At ten o’clock sharp the next morning the girls saw the Captain’s dory round the curve of the bay shore from Fair Havens, and make for the Knob. Nancy waved her hand to them, her face shaded by a pink sunbonnet. The girls were already in the water, paddling around in their new swimming suits, and splashing one another. Ted, Kate, and Polly, could just manage to keep their chins above water, and float, but the rest kept at waist-deep limits.

“We brought along some ring buoys,” said Nancy, as she stepped out of the dory, and helped run it up the beach. “That’s how I learned to swim. If you just hold on to one and start out with your feet, you can learn to use one arm at a time.”

That they were very willing and obedient pupils, even the Captain had to admit. Nancy was the teacher, while the Captain stood by in case of trouble, and gave orders.

“Let yourself go,” Nancy urged Sue, as the latter clung closely to her in the deep water. “Just let yourself go, and you’ll find out you’re floating.”

Sue obeyed, willingly enough, and the next instant a pair of stockinged feet waved in the air above the water. As Nancy pulled her up, spluttering, she laughed, and insisted on going ahead, and before she realized it she was making the stroke properly and could keep herself afloat.

Polly had caught the stroke almost at once, and was swimming around helping Nancy. Ruth and Kate went about it practically, counting their strokes, and trying first in water up to their armpits. But Isabel waded in and sat down at ease in the water, just where the waves could curl up around her comfortably. Then she proceeded to loosen her hair, and give it a good wetting. Then back on a rock she climbed, and sat there, letting it dry in the sun.

“Come on in,” called Polly, splashing her with water. “You mustn’t sit up on that rock and play you’re a nixie or a mermaid while we have to work so hard. Come on in, and swim.”

“Oh, Polly, I don’t think I want to,” said Isabel, anxiously. “I can’t keep the water out of my eyes.”

“Fiddlesticks,” cried the Commodore; “come and splash her, girls,” and they drove Isabel back to work like the rest.

“Now then, now then,” shouted the Captain in his rolling bass. “Keep at it lively, keep at it lively. Tom’s coming with the boats at noon if the wind holds fair, and you must learn how to keep your heads out of the bay.”

So they kept at it diligently, and when it was over they went up on the beach. While they lay around in the warn sand, the Captain took Nancy and gave a regular life-saving drill to show them what to do in case of danger.

“First aid to the injured class,” Polly called it, and it was a good name.

“Don’t scream and get excited. That’s the first and last rule I want to give you,” he told them, emphatically. “What would you think of a boat crew of life-savers whooping at the top of their lungs when they were going out at a call? If you do happen to fall overboard, or you see one of the others in trouble, don’t run and call for help. Keep cool, and get right down to business.”

“Don’t people who are in danger of drowning try to catch hold of any one who goes to rescue them, and they both are lost?” asked Isabel, doubtfully. “I should think it would be better to throw them a buoy or a life preserver or something.”

“That’s something you don’t worry about,” the Captain told her, comfortably. “I guess if people had always been thinking of that sort of thing, there would never have been any life saving apparatus at all. I sorter feel that we must leave a whole lot to Him who holdeth the sea in the hollow of His hand. Now, remember what I did just now, and how I did it. I’ll drill you on it next week. You never can tell when it will come in handy. Don’t start giving a drowned person strong black coffee or clam chowder the first thing to brace them up, do you mind me? ’Tain’t done by real life savers.” The Captain’s eyes twinkled. “Just roll them over a barrel, or your knee, and get the water out of them; then take hold of their tongue, using a piece of clean cloth, and get somebody else to work their arms up and down, and if there’s any beat left in their heart it’s going to start up again. And when you do start them going, then it’s time enough to give them coffee, or hot ginger tea, or anything. Mother’s great on hot ginger tea, and I don’t know but what prayer and ginger ought to be counted in with the first aid to the injured. I use them both myself in strong doses.”

Promptly at eleven they all straggled up the beach, a happy, dripping lot, running in to dress and get luncheon over before Tom came with the boats.

“Do you think we’ll do, Captain?” asked Polly, when she reappeared.

“Do? Of course you’ll do. I’ll come over every morning on my way to the Point for a week and drill you until you can swim. Now you take Nancy and Tom out with you this afternoon. It’s calm and easy, with a light breeze blowing off shore. Better try going out in two of the boats for a few days with Nancy and Tom to show you how to handle them.”

Sue ran upstairs to the “lookout,” to see if their fleet was in sight.

“Sister Anne, Sister Anne, do you see anyone coming?” called Ted, merrily.

“Here’s Tom,” Sue cried. “Oh, I wonder how soon I can make a boat act like that.”

Tom came around the bay from Fair Havens beautifully. He was showing off his sailor craft freely, and the fifteen-footer was as tame to his touch as a horse to the rein. Polly watched him eagerly, as he brought it gracefully to the landing. The name on the prow was the Tidy Jane.

“That’s the best sail boat in the lot,” the Captain declared, as he left them. “Nancy named her after the first fishing boat I sailed on up to the Banks of Newfoundland. And she’s a good one. She’s shapely as a sloop-o’-war, and twice as slippery.”

“Then she ought to be the flag ship,” said Kate. “Why don’t you take her, Polly?”

Polly’s face fairly glowed with pride and pleasure. Although in a way the whole club owed its existence to her, and she was the ruling spirit, yet she never allowed the girls to give her, as Crullers said flatly, “the best of everything.” In a hundred ways she showed a steady, loving generosity and unfailing thoughtfulness and courtesy to her “crew,” as the Admiral called the rest of the club, but Polly said he was wrong.

“A crew mans one boat or vessel, but we are an independent club of yacht racers.”

So to-day when the Tidy Jane was handed over to her, she hesitated, saying that it didn’t seem fair to the rest. But the rest insisted and Polly consented.

“Why, I’d love her just on account of her name,” she said, as she ran down to the landing, and stepped over into the cockpit. “You go back and get the other boats, Tom, please. We shall want to look this one all over till we know the name of every part of her and just what it is for.”

“I’ll bring up a knockabout next,” said Tom.

“What’s the difference between a catboat and a knockabout?” asked Ted.

“A cat’s different from all other yachts because her mast is set right up in the eyes of her,” explained Tom. “And she’s broader beamed, and wider, and has only one sail.”

“She’s a beauty,” Sue exclaimed, and Polly nodded.

“I know it,” she laughed.

Tom made six more trips, and finally the last of the boats lay close to the little landing. It was a long-remembered afternoon, as under Tom’s guidance the girls had their first lesson in sailing them. The day was a perfect one. A southerly breeze came up, just enough to bear them lightly on their course over the bay. The Admiral had come down during the afternoon and had given much valuable advice; but as Polly said herself, as she stood on the porch at sundown, her face already tanned and sleeves turned back to the elbows:

“All the advice in the world won’t help us to sail these boats till we know all about them ourselves, know every bit of wood in them, and every inch of sail, and every cleat and bolt and pin—”

“Don’t they call them pintles?” suggested Kate, but Polly never noticed the interruption.

“And we know what they’re going to do next in all sorts of weather. But I like it, don’t you, girls?”

“It’s glorious,” cried Ruth, enthusiastically. Her hair was hanging down her back, while she brushed it vigorously, trying to get the salt water harshness out of it. “I’ve named my yacht the Iris. It means a rainbow.”

“Mine’s the Patsy D.,” Sue said complacently. “I’ve always wanted a boat named the Patsy D.”

“Patsy D.,” exclaimed Polly, laughing. “Why do you want to call her that?”

“Because,” said Sue, firmly, “I want a name that will be simple and vigorous, and easy to say, and besides the only boat I ever had a really happy sail on was named the Patsy D. It’s the excursion steamer that runs around Chesapeake Bay for Sunday-school outings, and last year she bumped into something and spoiled the shape of her lovely nose, and now she’s a barge down at Newport News. So I shall perpetuate her memory and call my yacht the Patsy D.; and you may name yours after all the rainbows and other beauties in creation. I believe that names should be suggestive of pleasant memories.”

“Hurrah for the Patsy D.,” sang out Ted from the couch corner.

“I don’t care if you do make fun of it. She’s the Patsy D. all the same,” said Sue, stoutly.

“How can she be the Patsy D.?” asked Polly, teasingly.

“Well, she is,” retorted Sue. “Maybe her real name’s Patricia.”

“My boat is the Witch Cat and Kate’s the Hurricane,” said Ted slowly; “so we shall not have the trouble of naming ours.”

“Tom says my boat is called the Spray. Do you like that, Polly?”

“Yes, I do,” said Polly. “Don’t you?”

“Not very much. I thought I’d change it to the Lurline, or Lorelie.”

“I like the Spray the best. The name of the yacht Dorothy and Bess Vaughan sail is the Nixie. You don’t want to get too near to that. Crullers, have you named yours? It’s the smallest one in the lot, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Her name is the Yum-Yum. The sail is like a junk boat’s,” Crullers announced, thoughtfully; “or a bat’s wing.”

“Tom says the boys fitted it out that way, just for a novelty. It’s broad, and deep, and wide, and positively unsinkable.”

“I’ve got two life preservers, and three ring buoys in the lockers,” Crullers said. “Tom and the Captain put them in there so I’d feel perfectly safe and easy.”

“Safe and easy? Safe and easy?” Aunty Welcome’s voice came from the kitchen. “Dey ain’t nuffin on earth could make me feel easy a-sailing round on de face ob de deep like a leviathan. You couldn’t get me on dat waste of waters in sech a li’l’ boat for all de gold in de bowels ob de earth. No, sah.”

“Oh, but, Aunty, you’re going in swimming with us some day,” coaxed Polly.

“Deed, I wouldn’t any more’n I’d step into an open grabe and pull de cover in after me,” protested Welcome. “Last night I couldn’t sleep a wink a-listening to de rolling ob de waves.”

“Girls, just look out there,” cried Kate suddenly, as she rose and pointed over the bay towards the Point Light. It was past sunset, the purple hour, as Polly always called it, and the whole world lay wrapped in softest violet. From somewhere beyond the Point, a deep, long-drawn whistle sounded, then another, then another. A faint sound of music drifted to them on the night air, and as the steamer rounded, they caught a glimpse of her cabin lights, a row of gleaming diamonds against the gloom of the twilight. Then a search-light sent a quick arm of radiance flashing over the bay, and for a second the little group on the porch were right in its path, before it swept on.

“I didn’t know any steamers ran in here,” said Polly. “Isn’t that splendid? Perhaps it comes often, and it’s really company just to see it go by.”

“It must be the Portland boat,” said Kate. “There’s one that makes a landing at Eastport, Tom said, and stops first at the hotel pier, before it goes up through the inlet.”

“Then that must be the steamer that grandfather meant, when he said he would go back by boat. He’ll go from Eastport to Portland, then down the coast to Boston, and so on straight south.”

“Then we’ll be alone away off here,” said Isabel, sadly. “Doesn’t it seem deserted? Think of it when there’s a storm.”

“And the thunders roll from pole to pole,” groaned Polly, mischievously. “Sue, get your mandolin, quick. Let’s play something that will ‘soothe this restless feeling and banish the thoughts of day.’”

Across the inlet made by the Knob’s projection into the bay, the sound of music floated even to Fair Havens, and Nancy stopped her evening task of washing the supper dishes to listen at the open door. The girls over at the Knob were singing, with the three mandolins and guitar giving a splendid accompaniment. Across the water the melody seemed indescribably softened and enhanced, as the gay, girlish tones rang out:

“I just love that bing, bing part,” said Nancy, drawing in a deep breath. “May I go over some evening, mother, and hear them play?”

“Indeed, you may,” Mrs. Carey replied heartily. “For they seem to be as warm-hearted and well-mannered a lot of girls as I ever did see, and the Captain, your father, agrees with me.”

“They’re not like those Vaughan girls from the hotel,” Tom said, stopping his whistling long enough to join in the conversation. “They had that knockabout of theirs out on the bay to-day, and when I sent out a hail at them they never even waved a hand. Some folks haven’t any more sociability than a mosquito.”

“They waved to Polly, Tom,” Nancy said; “but then I do believe the fish would stand up on their tails and waggle their fins at her, if she sang out to them.”

“What was it that father said about her?” asked Mrs. Carey, smiling till her blue eyes were almost hidden in wrinkles, as she stopped her mending a moment, and leaned back in the big, red rocker beside the south window where the roses climbed.

“Said she carried the starriest top-lights he ever saw on a craft under her t’gallant eyebrows.”

Mrs. Carey laughed as she turned to her sewing.

“Well, she has a pair of the brownest eyes, seems to me, I ever saw. And she’s lively too. I’d a sight rather have those girls than a pack of boys raising hob over there on the island all summer long. I hope nothing will happen to any of them.” She looked out of the window towards the Knob. Its outlines showed up darkly against the night sky, but the music had died away and no light was to be seen. “I think I’ll tell the girls to put a lamp in that side window every night, so I’ll know they’re safe and comfortable.”

So after that first night, all summer long while the Polly Page Yacht Club held forth on Lost Island, a beacon light was placed at the side window to assure the Careys all was well.