ed the red-headed boy.

"Pshaw! It was only a cat bird," scoffed George Baker. "Who's afraid of
spooks, anyway? The fact is that those girls have outwitted us three
times. We have lost the wager. Now the question is, when did they get
away?"

Larry declared that he had never removed his gaze from the anchor light
during his whole watch, except when he went to get wood for the
campfire.

"There's only one way out of it," decided Billy. "Duck the two of them.
We will be certain to get the right party then."

"'Nuff said," nodded George. The boys grabbed the two lads, and, despite
their struggles, managed to throw them into the lake, but in doing so,
George and Billy found themselves in the water, also.

This little experience put them in a better frame of mind. The lads
quickly divested themselves of their wet pajamas and put on their
clothes. Breakfast was a hurried meal that morning. After breakfast they
sat down to take counsel among themselves while Sam scraped the dishes
then threw them in the lake to be washed by the lake itself. They
decided that either Larry or Sam must have fallen asleep, and that at a
time when the girls had moved from their anchorage.

Both lads protested that nothing of the kind had happened. Sam stuck to
his story that the anchor light had faded away and that the "Red Rover"
had disappeared all in the same moment.

"What are we going to do about it?" questioned Larry Goheen.

"We are going to take up a collection for that camera, and then we are
going to find them," answered Billy.

"We are going to try, you mean," answered George with a mirthless smile.
"We have tried before--and failed, and now we are obliged to confess
that we are beaten for good and all. However let us reason this thing
out. The 'Red Rover' couldn't have disappeared, it could have gone only
by being towed away. If a launch had towed it, the noise would have
awakened us, even though Larry or Sam had been asleep. If the houseboat
was towed by the girls, which it undoubtedly was, it can't be far away.
That makes our work easier."

"There is only one flaw in your argument, George," interrupted Billy
Gordon. "Granting that they did row away from here, how do you know that
at daylight they did not pick up a launch and hike half the length of
the lake?"

George shook his head slowly.

"There wouldn't be any fun for them in that. They would want to be on
hand, to make faces at us behind our backs."

"You may be r