to them. The big berries were heaped upon the
wedges of buttered short-cake, and then cream poured over the berries,
with plenty of sugar.

"Yum! Yum!" mumbled Lance Darby, with a huge mouthful obstructing his
parts of speech. "Isn't this the Jim-dandiest lay-out you ever saw,
Chet?"

"I never sat down to a better one," admitted his chum. "But please don't
talk to me. Purt is getting more of the berries than I am--and he isn't
talking at all. Just pass the sugar, Lance, and then shut up for a
while."

But there was enough serious talk during the supper to arrange a return
treat for Eve and Otto Sitz. The farmer boy and his sister had seldom
been on Lake Luna and Laura and her brother suggested a trip by boat and
canoe to Cavern Island for the following Saturday.

"And no picnic luncheon at the park. That's too common," declared Jess
Morse, eagerly. "Let's do something different."

"Trot out your 'different' suggestion, Josephine," said her chum.

"Let's go to the caves. Let's picnic there."

"Oh!" cried one of the Lockwood twins. "That's where we saw the 'lone
pirate.'"

"The lone _what_?" rejoined Nellie Agnew. "What do you mean by that?"

The other twin explained how and when they had seen the bushy-headed,
wild-looking man at the foot of Boulder Head.

"There's where the caverns open onto the shore, exactly," remarked Chet
Belding. "Are you afraid of meeting the pirate, girls?"

"We'll capture him and make him walk the plank!" declared Bobby Hargrew.
"Hurrah for the pirate!"

So the trip to Cavern Island for the next Saturday was arranged, Eve and
Otto promising to join the party at Centerport. And the run home by
automobile in the moonlight was enlivened by plans for the coming good
time on the Lake.

Lance ran the sight-seeing automobile carefully and delivered it to Mr.
Purcell, the owner, in good season. The man who should have driven it,
but who was taken ill, had been removed to the hospital from the inn in
the woods.

"I understand one of those girls played the heroine and stopped the
car," said the automobile owner.

"Yes, sir," replied Lance. "That was one of the Lockwood twins."

"Which one was it? I'd like to thank her, at least," said Mr. Purcell.

"Couldn't tell you," laughed Lance.

"Why couldn't you? Sworn to secrecy, young man?" demanded Mr. Purcell.

"No, sir. But the twins themselves seem to be. Nobody knows them apart,
and they won't tell on each other. One of them is the he