the ground clean and smooth while Harriet was
beating the canvas to get the dust out of it. This done, the canvas
was spread out on the ground and folded over twice, leaving sufficient
of it to cover them after they had taken their positions for the
night.

Tommy regarded the preparations with mild interest.

"Who ith going to thleep next to the wall?" she asked.

"We thought we should place you next to the fold," replied Miss
Elting. "You can't kick the cover off there."

"And where ith Buthter going to thleep?"

"In the middle."

"That ith all right. I don't withh to be too clothe to her. We might
thquabble all night."

"Now, Tommy, you first," nodded Harriet.

Tommy took her place on the canvas with great care, gathering her
skirts about her, turning around and around as if in search of the
softest possible place on which to lie.

"You are thure Buthter ithn't going to thleep near me?" persisted Miss
Tommy.

"Yes, yes. Please get in," urged Miss Elting.

"I jutht wanted to know, that ith all." She lay down, then one by one
her companions took their places on the canvas. Harriet was the last
to turn in. Before doing so she drew the unoccupied half of the canvas
over the girls, leaving Tommy at the fold, as had been promised. There
were no pillows. It was a case of lying stretched out flat or using
one's arm for a pillow. The latter plan was adopted by most of the
girls, though Harriet lay flat on her back after tucking herself in,
gazing up at the stars and listening to the surf beating on the shore
as the tide came rolling in. Now and then a roller showed a white
ridge at its top, the white plainly visible even in the darkness, for
the moon had not yet risen.

The campfire burned low, the camp itself being as silent as if
deserted. Now and then twitterings in the tree tops might have been
heard; were heard, in fact, by Harriet Burrell, but not heeded, for
her gaze was fixed, as it had been for some moments, on two tiny
specks of light far out on the dark sea. One of the specks was green,
the other red. They rose and fell in unison, now and then disappearing
for a few seconds, then rising, high in the air, as it appeared. The
two lights were the side lights of a boat, red on the port and green
on the starboard, and above them was a single white light at the
masthead.

"According to those lights the boat is heading directly toward the
beach," mused Harriet reflectively. "I wonder if I ought to show a