Princess Polly At Play Part 6

Max and Jack had wagered a quant.i.ty of marbles that no girl, not even Gwen Harcourt, would dare to float in the rough old tub.

When Max reached the place where Jack had promised to wait for him, Jack was no where to be seen.

"Scamp!" cried Max. "He's gone off so as not to pay over those marbles I won. Well, he'll not get off so easy, for I'll find him, and _make_ him pay!"

With never a thought of Gwen, he started along the beach to search for Jack.

"Well, I'd not be mean enough to skin out like that," he cried as he hurried over the hard, damp sands. He thought it very mean to elude paying the little bet, and as he ran, he told himself that he would have promptly paid the marbles if he had owed them to Jack, which was true.

Jack was mischievous, but he would never have left a little girl in the plight in which Max, with all his boasting, had left Gwen.

And although Max Deland searched in every place where Jack was likely to be, he did not find him.

"I'll not hunt for him!" he cried at last, "but I'll make him pay when I catch him!"

"Max! Max Deland!"

The voice was shrill and piping.

"h.e.l.lo! Where are you?" Max shouted in reply, and the trim waitress from her position on the ledge, cried back;

"It's not where I am, but where you are that's worrying your mother.

You're the first boy I ever saw that had to be called to dinner. Come in!"

She turned and ran into the house, while Max rushed toward the big dining-room.

He thought of Gwen during dinner, but he felt no fear for her safety.

He believed that she had soon become tired of floating in the shallow water, had sprung from the leaky tub, and for hours had been playing with her friends.

That was not the case, however. Gwen, crouching in the tub, had waited quite patiently, watching for Max who was to return with Jack, while the tub bobbed and danced on the shallow water, and for a time she had found it rather amusing.

The clumsy craft had floated lightly, now toward the beach, now away, and she felt no fear because as often as a receding wave took her a few feet from the beach, an incoming wave brought her back.

Then the unexpected happened.

The tide had been turning, and a big wave s.n.a.t.c.hed at the tub, bearing it farther out than it had yet been, while the next inrolling wave went up onto the beach without so much as touching it.

Gwen screamed with fright, when she saw that now the tub was steadily going away from the sh.o.r.e.

There was no one in sight, and she sank in a little heap on the bottom of the tub, too tired to continue shouting, and frightened at the thought of drifting out to sea.

The gulls flew down and looked at her as if wondering what she might be, and Gwen cowered, afraid of their great, flapping wings.

No one could say what might have happened, but just at the moment when her last bit of courage had fled, a fortunate thing occurred.

A tiny fis.h.i.+ng craft was coming in, and as it neared the sh.o.r.e, one of the crew spied the floating tub, then a few moments later the man exclaimed:

"Why, there's a child in that leaky old tub, as true as I live!"

"Hi, there!" he shouted, and Gwen looked up, and wildly waved her hands.

"Sit still!" he commanded, "or something'll happen. Keep still, an'

we'll pull ye in when ye come 'long side."

Very thankful was Gwen when later, she found herself safe on the deck, the rough tub bobbing away across the waves, while the fishermen listened to her story of the trick that Max had played.

"If that boy was mine I know what he'd get, for doing a mean trick like that!" said one man, to which another responded:

"And I'd be glad ter help ye give it ter him."

One would have thought that Mrs. Harcourt might have been anxious because of Gwen's long absence, and her non-appearance at the noon meal, but such was not the case.

Some one at the table spoke of Gwen, asking if she were ill.

"Oh, dear no!" Mrs. Harcourt said, with a light laugh; "Gwen is never ill, but she is so very popular that when she does not appear at meal time, I know that someone has urged her to lunch at her home. Gwen is dearly loved, and so is constantly being coaxed to remain at this house or that."

The other guests could not be blamed if they wondered who it might be who continually longed to have Gwen as a guest.

When the noon meal was over, the guests made their way out onto the piazza, seating themselves in little groups for an afternoon of chat and gossip.

Some of the ladies were doing fancy work with gay colored silks. Mrs.

Harcourt always brought her embroidery frame to the piazza. Not that she did much needlework, but she thought it looked well to have it with her, even if she talked for hours, while the frame lay idle in her lap.

Someone said that the same piece of work was in the frame that was in it on the day of her arrival weeks before.

She had taken a seat at the far end of the piazza, and she now looked about her to see who might be near her.

A tall matron, standing at a short distance, turned, and seeing a large rocker behind Mrs. Harcourt, walked slowly over, and seated herself in it. She had just arrived, and so had not yet seen Gwen.

Here was a chance to talk to a listener who did not know her little daughter, and Mrs. Harcourt grasped it.

"You doubtless heard me telling the others how everyone loves my small girl," she said.

"Yes, I heard what you said," the woman replied, in a manner that implied her lack of interest, but Mrs. Harcourt did not notice that.

"Well, really, when you see Gwen, you will not wonder, for you, like everyone else, will enjoy her. She's _so_ original."

Just at this point those who sat near the railing noticed two odd looking figures toiling up the rough-hewn stairway on the cliff.

Those who watched them turned to exchange amused glances, and then look toward Mrs. Harcourt.

Quite unaware of what was going on, Mrs. Harcourt continued:

"As I was saying, Gwen is really very unusual, and original, and at the same time, she is so very sweet tempered, that----," but the sentence was interrupted by the appearance upon the piazza of a rough looking fisherman, and a drenched, and very dirty small girl, whose sailor frock was wet with sea water, and be-daubed with cement. Her eyes were red and swollen with crying, her hair had lost its ribbon, and hung about her face. Truly she did not look attractive.

"Could any of you fine ladies put down your needles long 'nough ter hear where I found this little la.s.s?" said the man, "fer she looks like she needed 'tendin' to."

Gwen could at once have run to her mother, but she chose to cling to the fisherman's rough hand, and be gazed upon as an abused child. Mrs.