The “Water Witch” rocked lazily on the breast of the waves, awaiting the coming of the four girls, who had planned to row up the bay on a voyage of discovery. They were not much interested in staying about among the Cape May cottagers, after the conversation which they had innocently overheard from the deck of the launch the night before. Of course, if Mrs. Curtis and Tom had come on to Cape May at once to occupy their cottage, as they had expected to do, all would have been well. The four young women and their chaperon would have been immediately introduced to the society of the Cape. However, the girls were not repining at their lack of society. They had each other; there was the old town of Cape May to be explored with the great ocean on one side and Delaware Bay on the other.

“Do be careful, children,” called Miss Jenny Ann warningly as the girls arranged themselves for a row in their skiff. “In all our experience on the water I never saw so many yachts and pleasure boats as there are on these waters. If you don’t keep a sharp lookout one of the larger boats may run into you. Don’t get into trouble.”

“We are going away from trouble, Miss Jenny Ann,” protested Phil. “There is a yacht club on the sound, but we are going to row up the bay past the shoals and get as far from civilization as possible.”

Madge stood up in the skiff and waved her hand to their chaperon. The girls looked like a small detachment of feminine naval cadets in their nautical uniforms. Each one of them wore a dark blue serge skirt of ankle length and a middy blouse with a blue sailor collar. They were without hats, as they hoped to get a coating of seashore tan without wasting any time.

“I shall expect you home by noon,” were Miss Jenny Ann’s final words as the “Water Witch” danced away from the houseboat.

“Aye, aye, Skipper!” the girls called back in chorus. “Shall we bring back lobsters or clams for luncheon, if we can find them?”

“Clams!” hallooed Miss Jenny Ann through her hands. “I am dreadfully afraid of live lobsters.” Then the houseboat chaperon retired to write a letter to an artist, a Mr. Theodore Brown, whose acquaintance she had made during the first of the houseboat holidays. He had suggested that he would like to come to Cape May some time later in the summer if any of his houseboat friends would be pleased to see him, and she was writing to tell him just how greatly pleased they would be.

The “Merry Maid” had found a quiet anchorage in one of the smaller inlets of the Delaware Bay, not far from the town of Cape May. The larger number of the summer cottages were farther away on the tiny islands near the sound and along the ocean front.

The “Water Witch” sped gayly over the blue waters of the bay in the brilliant late June sunshine. Madge and Phil, as usual, were at the oars. Tania crouched quietly at Lillian’s feet in the stern of the skiff. Eleanor sat in the prow.

“What do you think of it all, Tania?” Madge asked the little adopted houseboat daughter. Tania had been very silent since their arrival at the seashore. If she were impressed at the wonderful and beautiful things she had seen since she left New York City, she had, so far, said nothing.

Her large black eyes blinked in the dazzling light. She was looking straight up toward the sky in a curious, absorbed fashion. “I was trying to make up my mind, Madge, if this place was as beautiful as my kingdom in Fairyland,” answered Tania seriously, “and I believe it is.”

“Have you a kingdom in Fairyland, little Tania?” inquired Phil gently. She did not understand the child’s odd fancies, as Madge did.

Tania nodded her head quietly. “Of course I have,” she returned simply. “Hasn’t every one a Fairyland, where things are just as they should be, beautiful and good and kind? I am the queen of my kingdom.”

Phil looked puzzled, but Madge only laughed. “Don’t mind Tania, Phil. She is going to be a very sensible little houseboat girl before our holiday is over. Besides, I understand her. She only says some of the things I used to think when I was a tiny child. But I do wish the people on the boats would not stare at us so; there is nothing very wonderful in our appearance.”

The girls were trying to guide their rowboat among the other larger craft that were afloat on the bay. They wished to get into the more remote waters. In the meantime it was embarrassing to have smartly dressed women and girls put up their lorgnettes and opera glasses to gaze at the girls as the latter rowed by.

“Can there be anything the matter with us?” asked Phil solicitously. “I never saw anything like this fire of inquisitive stares.”

“Of course not, Phil,” answered Lillian sensibly. “It is only because we are strangers at Cape May, and most of the people whom we see about come here each year. Then we are the only persons who live in a Noah’s ark, as those pleasant people on the yacht called our pretty ‘Merry Maid’ last night. Don’t worry. Have you thought how odd it is that we won’t even know them if we should be introduced to them later? We did not see either them or their boat very plainly last night; we only overheard them talking.”

“But I’ll know the voice of that woman who screamed,” replied Madge rather grimly. “I just dare her to shriek again without my recognizing her dulcet tones.”

The girls were now drawing away from the crowded end of the bay. They kept along fairly close to the shore. There was an occasional house near the water, but these dwellings were farther and farther apart. Finally the girls rowed for half a mile without seeing any residence save an occasional fisherman’s hut. They hoped to reach some place where they could catch at least a glimpse of the wonderful cedar woods that flourish farther up the coast of the bay.

Suddenly Lillian sang out: “Look, girls, there is the dearest little house! It is almost in the water. It rivals our houseboat, it is so like a ship. Isn’t it too cunning for anything!”

Madge and Phyllis rested on their oars. The girls stared curiously.

They saw a house built of shingles that had turned a soft gray which exactly resembled an old three-masted schooner. It had a tiny porch in front, but the first roof ended in a point, the second rose higher, like a larger sail, and the third, which must have covered the kitchen, was about the height of the first.

“See, Tania, I can make the funny house by putting my fingers together,” laughed Lillian. “My thumbs are the first roof, my three fingers the second, and my little fingers the last.”

The girls rowed nearer the odd cottage. The place was deserted; at least they saw no one about. Over the front door of the house hung a trim little sign inscribed, “The Anchorage.”

“Dear me, here is a boathouse, and we’ve a houseboat!” exclaimed Eleanor. “I wish we dared go ashore and knock at the door, to ask some one to show us over it.”

“I don’t think we had better try it, Eleanor,” remonstrated Phil. “The house probably belongs to some grouchy old sea captain who has built it to get away from people.”

At this moment a man at least six feet tall, wearing old yellow tarpaulins, came around the side of the house of the three sails with a large basket on each arm. He sat down on a rock in front of the house and began lifting mussel and oyster shells out of one of his baskets. He would peer at them earnestly before throwing them over to one side. He was a giant of a man, past middle age. His face was so weather-beaten that his skin was like leather. His eyes were blue as only a sailor’s eyes can be. On one of the man’s shoulders perched a wizened little monkey that every now and then tugged at its master’s grizzled hair or chattered in his ear.

The man did not observe the girls in the rowboat, although they were only a few yards away.

“Good morning,” sang out Madge cheerfully, forgetting the vow of silence which the girls had made that morning against the Cape Mayites. But then, the girls had never dreamed of seeing such a fascinating seafaring old mariner. Their vow had been taken against the society people.

The sailor, however, did not return Madge’s friendly salutation; he went on examining his oyster and mussel shells.

Madge looked crestfallen. The old sailor had such a splendid, strong face. He did not seem to be the kind of man who would fail to return a friendly good morning greeting.

“I don’t think he heard you, Madge. Let’s all halloo together,” proposed Lillian.

“Good morning!” shouted five young voices in a mischievous chorus.

The seaman lifted his big head. His smile came slowly, wrinkling his face into heavy creases. “Good morning, mates,” he called heartily. “Coming ashore?”

“Oh, may we?” cried Madge in return. “We should dearly love to!”

The five girls needed no further invitation. They piled out of the “Water Witch” before their host could come near enough to assist them.

The seaman did not invite them into the house. The girls took their seats on the big rock near the water. Madge was farthest away, but promptly the monkey leaped from its master’s shoulder and planted itself in Madge’s hair, pulling the strands violently while he chattered angrily.

“You horrid little thing!” she cried; “you hurt. I wonder if you hate red hair. Is that the reason you are trying to pull mine out? Please, somebody, take this playful beast away.”

The old sea captain, as the girls guessed him to be, promptly came to Madge’s rescue and removed the angry monkey.

“You must forgive my pet,” he remarked kindly. “My little Madge is jealous. She doesn’t like strangers and we don’t often have young lady visitors.”

“Madge!” exclaimed the little captain, smiling as she tried to re-arrange her hair. “What a funny name for a monkey. Why, that is my name!”

After a few advances the monkey became very friendly with the other girls, but she would have nothing to do with Madge. She would fly into a perfect tempest of rage whenever Madge approached her or tried to talk to her. The monkey even deserted her master to perch in Tania’s arms. The animal put its little, scrawny arms about the queer child’s neck, and there was almost the same elfish, wistful look in both pairs of dark eyes.

“Do you catch many fish in these waters?” inquired Eleanor, whose housewifely soul was interested in the big basket of lobsters that she saw crawling about, writhing and twisting as though they were in agony.

“Almost every kind that lives in temperate waters,” answered the sailor, “but there is nothing like the variety one finds in the tropics.”

“Were you once a sea captain?” asked Lillian curiously.

The man shook his head. “I’m not a captain in the United States service,” he returned. “I am called captain in these parts, ‘Captain Jules,’ but I have only commanded a freight schooner.”

“I know I have no right to be so curious,” interposed Madge, “but I dearly love everything about the sea. Were you ever a deep sea diver? Somehow you look like one.”

“I was a pearl-fisher for many years,” the seaman answered as calmly as though diving for pearls was one of the most ordinary trades in the world. But his eyes twinkled as he heard Madge’s gasp of admiration and caught the expression on the faces of the other girls.

“You were looking for pearls in those oysters and mussel shells when our boat came along, weren’t you?” divined Madge, regarding him with large eyes.

The man nodded a smiling answer.

“Yes, but I didn’t expect to find any pearls,” he answered. “It is strange how a man’s old occupation will cling to him, even after he has long ago given it up. There are very few pearls to be found now in the Delaware Bay or the waters around here.”

Captain Jules was gravely removing lobsters from his basket for Tania’s entertainment while he talked to Madge. Tania was watching him, breathless with admiration and terror. The captain would take hold of one of the great, crawling things, rub it softly on its horned head as one would rub a tabby cat to make it purr. He would then set the lobster up on its hind claws and the funny crustacean would fall quietly asleep, as though it were nodding in a chair.

“I never saw anything so queer in my life,” chuckled Phil. “You hypnotize the lobsters, don’t you?”

Captain Jules shook his shaggy head. He was proud of the appreciation his accomplishment had excited. “No; I don’t hypnotize them,” he explained. “Anybody can make old Father Lobster fall asleep if he only rubs him in the right place. You are not going, are you?” for the girls had risen to depart.

“I am afraid we must,” said Madge; “we promised to get back to our houseboat by noon. If you come down to Cape May, won’t you please come to see us? Our houseboat is a rival to your boathouse.”

“You are very kind,” answered the old captain, shaking his head, “but I don’t do much visiting. I thank you just the same. Let me fix you up a basket of fish. Afraid of the lobsters, aren’t you, little girl?” he said, smiling at Tania.

The old sailor followed his visitors to help them aboard their rowboat. He walked beside Madge, keeping a careful watch on his monkey, which still chattered and gesticulated, showing her hatred of the little captain.

The girls realized that this man had the manners of a gentleman, although he looked as rough and uncouth as a common sailor. There was a kind of nobility about him, as of a man who has lived and fought with the big things of the earth.

Madge looked at him beseechingly just before they arrived at their skiff. Now, when Madge desired anything very greatly she was hard to resist. Her blue eyes wore their most bewitching expression. “Please,” she faltered, “I want you to do me a favor. I know I have no right to ask it, but, but——”

“What is it?” inquired Captain Jules, smiling.

“Have you your diving suit?” asked Madge. “If you have, and you would show it to me some day, I would be too happy for words.” Madge blushed at her own temerity.

The captain shook his head. There was little encouragement in his expression. “Maybe, some day,” he replied vaguely; “but I have had the suit put away for some time. Who knows when I will go down into the sea again? Be careful in that small skiff,” he warned the girls. “There are so many launches about on these waters, run by men and women that don’t know the very first principles of running a boat, that a small craft like yours may easily drift into danger. You must look lively.”

The girls waved their good-byes as Madge and Phil pulled away. Madge noticed that the old sailor stared curiously at her, and every now and then he shook his head and frowned. Madge supposed it was because she had been so bold as to ask a favor of a perfect stranger. Yet, if she could only see Captain Jules again and he might be persuaded to show her his diving suit and to tell her something of the strange business of pearl-fishing, she couldn’t be really sorry for her impudence. This accidental meeting with an old sailor inspired Madge afresh with her love of the sea and the mystery of it. She could not get the man out of her mind, nor her own desire to see him soon again and to ask him more questions.

As for Captain Jules, when the girls had fairly gone he lighted his pipe and strode along the line of the shore. “It’s a funny thing, Madge,” he said, addressing the monkey, “but when a man gets an idea in his head, everything and everybody he sees seems to start the same old idea a-going. I wish I had asked her to tell me her surname. I wonder if she is the real Madge?”