Cutting across the little stretch of green that bound Glimmer Lake, Margaret and Julia were soon on the board walk.
"Oh listen!" shouted Julia. "Listen!" she repeated in that useless way girls have of holding off news.
"We are listening, of course," replied Grace, "but get your breath or you'll choke. What's the excitement!"
"That funny girl with the tongue," Margaret managed to say, before Julia could get her breath. "She's the queerest thing. She followed us all the way from the village. We turned corners, and so did she; we hurried, and she hurried, and when we stopped, she stopped. Isn't that too impudent for words? I think we ought to report her," declared the indignant Margaret.
"Report her for doing the things we do?" laughed Cleo. "Why, Margaret, who would think you were a first class scout? I'm surprised," and the girl's voice mimicked the severe tones of a prim elder.
"Just the same," Julia insisted, "I can't see why she should be allowed to plague us and molest us in the streets." Julia was not quite sure "molest" was the word, but it had an important sound and all the girls seemed impressed by it.
"Aren't we special officers?" protested Grace. "Why shouldn't we do our own--our own policing? Let's form ourselves into a squad, and track down the culprit," and she rolled her tongue, as well as her eyes.
"Let us sit down and talk it over," suggested practical Margaret. "I'm ready to drop from all the paces we made samples of to suit our trailer."
"Ducked into a little shanty with a laundry sign on the fence," replied Julia, "and we were so glad to be rid of her we just raced all the way down B street."
"And look!" said Margaret. "There's our other hero. The boy with the books. See, he is making for a quiet bench, and look! That's yellow paper sticking out of his pocket. Let's watch him! Maybe he will get our bottle letter."
But the studious boy with the books and papers made straight for the bench, and finding a seat proceeded to read. He didn't even notice the girls when they brushed past him.
"ARE you perfectly sure it is safe?" asked Cleo. "Seeing the bottom here doesn't mean we can see it all the way across."
"Why, you could walk across the river, really," replied Louise. "Even at high tide it's not more than a big pond."