as his hand."

But Julia was off, down the avenue, her light hair floating like a cloud
about her shoulder, and her slim figure--the girls called it
svelt--still proclaiming her the little girl, in spite of her grown up
manners. Every one liked Julia; she was pensive and temperamental, but
distinctively individual withal.

"No use my winning those crabs," said Margaret, "we haven't any one to
shell them, or cook them, or do anything with them."

"You can put them in a tub of water and let them grow up," suggested
Cleo, drawing a long straw, when a short one would decide the crabs.

"There, Louise, you have them. Take them! I hope they make you a lovely
salad, and that they don't make you sick."

CHAPTER VIII

AT WEASLE POINT

"ISN'T it queer how no one seems to know any one else?" remarked Grace,
with more words than meaning.

"You mean every one seems a stranger to every one else," added Cleo,
affecting the same ambiguity.

"Yes; to put it collectively, the whole town is being populated by rank
'furriners,'" said Louise, "but I can explain the analogy. You see, when
summer comes the natives pack up and leave their homes to rent them
profitably. That means only the post-master, and store keepers stay
put."

"I have asked more questions and got fewer answers since I came to Sea
Crest than I would have believed possible to ask and not receive,"
declared Cleo. "But what is your special trouble, Grace?"

"I asked a couple of girls who our queer Letty was and they didn't know.
Now, they were barefoot and peddling clams, the kind they dig up in the
sand, and does it seem possible they would not know that girl?"

"They may come in from another town," suggested Louise. "It is quite
possible they wouldn't know a thing but clams. I have found that out.
But let's hurry off. I've got the lunch, and we are not to go farther
than the Point. I have learned that girls go out there with perfect
safety, and there's a nice little ice cream place tended by a perfectly
prim, gray-haired lady, who keeps an eye all over the Point. It must be
a very small point, or the woman must have a long distance eye,"
finished Louise.

"We are going in the launch, of course," asked and answered Cleo. "I had
to assure mother that the man who runs it has a brand new license, and I
almost promised to bring back the number. Mother is so afraid of all
sorts of motors."

Ready for the excursion to Weasle Point, Grace, Cleo, and Louise,