left the hut. None of the visitors dared
to speak to him, so black had his face grown at the recollections called
up by Peggy's unlucky remark.

After an absence of some moments he came back. He carried a string of
cleaned fish in one hand and a tin measure of potatoes in the other. In
the interval that had elapsed he seemed to have recovered his equanimity.

"Well, here's dinner," he announced in a cheery voice, "it ain't much to
boast of, but hunger's the best sauce."

Sitting on an upturned box he started to peel potatoes, and presently put
them on the fire in a rough iron pot. When they were almost done, a fact
which he ascertained by prodding them with a clean sliver of wood, he set
the fish in a frying pan or "spider," and the appetizing aroma of the meal
presently filled the lowly hut.

On a table formed of big planks, once the hull of some wrecked schooner,
laid on rough trestles, they ate, what Peggy afterward declared, was one
of the most enjoyable dinners of her life. Their host had at one time of
his life been a sailor it would seem. At any rate, he had a fund of
anecdote of the sea and its perils that held them enthralled.

Every now and again, through the open door, Peggy cast a glance outside.
But the fog still hung thick. Suddenly, in the midst of their meal,
footsteps sounded and voices came to their ears.

"Hullo, more visitors!" exclaimed the man of the island starting to his
feet, "this is a day of events with a vengeance. Who can be coming now?"

The footsteps had drawn close now and a voice could be heard saying:

"What a rickety, tumble-down old place. I wonder what kind of savage lives
here."

"Fanning Harding!" gasped Peggy, as another voice struck in. A voice she
instantly knew as Regina Mortlake's.

[Illustration: The next minute the man of the island ushered in his two
new guests.]

"Oh, what a dreadful place. Why won't this miserable fog lift. I'll be
dead before we get back to the hotel."

The man of the island had hastened hospitably out to welcome the
newcomers.

Peggy, Jess and Jimsy exchanged glances. The prospect of spending the
afternoon marooned on an island with Fanning Harding and Regina Mortlake,
was not alluring. But there was no escape. The next minute the man of the
island ushered in his two new guests.

"What, you here?" said Fanning in an ungracious tone, while Regina
Mortlake, more skilled at disguising her feelings, exclaimed:

"Oh, how perfectly wonderfu