oman?" asked Amy, now, as well as her chum, taking an interest in
the matter.

"There wasn't a thing happened to her that I know of," said Henrietta,
shaking her head again. "But by the way that lady talked it would
happen to her if she got hold of Bertha again."

"How dreadful," murmured Jessie, looking at her chum.

"I don't see how we can help the girl," said Amy. "She has been shut
up some place, of course. If I could just think who that skinny woman
is--or who she looks like. But how she can drive a car!"

"I think we can do something," Jessie declared. "I've had my head so
full of radio that I haven't thought much about this poor child's
cousin and her trouble."

"What will you do?" asked Amy.

"Tell daddy. He ought to be able to advise."

"That's a fact," agreed Amy, her eyes twinkling. "He is quite a good
lawyer. Of course, not so good as Mr. Wilbur Drew. But he'll do at a
pinch."

CHAPTER X

THE PRIZE IDEA

When the two girls paddled back up the lake after their adventure at
the old Carter house, Henrietta squatted in the middle of the canoe
and seemed to enjoy the trip immensely.

"I seen these sort of boats going up and down the lake, and they look
pretty. Me and Charlie Foley and some of the other boys at Dogtown
made a raft. But Mr. Foley busted it with an ax. He said we had no
business using the coal-cellar door and Mrs. Foley's bread-mixing
board. So we didn't get to go sailing," observed the freckle-faced
child.

Almost everything the child said made Amy laugh. Nevertheless, like
her chum, Amy felt keenly the pathos of the little girl's situation.
Perhaps with Amy Drew this interest went no farther than sympathy,
whereas Jessie was already, and before this incident, puzzling her
mind regarding what might be done to help Henrietta and improve her
situation.

The girls paddled the canoe in to a broken landing just below the
scattered shacks of Dogtown, and Henrietta went ashore. It was plain
that she would have enjoyed riding farther in the canoe.

"If you see us come down this way again, honey," Amy said, "run down
here to the shore and we will take you aboard."

"If Mrs. Foley will let you," added Jessie.

"I dunno what Mrs. Foley will say about the strawberries. I told her
I'd bring home some if she'd let me go over there. And here I come
home without even the bucket."

"It is altogether too wet to pick wild strawberries," Jessie said. "I
wanted some myself. But we shall