
 
 "Thank you. Will you see if he is in his 
 room ?" 
 
 'Just gone out ? When he comes in will you
 
 LIPTON S. CLAIR in 
 
 please tell him to call up " He turned to us. 
 "What is the number of this telephone?" 
 
 "Tell him to call up Green's Island," I an- 
 swered. 
 
 "Hello, tell Mr. Blaney to call up Green's 
 Island and ask for Mr. Lipton S. Clair. Good- 
 bye." 
 
 After he had hung up the receiver there was 
 silence for a few moments, then Bopp, in a 
 tone of repressed emotion enquired, "May I 
 ask if you are Mr. Lipton S. Clair?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "The famous novelist and magazine 
 writer?" 
 
 "I'd hardly say that, although I suppose my 
 work is more or less widely known." 
 
 "And you," continued Bopp, checking off on 
 his fingers, "feel faint from hunger and think 
 that you will starve to death if you don't get 
 food?" 
 
 "Is there anything strange in that?" 
 
 Bopp said nothing, but picked up a magazine 
 which Lucile had left opened face downward 
 on the table, and handed it to Mr. Clair. He 
 looked at it for a moment and then smiled.
 
 H2 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I remember when I wrote this. It was 
 over a year ago. It's a bully theory, isn't it ?" 
 
 "Didn't you ever try it?" 
 
 "Why, no. I've never had time. I've al- 
 ways wanted to meet someone who had made 
 the experiment to see if I was right." 
 
 "You have met them," I thundered in the 
 tones of a judge, "and you need not ask about 
 the result of the experiment, because you are 
 going to try it yourself." 
 
 A burst of applause greeted me from Bopp. 
 
 " 'Eating three meals a day is a habit,' " I 
 quoted. " 'We have made tyrants of our 
 stomachs. They demand to be fed every so 
 often, and if we answer that demand we are 
 slaves.' ' 
 
 Lipton S. Clair groaned. 
 
 I explained how we had sent our supplies 
 and cook away so that we should not be 
 tempted. 
 
 "And when do you expect to receive more 
 supplies?" he enquired. 
 
 "You were on the boat which was bringing 
 the groceries," I informed him. 
 
 "Then they are out there in the lake ?"
 
 LIPTON S. CLAIR 113 
 
 I nodded. 
 
 He grabbed a hat (mine, I discovered after 
 it had blown into a mud-puddle), and rushed 
 out. 
 
 "Where are you going?" Kent yelled. 
 
 "To save some of those groceries," said the 
 distinguished author. 
 
 This was such a wonderful idea that we all 
 followed him, Kent, more thoughtful than the 
 rest, pausing to get a clothes line from the shed. 
 
 It was still too rough to go out to where the 
 Mary Bell had gone down even if we had pos- 
 sessed a boat, but boxes and crates of gro- 
 ceries, fruits and vegetables were still stream- 
 ing past the leeward point of the cove. 
 
 We spent two hours trying to lasso these 
 packages. Only one throw netted us anything 
 and when we had opened the case we towed in, 
 we found three dozen boxes of wet matches. 
 
 After the last crate had bobbed serenely by, 
 nodding us a friendly farewell, we sighed and 
 returned to the house.
 
 CHAPTER SEVEN 
 FIVE FRIDAYS
 
 CHAPTER SEVEN 
 
 "How soon can I get away?" Clair asked 
 Captain Perkins as we straggled up the path. 
 
 "That sea out there," mused the captain, 
 "don't look like it had any intention of quitting 
 for a couple of days anyhow." 
 
 "Then what can I do?" 
 
 "Jest set." 
 
 "Stay here?" 
 
 "You guessed it." 
 
 Clair walked on in silence for a moment, then 
 he voiced his thoughts thus : "I believe I can 
 make copy out of this experience. I'll be a 
 second Robinson Crusoe." 
 
 " 'Pears to me," debated the captain, "that 
 you got an awful lot of society for a Robinson 
 Crusoe. Seems like I recollect this fellow 
 Crusoe had only one nigger to wait on him." 
 
 "His man, Friday," interpolated Bopp. 
 
 "That's the one. If you don't count the 
 117
 
 ii8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 women and the dog there's six human souls on 
 this island." 
 
 "That won't make any difference." I came 
 to the rescue. "Every first-class 'Uncle Tom's 
 Cabin' show nowadays has two Topsys and two 
 little Evas at least. We'll have one Robinson 
 Crusoe and five Fridays." 
 
 "That's a good idea," assented Clair, enthusi- 
 astically following up the scheme with details. 
 "I'll get a bell and whenever I want anything 
 I'll ring for you." 
 
 "Fine," agreed Bopp, who began to see pos- 
 sibilities in the scheme. "We'll get you a lot 
 of musical bells so that the ringing won't annoy 
 us any if you keep it up for some time." 
 
 "Maybe I could rig up an electric chime," 
 Kent suggested with an eye to mechanical de- 
 tails of which he alone was master. "We'd 
 have to each have a number and only answer 
 our own note on the chime. For instance, 'do' 
 would call for the gink who was Friday No. I ; 
 that would be the captain here." 
 
 "Let me be Friday the thirteenth," Bopp 
 continued, "and Jim, the galley mechanic, can 
 be Black Friday. Kent, you're Good Friday
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 119 
 
 you get a hot cross bun. What shall I baptize 
 you, Monty? I can't think of any more Fri- 
 days." 
 
 "Let me be Ash Wednesday. I don't care 
 much for fish anyway." 
 
 By this time we had reached the house. 
 
 Lucile greeted us downstairs in the living- 
 room. 
 
 "Miss Dunmore is waiting for you." 
 
 I looked around to see whom she was ad- 
 dressing. 
 
 "I mean you, Mr. Blainey." 
 
 "Who is Miss Dunmore?" 
 
 "The lady whose life you saved. Do you 
 mean to say that you didn't recognize her with 
 those things on?" 
 
 "I assure you that I don't know what you 
 mean." 
 
 "That's right," said Bopp. "No matter 
 what you say, we'll all of us agree that it's true. 
 We men must stick together. Monty never 
 saw the lady before." 
 
 This was especially despicable on the part of 
 Bopp, as he knew as well as I did that the tele-
 
 120 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 gram had been for the other Blaney whom 
 Clair had spoken of. 
 
 "I certainly never did." 
 
 "How about this, then?" enquired Lucile 
 sweetly, handing me a damp newspaper clip- 
 ping. "She had that in her hand all the time." 
 
 I took the paper gingerly and looked at it in 
 amazement. It was my own criticism of a 
 production of "As You Like It," which had 
 been staged the week before. One paragraph 
 was marked with a blue pencil and read as fol- 
 lows: 
 
 "The fashionable audience which assembled 
 to see Miss Langland as Rosalind was obvi- 
 ously disappointed when the management an- 
 nounced that Miss Langland was indisposed 
 and that her understudy would play the part. 
 Before the first act was over, however, the dis- 
 criminating ones in front knew that they had 
 been present at the birth of a new star. The 
 management need never again offer excuses 
 for presenting Miss Vida Dunmore as Rosa- 
 lind. The public had never dreamed that 
 Rosalind could be as physically perfect as Miss
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 121 
 
 Dunmore made us see her. Shakespeare could 
 never have written the part had he seen Miss 
 Dunmore's figure. He would have known 
 that Rosalind in tights could not for an instant 
 deceive Orlando as to her sex. It is impossi- 
 ble to say more than that the part and the boots 
 have never been more perfectly filled. Miss 
 Dunmore comes from a famous theatrical fam- 
 ily and neither her Cousin Ethel nor her Uncle 
 Jack need fear that the family laurels will fade 
 in Miss Dunmore's possession. Her voice has 
 the soft note of the thrush which seems too 
 sweet to be heard by an entire audience." 
 
 I had written in a burst of enthusiasm over 
 a perfect bit of artistry. I take pride in my 
 work and like to praise the thing well done as 
 well as censure lack of adroitness. Taken 
 away from the context of the review, however, 
 the paragraph did sound a trifle eulogistic. 
 
 "He read the clipping," said Bopp, "then 
 sank into a chair by the club window and or- 
 dered brandy and soda. He might just as well 
 have ordered ham and eggs, which are more 
 nourishing." 
 
 "Hadn't you better go up and see her?"
 
 122 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 urged Lucile. "She is conscious now and she 
 seemed so pleased when I told her you were 
 here. I didn't tell her that you were the one 
 who rescued her. I thought she would prefer 
 to hear that from your own lips." 
 
 If I had known as much then as I do now 
 about girl psychology, I could have read jeal- 
 ousy into every word Lucile spoke and it would 
 have comforted me a lot. As it was, I let her 
 drive me upstairs and into the room occupied 
 by Miss Dunmore. 
 
 I entered alone. Dressed in one of Lucile's 
 negligees she was propped up in bed. My dra- 
 matic criticism was right. She was pretty. 
 There was a veil of charm about her such as 
 one expects to find around a convent-bred girl 
 who knows nothing of the world. At first I 
 was at a loss to account for it. 
 
 She looked at me enquiringly. 
 
 "Did you wish to see me?" I asked. 
 
 "You are Mr. Green?" she hesitated. 
 "No? I have seen no one except the lady and 
 I didn't understand whether she said Miss or 
 Mrs." 
 
 Her voice lost none of its quality through
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 123 
 
 not being heard over the footlights. It vi- 
 brated like the "G" string on a violin. 
 
 "Miss Green it is," I informed her. "She 
 said you wanted to see me. I'm Mr. Blarney." 
 
 "Not the playwright?" 
 
 "No, the dramatic critic." 
 
 "I knew you didn't look like Ned Blaney. 
 You see, I'm engaged to him and I ought to 
 know what he looks like unless I'm delirious. 
 What dramatic critic are you?" 
 
 "I'm the only one who is not the author of 
 an unproduced play." 
 
 "I'm sorry you're a critic. I don't like 
 critics, except one. I had a clipping that he 
 wrote about me that was the one thing that I 
 saved from the wreck. I'd show it to you, but 
 Miss Green borrowed it." 
 
 "This is it." I handed her the water soaked 
 fragment of paper. 
 
 "Did you read it?" she exclaimed with girl- 
 ish enthusiasm. "Isn't he a dear?" 
 
 "Thank you," I murmured. 
 
 "Are you that dramatic critic?" she de- 
 manded, sitting bolt upright in bed and holding 
 out her hands to me.
 
 124 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 My impulse was to take her in my arms just 
 as anyone would pick up a child, but I knew 
 she did not intend anything like that, so I took 
 both her hands instead. 
 
 Just at that moment someone rapped and 
 Miss Dunmore said, "Come in." 
 
 Lucile entered, saw our handclasp, blushed 
 and stammered, "I didn't mean to intrude." 
 
 "Intrude? Not a bit of it," chattered the 
 other. "I want to thank you for sending this 
 adorable man up to me. I think I've been in 
 love with him ever since he wrote that article 
 in the paper about me last week." 
 
 Of course she meant as much by that as you 
 mean when you say that you just love ice-cream 
 soda or buckwheat pancakes with sausage, or 
 whatever it is that you do just love, but to 
 Lucile it verified all that she had suspected. 
 With one scornful glance at me she left the 
 room with a murmured excuse about finding 
 some clothing for Miss Dunmore to put on. 
 
 That look from Lucile would have spoiled 
 for me the brightest day that ever was minted, 
 but the young lady had not noticed it. 
 
 "I wonder why she didn't stay," she mused.
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 125 
 
 "I'm afraid she doesn't like me. I wonder if 
 it is on account of the clothes I wore. It was 
 just an accident that I had them in my grip. 
 Ned that's my fiance, you know thought I 
 looked well in that costume, so I was always 
 going to keep it, even after I was an old mar- 
 ried woman with ten children. I wonder if 
 the water will hurt it ?" 
 
 I told her I thought it would be all right 
 when it was dried. 
 
 "The captain said my tailored skirt was too 
 heavy to swim in, and told me to take it off. 
 I did and put my costume on instead. Was 
 it too dreadful?" 
 
 The naivete of this youngster was beyond 
 belief. In this day when so many hammer 
 throwers, mostly women, are writing novels of 
 the stage in which the actresses are always de- 
 picted as all that they should not be, it may be 
 difficult to convince the reading public that 
 there are girls in the profession who are as 
 ignorant of viciousness as a farmer's daugh- 
 ter. This is more apt to be true, as in Miss 
 Dunmore's case, of the younger generation of a 
 great theatrical family. A girl born to the
 
 126 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 footlights thinks nothing of the unconvention- 
 alities which charm and shock the newcomer. 
 To her, they are the accepted thing; it is the 
 conventions of life that appear strange. With 
 the first-class artistic connections which were 
 her heritage, Miss Dunmore had an assured 
 position in the theatrical world as soon as she 
 entered it and so was not at the mercy of the 
 managers and agents who prey on the am- 
 bitious young girls beginning in the profession 
 and convince them that without their aid ad- 
 vancement is impossible. It may be that from 
 this you can understand why Vida Dunmore 
 was as sweet and girlish in heart and soul as 
 you would expect your sister or daughter to be. 
 
 Soon Kent came up with a bundle of clothes 
 for Miss Dunmore from Miss Green, and 
 promising to wait for her downstairs I excused 
 myself and went in search of Lucile. 
 
 I found Captain Perkins and Jim, a nonde- 
 script picture in the evening clothes and blazer 
 suit, wandering ill at ease about the living- 
 room. I asked for Miss Green. 
 
 "She went out with that other young man," 
 said the captain. "She said she was going to
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 127 
 
 look for her mother." I had almost forgotten 
 the missing Mrs. Green. I was about to start 
 out searching again when I remembered my 
 promise to Miss Dunmore. 
 
 "And where is Mr. Clair?" I asked. 
 
 "I seen him out in the yard looking for wal- 
 nuts under them hard maple trees," volunteered 
 Jim. "I didn't tell him they weren't a nut- 
 bearing tree on this island. What's the use? 
 It ain't nutting time yet nohow." 
 
 Miss Dunmore came downstairs in a dress 
 of Lucile's, or rather a blouse and skirt of the 
 sailor-suit order. She seemed very little ruf- 
 fled by her adventure on the high seas. 
 
 "Where is Miss Green?" she asked, looking 
 around. "I want to thank her for her kind- 
 ness." 
 
 "She is out searching for her mother." 
 That sounded like a foolish statement, so I 
 qualified it. "Her mother disappeared last 
 night during the storm." 
 
 "Oh !" Miss Dunmore did not seem partic- 
 ularly impressed. "I don't see how any one 
 could get lost on a little island like this." 
 
 "That's where the mystery comes in. There
 
 128 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 are only about half a dozen places she could 
 be and we've looked in all of them." 
 
 "I had a brother who walked in his sleep," 
 said Captain Perkins, following up a train of 
 thought suggested by Mrs. Green's disappear- 
 ance. "Do you want to hear the story about 
 the funny place where the zebra bit him?" 
 
 "A little later," I suggested hastily. "J ust 
 now we all ought to scatter and help look for 
 Mrs. Green." 
 
 "How was she dressed?" Captain Perkins 
 enquired. 
 
 "I don't know. I'm not sure whether she 
 was dressed at all or not that is she prob- 
 ably had on a kimono or something, but I don't 
 think she had on regular skirts and things." 
 
 "We might take a stroll along the beach," 
 suggested Jim, whom I suspected of wanting 
 to display his striped clothing in public. "Pos- 
 sibly we might find something we could eat." 
 
 After the captain and Jim had started out 
 Miss Dunmore seemed lost in deep and bewil- 
 dered thought. I forebore to break in on so 
 portentous a brain struggle. 
 
 At last she spoke. "Where do you suppose
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 129 
 
 the zebra did bite Captain Perkins' brother?" 
 "If you go with him perhaps he will tell 
 you," I said, with an idea of doing my search- 
 ing alone with a weather eye constantly peeled 
 for Lucile and Bopp. 
 
 "No," she demurred, "I would much rather 
 go hunting with you. It will be more fun." 
 
 Evidently she thought that hunting old ladies 
 in the underbrush was one of our innocent is- 
 land pastimes. 
 
 I sighed. We sallied forth. If I had 
 wanted to run across Lucile when I was alone 
 I was just as anxious to avoid her while I was 
 in the company of Miss Dunmore. 
 
 "Do we have to find her before lunch?" 
 I explained painstakingly the remote possibil- 
 ity either of finding Mrs. Green or of having 
 any lunch. Contrary to my expectations she 
 took the information about the lack of food 
 just as cheerfully as she had everything else. 
 I don't believe it would be possible to dampen 
 the spirits of that girl. Not that she was un- 
 responsive to another's distress, for I have 
 rarely met one so sympathetic, but she was per- 
 sistently optimistic.
 
 130 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I don't mind going without lunch a bit," 
 she smiled. "I very seldom eat anything until 
 after the show at night anyway. Only there 
 won't be any show to-night to eat after, will 
 there? That will seem funny. I've always 
 been in shows ever since I was a kid, except a 
 few weeks in the middle of summer, and then 
 generally I was rehearsing." 
 
 She laughed gaily. 
 
 "But I love it. I wonder how it will seem 
 after I am married to Ned. About eight-fif- 
 teen every night I suppose I'll be straining my 
 ears for some invisible orchestra to pound out 
 an overture. That always thrills me and puts 
 me on my toes. When the overture begins, it's 
 like kicking aside a plank that connects you 
 with the real world. You're committed to an- 
 other life a three hour existence where the 
 sunlight is turned off and on by a little man up 
 on a bridge, and where the green grass and the 
 flowers smell only of musty paint, overheated 
 by electricity. I wonder where I can find 
 something in real life, in your world, that will 
 smell like scenery. I doubt whether I can get 
 along without it."
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 131 
 
 She had carried on this monologue while we 
 walked along the shore. When I had sug- 
 gested that we search inland she had very prop- 
 erly objected on the grounds that she was apt 
 to get her feet wet. It had stopped raining 
 temporarily, so that the beach was fairly dry, 
 although a .trifle windy and very noisy on ac- 
 count of the breaking of the waves on the rocks 
 just off the shore. 
 
 Vida chattered away with all the heedless 
 gaiety of a child who knows that someone is 
 going to provide the next meal. She told me 
 at length about her fiance. That took a lot of 
 the romance out of our walk. Not that I was 
 falling in love with Vida. Not a bit of it. 
 But it was too bad as long as I had lost favor 
 with Lucile on her account, to have her tell me 
 about her love affair with someone else. I 
 have since reasoned that she regarded me as 
 being old enough to be her father or her Uncle 
 Jack, and treated me accordingly. Nothing 
 bores a man, I find, so much as girlish confi- 
 dences about some other male being who is ap- 
 parently perfect. 
 
 "I wouldn't mind being all alone with you
 
 132 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 on this island," she confided, "if you were only 
 Jack." 
 
 "Jack? Who is Jack?" 
 
 "I mean Ned," she explained. "I was going 
 to marry Jack, but Ned wouldn't have it. We 
 wouldn't care much about food, even," she 
 went on. "Ned would find something for me. 
 He's dreadfully ingenious. That comes from 
 writing plays, I guess. One has to be clever 
 to think out plots for plays, don't you think?" 
 
 "Not most of them." I lapsed into my crit- 
 ical manner. "Not as clever as you have to be 
 to sell them." 
 
 "He wrote a play once about two people on 
 a desert island." Vida's eye kindled as she 
 recollected it. "There was a bully part for the 
 girl in it. They found bananas and cocoanuts 
 to eat and some kind of birds' eggs." 
 
 "In plays and stories dealing with castaways 
 on an island," I explained, "the scene is always 
 conveniently located on a tropical island where 
 all sorts of food products grow wild. May I 
 ask if in Mr. Blaney's play there was any treas- 
 ure buried on the island ?" 
 
 ".Yes," she assented.
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 133 
 
 "And were they attacked by savages armed 
 with poisoned darts ?" 
 
 "Oh, you've read his play!" 
 
 "No, but I know just what ought to be in 
 every castaway story. This island that we are 
 on, you see, is quite different. Nothing more 
 nourishing than spruce-gum ever grows here 
 and there isn't a native with a poisoned dart 
 within a thousand miles, unless you count 
 Lucile." 
 
 "What do you mean by that?" 
 
 I did not answer. An idea had germinated 
 from something she had said. There was a 
 natural food resource on the island. I might 
 be able to develop it quietly by myself and then 
 if it was successful, confer it, as a boon, on the 
 entire community. 
 
 When we were about two-thirds of the way 
 around the island and approximately a quarter 
 of a mile from home, a sharp stinging patter of 
 raindrops drove us to shelter. There was a 
 small lattice summer-house on a high part of 
 the island overlooking the lake nearby, and we 
 hastened toward it. In our path, between the 
 sandy beach and the higher bank, was a shal-
 
 134 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 low strip of water which had been left there 
 by the highest waves of the night before and 
 had been augmented by the rain. Vida looked 
 in dismay from her white shoes to the muddy 
 water. 
 
 "I never can cross it," she wailed. "These 
 are Miss Green's shoes and I must not ruin 
 them." 
 
 "We've got to get under cover," I argued. 
 
 "You could carry me across," she suggested 
 practically; "that is, if you can lift me." 
 
 "I carried you further than that this morn- 
 ing." 
 
 "Were you the brave man who risked his 
 life for me?" she exclaimed impulsively, then 
 added with naive conceit, "I know Ned can 
 never thank you enough. Just pick me up in 
 your big strong arms and put me down the 
 minute we get across." 
 
 So she gathered her skirts carefully about 
 her and I picked her up easily and splashed 
 through the puddle. Then just because she in- 
 sisted upon being put down immediately I car- 
 ried her on further and laughing and strug- 
 gling we entered the summer-house.
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 135 
 
 Lucile and Bopp were there. 
 
 I stood a moment in stupefied silence. My 
 luck would bring tears to an oculist's advertise- 
 ment. I put Vida down. 
 
 "It started to rain," I stammered, "and we 
 had to hunt up shelter. Miss Dunmore was so 
 afraid of spoiling your clothes." 
 
 "That's all right," said Lucile sweetly; "I 
 don't mind their being wrinkled a bit. I'm 
 going to have that suit pressed anyway." 
 
 "I didn't mean that," I explained, after the 
 fashion of any man floundering in the net of a 
 woman's sarcasm. "I only meant she didn't 
 want the rain to spoil them." 
 
 "Why, that's what I meant, too," responded 
 Lucile, in wide eyed innocence. "What else 
 could you have thought I meant ?" 
 
 I blushed and held my tongue. 
 
 "I do not suppose you have anything favor- 
 able to report about mother ?" 
 
 "No," I rejoined shortly. 
 
 "Nor we," sighed Lucile. 
 
 "Nothing could have happened to her," 
 cheered Vida. "We'll find her curled up some- 
 where fast asleep."
 
 136 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 The picture of Mrs. Green, dormant in a 
 hollow tree, like a squirrel, made even Lucile 
 smile. 
 
 "I don't believe you have met Mr. Bopp yet," 
 said Lucile. "At least you were not conscious 
 when you first saw each other." 
 
 "What name did you say?" 
 
 "Mr. Bopp, my fiance." 
 
 "Your fiance?" I ejaculated. 
 
 "Yes." Lucile turned to me. "I wanted to 
 tell you two the first ones. I knew you would 
 appreciate our happiness." 
 
 My mind refused to grasp this disaster. It 
 could not be, that was all. I had never seri- 
 ously considered Bopp as running even a very 
 dangerous second. 
 
 My mind puzzling over Lucile's statement, I 
 heard Vida's clear soft voice saying, "Mr. 
 Bopp, I am pleased why, aren't you called 
 'Boppy'?" 
 
 "Boppy?" repeated Lucile curiously. 
 
 "Yes, don't you call him that? All the girls 
 in the 'Show Girl' company did. I was in the 
 chorus then. We used to regard him as almost 
 one of the company, he was around with us so
 
 FIVE FRIDAYS 137 
 
 much. We had a good time that season," she 
 added reflectively. 
 
 Lucile murmured, "I should imagine so." 
 
 I presume Bopp's stock sank about one thou- 
 sand per cent. Vida did not realize the dam- 
 age she was doing and prattled on. It meant 
 nothing to her that Bopp had been a hanger-on 
 at stage doors. In her world that was the only 
 interesting place to be, that is, if you couldn't 
 be before the footlights. The man who went 
 around with the company was the natural sort 
 of male, the one who didn't, to her, must have 
 seemed the freak of the species. 
 
 I was glad to let Bopp be the centre of atten- 
 tion for the time being, while I railed inwardly 
 at a fate which had twice placed me in a false 
 position that morning. 
 
 "I know you will be happy," Vida was say- 
 ing. "I've been engaged a good many times 
 and I enjoy it more every time." 
 
 "You must be terribly tired, Monty," I heard 
 Lucile say; "no sleep for thirty-six hours and 
 no food for three days. I wish that there were 
 something that I could do for you." 
 
 I listened in amazement. Could this be
 
 138 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 Lucile, and was she addressing me ? She was. 
 I puzzled over the gentleness in her tones and 
 the solicitude she was showing for my welfare. 
 I did not hit upon the answer then, but I have 
 since. She was going to show me what a su- 
 perior sort of person I had lost in choosing 
 Vida instead of herself. Now that she was 
 committed to Bopp she did not mind in the 
 least making him suffer. Sometimes I think 
 that women must be an invention of the devil, 
 and then again I don't believe the devil would 
 be capable of it.
 
 CHAPTER EIGHT. 
 ENGAGED, IF
 
 CHAPTER EIGHT 
 
 AFTER awhile the rain let up and we went 
 back to the house to see what the others might 
 have discovered and to lay some definite plan 
 of campaign. 
 
 Vida elected to stay out of doors, and I sug- 
 gested that she take on Mr. Clair for a walk. 
 I told her that he was a woman hater and thus 
 inadvertently aroused her interest. 
 
 "I'll have to make him change his ideas." 
 She looked up at me innocently. "Do you 
 think I can do it?" 
 
 "Ask him," I suggested. 
 
 "Meaning that you don't think I can. I'll 
 bet my seal ring against yours that I can make 
 him propose before dark. Mine is a very curi- 
 ous one, too. A Russian duke gave it to me. 
 I never met him, but he sent it to my dressing- 
 room with some flowers." 
 
 It seemed to me to be a possible way to gain 
 141
 
 142 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 a little solitude for reflection and I assented to 
 the wager. 
 
 "You don't intend to tell him, then, that you 
 are engaged already?" 
 
 "Oh, no, not until he proposes. Of course, 
 I might like him better than I do Ned. Then 
 I'd never tell him." 
 
 I could see that Ned Blaney was going to 
 have the time of his life immediately after he 
 found himself hitched more or less for life to 
 this volatile young person. Vida was not one 
 of those who would pass by an inviting pasture 
 lot simply because she was in harness. 
 
 The rest of us went into the house. As we 
 came in the telephone was ringing. Asking 
 Lucile's permission I answered it. 
 
 "Hello." 
 
 "Hello," said a male voice speaking with 
 staccato sharpness. "May I speak to Mr. Lip- 
 ton S.Clair?" 
 
 I put my hand over the mouth-piece and 
 turned around. Lucile had gone upstairs but 
 Bopp was gazing idly out of the window. 
 
 "Is Mr. Clair still there in the yard?" I asked 
 him.
 
 ENGAGED, IF 143 
 
 "No. He went off down the beach with Miss 
 Dunmore." 
 
 "Hello." I spoke again into the telephone. 
 "Mr. Clair was here a moment ago but he has 
 just gone for a walk with a young lady." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "He has just gone for a walk with a young 
 lady." 
 
 "Impossible!" The voice at the other end 
 shot that emphatically at me. 
 
 "It's so." 
 
 "Clair is a woman-hater." 
 
 "What if he is ? This one is going to con- 
 vert him." 
 
 "Humph." It sounded as if the party were 
 sniffing in my ear. "She can't do it. Who is 
 she?" 
 
 "Her name is Miss Vida Dunmore." 
 
 "Vida Dunmore?" 
 
 "That's what I said." 
 
 "Vida Dunmore there?" 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 "Thank heaven," he ejaculated fervently. 
 "I've been waiting for hours for her to get 
 here. How does she come to be there ?"
 
 144 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I explained to the young man, who proved 
 to be Ned Blaney, as I had already suspected, 
 all about the wreck of the Mary Bell and the 
 casting ashore of her passengers. 
 
 "Thanks very much," said Blaney with con- 
 siderable relief in his voice. "I'll come right 
 over after her. Don't tell her that I called up 
 and I will surprise her. Good-bye." 
 
 He hung up before I could tell him that he 
 probably couldn't get any kind of a boat to 
 come over to the island, but I judged that he 
 would find that out soon enough for himself. 
 
 "Where's Miss Green?" I asked Bopp. 
 
 "I advised her to lie down for a little while 
 and rest. This search is wearing her out. 
 She is leaving everything in my charge." 
 
 "I presume that congratulations are in or- 
 der," I said, extending my hand with as good 
 a show of cordiality as I could muster. "I 
 do congratulate you, Mr. Bopp." 
 
 "We're not regularly engaged," Bopp said 
 sourly. "She has promised to be mine if I 
 can find her mother. That makes me just 
 about as near engaged to her as if we had 
 never met."
 
 ENGAGED, IF 145 
 
 So Lucile's promise had a string tied to it. 
 My heart leaped exultantly. There was a 
 chance yet. 
 
 "Let's have a drink on the strength of your 
 engagement anyway," I said, starting toward 
 the kitchen. 
 
 "Water?" queried Bopp, hoping against 
 hope. 
 
 "Why, yes." 
 
 "No, thanks. My tummie is looking for 
 Mount Ararat now." He sank disconsolately 
 into a seat. In a moment he rose wearily. 
 "I've got to start out again. I promised Lu- 
 cile I would search while she rested." 
 
 Hardly had he left the house when the tele- 
 phone rang again. I answered it. 
 
 "Hello." 
 
 "Hello. Is that you, Mr. Blainey? Will 
 
 you call Lucile to the telephone? I want 
 , 
 
 The voice ceased abruptly. 
 "Hello," I called, "hello, hello!" 
 There was no answer. 
 The voice I had just been listening to was 
 that of Mrs. Green.
 
 CHAPTER NINE 
 FOUND BY 'PHONE

 
 CHAPTER NINE 
 
 AFTER awhile I got Central's attention and 
 demanded to be told why I had been cut off. 
 
 "That party called up from a private tele- 
 phone," said Central sweetly. "She had no 
 right to use it. It is a summer telephone only 
 and the instrument is to be taken out next 
 week." 
 
 "But it was Mrs. Green who was talking." 
 
 "It couldn't be," Central was positive. "You 
 are speaking from Mrs. Green's residence 
 yourself." 
 
 "It was Mrs. Green. I recognized her 
 
 voice." 
 
 "Just a minute." There was a pause, then, 
 "Hello. That party called up from Hunting- 
 don's. What could Mrs. Green be doing there 
 on a stormy day like this ?" 
 
 I could not explain to a gossipy telephone 
 operator what had really happened to Mrs. 
 
 Green. I did not know much about it myself 
 
 149
 
 150 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 and the few facts of her disappearance that I 
 was cognizant of would hardly sound well if 
 repeated. 
 
 "Mrs. Green," I hazarded, "went out walk- 
 ing, and I suppose she stopped in at Mr. Hunt- 
 ingdon's." 
 
 "Do you know," asked Central, "that Hunt- 
 ingdon's is on a small island three miles south 
 of where you are and three miles from the 
 mainland ? The walking is not very good." 
 
 I felt as if I had stepped off into space from 
 a high platform. "Probably that is the 
 chances are " I floundered, " the chances 
 are that she decided to row and the wind may 
 have carried her out of her way." 
 
 I finally persuaded Central to call up Hunt- 
 ingdon's. I think it was curiosity that made 
 her relent. I could be sure that she would 
 be listening to whatever might be said by Mrs. 
 Green and myself. 
 
 After a few minutes a voice answered the 
 call. 
 
 "Hello." 
 
 "Hello, Mrs. Green. This is Mr. Blainey." 
 
 "Hello, Mr. Blainey." There was a ring of
 
 FOUND BY 'PHONE 151 
 
 ladylike indignation in her voice. "Can you 
 explain to me, Mr. Blainey, how I happened 
 to find myself in a row-boat out in the middle 
 of the lake, wearing my red silk dress and a 
 night-cap tied under one ear?" 
 
 "Wait a minute, Mrs. Green, Central is lis- 
 tening." 
 
 "I don't care. She always does. She prob- 
 ably wants to know just as much as I do. What 
 happened? Was there an earthquake? I re- 
 member the island was sort of wobbly and hard 
 to walk on." 
 
 "No, there wasn't any earthquake," I an- 
 swered. "We were fasting, you remember?" 
 
 "Yes, I remember that, but I'm not any more. 
 The first thing I did when I landed was to 
 break into this house and cook myself a can 
 of baked beans. It's funny if there wasn't 
 any earthquake. I remember the floor of the 
 house all running in funny little waves." 
 
 "I'm afraid our time must be nearly up," I 
 suggested in the hope of turning the conversa- 
 tion. "Central will cut us off." 
 
 "No, I won't," interposed a third voice, the 
 sweetly professional one of the operator.
 
 152 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Talk all you want to. There ain't anybody 
 waiting for the line." 
 
 "I suppose I must have got into the boat 
 when the earthquake commenced," persisted 
 Mrs. Green, "but how did I get on the decol- 
 lete red dress ? And where did I get the night- 
 cap ? I haven't worn that dress for ten years." 
 
 I told her that we would have to wait until 
 she got home to explain a number of things. 
 "Lucile will be very glad to know that you are 
 safe," I added casually as if she had just gone 
 over to a neighbor's, hoping to deceive Cen- 
 tral. "She was afraid you might get wet." 
 
 "Did Lucile know I was going?" enquired 
 the startled Mrs. Green, who apparently did 
 not catch on to my acting. 
 
 "No, not until after you had started," I said, 
 skirting the edge of the truth neatly. "She 
 will be very glad to hear that you are all right. 
 I'll tell her as soon as she wakes up. She is 
 resting now." 
 
 "Sleeping? Now? What for?" 
 
 "Why," I explained, "she was up all night." 
 
 "What? And all alone on that island with 
 you two young fellows and no chaperone !"
 
 FOUND BY 'PHONE 153 
 
 "Oh, no," I hastened to reassure her and 
 Central. "Not alone with us. There are a 
 lot of people here, six or seven I should say." 
 
 "Holding a convention of earthquake suf- 
 ferers, I suppose," Mrs. Green surmised caus- 
 tically. "What sort of people are they?" 
 
 "Oh, very nice people," I answered promptly. 
 "One of them is a lady." 
 
 "How do you know she is a lady?" enquired 
 Mrs. Green. "Just because she happened to 
 be wearing skirts when she arrived?" 
 
 "Oh, no," I said hastily. How could I tell 
 this elderly dignified lady that our feminine 
 guest had not worn skirts on her arrival. 
 
 "Humph." Mrs. Green was not particu- 
 larly impressed. "The sooner I get back the 
 better. You'll have to send someone over 
 after me because there weren't any oars in 
 the boat I came in. I wouldn't go out in a 
 rowboat again anyway. Send a big boat or 
 I won't leave here." 
 
 "I'll send for you just as soon as I can." I 
 was glad to have the conversation draw to a 
 close. It had been bad enough already, but 
 who could tell what else might come out if
 
 154 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 we kept on talking. "The storm ought to 
 quiet down soon now. Good-bye for the pres- 
 ent." 
 
 "Wait a minute, I want to ask " 
 
 I am afraid I was guilty of rank discourtesy 
 in hanging up the receiver before I heard her 
 question, but I knew I should be unable to an- 
 swer it anyway, and I had to have an oppor- 
 tunity to think what it was all about. 
 
 First of all Lucile must be told and an end 
 put to her anxiety. I went upstairs and called, 
 "Lucile." 
 
 There was no answer and I stepped to the 
 door of her room, which stood open. She was 
 lying on her bed, dressed, with her head on 
 her arm sleeping the dead sleep of utter ex- 
 haustion. Nature demands her toll of a 
 healthy body even in times of utmost mental 
 distress. She seemed very small and childish 
 and her fingers curled adorably, like a baby's. 
 I didn't have the heart to waken her so I tip- 
 toed out. The news would be just as welcome 
 when she wakened of her own accord and sleep 
 would probably do her more good for the time 
 being.
 
 FOUND BY 'PHONE 155 
 
 When I came downstairs I saw Bopp go 
 through the yard, looking under every bush 
 and into every gully. I went out to tell him 
 that Mrs. Green was located. 
 
 He stopped when he saw me approaching. 
 
 "I see Clair has cut you out with your ac- 
 tress friend," he said. "I saw them arm in 
 arm on the beach a minute ago. There's no 
 use talking, Monty, you can't seem to hold a 
 girl's attention long enough to slip a ring on 
 her. Why don't you try avertising in one of 
 those matrimonial papers?" 
 
 I made no answer but turned around 
 abruptly and went back to the house. I don't 
 suppose he was particularly happy, and hunger 
 and fatigue may have loosened his tongue, but 
 I was angry enough myself to let him hunt 
 until the crack of doom before I would tell him 
 that Mrs. Green was found. 
 
 When I entered the house the telephone was 
 ringing again. I took off the receiver. 
 
 "Hello," I said. 
 
 "Hello," said a masculine voice. "I am a 
 newspaper man, representing the Haniman 
 Syndicate. I understand that you had an
 
 156 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 earthquake over there this morning, and that 
 Mrs. Green, the wife of the president of the 
 First National Bank, made her escape in an 
 aeroplane dressed in a spangled, red ball-gown. 
 I want to know if I have these facts absolutely 
 correct before I " 
 
 I carefully lowered the receiver until it hung 
 suspended from the wires, and tip-toed away 
 from the telephone letting him talk to the 
 empty air. 
 
 The story was out.
 
 CHAPTER TEN 
 THE CLAM HUNTER
 
 CHAPTER TEN 
 
 WHEN I went out, after leaving the reporter 
 holding the wire, so to speak, Tootles begged 
 to go with me and I let her out. Who am I to 
 deny the pleasures of liberty to a fellow crea- 
 ture no matter if her knowledge of language 
 is confined to wig-wagging with a short, stumpy 
 tail ? From the way she raced off up the beach 
 and conducted imaginary skirmishes with 
 every prominent bush or rock I inferred that 
 she was not ordinarily allowed to consult her 
 own wishes about staying indoors. 
 
 Dogs are supposed to be faithful companions 
 to man in his dark hours, but this one was just 
 about as faithful and companionable as a 
 grasshopper. In the pictures the faithful 
 hound puts his nose on his bereaved master's 
 lap looking up at him with great devoted eyes 
 that mutely offer unselfish and unquestioning 
 love. Anyone attempting that pose with 
 Tootles must first consult a taxidermist. 
 
 159
 
 160 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 All of which is by way of saying that we 
 became separated and lost, especially Tootles. 
 I whistled and otherwise implored the little 
 devil to come to me. I even mentioned her as 
 a "nice doggie," out loud, with a muttered 
 "damn" beneath my breath. 
 
 After awhile I gave it up. It isn't dignified 
 for two hundred pounds or more of man to 
 chase ten pounds or less of dog. I reflected 
 that she could not have gone very far and 
 would probably return to the house anyway. 
 I only hoped that Lucile would sleep until 
 Tootles, tired of hunting imaginary prey in the 
 underbrush, would come home. Chasing game 
 is a futile pastime for Tootles. If a good 
 husky rabbit ever met her in a pasture lot and 
 said "Boo" to her, Tootles would expire of 
 fright. I think it's a shame the way dogs have 
 been converted into costume accessories by 
 women. However, I do not think it wise to 
 express myself fully on this subject. 
 
 When I had definitely given Tootles up I 
 turned my attention to the undeveloped food 
 supply which I had discovered earlier when 
 walking with Vida. There were hundreds of
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 161 
 
 fresh water clams on the beach and it was 
 possible to dig them in the cove when the water 
 was not particularly rough. I spent the after- 
 noon wading, compensated for the cold dis- 
 comfort of the performance by the thought 
 that, by providing food, I would win back a 
 large share of the favor I had lost with Lu- 
 cile. Not that she would admit that she 
 needed food. Not she. No complaint had 
 left her lips, but I knew that the sight of a 
 soda cracker would make her break down and 
 weep like a child. I knew because I felt that 
 way myself. 
 
 Vida and Lipton S. Clair strolled by while I 
 was wading. 
 
 "Are you still looking for Mrs. Green?" 
 Clair called out, as I fished under water 
 cautiously. 
 
 "No," I replied shortly, "I am teaching a 
 pet fish to swim." 
 
 "You look as though you were taking one of 
 those barefoot cures." 
 
 "I didn't know you could cure bare feet," 
 supplied Vida. "By the way, Mr. Blainey, 
 does your ring come off easily ?"
 
 162 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "It would from your hand. Do you wish 
 to wear it?" 
 
 "Oh, no, not yet not until I am entitled to. 
 You can begin to work it off though." 
 
 "Did anyone call me up on the telephone?" 
 asked Mr. Clair. 
 
 "Yes," I said. 
 
 "Why didn't you call me?" he demanded 
 crossly. "I haven't been far away." 
 
 The self-assurance of this man enraged me. 
 Here he was, an uninvited guest, complaining 
 that he was not paged as he would have been 
 in a hotel. I wondered where he got his ideas 
 of the social relations of modern people. Who 
 could have spoiled him so ? Sometimes the adu- 
 lation of women will put an ego on the bias 
 that way, but Clair was a professed woman- 
 hater. I only hope that some day he will write 
 a play which it will be my pleasure to review. 
 
 I explained in words of one syllable that I 
 had not called him because I did not know 
 where he was, had a sore throat, was under 
 physician's orders not to call anyone, my 
 mother had trained me not to yell at strangers,
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 163 
 
 and besides I never did any calling except on 
 Thursdays. 
 
 Vida pointed her finger at me for shame the 
 way children do and led him away before I 
 could think of anything more. 
 
 "Ned says," she smiled at me as they went 
 on up the beach, "that heaven is a place where 
 there are no dramatic critics." 
 
 "You tell him from me," I retorted, "that 
 he knows more about heaven now than he ever 
 will from actual experience. Unless," I added, 
 "the girl he is engaged to actually marries 
 him." 
 
 She waved her thanks and trotted on at the 
 fat magazine man's side. Yes, I said fat. 
 There was something about him that was an- 
 noyingly fat, possibly his intellect. In figure he 
 was no more fat than I am, but some way his 
 avoirdupois flaunted itself flagrantly. He 
 obstructed an otherwise pleasant landscape, 
 and the worst of it was that he would not ad- 
 mit that he was fat. He thought he was 
 just plump. You could tell by the way that he 
 carried himself that he thought he was just
 
 164 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 plump. Why don't fat people give up and ad- 
 mit it instead of lying to themselves and their 
 friends ? 
 
 I disliked Mr. Clair so thoroughly and heart- 
 ily for a few minutes that I nearly forgot what 
 I was standing in the lake for, but a numb- 
 ness about the ankles where my feet should 
 have been attached if there had been any feel- 
 ing in them reminded me to stir around a bit 
 unless I wished to become an angel mermaid, 
 regardless of sex. I invented "angel mer- 
 maid" myself. As your own imagination will 
 tell you, they are similar to hydro-aeroplanes, 
 only safer. I gathered up my clams and went 
 back to the house. With criminal caution I 
 went in the back way so that no one would see 
 what I had brought, and built a fire in the long 
 unused stove. 
 
 Then I opened the clams. The clam is 
 noted in literature for his silence. I wish to 
 add that he is not only uncommunicative, but 
 positively insultingly unsociable. He is a stay- 
 at-home. I never met anyone so reluctant to 
 come forth. In getting those bivalves to loosen 
 up I ruined two hatchets, a can opener, a thumb
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER ,165 
 
 and an already frazzled temper. But they did 
 come out finally. If the clam is doggedly per- 
 sistent, put me down as persistently dogged. 
 
 I am no cook, but I knew that those clams 
 would never do to be eaten in their natural 
 state, especially after I had finished interview- 
 ing them, so I decided to give them the star part 
 in a bouillon. The other ingredients were 
 plain water and distilled water. There wasn't 
 enough of the distilled water left, so I filled it 
 up with the common or garden variety. A few 
 microbes would undoubtedly make it more 
 nourishing. Besides, I was anxious to pit 
 something against those clams. Give them a 
 fair deal and I'd back them against anything 
 that inhabits the water, except a submarine. 
 
 Lucile came downstairs while I was in the 
 kitchen, but she did not come out where I was. 
 I heard her asking someone in the living-room, 
 "Who left the telephone off the hook?" 
 
 There was a mumbled reply in the voice of 
 Captain Perkins which I did not catch. Lucile 
 apparently put the receiver back in its place 
 because presently the telephone bell rang and 
 she answered it.
 
 166 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "No," I heard her say, "Mr. Clair is not 
 here." Then, after a pause, "No, Miss Dun- 
 more isn't here either. Who shall I say 
 called? Oh, you don't wish them to be noti- 
 fied ? Very well." There was a click as of the 
 receiver being placed on the hook. 
 
 I came in from the kitchen. Lucile greeted 
 me pleasantly enough when I asked her how she 
 had enjoyed her nap. 
 
 "I don't think I've been asleep," she denied. 
 "I just rested, that was all." 
 
 I did not tell her that I did not believe her. 
 You have noticed yourself how a person who 
 can sleep soundly through a thunderstorm or a 
 piano-tuners' convention will tell how the 
 slightest sound banishes their restless slumber. 
 
 "Your mother called up," I said briefly. 
 
 "Called up?" Lucile repeated. "How could 
 she?" 
 
 No, she was not any more surprised than 
 that. 
 
 "From Huntingdon's Island," I explained, 
 and went on to tell what I knew of Mrs. Green's 
 experience. 
 
 "She had no right to frighten me so," Lucile
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 167 
 
 exclaimed, with the righteous indignation of 
 one whose sympathies have been wasted. 
 
 Also, Lucile selfishly disregarded my suffer- 
 ings. Also those of Bopp. His emotions, I 
 imagine, were chiefly confined to his digestive 
 apparatus, but I suppose they must be classed 
 as sufferings just the same. 
 
 I pointed out to Lucile that her mother had 
 been through a tremendous adventure and had 
 escaped only by a miracle. 
 
 "What possessed her to do such a thing?" 
 Lucile was as petulant as a half-awakened 
 child. 
 
 "I had a brother once who used to walk in 
 his sleep. There was a zebra that " 
 
 I interrupted Captain Perkins. "Your 
 mother was scarcely responsible," I said. 
 
 "My brother was that way," chimed in the 
 real estate captain. "You never could tell 
 where you could find him nights. But the time 
 that the zebra bit him was the curiousest, I 
 allow." 
 
 "The zebra bit him?" Lucile's interest was 
 aroused. 
 
 The captain settled himself to tell his favor-
 
 i68 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 ite tale, but did not get started because Vida 
 breezed in with a rather shamefaced Clair in 
 tow. 
 
 She came directly to me. 
 
 "I'll take that ring, please," she said. 
 
 "Do you really want it ?" 
 
 "Certainly, I am entitled to wear it." 
 
 "Of course she ought to have your ring," 
 urged Lucile. "That one will do until you can 
 get her something else. May I congratulate 
 you, Miss Dunmore ?" 
 
 "Has Mr. Blainey told you about it?" Vida 
 asked, naturally surprised that a third party 
 should take an interest in a jesting wager. 
 
 "He didn't need to." Lucile smiled. 
 
 With Clair present I could hardly explain 
 that Miss Dunmore had won my ring because 
 she had made him propose to her. Thus I al- 
 lowed myself to be misunderstood once more. 
 
 I retired as gracefully as possible to the 
 kitchen, to be followed there shortly by Lipton 
 S. Clair, who seemed to be in an agitated frame 
 of mind. 
 
 "May I speak with you alone ?" he demanded
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 169 
 
 cautiously, looking first right and then left like 
 a stage villain. 
 
 "You will never see me more lonesome than 
 in your company," I returned, stirring my 
 clams. 
 
 "Have you ever been engaged?" He actu- 
 ally blushed as he said it. 
 
 "Why, yes," I was inclined to be reminiscent, 
 "chronically. I've been engaged ever since I 
 was about sixteen years of age. Do you care 
 to listen to the history of my romances ?" 
 
 "No, no," he reiterated, "not now, not now." 
 
 "All right, all right." I was not to be out- 
 done in lavishness of language. "Say no more 
 about it, say no more about it." 
 
 "What I want to ask," he began hastily, 
 choked by emotion and one of my collars which 
 was a quarter size too small for him, "what I 
 want to ask is, how do you break off an engage- 
 ment?" 
 
 "You have me there," I replied, putting more 
 wood in the stove. "I never broke off an en- 
 gagement in my life. Someone else always 
 broke my engagements for me."
 
 i/o FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "You mean you were jilted?" 
 
 "That's a short, ugly word," I mused, 
 tempted to put him in with the clams, "but 
 ' 'twill pass, aye, it will serve/ ' 
 
 "But I am afraid I won't be jilted," said 
 Clair thoughtfully. "You see, I am a very de- 
 sirable match." 
 
 "We thank you for the implied compliment," 
 I bowed, and picked up a piece of cord-wood. 
 
 He went on obliviously. "I am a woman- 
 hater. The ornamental sex has no place in the 
 world of a man of genius. All my life I have 
 escaped, and here on a bleak, inhospitable island 
 where there are only two women I am trapped 
 by one of them." 
 
 "I take it that you are engaged to Miss Dun- 
 more," I hazarded. 
 
 "Practically," he retorted glumly. "She 
 trapped me into a sort of a proposal. I didn't 
 know what I was saying." 
 
 "And she accepted you ?" 
 
 "Not yet," he replied, "but there is no hope ; 
 she will. I don't suppose she has met many 
 men of culture among her associates, and I 
 imagine I am a novelty to her."
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 171 
 
 "Man," I said admiringly, "you'd be a nov- 
 elty to any girl." 
 
 'Thank you," said he absently. "But what 
 can I do now ?" 
 
 "Why," I explained innocently, "when you 
 get on the mainland you get a marriage license 
 and, unless you prefer a church wedding, I 
 would suggest that you hunt up the justice of 
 the peace and get it over with. I don't believe 
 in long engagements myself." I was perfectly 
 willing to tease this pedantic braggart. We 
 owed him something for that fasting article 
 anyway. 
 
 "But I don't want to marry anyone," he 
 cried. "I must not sacrifice my career to ro- 
 mance and sentiment. I belong to the world. 
 There must be a way out." 
 
 "If you don't want to marry Miss Dunmore, 
 why did you arouse the spark of passion in her 
 innocent breast ?" I demanded. 
 
 "I don't know." He writhed in mental an- 
 guish. "I didn't dream that I was even being 
 agreeable to her." 
 
 "Some women are more attracted by indif- 
 ference than by attention," I comforted.
 
 172 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Others are fascinated by downright brute vio- 
 lence." 
 
 "I suppose there must be some charm about 
 me that I did not dream of," he mused mod- 
 estly. "Don't you think she could forget me 
 if she did not see me for a long while?" 
 
 "I'm afraid," I sighed, "that having once 
 met you, no girl could ever forget you." 
 
 "Come, now," he said sharply, trying to de- 
 tect a smile on my face ; "it isn't as bad as that. 
 If I could get away and write her a letter saying 
 that I had been taken down with some illness 
 and could not, as a dying man, hold her to her 
 promise, that would solve the difficulty." 
 
 "Rather a nifty idea," I commented, "but, as 
 a novelist, you must know that the heroine al- 
 ways flies to the bedside of the stricken hero 
 and nurses him back to life. There is no use ; 
 Miss Dunmore would not allow you to die." 
 
 "No, I suppose not." He abandoned this 
 scheme reluctantly. Another thought bright- 
 ened him. "The getting away part of it is all 
 right. If I did that I could get put in jail or 
 something like that where she couldn't possibly
 
 THE CLAM HUNTER 173 
 
 see me. While I was there I could write an 
 article on prison reforms." 
 
 I heartily endorsed this scheme. The idea 
 of seeing him in prison appealed to me person- 
 ally. The colossal blindness of a conceited 
 fat-head like that trying to get away from a 
 charming, sweet, young girl like Vida, alien- 
 ated him from human consideration. 
 
 He mused a moment. "I'll do it," he ex- 
 claimed. "If I don't show up, mum's the 
 word." 
 
 "You can't get away," I reminded him. 
 "There's no boat." 
 
 "I forgot to tell you that I am the champion 
 swimmer of the Brooklyn Athletic Club. I 
 think I saw some bathing suits hanging up in 
 the shed. With one of those on it will be 
 child's play to me." 
 
 Strangely cheered, he let himself out the back 
 way and left me to the silence of my clams. I 
 suppose I should have restrained him by force, 
 but I had no idea that he really meant it
 
 CHAPTER ELEVEN 
 MISS DUNMORE IS CONCERNED
 
 CHAPTER ELEVEN 
 
 I LEFT the clams to their own devices for a 
 while and went back to the living-room. Vida 
 was there idly taking impressions from my seal 
 ring on some soft kneaded rubber that lay on 
 Lucile's desk. Lucile herself was not in sight. 
 The captain and the best cook who ever ran a 
 marine engine were sunk deep in the gloom 
 which surrounds the non-reading man when 
 cut off from his kind and his employment. 
 
 "Well," said Vida, when I stood over her, 
 like an accusing judge, "what have I done now? 
 Shouldn't I play with this rubber this way?" 
 
 "You know what you've done," I said 
 sternly. "You trapped Lipton S. Clair into 
 proposing to you." 
 
 "There's nothing wrong about that," Vida 
 protested. "How do you suppose any man 
 ever proposes? You have to trap them. 
 Were you under the impression that adult 
 males went around looking for a chance to pay 
 
 177
 
 i;8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 for someone else's board and millinery and 
 hosiery and all that sort of thing? No, sir, 
 the masculine mind is very wary. That's why 
 we women have to be so much brighter than 
 the men. It's a case of self-preservation." 
 
 "Anyway, you scared the wits out of Clair." 
 
 "What's the matter?" 
 
 "He's afraid you meant it. He's going to 
 try to swim to the mainland in order to get 
 away." 
 
 "What? Swim to the mainland?" 
 
 "Yes. He's a woman-hater, as you know, 
 and he's afraid to face you." 
 
 "Good heavens! He must not do that." 
 Vida was genuinely concerned. "What can I 
 do to prevent it?" 
 
 "You might tell him that you are engaged to 
 someone else. That might reassure him." 
 
 "I will." Vida got up determinedly and 
 went to the door. It was dark outside and she 
 turned back for directions. "Which way did 
 he go?" 
 
 "Right down to the shore, I think," I said. 
 "He seemed a trifle dazed ? though, and might 
 have wandered,"
 
 MISS DUNMORE IS CONCERNED 179 
 
 "Funny thing," interjected Captain Perkins, 
 "the way a feller will wander sometimes. My 
 brother, he used to walk in his sleep. I was 
 goin' to tell you where the zebra bit him that 
 time." 
 
 "Yes," said Vida eagerly, "tell us where the 
 zebra bit him." 
 
 "You'll have to hurry to catch him," I inter- 
 rupted, "or it will be too late." 
 
 I literally pushed her out of the door and 
 shut it after her. 
 
 The telephone bell rang. 
 
 "Hello," I answered it. 
 
 "Hello, this is Blaney. Is Clair there?" 
 
 "No, he's not here now." 
 
 "Then let me speak to Miss Dunmore, 
 please." 
 
 "She isn't here either," I explained. 
 
 "Oh, they're out walking together again, I 
 suppose," said my namesake sarcastically. 
 
 "No, not walking," I said; "swimming." 
 
 "What? At this time of night?" he yelled. 
 "Not both of them? Vida can't swim." 
 
 "Maybe he is teaching her how," I sug- 
 gested. I didn't know of any reason why I
 
 i8o FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 should ease his mind anyway. A little jealousy 
 would be good for him. 
 
 "Oh !" He took the blow like a man. Then 
 I heard him say faintly, "Good bye," and I hung 
 up the receiver. 
 
 Lucile confronted me when I 'turned around. 
 "Do you know where Tootles is?" 
 
 I had forgotten about the pesky six-inch 
 canine. 
 
 "No, I don't know where she is," I replied, 
 with strict adherence to the truth. "Isn't she 
 here ?" I added guilelessly. 
 
 "No, and I'm dreadfully worried. There 
 are so many strange people in the house that 
 some one may have let her out, not knowing 
 how careful we are with her." 
 
 "What would happen if she did get out?" I 
 questioned, determined to know the depth of 
 my crime. 
 
 "Why, lots of things. She might get lost 
 and starved or get her feet wet and have pneu- 
 monia or a hawk might carry her off." 
 
 At this moment the unspeakable Bopp en- 
 tered. He made a great show of weariness,
 
 MISS DUNMORE IS CONCERNED 181 
 
 dragging his feet as if they were too heavy to 
 lift. 
 
 "Have you seen her?" demanded Lucile. 
 
 "No," Bopp said wearily. "I've tramped all 
 over the island again and again. There's no 
 ravine, no gully, no bush that I haven't investi- 
 gated. She must have left the island." 
 
 "She can't swim," moaned Lucile. "Her lit- 
 tle legs are too short and her fur would get in 
 her eyes." 
 
 "What?" Bopp yelled. "Fur get in her 
 eyes ? What are you talking about ?" 
 
 "Tootles is lost," I threw in by way of ex- 
 planation. 
 
 "Tootles?" said Bopp bewildered. "I've 
 been looking for Mrs. Green." 
 
 "Oh, she's been found," Lucile explained. 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "Oh, hours and hours ago. She telephoned 
 Mr. Blainey. She got in Mr. Kent's rowboat 
 and was blown to a nearby island." 
 
 "You knew where Mrs. Green was in the 
 middle of the afternoon," raged Bopp, turning 
 on me, "and you didn't tell me, but let me;
 
 182 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 tramp my feet off looking for her? Here I 
 am, dying of weariness and lack of sleep, when 
 a word might have saved me." 
 
 While he was glaring at me Kent strolled in. 
 
 "Say, Mr. Bopp," Kent said curiously, "will 
 you tell me one thing?" 
 
 "Why, certainly." 
 
 "How did you ever come to find that shelf on 
 the cliff where you were sleeping all the after- 
 noon? I passed you a dozen times, and I'd 
 never have seen you at all if I hadn't heard you 
 snore."
 
 CHAPTER TWELVE 
 'OH, MY POOR TOOTLES!"
 
 VIDA came in carrying a pair of shoes, a 
 coat, a pair of trousers and a hat. 
 
 "He's gone," she said briefly. "As soon as 
 he saw me coming he dived into the lake and 
 swam off rapidly. He looked back from time 
 to time, but I couldn't make him hear." 
 
 "He was afraid you would swim after him," 
 I explained. "Are you in the market for old 
 clothes ?" I indicated her burden. 
 
 "No, these are his. He left them on the 
 bank and I thought I might as well bring them 
 in. I suppose he will be killed." 
 
 "Who?" asked Lucile and Bopp in one 
 breath. 
 
 "Mr. Clair," Vida answered. "He is trying 
 to reach the mainland by swimming." 
 
 "Oh, the brave fellow," Lucile exclaimed. 
 "He is risking his life to get supplies to us. 
 To think that I didn't like him very well at 
 
 first." 
 
 185
 
 i86 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I explained gently that if Mr. Clair ever 
 reached the shore, which was very doubtful, he 
 would probably never think of us again, or if 
 he did it would be only to recall a very unpleas- 
 ant experience which he would endeavor to 
 banish from his mind. 
 
 "I wish I knew where Tootles is," worried 
 Lucile. 
 
 "So do I," I added fervently. I don't sup- 
 pose that anyone wished it any, more sincerely 
 than I did. 
 
 "She must be in the house," Vida said. 
 
 "I've looked everywhere," Lucile declared 
 despondently. 
 
 "But she is such a little doggie," Vida in- 
 sisted. "She might hide herself in a valise or 
 an old box or she might even get inside the 
 walls. Is there an unfinished part of the house 
 in the attic where she might get in under the 
 floor or between the inner and outer walls ?" 
 
 "Why, yes, there's an attic," admitted Lucile, 
 encouraged. "I went up there and whistled, 
 but I never thought that she might get in under 
 the floor. Come on, let's look." 
 
 We all mounted to the attic wherein reposed
 
 "OH, MY POOR TOOTLES!'' 187 
 
 the usual treasures of discarded and broken 
 furniture, ancient magazines, trunks, and cob- 
 webs, all bathed in a hot, dusty atmosphere 
 reminiscent of mothballs. 
 
 "I'll whistle," Lucile said, "and then we'll 
 be just as quiet as possible. If she's here she'll 
 answer me." 
 
 "Answer you? Can she whistle, too?" 
 asked Jim, the frying-pan engineer. 
 
 "No, of course not. When I whistle, if 
 she's alive, she'll whine and bark." 
 
 "Oh." 
 
 "Shut up, Jim. Let her whistle," com- 
 manded Captain Perkins. "I never knew but 
 one girl who could whistle good and after a 
 dentist pulled one of her front teeth she couldn't 
 any more." 
 
 "Sh," Vida said, laying a hand on the sea- 
 dog's arm. 
 
 After a pause Jim asked, "Why don't she 
 whistle ?" 
 
 "She's tryin' to," explained the captain, who 
 correctly interpreted the facial gymnastics 
 which Lucile was performing. 
 
 "Maybe she ain't got enough steam in her
 
 i88 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 biler." Jim was earnestly endeavoring to be 
 helpful. 
 
 "No, from the way she looks I think she's 
 bust something," said his superior officer. 
 
 At last a faint hissing sound came from 
 Lucile's puckered lips. No right-minded dog 
 would ever have recognized it as a summons 
 to heel, but I heaved a sigh of relief I knew 
 at last that Lucile was safe anyway. 
 
 After a pause Lucile asked, "Did you hear 
 anything?" 
 
 "Not yet," Jim replied. "Why don't you try 
 singing through a comb ?" 
 
 "I meant, did you hear Tootles bark?" 
 
 "No, ma'm." 
 
 "Then she's dead." Lucile nearly broke 
 down. She looked around for a bosom on 
 which to weep, but scorned both Bopp's and 
 mine. "I loved her so." 
 
 There was a whispered consultation between 
 Captain Perkins and Jim, and Jim tiptoed 
 downstairs. 
 
 "Maybe if you tried again," said the captain 
 to Lucile, "the pup might hear you. You 
 didn't whistle very loud the first time."
 
 "OH, MY POOR TOOTLES!" 189 
 
 Lucile whistled again with a considerably 
 more audible result. 
 
 We all listened. 
 
 There was a faint whine and a short, sharp, 
 but distant, bark. I presume that I was the 
 most surprised person in the party. 
 
 "There she is," Vida declared. "I thought 
 maybe she was up here." 
 
 "But that doesn't sound like Tootles," Lucile 
 objected. 
 
 "It must be." Bopp announced this master- 
 piece of logic. "There isn't any other dog in 
 the house, is there ? Probably her voice sounds 
 different far off." 
 
 "And probably she is penned in somewhere 
 and frightened. That might make her sound 
 different." Ah, why did I have that idea, and 
 why, having it, did I not conceal it in one of the 
 recesses of my brain instead of voicing it to 
 all? 
 
 "Oh, my poor Tootles!" Lucile began pic- 
 turing her pet suffocating. "Maybe she is 
 dying or dead already." 
 
 "Whistle again," directed the captain. 
 
 Lucile made several ineffectual attempts, but
 
 190 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 failed. "I can't," she declared; "I have to 
 cry." 
 
 "Let me call her," I interposed. "She 
 knows me." 
 
 As a boy I used to be able to make consider- 
 able racket by blowing on two fingers held at 
 the proper angle in my mouth. I tried it with 
 gratifying results. I must have been heard on 
 the mainland. 
 
 The reply was immediate short, snappy 
 barks still a long way off, but very reassuring 
 as to vigor and delight. 
 
 "She's right under us," Lucile cried. 
 
 "No, over by the window, I should say," ar- 
 gued Vida. 
 
 "Poor darling, she has forgotten how she got 
 into the place and she thinks someone is keep- 
 ing her cooped up on purpose. Please, Monty, 
 keep on whistling. She does recognize you, 
 and she'll know that help is coming. We must 
 take up the floor." 
 
 In her excitement and time of need she had 
 turned to me and not to Bopp ! I didn't know 
 how Tootles, whom I had last seen dashing up 
 the beach amid a cloud of sand, could possibly
 
 "OH, MY POOR TOOTLES!" 191 
 
 have managed to get under the attic floor, but 
 Lucile had called me "Monty/' and reason dis- 
 mounted from her throne and carnival was 
 king. 
 
 I whistled blithely, piercingly, joyfully, coax- 
 ingly, and whenever I paused the barking re- 
 warded me. 
 
 "Tear up the floor," Lucile ordered. "We 
 can't let her stay there any longer." 
 
 "Hadn't we better see if she won't come out 
 by herself?" the captain asked tentatively. 
 "It seems a shame to tear up that there plank- 
 ing." 
 
 "Not for Tootles/' Lucile replied. "What 
 do I care for an old attic floor when my Tootles 
 is in danger? She shan't stay there another 
 minute if I can help it." She tried to pry up 
 a board with her finger nails. 
 
 "Wait," I requested. "Let me do this scien- 
 tifically." 
 
 I wrenched a leg from an old armchair 
 which had already suffered the amputation of 
 one of its extremities, and with that as a lever 
 pried up one of the flooring boards at the ends 
 which extended loose over the floor beams. As
 
 192 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 the plank came up amid a cloud of dust Lucile 
 gave me a look such as must have rewarded 
 Launcelot from the grandstand after he ran 
 a curtain pole through a cast-iron white 
 hope. 
 
 We assembled around the hole I had made. 
 No Tootles in sight. 
 
 "Whistle," Lucile commanded me. 
 
 I obeyed. 
 
 Joyful barks, but nothing more. 
 
 "Take up some more boards," Lucile might 
 have been saying; "Wait until you see the 
 whites of their eyes," or "Don't give up the 
 ship." 
 
 "Hadn't we better wait?" Captain Perkins 
 was an earnest advocate of the Fabian policy. 
 
 "No." 
 
 I took up another board, and yet another, 
 stopping to whistle each time without appar- 
 ently getting any nearer. 
 
 "She's there somewhere," declared Tootles' 
 foster mother, puzzled but still determined. 
 "Keep on until you find her." 
 
 I had taken up all but half a dozen of the 
 boards when my foot slipped from the cross
 
 "OH, MY POOR TOOTLES!" 193 
 
 floor beam on which I was working and struck 
 the lath which was nailed on the other side. 
 
 The lath offered but slight resistance, the 
 plaster was even more fragile, and I went 
 through rather hastily, clutching wildly at 
 nothing in particular. My last recollection 
 was of Lucile's horror-stricken face as she saw 
 me sinking from sight, like the villain in 
 "Lorna Doone." 
 
 My next conscious remembrance was of sit- 
 ting flat in the middle of a bed, the springs of 
 which were gently bouncing me up and down 
 after the fashion of a net into which a trapeze 
 performer has dropped from the top of the 
 tent. Above was a hole in the ceiling, around 
 me were chunks of plaster and splinters of lath 
 and sitting in a chair by the window was Jim, 
 his mouth open, emitting a series of short sharp 
 yelps.
 
 CHAPTER THIRTEEN 
 FURTHER MYSTERY
 
 CHAPTER THIRTEEN 
 
 LUCILE, Vida, Bopp, Kent, and the captain 
 made a ring of faces around the hole in the 
 ceiling. 
 
 "Stop barking, you darn fool," shouted the 
 captain, after a moment devoted to startled sur- 
 prise by all concerned. 
 
 "Aye, aye, sir," replied Jim, saluting. 
 
 "Then it wasn't Tootles at all." Lucile was 
 overwhelmed by grief that was all the more 
 poignant because it had been held off so long 
 by hope. 
 
 "You have to admit that Jim is an all round 
 bright young fellow," declared the captain 
 proudly. "It ain't often you can find a marine 
 engineer who can cook and do as good an imi- 
 tation of a dog as that." 
 
 "But why," I fixed the captain with a malev- 
 olent eye, "why did he imitate a dog at this par- 
 ticular moment? What is the cause of this 
 character study of a canine under a floor? 
 
 197
 
 198 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 Why not a dog out in the yard chasing his tail, 
 or a Newfoundland pup having an argument 
 with a dilapidated shoe?" 
 
 "Why, this was a little idea of my own," 
 stated Captain Perkins, modestly. "When I 
 see Miss Green was going to be all broke up if 
 nothing answered when she whistled, I told 
 Jim there to go downstairs and pretend to be 
 the pup, just so's she'd feel better." 
 
 "What I want to know, Mr. Blainey," Jim 
 asked, with a brightly enquiring eye, "is how 
 did you know just where that bed was?" 
 
 "Are you hurt ?" Lucile enquired, with tardy 
 solicitude. "I'll come right down and get the 
 liniment." 
 
 "These modern steel springs are marvels of 
 strength, aren't they?" speculated Bopp, when 
 they had all descended and formed an admiring 
 circle around the bed. "Think of dropping 
 Monty on one of those old-fashioned coil 
 spring affairs." 
 
 Lucile entered with a strip of inch gauze and 
 a bottle of peroxide. 
 
 "This is all I could find," she explained. 
 "Mr. Johnson borrowed the liniment last week
 
 FURTHER MYSTERY 199 
 
 to use on his horse. Where shall I put this?" 
 
 "Rub a little of it right here," Bopp pointed 
 to one of the legs of the bed. 
 
 "I never can thank you enough, Monty," de- 
 clared Lucile, disregarding Bopp and smiling 
 at me tenderly. "You did your best, and even 
 if we never find Tootles I shall not forget what 
 you have gone through for her." 
 
 "Neither will your father." Bopp indicated 
 the ceiling. 
 
 "I know where I saw that dog last," ex- 
 claimed Kent, as one inspired. 
 
 "Where ?" Lucile turned to him. 
 
 "He was out doors hittin' the breeze this aft- 
 ernoon." 
 
 "Outdoors? She isn't allowed out. What 
 was she doing?" 
 
 "She was vamping up the beach and Mr. 
 Blainey was running after her." 
 
 Guilt seeks out the criminal and fastens her 
 brand upon him publicly. Policemen are but 
 jailers. Detectives are only men who let na- 
 ture do their work for them. 
 
 There was a nasty staccato laugh. I did not 
 need to look to know that it was Bopp.
 
 200 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Mr. Kent seems to have a very observing 
 mind/' he said. 
 
 Lucile looked at me reproachfully. "Is this 
 true?" she asked. 
 
 "Yes." George .Washington could have 
 done no more. 
 
 "You didn't catch her?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 Nothing more was to be said. I had been 
 tried, convicted and sentenced. 
 
 The telephone rang. Lucile went to answer 
 it. The rest of us followed more at our leisure. 
 When we had arrived downstairs, Lucile was 
 talking to someone over the wire, evidently her 
 mother. 
 
 "I'm glad you're all right," she was saying, 
 "and that you have had something to eat. 
 Don't feel badly about breaking the fast. No 
 one blames you a bit. That's all right. We 
 would too if we could." 
 
 A pause during which she listened, a frown 
 gathering on her face. 
 
 "Don't you worry, mother. We're all right. 
 All except Tootles. She is lost. What's 
 the matter? You saw someone outside in the
 
 FURTHER MYSTERY 201 
 
 moonlight? A man? With whiskers? 
 Nonsense, no one lives there at this time of 
 year. Everybody left in September. Just go 
 to bed and don't think about such things." 
 
 Lucile stifled a scream. 
 
 "Hello, mother. What? Someone is try- 
 ing the door? It's opening hello hello 
 mother " 
 
 Lucile dropped the receiver and sank back- 
 wards into Vida's arms. I picked up the tele- 
 phone and held it to my ear shouting "Hello! 
 Hello!" 
 
 There was no response. The wire was dead.
 
 CHAPTER FOURTEEN 
 THE SECRET OF THE SOUP
 
 CHAPTER FOURTEEN 
 
 WHEN Lucile had been revived without re- 
 sorting to any of the violent methods suggested 
 by the resourceful Captain Perkins, I endeav- 
 ored to explain away any cause for fright. 
 
 "Even if she really did see a man," I said, 
 "which seems improbable, he is not going to 
 murder her. Probably he just stopped to en- 
 quire the time of day." 
 
 "But mother said he had whiskers." 
 
 "I know," I continued, "that is against him, 
 but maybe it is hereditary in his family." 
 
 "Maybe she just dreamed it," Kent offered 
 sensibly. "Let's call her up again. She 
 seemed a little dented on top when I first saw 
 her. By this time maybe the attack is over." 
 
 That seemed a fair enough suggestion and I 
 acted on it. I asked Central to give me Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island once more. 
 
 "I'm sorry," Central answered, "but I can't 
 
 seem to get them. I've been ringing on that 
 
 205
 
 206 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 line for the last ten minutes. There's another 
 party trying to get them." 
 
 "Another party?" I questioned. "Who?" 
 
 "I couldn't say. It isn't anyone I know. 
 His voice sounds like he was a tall, thin, young 
 man from New York." 
 
 "Can't get them," I told the listening group. 
 
 "What can we do now? I must go to help 
 mother. I must go. I must go." Lucile be- 
 gan to get hysterical. 
 
 "Wait, dear," Vida said, patting her hand. 
 "We can't go because we haven't any boat." 
 Turning to the rest of us she asked, "Whom 
 could we telephone to and ask to go over 
 there?" 
 
 "The sheriff is the right man, I should 
 think," Bopp suggested. 
 
 "He'd be plumb tickled, too," added Captain 
 Perkins. "He ain't had a chance to arrest no- 
 body since he's been swore in." 
 
 "That's it, the sheriff," Lucile said fever- 
 ishly. "Get the sheriff and let me talk to him." 
 
 "We don't want the public to know about 
 this," I objected. 
 
 "What do I care about the public if my
 
 THE SECRET OF THE SOUP 207 
 
 mother is in danger ?" Lucile very properly de- 
 manded. 
 
 There seemed to be nothing else to do, so 
 I asked the telephone operator to see if she 
 could locate the sheriff. 
 
 "I guess he's down to the railroad station," 
 Central volunteered. "It's most train time, 
 and he most usually goes down there looking 
 for a suspicious character to get off the north- 
 bound passenger. I'll ask the agent if he's 
 there." 
 
 She did, and he was. After a slight delay 
 I found myself addressing a strange voice 
 which I requested to hold the wire. I turned 
 the receiver over to Lucile. 
 
 She told the sheriff in breathless haste that 
 her mother had been foully dealt with on Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island and offered him limitless re- 
 wards to capture her slayer. I don't believe 
 that Lucile herself really thought the situation 
 was as serious as she painted it, but she was a 
 victim of the well-known human vice of exag- 
 geration to which women especially are ad- 
 dicted when relating some calamity. 
 
 When she had told him details which I am
 
 208 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 sure even the Haniman Syndicate reporter 
 would never have thought of without her as- 
 sistance, she at last reluctantly hung up. 
 
 "Is there anything further we can do?" 
 Lucile paced up and down the room, stopping 
 to look out the window from time to time as if 
 she expected to be able to see to Huntingdon's 
 Island. 
 
 "Nothing but wait, dear," Vida said. "I'm 
 sure nothing serious has happened." 
 
 "Then why doesn't mother call up and tell 
 us that she is all right?" 
 
 This was unanswerable. No one thought of 
 a sensible reason for keeping Mrs. Green away 
 from the telephone. 
 
 "We had better do something to occupy our 
 minds until we hear from the sheriff," Vida 
 said, rising to the position of commanding 
 officer in the emergency. 
 
 I thought of my clams. 
 
 "Come with me," I exclaimed, and led the 
 way toward the kitchen. "I have a surprise 
 for you." 
 
 "You have found Tootles!" Lucile was
 
 THE SECRET OF THE SOUP 209 
 
 radiant. That girl's mind oscillated like a 
 pendulum between her lost mother and her lost 
 dog. 
 
 "No," I replied, somewhat crestfallen, for I 
 had again forgotten Tootles, "but I have some- 
 thing for you to eat." 
 
 Never have I been so popular as I was at 
 that moment, that is, with all but Lucile. I 
 haven't said much about our hunger because 
 there is little to be said. It is practically im- 
 possible to convey to the mind of the well-fed 
 reader what it means to miss many meals. 
 There is nothing in the average run of experi- 
 ence with which to compare it. The sensa- 
 tions of a drunkard taking an enforced cure 
 may be somewhat similar, but I doubt if even 
 that is as strenuous. We had now been with- 
 out food three days and had missed nine meals. 
 One interesting sidelight of our experience is 
 the discovery that men seem to depend more 
 on food than women do. A male is an indi- 
 vidual to avoid when minus one or two meals. 
 Don't speak to him at all unless you absolutely 
 must and then it is better to write your com-
 
 210 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 munication and shove it under the door. 
 
 I led my hopeful companions to the kitchen. 
 
 "What is it?" Bopp asked. 
 "It's a secret," I replied mysteriously, inves- 
 tigating my kettle of clams, which, strange to 
 relate, had not boiled entirely away. "I'll 
 serve it to you and then you can guess what 
 it is." 
 
 I found a number of bowls in the pantry and 
 with a porcelain dipper I ladled a goodly por- 
 tion of clam broth into each. When I had 
 passed them around my companions stood 
 sniffing their rations suspiciously. 
 
 "Did you cook this all by yourself?" asked 
 Kent. 
 
 "I did," I averred modestly. 
 
 "From raw materials you found on the is- 
 land?" supplemented Bopp. 
 
 "Everything in it grew right here," I ex- 
 plained. 
 
 "It's Tootles," screamed Lucile, turning pale 
 and putting her bowl down on the table. 
 
 "It can't be," said Bopp, sniffing. "This has 
 a decidedly fishy smell." 
 
 "I know it," wailed Lucile with tears cours-
 
 THE SECRET OF THE SOUP. 211 
 
 ing down her cheeks. "That's what makes me 
 think it's Tootles-*-we have been feeding her 
 lots of fish lately." 
 
 I started to explain. "Lucile, how can you 
 accuse me of such a thing?" 
 
 "You never liked Tootles. I know it. You 
 cared more for your appetite than for my little 
 darling. Now I see through all the mystery 
 about what the food was, and what you were 
 doing all the afternoon while I slept. I sup- 
 pose you drugged me so that I wouldn't hear 
 the poor little thing's screams. Oh, mother! 
 Oh, Tootles!" 
 
 "Lucile," I began, "I" 
 
 "Don't speak to me. I don't ever want to 
 see you again, you fat murderer." 
 
 That was too much. I might have stood for 
 being called a murderer, but not a fat one. 
 
 "Very well," I replied. "It certainly will 
 not be necessary for you to see me. I will go, 
 and I assure you that I will never enter your 
 house again." 
 
 I went to the door with as much dignity as 
 I could assume. 
 
 "Good bye," I said as I opened the door.
 
 212 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 No one answered but Bopp, who tiptoed 
 after me and whispered solemnly, "We are 
 going to bury your soup tomorrow morning 
 with full military honors. If you can't come, 
 send flowers. The service will be held at ten- 
 thirty." 
 
 I went out and slammed the door in his face. 
 
 It was raining again.
 
 CHAPTER FIFTEEN 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE
 
 CHAPTER FIFTEEN 
 
 To my shame be it said that my thoughts 
 dwelt with that untasted clam stew as I left the 
 house. I had quarreled with her whom I loved 
 best, but even that paled into insignificance 
 compared with the fact that I craved food. 
 Thus does physiology triumph over psychology 
 every time. 
 
 While the rain drizzled down on my unpro- 
 tected head and the chill night wind blew 
 through my intentionally porous outing cloth- 
 ing, I admitted to myself that perhaps I had 
 been a trifle precipitate in asserting my pride 
 without first providing myself with an over- 
 coat and an umbrella. It is one thing to leave 
 a friend's house in the city vowing never to 
 return, and quite a different proposition to do 
 the same on an island where there are no other 
 dwellings. Standing in the rain with an 
 empty stomach, I find, is an excellent cure for 
 
 215
 
 216 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 haughtiness of spirit. Prominent members of 
 the Bread Line can doubtless corroborate this. 
 
 There was no particular place to go and ap- 
 parently no chance of leaving the island before 
 morning, anyway. I bethought me of the lat- 
 tice summer house and decided that it might 
 not be a bad idea to take what shelter it af- 
 forded. Before I started out, however, I went 
 out to a shed in the rear of the house which by 
 courtesy is called the "garage," to see what I 
 might find to protect me from the weather. 
 The chief contents of the place as revealed by 
 a flickering match were step-ladders, cans of 
 paint, coiled up garden hose, kerosene cans and 
 empty wash tubs. None of these, even the last 
 named, were particularly serviceable unless 
 one happened to be built like Diogenes, whose 
 figure, to my mind, has always been a subject 
 for speculation. 
 
 On a line stretched across the shed dangled 
 a small collection of dainty clothing of an inti- 
 mate nature which I discovered to be the cos- 
 tume worn by Miss Dunmore when she came 
 ashore and which had been hung there to dry 
 out. The tights and doublet were almost dry,
 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE 217 
 
 but practically useless to me because Vida and 
 I have not the same waist measure by a couple 
 of feet. I abandoned any idea of staying in 
 the shed on account of its proximity to the cot- 
 tage and headed for the summer house. The 
 wind, I noticed, was not nearly as strong as it 
 had been during the day and was hauling 
 around to the southward, which gave me hopes 
 of a calm day on the morrow. A calm day 
 meant food and a chance to leave the island. 
 
 After some difficulty I found the summer 
 house and sat under its cheerless shelter listen- 
 ing to the rain drip off from its roof on to the 
 dead leaves below while I reviewed my situa- 
 tion. I had to admit that I could not be in a 
 much worse plight. Lucile had doubtless 
 spoken hastily and with a sharpness engen- 
 dered by knife-edge nerves ; still she was proud 
 and would probably not apologize to me any 
 more than I would retract my spoken vow not 
 to enter her house again. We might meet at 
 the homes of friends or even in restaurants, 
 but doubtless she would be careful to avoid 
 chance encounters. Clearly my love affair 
 was in a bad way and required heroic treat-
 
 218 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 ment to put it back into a healthy normal con- 
 dition. 
 
 Meditating upon that and wondering what 
 could have happened to Mrs. Green on the lit- 
 tle island just south of us I gradually dozed off 
 and slipped down to the floor. It is surprising 
 under what strange conditions a man can sleep 
 if he really needs it. They say Napoleon was 
 able to snatch a nap on the battlefield with an 
 artillery duel going on. 
 
 My figure is not such, however, that I rest 
 perfectly on a flat surface. For that reason 
 my slumbers were uneasy and troubled with 
 dreams in which I went through various tor- 
 tures of the Inquisition, such as having my 
 bones broken on the rack and other mediaeval 
 variations of the third degree. My last night- 
 mare was that of being blinded by a red-hot 
 iron. (Who was it had that done to him? 
 I remember, it was "Michael Strogoff, the 
 Courier of the Czar." Shades of Jules 
 Verne!) Anyway, it happened to me in my 
 dreams and the burning sensation was so vivid 
 that I awoke in terror. 
 
 Tootles was calmly licking my face. I sup-
 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE 219 
 
 pose her tongue had rasped across my eyes. 
 I remembered having been told that this 
 method of awakening a sleeper was one of her 
 cutest tricks. If I ever have a dog of my own 
 I'm going to spend a lot of time teaching him 
 not to do this trick. 
 
 My first and most natural impulse was to 
 kick the little pest about two-thirds of the way 
 to the mainland, but I was governed by a later 
 and more humane course of reasoning. Tootles 
 had already caused me too much trouble for 
 me to care about losing sight of her again. In 
 the future Damon and Pythias would have 
 nothing on Tootles and me as far as intimacy 
 went. 
 
 I was about to insist that the pup rest some- 
 where besides on my head and return to my 
 slumbers once more, when my attention was 
 attracted by a slight noise outside. Someone 
 was cautiously approaching the summer house. 
 Who the dickens could be out wandering about 
 at that time of night ? I judged by the feel that 
 it was about midnight. You know how you can 
 feel lateness. It is harder to do in the country 
 than in the city where you have the sense of
 
 220 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 hearing to help you, but you can tell just the 
 same even in the woods. I think maybe there 
 is a difference in the quality of the air after the 
 sun has not magnetized it for a long time. 
 
 The person, whoever he was, came nearer, a 
 little at a time. Finally he touched the side 
 of the house and felt his way around to the 
 door. 
 
 The latch was lifted and some one entered 
 and paused a moment as if in doubt where to 
 stop. 
 
 I silenced an impulse on the part of Tootles 
 to welcome the intruder. 
 
 The weight of the man who was there not 
 ten feet from me made the floor boards sag as 
 he walked about. He was coming towards 
 me. 
 
 Apparently he struck one of the benches with 
 which the place was furnished, for it scraped 
 along the floor. For a moment he paused un- 
 certainly and then lit a match. 
 
 In its light I discovered that he was a tall, 
 nattily clad young man whom I had never seen 
 before. 
 
 I imagine my surprise was infinitesimal com-
 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE 221 
 
 pared to his. I was expecting him, but he 
 could not, by any possible chance, have been 
 prepared for a wide-awake, unblinking stranger 
 staring at him six feet away. For an instant, 
 only an instant, I saw a flicker of fear in his 
 eyes, then, disregarding me, he held the match 
 to a cigar stub already between his teeth and 
 drew a long, deep puff. 
 
 When we were once more in darkness save 
 for the tip of his cigar, he said pleasantly, 
 "Good evening." 
 
 I waited. I knew that the superstitious sav- 
 age man way down in his heart was telling him 
 that there would not be any answer. 
 
 At last I said with equal pleasantness, "Good 
 evening." 
 
 He sighed with relief. 
 
 "Is this Green's cottage?" he enquired. 
 
 "No," I replied, "this is merely a shelter 
 overlooking an especially fine view of the lake. 
 You will enjoy it in the morning." 
 
 "Oh. Unfortunately I shall not be here. 
 You, I presume, are taking care of things for 
 Mr. Green." 
 
 "Why, yes," I returned, perfectly willing
 
 222 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 that he should take me for a night watchman 
 until I discovered what he wanted and how he 
 got there. 
 
 "I was going to Mr. Green's cottage, but 
 since I have met you it will save me the trou- 
 ble." 
 
 "I imagine it will," I answered grimly. 
 
 "Now wait a minute," he retorted, correctly 
 interpreting my manner. "Don't you jump at 
 conclusions. I haven't much time or I could 
 explain it all perfectly. I'm not a thief, I'm a 
 newspaper man on the trail of a big story, and 
 there are a few questions I want to ask and a 
 couple of photographs I want to borrow. I 
 know it looks funny for me to be prowling 
 around at this time of night, but there's an old 
 grouch over at Green's who wouldn't answer 
 my questions over the telephone, so I simply 
 had to get a boat to bring me over to find out 
 for myself. Savvy ?" 
 
 "Umph," I pretended to weigh his case ju- 
 dicially. "So you were going to break into 
 Mr. Green's cottage to ask a few questions. 
 Well, I guess I can answer any questions you
 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE 223 
 
 want to ask until the sheriff takes you in 
 charge." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 "Honest to goodness, man," the reporter ex- 
 claimed, "you take yourself seriously, don't 
 you? If you help me I'm willing to cough up 
 a couple of dollars in real money, which is 
 more than my editor will be apt to stand for in 
 my expense account, but if you don't, I'll find 
 out anyway, because it's a way I have, and 
 you'll probably be discharged for not catching 
 me." 
 
 "But it seems to me that I have caught you," 
 I interposed mildly. 
 
 "Hardly," he retorted. "From the glance I 
 got at your figure when I lit the match I should 
 judge that you could run a hundred yards in 
 ten flat minutes, that is, while I am some 
 sprinter, as you will have to admit if you watch 
 me during the next few seconds. I am off." 
 
 But he wasn't. While he was talking I had 
 taken the precaution of moving around be- 
 tween him and the door, so that when he 
 started to leave, I tripped him neatly and sat
 
 224 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 on his chest. This is a very effective type of 
 jiu jitsu for a heavy set man to employ. 
 
 However, I couldn't sit on him all night. For 
 one thing I wanted to sleep. It wouldn't do 
 to let him get away, either. Finally an in- 
 genious scheme solved my difficulty. I re- 
 moved his coat without unbuttoning it, which 
 is done by grasping firmly the two tails in the 
 back, one in each hand, and pulling sidewise. 
 Treated in this fashion, even the most ex- 
 pensively made garment will separate along the 
 back seam and may then be taken off from the 
 front. After I had the coat in my possession 
 I tore it into strips, which I tied together and 
 made a rope with which I bound his ankles and 
 wrists. Just for good measure I ran a line 
 around his body to hold his arms down. 
 
 When I had him all done I lit a match to 
 make sure it was a good job. 
 
 "You'll be sorry for this," he growled. "Do 
 you know that Mrs. Green has been abducted 
 to Huntingdon's Island and murdered by lake 
 pirates ?" 
 
 I grunted. 
 
 "Won't you let me go? I will save her.
 
 THE SUMMER HOUSE CAPTIVE 225 
 
 Remember if you don't I know what you look 
 like and I'll put you in jail for assault." 
 
 "It isn't customary," I commented, "for men 
 who break into other people's houses to have 
 anyone put in jail." 
 
 "There's a place on my shoulder that itches," 
 he complained. "Will you please scratch it?" 
 
 "I would, if you hadn't made that remark 
 about my running a hundred yards in ten min- 
 utes. As it is, I think I'll let your shoulder 
 itch. It will take your mind off what the man- 
 aging editor of your paper will say when you 
 don't show up with that story. So long." 
 
 I went out. 
 
 "Help!" A cry of real terror came from 
 within the summer house. 
 
 I turned back. 
 
 "What is it?" I asked. 
 
 "There's something alive here," he chat- 
 tered. "I think it's a snake. It's crawling 
 across my face." 
 
 For a moment I thought of letting him think 
 that, then I decided that it would be too cruel. 
 
 I lit a match. 
 
 "There's your snake," I commented briefly,
 
 226 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 indicating Tootles, who was licking his face 
 industriously. 
 
 "Oh." He sighed with unmistakable relief. 
 "Take it away, will you ?" 
 
 "Couldn't think of it, old man. That dog 
 has been trained for months to do that very 
 thing. If I made her stop now, all those 
 months of training would be confused in her 
 little dog mind. She won't hurt you." 
 
 "I can't stand this." He apparently tried to 
 roll away from Tootles. "If you are going 
 away please take this pup with you." 
 
 "Impossible." I went to the door again. 
 "She will guard you. Tootles," I commanded 
 sternly as if she had been a regular dog. "Sic 
 'em, Tootles I mean lick him, Tootles, lick 
 him." 
 
 I went out, followed by a variously expressed 
 opinion of myself and Tootles. Lucile, I pre- 
 sume, would not have allowed Tootles to hear 
 such language, but I think it was a liberal edu- 
 cation for the dog, and I believe that she has 
 been the better for it ever since.
 
 CHAPTER SIXTEEN 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW
 
 CHAPTER SIXTEEN 
 
 IT had stopped raining entirely now and the 
 south wind had become a warm and welcome 
 reality. The stars were out in considerable 
 force, veiled now and then by scurrying banks 
 of storm clouds which were being driven in full 
 retreat to the horizon. 
 
 I went down to the cove. As I had rather 
 expected I found Bill Johnson there with his 
 motor-scow, the Merry Widow, with her nose 
 driven up on the beach. 
 
 "Morning, Bill." 
 
 "Goot morning, sare." 
 
 Bill's father was Danish, I believe, and his 
 mother was a French Canadian. His speech is 
 a combination of patois that he heard at home. 
 He's an oldish sort of a man now, with bent 
 back and twisted fingers, but he is still the best 
 guesser as to what might be the matter with a 
 
 motor boat that it has been my pleasure to 
 
 229
 
 230 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 meet. He has to be to keep his own boat 
 afloat. 
 
 "Quite a sea out there." I indicated the 
 lake., 
 
 "She shall run pretty high," replied Bill, "but 
 not so high like she do a while ago." 
 
 "Just come out for the ride?" I queried. 
 
 "No the Merry Widow she bring over a 
 young man, a newspaper feller. He say he 
 shall give three dollar or I wouldn't, by Yim- 
 miny Christmas, do it. No, sare, not for two- 
 fifty even I shan't do it." Then he added with 
 a slight wink, "The sea, she ain't so high now 
 as I make him think." 
 
 "Do you know where Huntingdon's Island 
 is?" I enquired, a vague plan of action formu- 
 lating itself in my brain. 
 
 "Sure, I know him. She set over yon 'bout 
 three mile, maybe four or two and a half." 
 
 "Well, the young man you brought over here 
 has decided to stay for an hour or so. While 
 you are waiting I want you to take me over to 
 Huntingdon's and get Mrs. Green." 
 
 "Missus Green? What she do by Hunting- 
 don's?"
 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW 231 
 
 "I'll tell you later after I think up some in- 
 teresting explanation. At present I shouldn't 
 be able to do the subject justice. How about 
 it? Will you take me over there?" 
 
 He hesitated. 
 
 "Here's a dollar," I said. "The storm is 
 quieting down a good deal and, anyway, you 
 know the Merry Widow is the best sea-boat on 
 the lake." 
 
 The flattery won him. What owner, even of 
 the veriest motor monstrosity, is not suscepti- 
 ble to praise bestowed upon his darling. I 
 have found, too, that when no word can be said 
 for the excellence of the engine, or the beauty 
 of line of the vessel, a knowing remark dropped 
 about her sea-going qualities will always hit 
 the spot. The worse they look the more sea- 
 worthy they are, at least to the distorted imag- 
 ination of the deluded individuals who own 
 them. 
 
 Bill took the dollar. 
 
 "I guess she shall run all right. One waive, 
 she shan't work yust so good as she ought, but 
 I got some wire. I fix him up." 
 
 I have since discovered that almost any re-
 
 232 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 pair can be made on the Merry Widow with a 
 piece of bell wire, from a burst water jacket 
 to a defective induction coil. 
 
 I helped him shove off and Bill tinkered with 
 the one cylinder machine gun which propelled 
 the barge, until he induced it to bark at irregu- 
 lar intervals. 
 
 Have I forgotten to mention that the Merry 
 Widow is an open boat with no superstructure 
 or canopy of any sort? If I have, let me state 
 here that her lines are very decollete and a large 
 wave meets with little obstruction save the pas- 
 sengers when it starts to travel from the bow 
 to the stern. 
 
 "She shall be, by Yimminy Christmas, dam' 
 choppy," Bill commented. "The wind she shall 
 haul to the south and make cross waves." 
 
 He was absolutely correct. As soon as we 
 left the mouth of the cove we went through 
 some evolutions which I would have said it was 
 absolutely impossible for a man of my build to 
 perform. I was favorably considering the 
 idea of being sea-sick when a larger wave than 
 usual washed over and struck the engine. It 
 expired peacefully on the spot.
 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW 233 
 
 "What has happened?" I asked, with a lands- 
 man's justified terror. 
 
 "The engine has stopped. 5 * Bill's calm state- 
 ment of the obvious exasperated me. 
 
 "Of course it has stopped. Can we ever 
 start it again ?" 
 
 "Sure. She shall run some more. The 
 wave, she short circuit the spark. See," Bill 
 pointed, "she all wet." His enthusiasm as a 
 lecturer on the gasoline engine made him for- 
 get the lake outside. 
 
 It was brought to his attention by a large 
 wave which tipped us on our beam ends and 
 dropped Bill and myself in an affectionate 
 group into the stern of the boat, where we were 
 joined presently by a collection of oil cans, 
 wrenches, grease cans, and other marine im- 
 pedimenta. 
 
 Bill removed his elbow from the pit of my 
 long since hopeless stomach and scrambled to 
 the engine. 
 
 "She ain't hurted a bit," he announced. 
 "Lend me your handkerchief." 
 
 I silently passed him the article he desired. 
 He carefully wiped off a large part of the en-
 
 234 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 gine with it before he offered it back to me. 
 I declined and told him to consider it my con- 
 tribution to the equipment of the boat. 
 
 "Now, sare," he directed, "you must hold the 
 coat over the spark so she shall not get, by Yee 
 Vizz, again wet." 
 
 He showed me how to protect the engine 
 from the elements by interposing my coat and 
 my shivering body between it and the waves. 
 This being accomplished he started the ma- 
 chinery and we lurched forth into the night 
 once more. 
 
 From time to time I caught a tubful of lake 
 on my back and it would slowly trickle down 
 through my clothing to my shoes. I had time 
 between waves that came over to get one siza- 
 ble batch of water partly warmed up before 
 another struck me. I must have taken the 
 chill off several hundred barrels of water on 
 that trip. 
 
 There was one consolation. I was too busy 
 and uncomfortable in other ways to be sea- 
 sick. Standing in a strained position, my feet 
 braced against the lee scuppers or the balloon
 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW 235 
 
 jib or something nautical like that, my back 
 bent and my arms holding my coat over a crip- 
 pled threshing-machine disguised as a marine 
 engine, I had no attention to spare for any 
 merely internal disturbance. 
 
 Bill split his time between steering and 
 mending the engine, keeping up a running fire 
 of conversation, not with me but with the mo- 
 tor. When she'd cough weakly, Bill would hit 
 her in some apparently tender spot with the flat 
 of a monkey wrench and say, "Come on, 
 Merry, you shan't stop. I knock the carbon 
 off your waives now you feel better." 
 
 Then the engine would pick up and run quite 
 smoothly for a hundred explosions or so, before 
 she'd go wrong in another place. Bill's chief 
 claim to distinction as a gasoline engineer lies 
 in the fact that no matter what went wrong he 
 did not let that engine entirely cease its activi- 
 ties until we reached the dock at Huntingdon's 
 Island. 
 
 After I had filled my lungs with a little un- 
 diluted air, I picked up a heavy wrench to use 
 as a weapon and, directing Bill to arm himself
 
 236 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 likewise and follow as quietly as possible, I set 
 out up the path leading from the dock, which 
 doubtless ended at the Huntingdon domicile. 
 
 The moon was up now, and though occasion- 
 ally darkened for a moment by flying clouds 
 there was sufficient light for us to proceed 
 rapidly. 
 
 A turn of the path brought us in range with 
 an illuminated window. Either someone was 
 in the house of which the window was a part or 
 had only very recently left it. I laid my hand 
 on Bill Johnson's arm, counselling caution, and 
 led the way off from the path and through the 
 shrubbery to a position near the house, but a 
 little to one side of the window. 
 
 Clearly it was up to me to look in and see 
 what was in that room. A dread of what I 
 might see, not unmixed with a little wholesome 
 fear for my personal safety, took possession of 
 my heart. Suppose someone were waiting in- 
 side to shoot at the first head which appeared 
 in the light. However, I had come a long way 
 to find out what had happened in that house 
 and I forced myself to be courageous. I crept 
 to the lower corner of the window and quickly
 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW 237 
 
 raised my head so as to bring the interior of 
 the room within range of one eye. 
 
 There was no one, nothing human or that 
 had been human, in sight in that part of the 
 room which I could see. The lamp, sitting 
 peacefully on a deal table shed its mellow rays 
 on surroundings and furniture which pro- 
 claimed the room to be the kitchen. 
 
 I crept back to Bill. 
 
 "No one in sight," I reported. "There is 
 someone in there I want to surprise, to play a 
 joke on, so I am going to break in the door." 
 
 "Ha ! Ha !" laughed Bill boisterously, before 
 I could check him. "She shall be dam' funny 
 yoke. I been comical cuss myself." 
 
 My explanation would have sounded a trifle 
 thin to anyone but Bill, and even to this day I 
 have misgivings about my ethical right to lead 
 a trusting stranger, even a motor-boat repair 
 man, into what might have been serious danger 
 without warning him first. However, I didn't 
 think of that then. 
 
 We felt our way to the door, which was a 
 solid one of plain wood with no glass panels.
 
 238 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Could you knock that off from its hinges?" 
 I whispered. 
 
 "I bet," Bill replied. "Easy." 
 
 "All right then. Get ready. One two 
 three!" 
 
 Crash! Bill sprang at the door and it fell 
 inward, letting him sprawl half way across the 
 room. 
 
 I stepped across the threshold and levelled 
 my monkey wrench like a revolver. 
 
 "Throw up your hands," I commanded. 
 
 To my surprise I found that I was address- 
 ing a whiskered individual, clad in white swim- 
 ming tights only, who was backed up against a 
 door in a far corner of the room. He threw 
 up one hand, keeping the other one behind 
 him. 
 
 "Up with the other hand," I shouted, advanc- 
 ing into the room to get a better view of its oc- 
 cupant but keeping sufficiently in the shade of 
 the lamp so that the real nature of my weapon 
 would not be immediately evident. "Throw up 
 your other hand !" 
 
 "I can't," said my prisoner stubbornly.
 
 VOYAGE OF THE MERRY WIDOW 239 
 
 "Can't?" I repeated in surprise. 'Why 
 can't you ?" 
 
 "Because I've got my thumb over the key- 
 hole and there is a woman on the other side 
 trying to peek through !"
 
 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF
 
 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 
 
 SOMETHING about the quality of that voice 
 seemed familiar. I grabbed the lamp from the 
 table and held it so the full light fell on his 
 face. 
 
 "Lipton S. Clair," I exclaimed. "You 
 here!" 
 
 "I admit that I did not expect to be recog- 
 nized in this island wilderness," he began 
 pompously, careful to gesticulate, however, 
 only with his free hand, "but why should I not 
 be here as well as anywhere else?" 
 
 "Because when I saw you last you were going 
 to swim to the mainland." 
 
 "Who are you?" he demanded in turn, try- 
 ing to see past the light which I held in front 
 of me. 
 
 "Montmorency Blarney," I replied. 
 
 "Yes, yes, I understand." Then suddenly 
 
 he shrank more closely into the doorway. "Is 
 
 243
 
 244 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 that woman my fiancee Miss Dunmore 
 with you?" 
 
 I reassured him and asked him how he came 
 to be where I had found him. 
 
 "I found the swimming a trifle more strenu- 
 ous than I had expected," he began, "and I 
 must have been carried off my course by storm 
 currents. Anyway, I discovered that it was 
 practically impossible for me either to reach 
 the mainland or to get back to Green's Island. 
 The general trend of the waves was in this di- 
 rection and I was forced to go along, saving 
 my strength for keeping my head above water. 
 
 "The rest of my story is absurdly simple. I 
 saw land here and came ashore. It was not 
 quite dark and I came up the path to the house 
 without noticing the light in the window. I 
 had no thought of there being any inhabitants 
 and my intention was to rummage around until 
 I found something to eat and some dry clothes. 
 
 "As soon as I opened the door I saw that I 
 had committed a social blunder. There was a 
 woman standing at the telephone and when she 
 saw me she screamed and ran through this 
 door, slamming and locking it after her. It
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 245 
 
 was useless to try to explain to a frightened 
 female the innocuous nature of my visit, so I 
 refrained. I was about to partake of some of 
 the food I found on the table there when I 
 heard the key being carefully withdrawn from 
 the lock on the other side. Quick as a flash I 
 asked myself the question, 'Why do people 
 withdraw the keys from locked doors?' The 
 answer struck me instantly. 'So that they may 
 look through the keyholes, of course/ I 
 recollected my costume. With one bound I 
 jumped to the door and put my thumb over the 
 keyhole, where it has been ever since." 
 
 "The little boy who saved the dikes in Hol- 
 land has nothing on you." I saw that he ex- 
 pected praise, so I gave it to him. "But if you 
 have been here surely you have heard the tele- 
 phone bell ringing." 
 
 "Yes, it has been making an infernal racket 
 ever since I arrived, but how could I leave my 
 post to answer it?" He helplessly waved his 
 free hand in the direction of the keyhole. 
 
 "Ouch ! Stop !" he yelled, jerking his thumb 
 away and dancing up and down frantically. 
 
 "What has happened?"
 
 246 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "She jabbed a pin into my thumb. I'm 
 bleeding to death. Put your thumb over the 
 keyhole a minute while I swear." 
 
 I was about to do that, foolish as it was, 
 when there was the sound of a rifle shot some- 
 where outside and almost simultaneously the 
 lamp which I held fell apart in my hand and 
 crashed to the floor. 
 
 "Ha! Ha! Ha!" laughed Bill Johnson in the 
 darkness. "I see the yoke now." 
 
 "What happened?" Clair asked. 
 
 "Some one shot out the light." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 "I can't imagine. I assure you that I wasn't 
 expecting it any more than you were. If I 
 had been I would have allowed you to hold the 
 lamp." 
 
 Any further conversation was cut short by a 
 scattering fusillade of shots, some of which 
 came through the window, as we could tell by 
 the tinkle of glass. 
 
 "This is a regular attack." Clair may have 
 been an egotistical ass, but I must give him 
 credit for not showing fear under fire. "What 
 shall we do?"
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 247 
 
 "As we have no weapon with which to fight 
 back I suppose we had better surrender. Let's 
 display a flag of truce." 
 
 "All right. Use your handkerchief." 
 
 I reached in my pocket. Then I remem- 
 bered that I had donated my handkerchief to 
 Bill for wiping off the engine. I explained 
 briefly to Clair. 
 
 Bill likewise proved guileless of a mouchoir. 
 
 "Anything white will do," Clair suggested. 
 
 "Then tear off a piece of your bathing suit." 
 
 "No," he protested, amid a further rattle of 
 musketry. "I can't spare any." 
 
 Fortunately any further discussion proved 
 unnecessary. Our assailants apparently dis- 
 covered that we were not putting up a very 
 formidable resistance, for the fusillade ceased 
 and a moment later a voice at the door ex- 
 claimed, "Resistance is useless. Every corner 
 of the room is covered. John, show a light." 
 
 A bull's eye flashed into the room and re- 
 vealed us blinking in its glare. 
 
 "Do you surrender?" 
 
 "I do," I promised, as solemnly as if I were 
 going through the marriage ceremony.
 
 248 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Humph! Desperate characters!" declared 
 the voice in the doorway. "Light up a few 
 lamps." 
 
 Several men entered and lit two kerosene 
 lamps which they found in a cupboard and a 
 lantern which seemed to belong to their party. 
 
 In the illumination thus afforded I could 
 make out at least a dozen men of the type 
 which is indigenous to the bench in front of the 
 small town grocery store. Just now, however, 
 they were doing an imitation of the vigilance 
 committee in the Third Act of "The Vir- 
 ginian." One carried a coil of half-inch rope 
 and all were armed with weapons which ranged 
 from shotguns to horse pistols. One, a little 
 better dressed than the rest, carried a camera, 
 which he proceeded to set up in one corner of 
 the room. 
 
 "Ye're arrested," announced the original 
 speaker, a rather heavy set man with gray 
 moustaches of the trailing arbutus type. "I'm 
 the sheriff." 
 
 He displayed a brilliant new star pinned to 
 a suspender bordering a shirt front, which 
 was slightly discolored by tobacco, betraying
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 249 
 
 rather imperfect marksmanship on the part of 
 the wearer. 
 
 "Arrested ?" Clair demanded. "What for ?" 
 
 "Fer wilful murder." The sheriff shivered 
 slightly as he spoke. "Ain't that so, boys ?" 
 
 A growl from the warlike posse answered 
 him. 
 
 "Lynch 'em," yelled the man who carried the 
 rope, apparently fearful lest he had brought 
 his burden in vain. 
 
 "Aye, that's it. String 'em up." These 
 and other enthusiastic cries reassured him. 
 
 "Now wait a minute, boys." The sheriff 
 turned a cold eye on his enthusiastic retinue 
 and spat with a fair degree of accuracy at the 
 kitchen stove. "While, as a private individool, 
 I have to admit, boys, that I would enjoy a 
 lynchin' as much as any of you, still I have to 
 remember that I have a duty to perform, a 
 sacred trust, namely, to wit, to uphold the 
 majesty of the law in Maskeloon County." 
 
 A murmur of applause among his henchmen 
 made it evident that they were used to oratory 
 from their chief. 
 
 "But we've never had a lynching in this
 
 250 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 county," protested the bloodthirsty man with 
 the rope, "and they've had two over Lake 
 County way." 
 
 Local pride nearly swayed the sheriff against 
 us, but at last he held up his hand. 
 
 "I can't allow it, boys," he said regretfully. 
 "All we can do, accordin' to the law, is to take 
 'em to jail." 
 
 "Before I move out of this place," Lipton S. 
 Clair protested, "I've got to have some clothes." 
 
 "All right, son," soothed the sheriff, "there 
 ain't any call to get hectic about it. Si," turn- 
 ing to one of the others, "see if there ain't some 
 old clothes in that closet in the hired help's 
 room." 
 
 Si departed and soon returned with a gar- 
 ment known in history as a "Mother Hubbard," 
 so called because of its resemblance to a squash. 
 
 "This is all I could find," Si reported. "The 
 Huntingdons' help was a female woman." 
 
 "That'll do," the sheriff said briefly, tossing 
 it to Clair. "Put this on without any argu- 
 ments and we'll be on our way." 
 
 Clair thought of protesting, but was over- 
 come by the idea of the woman in the next room
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 251 
 
 and hastily 'donned the garment, which was 
 cut on lines designed to cover any sort of fig- 
 ure which nature could turn out. The effect 
 of the dress plus the whiskers was startling, to 
 say the least. 
 
 "Before we go/' the sheriff decided, "we had 
 best have a look at the remains." To me he 
 said, "Where is the deceased? Where is Mrs. 
 Green?" 
 
 "Mrs. Green hasn't been murdered," I 
 started to set him straight. 
 
 "I didn't ask how she met her death," the 
 sheriff thundered. "Of course I don't expect 
 you to admit you killed her. All I asked was 
 where she is, and, by George, I'll have an an- 
 swer. Where is she?" 
 
 I pointed silently at the locked door. 
 
 "Boys," said the sheriff with emotion, "a 
 poor defenceless woman lies beyond that door 
 foully done to death by these here ruffians. 
 Smith, Wadsworth, Clancy, Snider, you will 
 act as ambulance department." 
 
 Four of his comedians went toward the door. 
 
 "Wait," the leader commanded. "Before 
 you enter that room, take off them hats."
 
 252 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 The four nondescript hats came off silently. 
 Then they discovered that the door was locked. 
 However, that proved only a slight obstacle, 
 for the lock was easily forced. 
 
 It struck me as funny that Mrs. Green had 
 not walked out on the scene before this, or fail- 
 ing in that, that she had made no outcry when 
 her retreat was invaded. A strange chill, 
 premonition of coming disaster, gripped my 
 heart. 
 
 The four men re-entered, carrying reverently 
 a limp figure, which was unmistakably Mrs. 
 Green. Had she been struck by a stray bullet 
 from the attacking party? If she had, things 
 certainly were looking black for Clair and my- 
 self. We had no way of proving that we were 
 innocent and all circumstantial evidence would 
 be against us. We had been found alone on 
 the island with her. 
 
 The hostility of the posse increased mark- 
 edly with the return of the four men. A mur- 
 mur of anger ran around the room and the man 
 with the rope fingered it nervously. 
 
 "Steady, boys." The sheriff checked them. 
 
 "One moment." The young man with the
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 253 
 
 camera held up his hand. "Stand just where 
 you are; don't move." 
 
 There was a blinding flash and my over- 
 wrought nerves jumped seven feet and re- 
 bounded before my brain assured them that it 
 was only a flashlight. (Memo: Organize So- 
 ciety for the Prevention of Flashlights.) 
 
 The effect on the four members of the am- 
 bulance squad was even more startling. Ap- 
 parently not expecting the explosion they 
 dropped their burden and stood with mouths 
 open. Accidentally they dropped the body in 
 a sitting posture. 
 
 There was a slight scream. Mrs. Green 
 opened her eyes and demanded, "Where am I ?" 
 
 If the officers of the law had been startled 
 before, their condition now was absolute con- 
 sternation. 
 
 "Madame," the sheriff enquired, "aren't you 
 dead?" 
 
 "I should say not!" 
 
 "Then you are not Mrs. Green." 
 
 "I certainly am." 
 
 "But Mrs. Green is dead. Her daughter 
 told us so."
 
 254 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Dead! Fiddlesticks! It's a wonder I'm 
 not, though, after coming over here in an open 
 boat and being attacked by a half-naked savage 
 with whiskers and, let's see some one was shot 
 that's when I fainted, I guess, because I don't 
 remember anything more until just now." 
 
 "All I have to say," stated the man with the 
 rope, jamming his hat on disrespectfully, "is 
 that this is a bum night to get a man out to play 
 a joke on him." 
 
 "I hope you are not angry with me," Mrs. 
 Green murmured, overawed by the disapproval 
 of the men. "I can't see that I've done any- 
 thing." 
 
 "Madame," the sheriff said, with gloomy po- 
 liteness, "you have spoiled the only murder 
 case we ever had in Maskeloon County, that's 
 what you have done. Come on, boys." 
 
 In majestic silence the members of the sher- 
 iff's posse filed from the room. The young 
 man with the camera was left behind, hastily 
 picking up his traps in order to join the others 
 before their boat left the island. 
 
 I approached him. 
 
 "Now that there is no murder mystery," I
 
 'I hope you are not angry with me," Mrs. Green murmured, overawe 
 " Madame," the sheriff said, with gloomy politeness, 
 Maskaloon County, that's what you ha
 
 the disapproval of the men. "I can't see that I've done anything." 
 a have spoiled the only murder case we ever had in 
 one. Come on, boys." See Page 254
 
 A DISAPPOINTED SHERIFF 255 
 
 began, "I presume that the picture you took 
 will be useless." 
 
 "Not at all," he answered, too busy folding 
 up his tripod to notice that I had opened the 
 shutter of his camera. "We'll find use for it 
 some way." 
 
 I lit a match and held it about an inch from 
 the lens of the camera, pretending to examine 
 the name of the maker on it. 
 
 "What are you doing?" he demanded 
 sharply. 
 
 "Just looking at your lens," I answered, 
 blowing out the match. "It's a Dalmeyer, I 
 see." 
 
 "Yes. I was afraid something might hap- 
 pen to that negative. I left the film in the 
 
 camera." 
 
 "Did you?" I asked innocently and closed 
 the shutter once more unobserved. "Mav we 
 
 
 
 have one of the pictures if they turn out well ?" 
 He paused on the threshold with a smile. 
 "If this picture turns out well," he said, 
 "nearly everybody in the United States will 
 have a copy of it. I'm a photographer for the 
 Haniman Syndicate of Newspapers."
 
 256 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "That's what I thought," I answered, return- 
 ing his smile. 
 
 After he was gone I added, "That's why I 
 let that negative get light-struck."
 
 CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 
 BACK TO GREEN'S ISLAND
 
 CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 
 
 I TURNED wearily to my ill assorted compan- 
 ions. They were sitting silently on opposite 
 sides of the table. 
 
 "Pardon me," I murmured, "I believe that 
 you have not met. Mrs. Green, this is Mr. 
 Lipton S. Clair." 
 
 They bowed stiffly to one another. 
 
 "Is he the one who wrote the article about 
 fasting?" Mrs. Green asked me, again ignoring 
 her vis-a-vis. 
 
 "He is," I admitted. 
 
 Mrs. Green said nothing further, but her 
 thoughts, I know, were unbecoming to the 
 president of the Charles Dickens Reading Club. 
 
 "I presume," Clair stated sourly, "Mrs. 
 Green has forgotten that she stuck a hat-pin 
 through my thumb less than half an hour ago." 
 
 "It was not a hat-pin. It was a safety pin, 
 bent out straight. I was afraid it would not 
 
 259
 
 26o FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 reach. Was that your thumb you held over 
 the keyhole?" 
 
 "It was. I suppose you are sorry it was not 
 my eye." 
 
 I could see that the more we talked the worse 
 the situation would get, so I interrupted them. 
 "We might as well go back," I suggested 
 wearily, surveying my companions. "I am 
 going to the mainland, Mrs. Green, and I can 
 leave you at home as I go by." 
 
 "You're not going away, Mr. Blainey ?" Mrs. 
 Green asked, with motherly kindness. 
 
 "Yes," I answered. 
 
 "What's the matter?" she queried gently. 
 "Lucile? You mustn't let her fickleness hurt 
 you. She has fads in beaux as well as fads in 
 foods and exercises." 
 
 Advising a jealous lover not to care is a good 
 deal like giving medicine to a dead man; it 
 doesn't have any effect one way or the other. 
 I appreciated Mrs. Green's thoughtfulness, but 
 assured her with what dignity I had left that I 
 would prefer to consider my visit at an end. 
 
 When we descended to the shore to embark 
 on the Merry Widow Mrs. Green took one look
 
 BACK TO GREEN'S ISLAND 261 
 
 at the lake and flatly declined to travel by boat 
 until it was calm. 
 
 "I don't know how I came over here. I 
 couldn't have been in my right senses even to 
 start, but I certainly am perfectly sane now, 
 and as long as I remain so I intend to stay on 
 dry land while a storm is in progress." 
 
 "But your daughter will worry," I protested. 
 "Lucile has been very nearly distracted for 
 twenty-four hours." 
 
 "She might better be distracted today than 
 an orphan on her mother's side tomorrow. 
 Anyway, I'll telephone her that I'm all 
 right." 
 
 "But we can't leave you here," I renewed my 
 argument, "and I have to go back." 
 
 "Perhaps the gentleman here " Mrs. Green 
 began. 
 
 "No," Clair declined, looking at his thumb. 
 "I have to be in Fair View before morning to 
 prevent my friend's marriage." 
 
 I took him one side. 
 
 "You can't go into Fair View wearing a 
 Mother Hubbard," I reminded him. 
 
 "Well, I can stop and get my own clothes."
 
 262 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "On Green's Island? And meet Miss Dun- 
 more again ?" 
 
 "I'd forgotten about her. What can I do?" 
 
 "Stay right here and I'll send the boat back 
 with a suit of clothes in an hour." 
 
 He wavered. 
 
 "Is the lady, Mrs. Green, a wife or widow?" 
 
 "She has a husband living." 
 
 "All right, then. My own clothes, that I 
 came ashore in this morning, are on a line on 
 the back porch, where I hung them to dry. 
 Send them back soon. I don't know what I 
 should do if Mrs. Green should fall in love with 
 me." 
 
 I surveyed him from the hem of his skirt to 
 the tip of his beard. "As long as you have 
 those clothes on," I gravely assured him, 
 "you're as safe as a dollar in Hetty Green's 
 bank." 
 
 Clair suffered himself to be led back to Mrs. 
 Green, to whom I announced the arrangement 
 which we had made. 
 
 Before I left, Mrs. Green telephoned to Lu- 
 cile and told her that she was safe. I took the 
 liberty of ransacking the pantries and store-
 
 BACK TO GREEN'S ISLAND 263 
 
 room of the Huntingdon house for supplies 
 and carried away enough tinned stuff to assure 
 the garrison at Green's Island at least one 
 square meal. 
 
 Bill and myself embarked alone. I carry 
 with me yet in memory the picture of Mrs. 
 Green and Lipton S. Clair as I left them, two 
 strangely clad figures, one in a red ball-gown, 
 the other in a calico wrapper and whiskers, hob- 
 nobbing over a pot of tea. 
 
 The journey back was uneventful. The sea 
 had calmed down enough so that we shipped 
 very little water and the motor was on its good 
 behaviour. When we landed at Green's Island 
 I was thankful to note that there were no lights 
 in the house. Apparently everyone had gone 
 to bed for a much needed rest. I looked at my 
 watch. It was nearly three o'clock. I had 
 plenty of time to finish up my business on 
 Green's Island and get away with my prisoner 
 before there was any danger of anyone wak- 
 ing up. 
 
 I sent Bill up to get Clair's clothing while I 
 unloaded the supplies and hid them under the 
 dock. I expected to telephone Jim in the morn-
 
 264 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 ing and tell him where they were, so that he 
 could cook breakfast for the castaways. Bill 
 apparently experienced no difficulty in finding 
 the clothes, and when he returned I helped him 
 put out to sea again. This required consid- 
 erable persuasion and three dollars in money. 
 I also had to promise to make it all right with 
 the newspaper man whom he had brought over 
 in the first place. 
 
 I made that promise with more assurance 
 than I had any right to feel, considering how 
 much I had to make right with that young man 
 on my own account before Bill should return to 
 take us to the mainland. The chances were 
 that the young reporter in the summer house 
 regarded myself and Tootles with about equal 
 favor at that moment, but I set out resolutely 
 to convince him that I was one of his very best 
 friends.
 
 CHAPTER NINETEEN 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 
 
 \
 
 CHAPTER NINETEEN 
 
 IT was then that the next adventure in this 
 Arabian nightmare occurred. 
 
 I happened to glance at the house to wonder 
 bitterly if Lucile was sleeping peacefully or if 
 her conscience troubled her slumbers because 
 of her unjust treatment of me. At first I 
 thought it was the reflection of the rising sun 
 in the windows of the cottage which caused the 
 red light, but when I looked to the east I saw 
 that the sun was not up. 
 
 Then the house must be on fire ! 
 
 Clearly I had no time to lose. Probably 
 everyone was sleeping. I ran up the path from 
 the beach to the house, my temples bursting 
 with the exertion. Could I get there in time to 
 save the entire household ? 
 
 The building was a frame one and offered 
 little resistance to fire. By the time I got to 
 the front door the flames were beginning to lick 
 out of one of the upstairs windows. 
 
 367
 
 268 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I threw myself against the front door and 
 broke the lock without ceremony. Luckily the 
 downstairs portion was not touched by fire as 
 yet. The stairway was still clear. 
 
 I dashed up, yelling "Fire!" as loudly as I 
 could. 
 
 When I got to the top of the stairs I ran into 
 Captain Perkins, who was partially dressed. 
 
 "What's the matter?" he asked mildly. 
 
 "Matter?" I repeated. "The house is on 
 fire. Didn't you know it?" 
 
 "No. I couldn't sleep and I got up and 
 smoked a pipe of tobacco. Then I wanted a 
 drink and I been having the durndest time find- 
 ing any water in the house." 
 
 I paid little attention to what he was saying, 
 but pounded on all the doors, one after an- 
 other. 
 
 The people began to come out in various 
 stages of undress, carrying clothing and valua- 
 bles. Vida's stage experience stood her in good 
 stead. She emerged from her room com- 
 pletely dressed and went downstairs as if she 
 were answering a rehearsal call. 
 
 All were accounted for but Lucile.
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 269 
 
 I pounded on her door again and again. 
 
 "Hurry!" I commanded at frequent inter- 
 vals. 
 
 "I'm hurrying," she always answered. 
 
 At last the smoke began to be unbearable in 
 the hallway and the crackling of the flames 
 warned me that in an instant the stairs would 
 be impassable. 
 
 I stood on ceremony no longer. I threw 
 open Lucile's door and walked into that young 
 lady's room. She was standing there in her 
 night gown, looking aimlessly about her, with 
 a stocking in one hand. 
 
 "I can't find my other stocking," she an- 
 nounced calmly. 
 
 "Don't be excited," I shouted. "The house 
 is on fire and we've got to get out." 
 
 "I'm not excited. But I can't find but one 
 stocking. How can I escape with only one 
 stocking?" 
 
 There was no time for argument. I grabbed 
 a dressing-gown or kimono that was flung over 
 the foot of her bed, wrapped her in it, and 
 swept her off her feet and into my arms. 
 
 The rescue was very simple. There was a
 
 270 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 little smoke on the stairway and in a minute it 
 would have been hard to get down, but as it 
 was I only had to hold my breath for a few sec- 
 onds and we were safe on the first floor, which 
 had not caught yet. 
 
 However, I carried Lucile clear out in the 
 front yard and deposited her in the little group 
 of scantily clad survivors. 
 
 "Where's the fire department?" asked Vida, 
 whose experience with the destroying demon 
 was confined to Broadway conflagrations. 
 
 "There isn't any fire department," Kent vol- 
 unteered gently. 
 
 "Can't anything be done ?" 
 
 "Not much now." I shrugged my shoul- 
 ders. "When a fire gets that much headway 
 in a country house built of wood there is noth- 
 ing much to do but save the nearby buildings. 
 As there aren't any nearby buildings except 
 the shed there is nothing to do but watch it 
 burn." 
 
 "How could it have caught?" asked Bopp, 
 trying to put his left shoe on his right foot. 
 He had carried them both out in his hands. 
 
 "No one was up," said Jim, the fireman.
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 271 
 
 "How did you come to be around, Monty?" 
 Bopp straightened up with a quick glance at 
 me. "Mrs. Green telephoned that you were 
 going to the mainland." 
 
 It hardly seemed possible, but I knew that 
 for a moment they all suspected me of having 
 set fire to Lucile's house in revenge for our 
 quarrel of the evening before. 
 
 "I came back to the island for something 
 and I noticed the fire," I explained weakly. 
 "The flames were coming out of the window 
 of the northeast room." 
 
 "Who slept there?" Captain Perkins asked 
 practically. 
 
 No one answered. 
 
 "That's funny." Captain Perkins was sar- 
 castic. "Didn't anybody sleep in the north- 
 east room? Or don't you know where you 
 slept?" 
 
 "You slept there yourself," Jim explained, 
 rather hesitant about calling his superior offi- 
 cer's attention to such a damning fact. 
 
 "Oh." The captain collapsed. "I guess I 
 did." 
 
 "Where did you empty the ashes of your
 
 272 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 pipe before you went to get that drink of wa- 
 ter?" I interrogated. 
 
 "Why, lemme see. I must have dumped 'em 
 in the waste basket. But the fire was all out." 
 The captain added this last, bristling with self- 
 defense against the unspoken accusation of his 
 
 fellows. 
 
 \ 
 
 Any further discussion was cut short by the 
 violent ringing of the telephone bell inside the 
 burning building. 
 
 "Who can that be calling up at this time of 
 night?" wondered Vida, voicing the general 
 curiosity. 
 
 "We probably will never know." Bopp 
 gazed dreamily into the fire. "Maybe some- 
 one saw the blaze from the mainland and is 
 calling up about it." 
 
 "No," said Lucile with conviction, "it's my 
 mother. She has seen the fire from Hunting- 
 don's and wants to know if I am safe. We 
 must answer it and tell her that everything is 
 all right." 
 
 "No one could go in there," I protested. 
 "The fire is raging in the living-room and the 
 walls may fall any moment."
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 273 
 
 "But mother will worry." 
 
 "What if she does?" A man under stress 
 of excitement is sometimes unintentionally 
 brutal. 
 
 "If you men are not brave enough," Lucile 
 declared with eyes flashing, "if you're so afraid 
 of getting singed I'm going in to answer that 
 telephone myself, and tell my mother that I am 
 safe." 
 
 "You wouldn't be safe if you were talking 
 over that telephone." I was exasperated, but 
 it was impossible to allow a girl in a flimsy 
 nightdress and negligee to go into that furnace. 
 "Since you put it that way, I'll go." 
 
 Amid a storm of well meant protests from 
 the others I left them and made a quick dash 
 for the front door, dodging the falling sparks. 
 Once inside, the atmosphere was a trifle clearer. 
 Owing to the terrific draft up the stairway 
 most of the smoke went that way instead of 
 spreading through the main room. There was 
 plenty, however, and the roaring of the flames 
 made a very unpleasant accompaniment to the 
 telephone bell, which kept on ringing with un- 
 diminished insistence.
 
 274 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 I groped my way to the instrument, jammed 
 the receiver to my ear and shouted, "Hello." 
 
 "Sorry to waken you, old chap," said a male 
 voice apologetically, "but I simply must speak 
 to Miss Dunmore." 
 
 "You go to hell," I requested loudly, and 
 dropping the receiver made a wild dash for the 
 door, from which I emerged with my clothing 
 on fire in only one or two spots. 
 
 "Thank you." Lucile was very sweet in be- 
 stowing her gratitude. "Was she very much 
 worried ?" 
 
 "It wasn't your mother," I said shortly. "It 
 was Mr. Blaney." 
 
 "Ned?" asked Vida, then without waiting 
 for an answer, "I must speak to him." 
 
 I gently restrained her. 
 
 "Blaney?" queried Lucile blankly, then turn- 
 ing to me. "Your brother ?" 
 
 "No relation," I returned. 
 
 "He's my fiance," Vida explained. "Just 
 the darlingest old Blaney that ever lived. He's 
 waiting for me at Fair View. We were to 
 have been married today or yesterday, 
 rather."
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 275 
 
 "Oh." Lucile retired to her inner conscious- 
 ness to think. 
 
 I told Vida that Blaney knew she was safe, 
 as he had called up several times during the 
 day. 
 
 "Where was I?" 
 
 "You were always out somewhere with Mr. 
 Clair," I explained. 
 
 "You didn't tell Ned that, did you?" 
 
 "Why, yes, I guess I did. Why?" 
 
 "He's so jealous," sighed Vida. "It makes 
 him furious when I talk to other men. Of 
 course after we're married I'll train him dif- 
 ferently, but now I have to be careful." 
 
 Owing to the heat of the fire it was probably 
 not uncomfortable for such of our party as had 
 not escaped with a complete equipment. Lu- 
 cile's plight was the worst, as she had neither 
 shoes nor stockings. 
 
 Vida, all sympathy, offered to give her part 
 of her wardrobe and the ladies retired to the 
 shed to effect a compromise change, Lucile pro- 
 testing that she would not think of depriving 
 Vida of any of her clothing. 
 
 "I guess there isn't a thing saved," rumi-
 
 276 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 nated Bopp with the resignation which one has 
 on viewing another's loss. 
 
 "Shucks." Captain Perkins was also re- 
 signed. "They carried lots of insurance. I 
 writ the insurance myself. I run the agency 
 over to town. They got five thousand dollars 
 more insurance than the place is worth." 
 
 "The company will never allow it on a total 
 loss," I remarked, wise to the business-like 
 methods of insurance companies and experi- 
 enced in the eagle-eyed ways of the appraiser. 
 
 "No, I reckon not." 
 
 "Then why did you let them take out so 
 much insurance?" I demanded. 
 
 "I didn't think they'd ever have a fire," he 
 confessed frankly, "and the more insurance I 
 wrote the more commission I got." 
 
 Our attention was distracted from the burn- 
 ing building by the arrival of Bill Johnson who 
 walked unannounced into the circle of light. 
 The noise of the Merry Widow arriving had 
 apparently been lost in the crackling of the 
 flames. 
 
 "Well," I enquired, "were Mrs. Green and 
 Mr. Clair all right?"
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 277 
 
 "I shall not know it," Bill replied phleg- 
 matically. "I can't by Yimminy find 'em." 
 
 "Can't find them? Nonsense. Did you go 
 up to the house?" 
 
 "Yes, sare. And I look in all the rooms. 
 No one shall be in each." 
 
 "They can't have left. Mrs. Green said she 
 wouldn't." 
 
 "What's up now?" Bopp enquired. 
 
 "Mrs. Green has disappeared once more." 
 
 "Eloped with Lipton S. Clair?" 
 
 "Impossible. You haven't seen him since 
 he left here." 
 
 "What else could have happened ?" 
 
 "I can't imagine. It's a small island and 
 there would be no sense in supposing that she 
 was hiding anywhere outside of the house. 
 Besides they both knew that the boat was com- 
 ing back soon to get them." 
 
 "Mrs. Green is so elusive," Bopp criticized, 
 "that I should think that when once you lo- 
 cated her you would have kept your eye on 
 her." 
 
 "If I had," I reminded him, "you would 
 probably all be burnt to cinders now. There
 
 278 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 must be some plausible reason for Mrs. 
 Green's disappearance. Suppose we don't tell 
 her daughter right away until we try to find 
 out what has happened. It would only cause 
 additional worry in a night which has already 
 been more of a strain than the average human 
 constitution is accustomed to bear." 
 
 That was agreed upon. 
 
 "At any rate," Bopp said, "we can all go 
 over to the mainland in the Merry Widow and 
 get breakfast." 
 
 "No," declared Bill, shaking his head. 
 "Merry Widow, she shan't run she broke her 
 waive spring. Maybe it take all day to fix she 
 up." 
 
 "Then for heaven's sake get at it," Bopp 
 growled crossly. "We don't want to stay here 
 any longer than we have to. It was bad 
 enough before the house burned down, but 
 now " He shrugged his shoulders hope- 
 lessly. 
 
 "I fix him up wit' some wire, maybe," Bill 
 cheerfully promised, after the custom of those 
 who have to do with gasoline engines. Some 
 of the most promising men I have ever met
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 279 
 
 have been connected with the motor repair 
 business. 
 
 "Merry Widow," said Bill, picking up a dis- 
 carded hairpin, "she been dam' good boat but 
 her waives been little bit old. I believe she 
 run yust so good now, maybe better, as she did 
 fifteen year ago." 
 
 He departed once more to be with his float- 
 ing darling, his hands swinging from his long 
 arms like idle sledge hammers, his back bent in 
 the position of one who crouches perpetually 
 before stalled marine motors. 
 
 Lucile and Vida rejoined us presently. 
 The former was wearing the kimono in which 
 she had been carried out, and as Vida still ap- 
 peared to be fully dressed, it was not patent, to 
 the masculine eye at least, that any exchange of 
 apparel had been made. 
 
 About this time the sun rose resplendently. 
 
 ''Isn't that a lovely sky!" Vida exclaimed 
 with chastened enthusiasm, shivering slightly. 
 "It reminds me of a stage scene." 
 
 "Sunrises only remind me of breakfast," 
 Captain Perkins groaned lugubriously. 
 
 I started.
 
 2 8o FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I have some breakfast for you," I an- 
 nounced. 
 
 "Soup?" Bopp uttered the word sarcasti- 
 cally. 
 
 "Oh, Tootles," murmured Lucile. 
 
 "I forgot," I said. "Tootles is found." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "I found your dog, Tootles, last night." 
 
 "Oh, my darling." 
 
 I thought at first she meant me and prepared 
 to be aloof but not too aloof, when her next 
 words showed me there was no necessity. 
 
 "Where is my little sweetheart now?" 
 
 "In the summer house," I replied briefly. 
 
 "Oh, my Tootles girl," she exclaimed, 
 "locked up in that cold barn of a place all 
 night." 
 
 "I was there," I reminded her. "I stood it 
 all right." 
 
 Lucile started out as fast as she could for 
 the summer house. 
 
 "Wait a minute," I protested, wishing to ex- 
 plain about the other occupant of Tootles' 
 prison.
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 281 
 
 "Wait?" she flashed at me. "When Too- 
 tles wants me ? Never !" 
 
 She had a good start but I went after her. 
 
 "How about that breakfast?" Kent yelled 
 after me. 
 
 "Wait till I come back," I returned over my 
 shoulder. 
 
 Lucile broke into a run when she saw that 
 I was following her and reached the door of 
 the summer house first. 
 
 When I arrived I heard a scream. The pic- 
 ture was a trifle startling. On the floor lay 
 the reporter, his face twisted up into an ago- 
 nized expression, while Tootles stood over him, 
 feebly licking his face, her little red tongue 
 hardly able to wag, but still determined to 
 make this lazy person get up. 
 
 "Oh," Lucile screamed, jumping up and 
 down in her excitement, "he's killing Tootles !" 
 
 I'm afraid I laughed. Anyway, she cast a 
 look of reproach at me and made a dive for 
 the tired little pup. I don't believe Tootles 
 appreciated the affection which was lavished 
 on her because she reluctantly abandoned her
 
 282 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 job of licking and dived the other way. That 
 happened to be in the direction of the door, 
 which I had carelessly left open. Tootles went 
 through and dashed, barking, up the beach. 
 Lucile followed after. 
 
 They were too fast for me. The last I saw 
 of them was a. tiny bobbing speck that was 
 Tootles and a larger graceful figure with 
 hair blowing free and kimono flying back 
 which was Lucile. Once she stopped, when 
 she was nearly out of sight, and took off the 
 kimono and threw it aside in order to run 
 freer. 
 
 I sighed and returned to the summer house. 
 
 "What's all the excitement?" the reporter 
 demanded. "Who's the pippin?" 
 
 "We had a fire," I returned wearily. "Mr. 
 Green's house burned down." 
 
 "Everybody asleep, I suppose." The re- 
 porter sketched in the story from imagination. 
 "You, the faithful watchman, see the flames, 
 dash into the burning building and rescue the 
 owner's beautiful daughter. It's a peach of a 
 story." 
 
 I failed to reflect his enthusiasm.
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 283 
 
 "It's too bad you can't marry her," he added, 
 eyeing me ruefully. "You've got a wife and 
 seven kids, I suppose." 
 
 "I have not," I retorted. 
 
 "Then you can marry her." 
 
 "Thanks." 
 
 "I mean you're not so terribly old and you 
 might look all right if you washed your face 
 and had some decent clothes." 
 
 For the first time I realized that I must be 
 a pretty sad looking object, sartorially speak- 
 ing at least. My clothes were wet, torn, 
 singed and thoroughly mussed from having 
 been slept in and rained on. My collar had 
 long since ceased to be anything better than a 
 limp rag. 
 
 I looked at him sharply. "What size collar 
 do you wear?" 
 
 For an instant I saw his glance flicker to my 
 neckband. 
 
 "Fourteen and a half," he replied glibly. 
 
 I grunted. "I'll have a look, anyway." 
 
 I rolled him over and removed the collar and 
 necktie as carefully as possible. It was a fif- 
 teen and a half.
 
 284 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Because you lied, I shall confiscate the 
 necktie also." 
 
 I looked him over appraisingly. 
 
 "No," he shouted, interpreting my glance, 
 "you couldn't wear another thing of mine." 
 
 "I'm afraid we coincide only in the neck," 
 I sighed regretfully. 
 
 "Look here," he began belligerently, "don't 
 you think this farce has gone far enough? I 
 demand to be released. If you let me go now, 
 I'll promise not to have you put in jail, and if 
 you'll get me a picture of Miss Green, I'll give 
 you five dollars." 
 
 "No," I decided absently, having already 
 made up my mind before he asked. 
 
 "What are you going to do with me? You 
 can't keep me here indefinitely." 
 
 "I don't know. It has been puzzling me. 
 You know more about crime than I do; what 
 do you suggest?" I measured the height of 
 his collar with my eye. "I can't say that I 
 care much for your selection of collar style." 
 
 "If you aren't going to let me go," continued 
 the young man, whose mind seemed to dwell 
 constantly on himself, "when is breakfast?"
 
 A FIRE AND A RESCUE 285 
 
 "There, you have ruined an otherwise per- 
 fect day. No one knows when, where or what 
 breakfast is. It is as elusive as 'Qu f est que 
 c'est I'art?' " 
 
 His mind did not follow the flight of mine. 
 "No breakfast?" he questioned. 
 
 "Nope. Nary breakfast." 
 
 He sighed. "There's a cigar in my " He 
 started to tell me which pocket, when he recol- 
 lected my propensity for confiscating his prop- 
 erty. 
 
 "It's all right," I reassured him; "I'm not 
 smoking at present." 
 
 "In my left hand upper vest pocket," he 
 finished. 
 
 I found a flat leather case in the pocket he 
 had indicated. I opened the case and a hand- 
 ful of crumpled tobacco fell out. 
 
 "I'm afraid I sat on it," I said apologetic- 
 ally. 
 
 He turned his face to the wall without a 
 word. I left him alone with the dust of his 
 last cigar. 
 
 When I had gone a short distance, I heard 
 him sneeze, but decided not to return. He
 
 286 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 might acquire the habit of snuff-taking, but it 
 surely was not my place to prevent his getting 
 that tobacco into his system by the only channel 
 available.
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY 
 "THE ONLY WAY"
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY 
 
 WASHING one's face in a large ruffled lake 
 is not the simple process you would imagine. 
 It consists largely of going through the mo- 
 tions peculiar to reducing exercises and get- 
 ting your feet wet, as I discovered in making 
 my toilet. However, it can be done. After 
 I had aired my features to dry them, I put on 
 the purloined collar. This was also a triumph 
 of brute force over the cussedness of inani- 
 mate things. 
 
 The collar was one of those widely adver- 
 tised styles with a slot or notch in front instead 
 of a buttonhole. I have since learned that no 
 one should attempt to put one of these things 
 on without first taking a two weeks' corre- 
 spondence course in the subject, with diagrams. 
 Also it is more difficult to do the trick if it is 
 a secondhand collar because the notch or slot 
 is not so stiff and consequently does not hold 
 so well. I did not know all this at the time 
 
 289
 
 290 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 and I never would have got harnessed up in it 
 at all if I hadn't happened to invent a couple 
 of new cuss words, which seemed to make it 
 stay put long enough for me to get the cravat 
 tied as a sort of reinforcement. I ordinarily 
 wear a collar not more than half an inch in 
 height. Putting a three-inch white wall 
 around my neck is an improvement on the 
 invention of old Dr. Guillotine, the well-known 
 throat specialist. 
 
 When I was satisfied that I had done the 
 best I could I rejoined the disconsolate group 
 at the site of the one-time house. There were 
 only four of them, Captain Perkins, Jim, Vida 
 and Kent. Lucile had not returned. 
 
 'Where's Lucile?" Vida enquired. 
 
 "Tootles got away," I explained, "and she 
 chased her. She'll catch her presently and 
 come back." 
 
 "But Tootles is here." Vida indicated the 
 dog playing around the shed. "She came back 
 quite a while ago with this in her mouth." 
 
 Vida held up the torn and dirty remnants of 
 what had been Lucile's kimono. 
 
 "That's Lucile's kimono." I identified it.
 
 "THE ONLY WAY? 291 
 
 "But where is Lucile?" 
 
 An idea struck me. "What was she wear- 
 ing under that ?" 
 
 "I helped her put on my costume," Vida 
 vouchsafed; "the one that was drying in the 
 shed. It fits her beautifully." 
 
 "Then I presume that you will find Lucile 
 over there behind that clump of bushes," I haz- 
 arded in a loud tone of voice. 
 
 There was a sound of branches breaking and 
 leaves rustling as if someone were beating a 
 hasty retreat. 
 
 "Oh, I see." Light dawned on Vida. 
 "Just let her alone. She'll get used to them 
 in an hour or so. You do feel kind of funny 
 at first. Now about that breakfast." 
 
 "Yes," Bopp chimed in, "produce that feast 
 you were speaking of. With the dog in sight 
 we'll take a chance on anything you've pre- 
 pared." 
 
 "Sail ho!" cried Jim. 
 
 "Where be she?" demanded his superior, 
 who scorned nautical language. 
 
 "Just coming around the point," Jim replied, 
 pointing.
 
 292 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 Sure enough, a fat little tug boat was nosing 
 her way comfortably through the waves into 
 the cove. 
 
 "It's the revenue tug!" exclaimed Captain 
 Perkins, whose knowledge of lake craft was 
 naturally superior to that of the rest of us. 
 
 "A revenue tug?" Bopp repeated. "What 
 is she doing here?" 
 
 "Let's go and find out." Vida led the way 
 down to the dock. 
 
 The tug came in as far as she dared, and 
 then an officer came ashore in a dinghy. He 
 approached our party, cap in hand. 
 
 "Pardon me, ladies and gentlemen," he be- 
 gan suavely, taking no notice of our dishevelled 
 appearance, "I am the revenue officer in 
 charge of this district." 
 
 A wild cry of "Help" from the tug startled 
 us. 
 
 "What's that?" we exclaimed in various 
 keys. 
 
 The cry was repeated, this time with a 
 smothered finish. 
 
 "It's just a couple of prisoners we captured 
 this morning," explained the officer.
 
 "THE ONLY WAY" 293 
 
 "We are very glad to see you and your boat," 
 Bopp stated, doing the honors. "We have 
 had a terrible fire here and if you will set us 
 safely ashore at Fair View we shall be forever 
 in your debt." 
 
 "I'm sorry," he replied, "but I cannot carry 
 your party as passengers. Being on govern- 
 ment service my duties are very exacting. 
 However, I shall be glad to notify the first ves- 
 sel I meet and request them to call for you." 
 
 "But, man," Bopp exclaimed, "we have been 
 without anything to eat for three days. Surely 
 you can't refuse to take us to some place where 
 food may be had." 
 
 "You forget that I have provided food," I 
 interposed. 
 
 "I'm trying to forget it," Bopp replied with 
 ungracious impatience. "I want regular food. 
 After the way they have been treated already, 
 I'm not going to insult my insides with any- 
 thing containing water and one fish scale for 
 flavoring." 
 
 "The lake is calming down," the officer 
 pointed out, "and you can surely get aid soon. 
 As it happens we are hot on the trail of a gang
 
 294 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 of smugglers and if we delay now the chief 
 operator may escape us. He is posing as a 
 telephone repair man employed by the local 
 company in Fair View, but merely uses that 
 position to cloak his criminal operations. He 
 was sent to Green's Island before the storm 
 and has not reported back to the office, so we 
 presume that he is here now." 
 
 By a common impulse we looked for Kent, 
 He was not among us. Apparently he had 
 waited to hear no more after Captain Perkins 
 had identified the boat as in the government 
 revenue service. 
 
 "I can't believe that he is a smuggler," Vida 
 argued. She, like the rest of us, had conceived 
 a liking for the young man whose career had 
 been so varied and interesting. "He doesn't 
 look like a smuggler." 
 
 ' "I'm afraid that is no way to tell," the rev- 
 enue officer said pleasantly. "The worst 
 smugglers we have are society people, you 
 know. Appearances cut no figure whatever. 
 We captured two of his accomplices on Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island this morning, and when we get 
 him we shall have wiped out one of the worst
 
 "THE ONLY WAY" 295 
 
 gangs of smugglers operating across the bor- 
 der." 
 
 At the mention of Huntingdon's Island we 
 all pricked up our ears. What connection did 
 the smugglers have with the disappearance of 
 Mrs. Green and Lipton S. Clair? 
 
 "While you were on Huntingdon's Island," 
 I asked, "did you see anything of Mrs. Green?" 
 
 "Why," began the officer, with a puzzled 
 frown, "one of our prisoners claims to be a 
 Mrs. Green, but that is only an alias for 
 'Mother Parrel,' whose portrait is in the 
 rogues' gallery. I recognized her at once." 
 
 "Who is your other prisoner?" I had an 
 inkling of what had really happened at Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island since I had left it. 
 
 "The other one is a man masquerading in 
 woman's clothes. He refuses to give his 
 name, but I think he is Dan Maloney, a rather 
 high class crook who does smuggling only as 
 a side line for grand larceny." 
 
 "I'm afraid you have the wrong parties." 
 I smiled as I thought of Lipton S. Clair's out- 
 raged dignity. "The lady really is Mrs. 
 Green, and the gentleman is not Dan Maloney
 
 296 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 but Mr. L. S. Clair, a well-known literary 
 man." 
 
 The revenue officer's face fell, then a sus- 
 picious look came into his eyes. "How do I 
 know that you are not one of the gang yourself 
 and this is merely a trick to get us to release 
 your pals ? What was Mrs. Green doing over 
 there anyway?" 
 
 "She was out in a small boat and was blown 
 over there during the storm," Vida volun- 
 teered, seeing that I had run out of explana- 
 tions. 
 
 She turned her four hundred candle-power 
 glance in the direction of the officer. He re- 
 ceived the blow right between the eyes. "Miss 
 Green," he addressed her huskily, "I cannot 
 refuse to take your word. I'll have the pris- 
 oners brought ashore and if the lady is really 
 your mother I shall be glad to release her in- 
 stantly." 
 
 Vida did not correct his mistake, but asked, 
 "How do you know I am Miss Green?" 
 
 "Oh, I'd know you anywhere," he bragged, 
 smiling. "I've seen your photograph in the 
 newspapers so often."
 
 "THE ONLY WAY" 297 
 
 So he had, but not with the name of Lucile 
 Green attached to it. 
 
 "Thank you ever so much for your kind- 
 ness." 
 
 "Not at all," he returned. Then addressing 
 the man in the dinghy, "Smith." 
 
 "Aye, aye, sir." 
 
 "Report to Marshal Cochran on board and 
 ask him to bring his prisoners ashore." 
 
 The man departed and after an interval re- 
 turned with three passengers, two of them un- 
 mistakably Mrs. Green and Mr. Clair, the 
 other a United States federal officer. Mrs. 
 Green was decorated with a handkerchief, 
 which was tied over her mouth. 
 
 "I had to gag the dame," explained the mar- 
 shal; "she kept yelling all the time." 
 
 The look which the dishevelled lady in the 
 red ball-gown cast upon Uncle Sam's represen- 
 tative probably burned a hole in his aura which 
 will never heal up. 
 
 "Remove the gag," the revenue officer com- 
 manded. 
 
 "Wait," Vida requested; "wait until after I 
 have identified her."
 
 298 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 That was a wonderful inspiration on Vida's 
 part. As the two women had never set eyes 
 on each other before, Mrs. Green might not 
 address Vida as her own offspring as soon as 
 the power of speech was restored to her. 
 
 "If you say she is your mother it is all right," 
 said Vida's new conquest, gallantly. "You 
 may remove the handkerchief yourself if you 
 like. I trust your mother will forgive us for 
 our blunder. Can you identify the gentleman, 
 too?" 
 
 "She doesn't know me," Clair muttered, with 
 a look of terror. "I don't want to be iden- 
 tified." 
 
 "I ought to know him," Vida replied 
 wickedly. "I am seriously considering an of- 
 fer of marriage from him." 
 
 "Let him go then," the revenue man di- 
 rected. 
 
 "I don't want to be released." 
 
 "You have to be." The officer silenced him 
 sternly. 
 
 "How about the telephone man?" Cochran, 
 the marshal, enquired. "I've got to get one
 
 "THE ONLY WAY" 299 
 
 prisoner, anyway, or I won't dare show up in 
 Detroit." 
 
 "We'll arrest him all right," the other reas- 
 sured him. "He's on the island somewhere. 
 It's only a question of searching. Now, gen- 
 tlemen," turning to us, "it will save any un- 
 pleasantness if you will point out which one of 
 you is in the employ of the telephone company. 
 If not I shall be forced to ask all of you who 
 can not prove who you are to accompany me." 
 
 There was no answer. No one of us was 
 anxious to turn informer. 
 
 "I have a description of Horace Binns," said 
 the officer, "although at present he is travelling 
 under the name of Kent. Height five feet 
 four inches, slender, dark hair and eyes " 
 
 "Excuse me," interrupted Bopp, "what are 
 you going to do with the smuggler when you 
 get him?" 
 
 "We shall have to take him to Detroit and 
 thence to the Federal prison at Leavenworth, 
 Kansas." 
 
 "Will you give him a square meal?" Bopp 
 asked anxiously.
 
 300 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Why, yes," smiled the officer. "We have 
 a good cook on board, and we would not starve 
 a prisoner." 
 
 "All right," Bopp sighed. "Do I fit the de- 
 scription?" 
 
 The officer laughed. "I knew you all the 
 time, Binns. Step lively, get aboard and we'll 
 have you safe in jail in no time." 
 
 With a wink to the rest of us, Bopp climbed 
 into the boat with a demeanor that otherwise 
 would have been a credit to Sydney Carton. 
 
 When the boat was being rowed away, he 
 waved farewell. 
 
 "Don't worry," he reassured us, "I won't be 
 in jail long." 
 
 "We won't worry," I answered for all. 
 "Stay as long as you like."
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 
 WHERE IS LIPTON S. CLAIR?
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 
 
 AFTER the tug had gone, Clair stood looking 
 disconsolately after it. 
 
 "You don't seem overjoyed at being set 
 free," I said to him in a low voice, so that the 
 others could not hear. 
 
 "Didn't I tell you I wanted to be arrested 
 so that Miss Dunmore would break our en- 
 gagement? Jail is better than marriage any 
 time. They shorten jail sentences for good 
 behavior." He shook his fist at the departing 
 tug. "They were just ready to have breakfast 
 on board, too." 
 
 A confusion of inarticulate sounds advised 
 me that Miss Dunmore was removing the gag 
 from her hastily adopted mother's mouth. 
 
 "Who are you?" Mrs. Green demanded, as 
 soon as she could speak. "Where's Lucile? 
 What is the next thing I have to do, loop the 
 loop or be electrocuted?" 
 
 303
 
 304 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I'm a castaway, wrecked on your island," 
 Vida explained. "Your daughter is all right." 
 
 "Where is she?" Mrs. Green fired the 
 question at me as if I were in some way re- 
 sponsible. 
 
 "Why " I started to explain, but realized 
 suddenly that Mrs. Green might not take 
 kindly to the idea of her daughter's present 
 costume, so I stopped. 
 
 "She's over there." Captain Perkins waved 
 in the general direction of the thicket where 
 we had last heard Lucile. 
 
 "Dead?" Mrs. Green murmured, leaning for 
 support on my arm. 
 
 "No, no," interposed Vida, who should have 
 done the explaining in the first place. "She is 
 just taking a nap. She has had such a terribly 
 exhausting experience the last forty-eight 
 hours that we were all thankful when she 
 dozed off a little while ago. Poor thing, the 
 rest will do her a world of good." 
 
 "What's she sleeping over there for ?" point- 
 ing at the bushes. "Why isn't she in her own 
 bed in the house?" 
 
 "Oh, the house," Vida repeated blankly.
 
 WHERE IS LIPTON S. CLAIR? 305 
 
 "Didn't anyone tell you? There isn't any 
 house." 
 
 "No house? Why not?" 
 
 "Your house, madam," said Captain Per- 
 kins, "has been consumed by the devouring 
 element." He quoted a fire insurance adver- 
 tisement from memory. 
 
 "Well, well," Mrs. Green repeated in a daze. 
 "Well, well." 
 
 Lipton S. Clair plucked me by the sleeve to 
 attract my attention, and whispered in my ear, 
 "Where are my pants?" 
 
 "Why," I replied, "I sent them over to Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island, as I promised I would." 
 
 "Are they there now ?" 
 
 "Yes. Bill left them in the kitchen for 
 you." 
 
 "Then I suppose I'll have to wear this." 
 
 "I should think that it would be immodest 
 if you didn't." 
 
 He walked away. With his skirts held out 
 before him with both hands as if he expected 
 something to drop into his lap from heaven, 
 stepping high because he couldn't see the 
 ground in front of his feet, he was a dead
 
 3 o6 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 ringer for my childhood's conception of Elisha 
 going out to see if the bears would bite him. 
 On taking a second look, I decided that he 
 might with equal facility be mistaken for one 
 of the bears. 
 
 "Take me to my daughter," Mrs. Green said 
 with a sigh. "Let me see that there is some- 
 thing left of my life as it was before the earth- 
 quake." 
 
 "You can see her if you wish," said Vida 
 calmly, "but I assure you she is all right, and 
 you will only disturb her from a sleep which 
 she needs very, very much." 
 
 Vida is an admirable liar. Mrs. Green ac- 
 tually believed her, and ceased to worry about 
 Lucile. Mrs. Green is one of those placid 
 ladies who let other people bully them and 
 mould their very thoughts. Lucile had always 
 made her mother think just whatever she told 
 her to, and Vida was apparently able to do the 
 trick also. 
 
 We walked up to inspect the ruins. It was 
 as nice and complete a set of ruins as I have 
 ever gazed upon. Nothing was left to the 
 imagination the whole business was ruined.
 
 WHERE IS LIPTON S. CLAIR? 307 
 
 While we were engaged in that mournful 
 amusement, a tall, muscular young man walked 
 into our circle and demanded, "Where is Lip- 
 ton S. Clair?"
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO 
 A WEDDING INVITATION
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO 
 
 "NED!" Vida exclaimed, rushing toward 
 him. She stopped when she saw his face. 
 
 He brushed past her. 
 
 "Ned Blaney!" shouted Clair, joyfully ad- 
 vancing toward the young man. 
 
 "You treacherous hound!" hissed Blaney, 
 gazing on that whiskered travesty without 
 smiling. "You stole the only woman I ever 
 loved away from me. Heart breaker!" 
 
 "I couldn't help it," Clair admitted. 
 
 "Viper!" yelled Blaney, as he fell on his 
 friend. 
 
 It would have been a fairer fight if Clair 
 had not been hampered by his skirts. As it 
 was, it ended with Blaney athwart Clair's 
 back, grinding his nose into the dirt. 
 
 "I give up," choked Clair. " I'll marry 
 her." 
 
 "Marry her?" Blaney shook his friend 
 
 again. "Not while I live." 
 
 311
 
 3 i2 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Isn't that what you're trying to make me 
 do?" Clair expostulated, as well as he could. 
 "I don't want to, that's certain." 
 
 "Don't you see, Ned," Vida interrupted 
 soothingly, "he doesn't want to marry me. 
 Your outrageous jealousy has led you into 
 making mistakes again." 
 
 "But," doubted Blaney, still retaining his 
 position of advantage on Clair's back, "every 
 time I called up here they said you were out 
 together, and when I asked for you on the 
 telephone early this morning, he told me to go 
 to" 
 
 "I was the one you were talking to," I has- 
 tened to interrupt. "The house was burning 
 down, and I didn't have time to tell you that 
 a cinder had just lit on my ear while I was 
 talking to you." 
 
 "Has there been a fire?" asked the young 
 man, scrambling to his feet. "Were you 
 saved, my darling Vida?" 
 
 "I was," Vida said gravely. 
 
 The excited young man abandoned his pros- 
 trate friend and rival and embraced Vida. 
 
 "Who," he demanded, releasing her and
 
 A WEDDING INVITATION 313 
 
 holding her off at arm's length, "who saved 
 you?" 
 
 "Mr. Blainey, here." Vida smiled mischiev- 
 ously in my face as she directed the strenuous 
 young bear's attention my way. 
 
 "How?" Blaney made his demand, jeal- 
 ously picturing Vida a limp figure in my arms. 
 
 "By rapping on my door and shouting 
 'Fire !' you goose," laughed Vida. 
 
 "Oh, all right, then." Blaney admitted her 
 to the favour of his arm again. 
 
 "Ned apologizes for being a bear," Vida 
 said over her shoulder to Mrs. Green, who was 
 quite overwhelmed by the whirlwind young 
 gentleman. 
 
 "I'm sorry," corroborated Blaney. "I've 
 been under a terrible nervous strain. First I 
 was afraid Vida was lost in the storm and then 
 when I tried to reach her she was always away 
 from the telephone. Then, this morning after 
 I called up and couldn't speak to her, I kept 
 calling again and again, but Central said the 
 wire was dead. I was nearly frantic till I got 
 hold of a rowboat and came over. It was an 
 awful pull in the sea that's running out there.
 
 3 i4 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 But it's all right now. You must all come 
 over to Fair View to see Vida and me get 
 married this morning." 
 
 Clair was listening to all this in a sort of 
 a dazed wonder. 
 
 ''Don't I have to marry her?" he asked. 
 
 "Have to marry her ?" echoed Blaney, good- 
 naturedly. "Why, you old rhinoceros, you 
 couldn't trap a girl into marrying you even if 
 you dressed up like Mrs. Katzen jammer to 
 please her." 
 
 "But she said " began Clair. 
 
 Vida flashed an imploring look at me. 
 Clair could still do a good deal of damage if 
 he revealed all that she had said and done try- 
 ing to win that wager from me. 
 
 "She said," I repeated, brushing off and ad- 
 justing Clair's skirt, which had suffered sadly 
 from his rough and tumble encounter, "she 
 said that she knew she would like you because 
 you were a friend of Mr. Blaney's." 
 
 "Stop pinching my leg," roared Clair, fail- 
 ing to get the significance of my signal, and 
 whisking his skirts out of my grasp. He 
 glared at me balef ully.
 
 A WEDDING INVITATION 315 
 
 Blaney laughed. The picture Clair made 
 obliterated the recollection of his jealousy for 
 a moment. Then he caught sight of my seal 
 ring on Vida's hand. 
 
 "What's that?" he demanded. 
 
 "That?" echoed Vida blankly, turning the 
 ring on her finger. She had forgotten 
 that she was wearing it. "That is a seal 
 ring." 
 
 "Yes, I see it is," admitted her fiance sar- 
 castically. "Your explanation so far is per- 
 fectly satisfactory." 
 
 "I got it for you," she pouted, "but I don't 
 know whether to give it to you or not." 
 
 When Vida had definitely cast herself for 
 the part she was going to play, she went ahead 
 with the certainty of a trained artist. 
 
 "Let's see it," Blaney demanded doubtfully. 
 
 She handed it to him. 
 
 "Hm !" He examined it closely. "You got 
 this for me? The 'B' is all right but this 
 other initial looks like an 'M/ ' 
 
 "No, it doesn't, dear," she said. "That's an 
 old English 'N.' The old Englishmen did 
 things differently. Their 'NY always look
 
 3 i6 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 like 'M's/ I've known lots of old English- 
 men." 
 
 "Oh," the young man said, slipping the ring 
 on his finger. "Thanks awfully, dear." 
 
 That was the end of my ring. 
 
 Bill Johnson ambled up to our party with a 
 triumphant grin on his face. 
 
 "She shall run," he announced. "For two 
 dollars she shall take everybody to Fair View." 
 
 "That's a lot to pay if you've ever spent a 
 day in Fair View," said the prospective bride- 
 groom; "nevertheless, I will pay it and ask you 
 all to come to our wedding and the wedding 
 breakfast." 
 
 "Could it be possible," Captain Perkins 
 asked, "to have the wedding breakfast first?" 
 
 "I think it could," laughed Blaney. 
 
 "Come on, everybody," invited Vida. 
 
 I started to follow the others, but Vida 
 dropped back to my side and whispered, 
 "You're not invited." 
 
 "What?" I exclaimed, startled. 
 
 "You're not supposed to come." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "If I were you, I should get lost in the woods
 
 A WEDDING INVITATION 317 
 
 somewhere. You might run into something to 
 your advantage." 
 
 "I couldn't. What would she think of me ?" 
 
 "Try it and find out." Vida smiled at me 
 quizzically. "I'm a woman myself, and I can 
 guess. You won't need to make any advances. 
 Don't you want her ?" 
 
 "Yes," I answered. 
 
 "Then don't bother about anyone else's wed- 
 ding breakfast. Just attend to your own." 
 
 "She's engaged to Bopp," I protested feebly. 
 
 "To make you angry," she whispered. "I 
 can't talk to you any more because Ned is get- 
 ting red behind his ears. That means that he 
 is fearfully jealous. I must run along and be 
 scolded. Think it over." 
 
 She skipped blithely to the side of her soon- 
 to-be lord and master (maybe), smiling into 
 his face with a look so childlike and ingratiat- 
 ing that Othello would have eaten the bolster 
 himself had he been in Blaney's shoes. 
 
 Mrs. Green halted the procession. 
 
 "I can't go without Lucile." 
 
 "Mr. Blainey will explain it to Lucile," 
 Vida assured her, taking my acquiescence for
 
 3i8 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 granted. "You see, I need you terribly be- 
 cause I have no other woman friend with me. 
 My own mother " her lips quivered. 
 
 "I'm sorry," said Mrs. Green. "Has she 
 been dead long?" 
 
 "She isn't dead, but she's in a stock company 
 in St. Louis." 
 
 "You really ought to go to the mainland," 
 I said, thinking to help matters out, "in order 
 to bring back some clothes for Lucile." 
 
 "What's that?" Mrs. Green turned. 
 "Hasn't she any clothes on?" 
 
 "Certainly," Vida hopped into the breach 
 sure-footedly, "she has plenty of clothes on, 
 but they would not be suitable for her to wear 
 to go over to the mainland and register at a 
 hotel." 
 
 Vida spoke the truth almost as convincingly 
 as she lied. 
 
 "Please come," she urged. 
 
 "I'll go," decided the older woman. 
 
 Fortunately she forgot that her own costume 
 was a trifle bizarre for a morning wedding, 
 even in Fair View.
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE 
 "THE HONOR OF THIEVES"
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE 
 
 I CONDUCTED the company to the dock and 
 saw that they were made as comfortable as 
 possible in the Merry Widow. When I would 
 have cast off the lines by which she was fas- 
 tened to the dock, Bill Johnson remonstrated. 
 
 "She shan't go not until the young mans 
 comes what say he shall pay three dollar to 
 come over." 
 
 "What young man ?" Mrs. Green demanded. 
 
 "Why, just a young man." I looked help- 
 lessly at Vida for assistance. I couldn't tell 
 the truth and I thought maybe an idea would 
 occur to her. 
 
 One did. 
 
 "It's Clarence Jones," said Vida. 
 
 "A friend of yours ?" Blaney eyed her dis- 
 trustfully. 
 
 "No, not at all," Vida said glibly; "he's an 
 old college friend of the other Mr. Blainey." 
 
 "What's he doing here?" 
 321
 
 322 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Why, he just dropped in." 
 
 "Oh he was passing by in this old tub 
 and" 
 
 "She not be tub by damsite." Only one 
 thing would rouse Bill's anger, an insult to his 
 craft. "Yee Viss, there ain't not a better 
 boat" 
 
 "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings," apolo- 
 gized Blaney. "All that I want to say is that 
 if this guy Jones is going back in the boat, I'm 
 not. Jones sounds to me like a fishy name." 
 
 "It is," Vida teased. "I've met a great 
 many fish named Jones." 
 
 "Well," Mrs. Green declared, "I certainly 
 am not going to leave the island while there is 
 a strange young man roaming around." 
 
 She started to get out of the boat. 
 
 "Wait !" I halted her. "I'll go and get him." 
 
 "He don't go in this boat," stated Blaney. 
 
 "If he doesn't, I won't go," asserted Mrs. 
 Green, with equal firmness. 
 
 "Bill," I commanded, "get that row boat 
 that Mr. Blaney rowed over in and tie it on 
 behind the Merry Widow." 
 
 I departed for the summer house, vaguely
 
 323 
 
 wondering if I could silence the reporter with- 
 out using chloroform. 
 
 When I entered the summer house he eyed 
 me with a cold gleaming sort of hate, that 
 made me think of Italian daggers or Malay 
 krisses. 
 
 "If I let you go," I began the parley, "how 
 much will you take to shut up and not ask any 
 questions ?" 
 
 "Nothing doing," he declared without hesi- 
 tation. "I'm going to get you, and I'm going 
 to get you good." 
 
 "That's all right," I conciliated. "You can 
 get me just as soon as you like, but all I ask 
 is that you do nothing to injure some perfectly 
 harmless people." 
 
 He looked at me keenly. 
 
 "You're not the care-taker here, as I 
 thought, are you ?" 
 
 "Why, no," I replied modestly, "not in a 
 professional way, anyhow." 
 
 "Who are you?" His newspaper instinct 
 made him put the usual questions in spite of his 
 dislike. 
 
 "I'm just a guest," I said.
 
 324 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "I know, but where shall I find you if you 
 dare meet me when we get off this island and 
 my hands aren't tied? What's your name?" 
 
 "You can find me any time you like in the 
 editorial rooms in the New York Planet and my 
 name is Blainey." 
 
 "Not Montmorency Blainey, the dramatic 
 critic?" 
 
 "That's the one." I was gratified that my 
 fame had spread so far. 
 
 "They say," quoted the reporter, "that you 
 are the worst dramatic critic in New York." 
 
 "That is an enviable distinction," I mur- 
 mured, "in a place where they are so numerous 
 and so bad." 
 
 "What I mean is, that you are the most 
 severe. If a play gets praise from you, it's 
 sure of success." 
 
 "Well, hardly that," I explained. "I have 
 picked a good many winners, that's all." 
 
 The young man offered himself some mental 
 problem for a few moments. Then he looked 
 up at me. 
 
 "I've written a play," he announced. 
 
 "Only one?" I asked, with simulated inter-
 
 325 
 
 est. "Almost every person in the United 
 States has written one play. To attain dis- 
 tinction you must measure your dramatic 
 achievements by the bushel." 
 
 "But mine is different." 
 
 "Yes? Wherein lies the difference?" 
 
 "Mine is going to be produced." 
 
 "That may or may not be an advantage." 
 
 "With your help it is going to be an advan- 
 tage." 
 
 "How is that?" I enquired politely, with a 
 sinking premonition of what my part was 
 going to be. 
 
 "When the play is produced you are going 
 to hail it as the great American play of the 
 century. No matter if the other critics con- 
 demn it, they will qualify their criticism when 
 they note your enthusiasm. They will go 
 again and discover subtle merits that escaped 
 their first attention. Started by your pane- 
 gyric, its fame will grow, the public will attend, 
 I shall get contracts for more plays and I shall 
 have arrived." 
 
 "Very clever," I sneered, "but your play is 
 probably rotten, and I shall tell the public so."
 
 326 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 "Then I'll tell all I know about what has 
 happened on Green's Island, and I shall hint 
 at a lot of things I don't know. If you will 
 agree to like my play, I'll promise to shut up 
 and not ask any more questions." 
 
 He looked me squarely in the eye. 
 
 "Does Mrs. Green ordinarily drink too 
 much?" he asked. 
 
 His guess was too near the mark for com- 
 fort. I took out my knife and cut his bonds. 
 
 "Thanks, old man," said the reporter, slowly 
 stretching his aching muscles before attempt- 
 ing to get up. 
 
 "They are waiting to take you back to Fair 
 View," I informed him. 
 
 "They?" he enquired. "Who are they?" 
 
 "All the principal characters in that story 
 you were going to write. By the way, your 
 name is Jones Clarence Jones you're an old 
 school friend of mine." 
 
 "Any particulars?" he asked, as we walked 
 down to the dock. 
 
 "It isn't necessary. They won't have a 
 chance to pump you because you are going to 
 be towed behind the rest in a row boat."
 
 "THE HONOR OF THIEVES" 327 
 
 "Why is that?" 
 
 "You promised not to ask any more ques- 
 tions," I reminded him. 
 
 He subsided, racking his brain for a reason 
 for such a fool piece of business. 
 
 At the dock I introduced him perfunctorily 
 to his fellow voyagers and he took his seat 
 docilely in the row boat. 
 
 Bill Johnson cranked up his engine and the 
 Merry Widow started blithely away. When 
 she was a few feet from the dock, the engine 
 stopped. 
 
 "What's the matter? Broke down?" I 
 shouted. 
 
 "No," answered Bill, "I yust stop her be- 
 cause you forgot to tal me what for Mrs. Green 
 be on Huntingdon's Island. You say you tal 
 me and you forget." 
 
 "Yes," chimed in Mrs. Green, "and I want 
 to know how I came to be floating out on the 
 lake during the storm with my red dress on." 
 
 I reflected a moment. 
 
 "The young man in the row boat knows all 
 about it," I shouted. "You can ask him as
 
 328 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 soon as you get to the mainland." I didn't 
 add that he wouldn't answer. 
 
 "Mr. Blainey," yelled the reporter as the 
 engine started up again. 
 
 "Yes," I replied. 
 
 "The name of that play is, 'The Honor of 
 Thieves.' " 
 
 "All right." I waved my hand in farewell. 
 
 The Merry Widow towed my troubles 
 around a point of land at the entrance of the 
 cove and out of sight.
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR 
 THE FOREST OF ARDEN
 
 CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR 
 
 I SMILED to myself as I turned away, and I 
 whistled an aria that was partly Puccini's and 
 partly my own in places where I couldn't re- 
 member the original. 
 
 The provisions I had brought from Hunt- 
 ingdon's Island were still where I had hid- 
 den them. I took them with me. If I was 
 going to get thoroughly lost, at least I should 
 be well provisioned. 
 
 On my way to the trackless depths of this 
 half-mile wide wilderness I stopped at the sum- 
 mer house and unearthed some tea things which 
 I knew were stored there in a locker. There 
 was a lunch cloth, silver, china, a small caddy 
 of tea and tiny water heater, all of which I 
 added to my pack. 
 
 With a last look at the lake which was now 
 a jewelled mirror for the sun I plunged 
 through the underbrush into the warm, soft by- 
 paths of the forest. The leaves rustled pleas- 
 
 331
 
 332 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 antly under foot as I walked along and the 
 squirrels and birds overhead scolded me and 
 told one another that there was a gypsy chief- 
 tain abroad in the forest. For surely the birds 
 and the squirrels recognized my character even 
 if some of the outward signs and trappings 
 were missing. A slight breeze, only a tattered 
 shred of the boisterous storm that had passed, 
 stirred the leaves just enough to shake through 
 an occasional dancing sunbeam. 
 
 After I had lost myself in the forest as far 
 as I could without coming out again on the 
 other side, I put down my burden and pre- 
 pared to abandon myself to despair as comfort- 
 ably as possible. I was rather relieved to find 
 that I had given up hope of finding my way, 
 very close to the spring which I believe I have 
 mentioned as existing on the island. At any 
 rate I should not die of thirst. 
 
 A fairly flat tree-stump looked extraordinar- 
 ily like a table when a cloth was spread on it 
 and places set for two. There was a cheerful 
 look, too, about the tea-kettle when the alcohol 
 lamp under it had been lit long enough to make 
 it send out tiny curly spirals of steam. And
 
 THE FOREST OF ARDEN 333 
 
 over all a flicker of sunlight romped about the 
 table as if the fairy, "Tinker Bell," were touch- 
 ing the dishes to make it a magic feast. 
 
 Opening the canned goods was no difficult 
 matter to one who had successfully done bat- 
 tle with a half a bushel of reluctant clams. 
 There were sardines, potted ham, peanut but- 
 ter, jam and a tin of crackers. Of course such 
 things are not to be compared to a steak with 
 mushrooms or turkey with cranberry sauce or 
 even ham and eggs, but they have certain at- 
 tractions for the person who has not eaten for 
 several days which I need hardly dwell upon. 
 
 I did not eat, though. Instead I leisurely 
 brewed a pot of tea. I had never cared a 
 great deal about tea before, but the aroma of 
 that particular brew will haunt me when other 
 perfumes have lost their savor. 
 
 I drew up two pieces of fallen tree trunk to 
 serve as chairs and seated myself on one side 
 of the table. My trap was ready. 
 
 Presently there was a sound of breaking 
 twigs in the underbrush nearby. I pretended 
 not to notice. Then Tootles came forth, frisk- 
 ing and wagging her tail. I petted her.
 
 334 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 Someone coughed in back of me. I turned. 
 Parting the bushes on either side like the folds 
 of a heavy green velvet drop curtain, stood the 
 shy spirit of the wood. 
 
 "I had to make you turn around," she said 
 apologetically, "and get it over with." 
 
 Never was a fairer Rosalind. She held up 
 her head with a fine courage in spite of the 
 crimson blushes which chased each other over 
 her face and neck, and she stood straight in the 
 high-heeled soft kid boots, a slender figure, al- 
 most boyish, save for a slightly curving bosom 
 and a soft roundness of the knee. 
 
 "Won't you sit down?" I had risen when 
 she first appeared and I indicated the rough log 
 seat opposite mine. 
 
 "Were you expecting someone?" she asked, 
 casting an anxious look at the seat. She was 
 wishing she was in it with her boots under the 
 table cloth. 
 
 "Why, yes," I pretended to be hesitant about 
 confiding in her. "I was expecting someone, a 
 lady, one that I am very fond of, but I am 
 afraid that she has disappointed me. Won't 
 you take her place?"
 
 THE FOREST OF ARDEN 335 
 
 "Thank you," she said simply and slid into 
 the seat. 
 
 When I poured her some of the tea and of- 
 fered her such food as was available she ac- 
 cepted everything and ate with unembarrassed 
 appetite. It may sound unromantic to say that 
 we satisfied our hunger without conversation, 
 but remember that there had been many hours 
 when talk had been our only substitute for 
 food. Tootles had some of everything, includ- 
 ing tea, which proves to my mind conclusively 
 that she isn't a regular dog. But no more of 
 that. 
 
 "I'm sorry," my vis-a-vis said at last, leaning 
 forward with her chin resting on the backs of 
 her clasped hands, "I'm sorry to be sitting in 
 the place of someone else whom you would pre- 
 fer to have here." Then she added, with a 
 little sigh, "That is, if you would prefer some- 
 one else." 
 
 "I would and I wouldn't," I smiled. "I am 
 trying to imagine that you are she." 
 
 "In these in this costume?" 
 
 "It is difficult to imagine her dressed as you 
 are, but not impossible. I admit though, that
 
 336 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 it would be easier to picture you in her dress 
 than her in yours." 
 
 "What do you suppose was the reason that 
 she did not come?" 
 
 "She is angry with me." 
 
 "How could she be?" 
 
 "I have displeased her." 
 
 "If she has been angry it must be that she 
 forgot for the moment how brave you are and 
 how kind." 
 
 "She said she never wanted to see me again." 
 
 "And you said you would never enter her 
 house again. Yet you broke your word when 
 she was in danger and she was very glad to 
 see you indeed." She reached across the table 
 impulsively and laid her small brown fingers 
 in my palm. 
 
 "What would you do," I asked, "if you were 
 she?" 
 
 "I'd come and find you," she answered, "and 
 when I'd found you, I'd put my hands in yours, 
 just like this, and I'd ask your forgiveness for 
 being a cross, cranky, old maid." 
 
 "But she isn't an old maid." I held her 
 fingers tightly lest she draw them away.
 
 THE FOREST OF ARDEN 337 
 
 "She'll be twenty-five tomorrow." She 
 laughed. "And if a girl isn't married by the 
 time she is twenty-five she is an old maid." 
 
 "Then she'll never be an old maid," I de- 
 clared, "because by this time tomorrow she'll 
 be married. That is," I added, "if she'll ac- 
 cept a stout, middle-aged man for a husband." 
 
 "There isn't one on this island," she declared, 
 looking at me with shining eyes. "You can't 
 claim to be stout when your belt nearly reaches 
 around you twice. Monty," she gave my hand 
 a quick little squeeze, "you're a dear." 
 
 "Will you marry me?" I asked. 
 
 "Of course. I decided that long ago. Do 
 you suppose I'd let any man see me in this cos- 
 tume unless he was going to marry me ?" 
 
 I pulled her toward me. 
 
 "Excuse me, folks," said a voice, "I hate like 
 the deuce to butt in on the Sothern and Mar- 
 lowe stuff and I certainly have enjoyed it, but 
 I've got to make a get-away and I can't do a 
 Brodie out of this tree without disturbing you." 
 
 We looked up at the anxious face of Kent 
 peering between the branches. 
 
 "That revenue boat is coming back, and it's a
 
 338 FIVE FRIDAYS 
 
 cinch they're going to get me this time if I 
 stick around this dinky island. I've got to beat 
 it." 
 
 He scrambled down. 
 
 "How can you get away?" I asked. 
 
 "The launch," he explained briefly. "I've 
 been fixing her up on the q. t. this week getting 
 ready for an emergency. She looks good for 
 fifteen miles an hour." 
 
 "Sixteen," corrected Lucile. 
 
 "All the better then. I'll lose 'em out there. 
 I don't suppose you two doves will mind if I 
 keep 'em so busy that they ain't got time to 
 land Mr. Bopp for an hour or so." He 
 grinned. 
 
 "Not a bit," I answered. "Good luck." 
 
 He started for the cove. I watched him out 
 of sight. 
 
 When I turned back, the bench opposite me 
 was empty. A slender figure was stealthily 
 making for the shelter of the thicket. 
 
 When I had caught her and punished her as 
 she deserved for desertion I still held her tight 
 in my arms for fear she would escape me again. 
 
 "By the way," I asked casually some time
 
 THE FOREST OF ARDEN 339 
 
 later, "where would you like to spend your 
 honeymoon ?" 
 
 She considered a moment and then parted 
 her lips in a slow smile. 
 
 "I think I'd like to spend our honeymoon in 
 a dining-car." 
 
 THE END
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
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