en we have drill, and some government
messages to explain--make it two-thirty," he said finally, "and we'll
see what we can do."

CHAPTER XVII

A RELIC FROM THE ALAMEDA

EAGER for the captain's story every scout was on hand promptly at
two-thirty. The captain dusted off the wooden settee, and pulled out all
his chairs, for the True Treds were meeting as if in council.

"It's about Kitty," he began. "Of course, you have guessed that. But
what set me on this course was the way you have made friends with that
heedless one. Seems to me you would stick by her in a pinch."

"We surely would, Captain," spoke up Grace, and her voice had in it the
ring of the familiar "Aye, aye, sir."

"Well, you see," went on the captain, "she's so queer, no one makes
friends with her. But from the furst I was a'watchin' you 'uns, as they
say at Old Point, and I was curious to see if she was going to scare you
off, as she had done to all the others."

"I guess she tried," Louise could not refrain from interrupting, for the
memory of Kitty's throw of the paste board box was still vivid.

"Yes, she tried, and she has told me how she plagued you, but accordin'
to Kitty you wouldn't quit."

"Not exactly quitters," ventured Cleo.

From his smile of approval it was plain the captain agreed with every
interruption, and they seemed to whet his interest in the story he had
undertaken to tell. He continued:

"Just noticin' and watchin' I says to myself, there is the very thing
Kitty has always needed; girls, real live, jolly girls; and she ain't
never had none."

He expressed himself more pathetically when he fell into the vernacular.
"No sir, she ain't never had none," he repeated. "Then along you come,
just for the summer, and she tried every blusterin' trick she could make
use of to scare you off, to sort of bamboozle you, but you stick, and
so, she's sort of givin' in. Especially since you befriended old Pete.
That won her sure."

"She told us that she appreciated that," said Cleo. "But it was only fun
to drive him to the landing. Of course, he wouldn't hear of us driving
around to the Point, from where he could more easily have gone across to
the island."

"Now then, thinking all those things over, and puttin' two and two
together, as you might say, I've sort of concluded to ask you to do
something more. And I almost feel I know your answer," pursued the
well-trained narrator.

"You surely must know it, Captain," Cleo ass