nst the dock and the girls straightened their
hats, picked up their suitcases, and started down the narrow winding
stairs that led to the lower deck.

Connie led the way as she had done ever since they had left North Bend.
She scrambled quickly out upon the pier and the chums, following more
slowly, were in time to see Connie rapturously embrace first a lady and
then a gentleman standing near by.

"Well, well!" a deep masculine voice was saying, "it seems mighty good to
see our girl again. But where are the others?"

Connie turned eagerly to the girls.

"This is my mother and father, Billie and Laura and Vi," she said, with a
proud wave of her hand toward her smiling parents, who came forward and
greeted the girls cordially.

"It's too dark to see your faces," Mrs. Danvers said. "But Connie has
described you to us so many times that it isn't at all necessary. I'm
sure I know just exactly what you look like."

"Oh, but they're three times as nice as anything I've said about them,"
Connie was protesting when her father, who had been conversing with the
captain of the _Mary Ann_, stepped up to them.

"If you young ladies will give me your checks," he said--and the girls
knew they were going to love him because his voice sounded so kind--"I'll
attend to your trunks and you can go on up to the house."

The girls produced their checks, Mr. Danvers went back to the captain,
and Mrs. Danvers and the girls started off in high spirits toward the
bungalow.

"Are you very tired?" Mrs. Danvers asked them, and the turn of her head
as she looked at them made the girls think of some pert, plump, cheery
little robin.

It was really getting very dark, and the girls could not make out what
she looked like, but they could see that she was small and graceful and
her voice--well, her voice had a gay lilt that made one want to laugh
even though all she said was "what a pleasant day it is." No wonder, with
that father and mother, Connie was such a darling.

"Why, no, we're not very tired," Billie said in answer to Mrs. Danvers'
question. "We were on the train, but the minute we got on board the boat
we seemed to forget all about it. It's this beautiful salt air, I
suppose," and she sniffed happily at the soft, salt-laden breeze that
came wandering up from the sea.

"Of course it's the air," agreed Mrs. Danvers gayly. "The air does all
sorts of wonderful things to us. You just wait a few days and see."

They were walking along a