ll-work.

"Tell _me_ about it, please?" said Jess' mother, "You girls run and
get your baths and we'll get breakfast."

"I--I don't want to leave the tent if there are thieves about,"
complained Lil, to whom the water looked just as cold on this morning
as it had the day before. "I--I've got some jewelry in my bag."

"Very foolish," said Bobby, bluntly. "We told you not to bring
anything to camp that you cared about."

"Gently! gently!" said Laura, the peacemaker, "Come on, Lil. Don't be
afraid of either the kleptomaniantic thief, as Bobby calls him, or the
cold water--neither will hurt you, I guess."

They had their plunge and that--or something else--stirred Mother
Wit's "thinking machine." She said, as they trooped up to dress:

"We'll wig-wag the boys and bring them over. They will help us search
the island. Besides, we shall need one of the powerboats to go for
more food. It seems funny that a man who was willing to pay for what
he took--and pay so well--did not go down to Elberon Crossing and buy
at the store just what he took from us."

"He's an outlaw--a murderer, maybe, fleeing for his life," suggested
Lil, tremblingly.

"Pooh! so are you!" scoffed Jess. "More than likely he is some lazy
fisherman who did not want to go to the store--some rich fellow from
the city."

"If Liz knows what she is talking about," said Laura, "it _is_ a rich
fellow from Albany. A Mr. Norman. And she told me last night that he
was a great fisherman and hunter.

"But what under the sun," demanded Bobby, "should he take our food
for?"

"You can't tell me it is anything as simple as that," Lil Pendleton
declared. "He is a thief, just the same. And it as dangerous for us to
be on this island with him. Why! I wouldn't stay another night--unless
the boys were here to defend us."

"Ah! the cat is out of the bag," chuckled Bobby. "Lil wants Purt over
here with his revolver," and then the other girls laughed and Lil got
mad again.

CHAPTER XIII

THE SEARCH OF THE ISLAND

Laura dressed in a hurry and ran out with the flags. She took a slip
of paper with her on which Chet had marked down the code, to refresh
her memory, and at once stood out upon a high boulder and began to
wave the "call flag."

Without the glasses she could not see what the boys were doing about
their camp; but Jess came with the best pair of binoculars, and soon
told her that the boys were evidently in much excitement. Chet
appeared with _his_ f