; what impressed them most unfavorably about him was
his shifty eyes. He seldom permitted himself to meet the gaze of the
person with whom he was talking.

Some inquiry, after reaching the hotel, developed the fact that Dee
Dickinson was a notary, did a little real estate business, and drew a
few papers for his neighbors, thus managing to eke out a precarious
living. So far as the girls were able to find out, Dickinson's character
was above reproach. Miss Elting chided herself for having formed a wrong
opinion of the man. Still she could not overcome her irritation at his
evident reluctance in getting the boat ready.

It was quite late in the afternoon when Dee appeared at the hotel, red
of face, his clothes soiled and wet.

"Well, we got the old thing," was his greeting.

"Is the boat here?" inquired the guardian coldly.

"Yes, Miss Elting. It's down at Johnson's dock this very minute. You can
go down there and look at it. I've got some business to--"

"Please go with us. There will be things about it which we shall wish to
ask you. Does the boat leak much?"

He shook his head.

"It's all right," he said. "I can't spare the time to go to-day."

"If I might venture to offer to pay you for your trouble," suggested the
guardian, not certain whether he would resent her offer of money.
Dickinson, however, was not easily insulted.

"Of course, if--if you wish, I--yes, of course," he mumbled.

Miss Elting handed him two dollars. Dickinson led the way down to the
dock, though without enthusiasm.

"There's the tub," he said, pointing toward what appeared, at first
glance, to be a huge box. "That is it."

The girls walked out on the dock and stood gazing at the boat. In the
first place, the "Red Rover" was not red at all. It had once had a prime
coat of yellow paint, but this had succumbed to storm and sunshine. The
windows had been boarded up; and the exterior of the craft bore out all
that Dee Dickinson had said of it.

"Thirty feet on the water line," explained the man, for want of
something better to say.

The boat, originally, had been a scow used for the purpose of towing the
effects of summer residents of the island across the lake. Bert Elting
had bought it for a small sum of money, and had built the house over it.
He and a friend, had spent many days and nights aboard, anchored out on
the fishing grounds. When they desired to change their location a launch
usually could be found to tow them about.

A