as presently shouting with delight. Her little
lean, sharp face was keen with excitement.

"Now pretend--now, now, now! It's easy to out here! The fine lady's
going abroad, Judy--do you hear? She's going right straight over
'cross this sea, in this han'some ship! When she gets there she'll
_step out_ on the shore an' say what a beautiful voyage she's had,
an' good-by to the cap'n--you're the cap'n, Judy. An' you'll say, 'Oh,
my lady, sha'n't I help you ashore?' An' she'll laugh right out,
it's so ridic'lous! 'Help me, my good man!' she'll 'xclaim. 'I guess
you must think I can't walk!'"

Blossom's face was alive with the joy of the beautiful "pretend."
But Judith's face was sober.

"Laugh, why don't you, Judy?" cried the child.

"I'm laugh--I mean I will, dear. But I've got to row like everything
now, so you must do the pretending for us both. We've got to get out
there to those traps before you can say 'scat'!"

"Scat!" shrilled Blossom.

It was Blossom's sharp eyes that discovered Jem Three "out there."
Judith was bending to her work.

"There's Jemmy Three, Judy! True-honest, out there a-trapping! He
looks 's if he was coming away from our place--he is, Judy! He's got
our lobsters, to s'prise us, maybe."

"It won't surprise me," muttered Judy, in the clutch of the Evil
Thought again. She was watching the distant boat now keenly, her eyes
hard with suspicion. Jem Three it surely was, and he was rowing
slowly away from Judith's lobster "grounds." It seemed to her his
dory was deep in the water as if heavily weighted. He had been--had
been to her traps again. He was whistling--Judith could hear the
faint, sweet sound--but that didn't hide anything. Let him whistle all
he wanted to--she knew what he had been up to!

"Ship aho-oy!" came across faintly to them, but it was only Blossom
that answered.

"Ahoy! Ship ahoy!" she sent back clearly. Judith bent over her
toiling oars.

"He's going away from us, we sha'n't meet him," Blossom said in
disappointment.

"Of course he's going away--of course he won't meet us," Judith
retorted between her little white teeth.

"An' I wanted to 'speak him,'" the disappointed little voice ran on;
"I was going to call out, 'How's the folks abroad? We're on our way
'cross, in the Judiana B.,'--this is the Judiana B., Judy, after both
of us. B. stands for me."

"Funny way to spell me!" laughed Judith with an effort. She must hide
away her black suspicions. Not for the world w