and he wanted her to make fudge. He cudgelled his fat brain
for something to say, which would appease her. "Oh, I say----" he began
when Katherine turned around so suddenly he almost jumped.

"What's that floating out there in the lake?" she said abruptly.

"Where?" asked Slim, sitting up.

"Out there." Katherine pointed her finger.

Slim looked in the direction she pointed. "I don't see anything."

"It seems to have gone under," said Katherine, searching the surface for
the thing she had seen the moment before.

"There it is again," she said excitedly. "It just came up again.

"Slim!" she shrieked, springing to her feet and dragging him up with
her. "It's--it's a person, and it looks like a woman. It's red. A woman
in a red dress. She's drowning. She went down when she disappeared and
now she's come up again. Hurry! The little launch! Come on! Hurry!"

She dragged Slim down the path so fast it was a miracle they both didn't
go head over heels, untied the launch from the landing and sent it
flying across the lake in the direction of the drowning woman. Katherine
could run the launch as well as Uncle Teddy himself. Slim, panting and
speechless, hung over the side trying to keep his eye on the red spot in
the shimmery green water.

"She's got one arm thrown up for help," he cried above the thumping of
the engine. Slim was so softhearted he could not bear to see a creature
in distress, and the sight of that arm thrown up in a wild gesture
filled him with a quivering horror. He could not bear to look at it and
turned his eyes away.

Fairly leaping through the water, the launch came on the scene and
Katherine stopped the engine. "Don't give up, we're coming," she shouted
at a distance of fifteen feet.

Slim stood up and prepared to drag the woman over the side. Then he and
Katherine began to stare hard. Then they looked at each other. Then they
quietly folded up in the bottom of the launch and went into spasms of
mirth.

"It's--it's----" began Slim, and then choked, while tears of laughter
ran down his face.

"It's--it's----" began Katherine, and choked, likewise.

"It's a wooden lady!" they both shrieked together, with a final
successful effort at breath.

"Oh, oh, doesn't she look real?" giggled Katherine. "With her arm
sticking up like that!"

Slim remembered how that arm had nearly given him heart failure a minute
ago and shook anew.

"She's an Indian lady," said Katherine, leaning over the side to i