They had a delightful dinner at the Waloo. Granny gazed around the big room rather awed by the ornate display of rose velvet and gold, the crystal electroliers, and the army of waiters.

"I suppose this is what you'll have all the time in the Sunshine Islands," she said with pride. "Just think of your Uncle Pete, Tessie, sitting down to dinner every day in a room like this and to a dinner like this. I don't wonder he never came home. The good Lord has sure been kind to the Gilfoolys!"

Tessie did not eat much, and she did not talk much. She was still too dazed at what had happened. She could not believe that it was true. It couldn't be true that she was in the dining room of the Waloo Hotel, with Mr. Bill as the host of a family party—a family party of Gilfoolys! Such things never happened to poor working girls. But Mr. Bill's radiant smile and eager attention convinced her that at least he was real.

Gilbert Douglas was with a party of young people at the other end of the room. He came over to speak to Tessie, and tell her that he would call for her the next morning about ten. Mr. Bill yearned to stab him with his dinner knife. When Bert went back to his friends and told them who Tessie was, there were many curious and admiring, and almost as many envious, glances sent toward her. Altogether it was a very pleasant dinner. But Tessie would not loiter over the coffee—not even to listen to the orchestra nor to dance once with Mr. Bill.

"I'd faint," she declared. "I feel all wobbly sitting down. And I want to stop at the library. It closes at nine. And anyway it wouldn't be right to Uncle Pete. We had to have something to eat, but we don't have to dance."

Every one in the big dining room seemed to know who Tessie was when she left, and there was much craning of necks and whispering. The head waiter bowed them out with much ceremony and hoped that Tessie would come again. Tessie was pink to her little ears, and she shyly murmured that she would like to come again.

They reached the library barely in time. The librarian was just locking the door of the branch station when Mr. Bill and Tessie ran up to her. She obligingly unlocked the door and went back with them.

"The Sunshine Islands," she repeated, when she heard Tessie breathlessly explain what she wanted. "I never heard of them."

"They're in the Pacific Ocean." Tessie told her with much importance.

"We have several books that speak of the islands in the Pacific Ocean," the librarian remembered. "But why on earth do you come running in here at this time of night to ask for books on the Sunshine Islands?" And she looked from pink-cheeked Tessie to grinning Mr. Bill, as if she would not produce one of her books until that question was answered.

"Because," dimpled Tessie, who saw no reason why she should not tell—it was nothing to be ashamed of, and she felt that she had to give some reason for taking the librarian back to her library after the door had been locked for the night—"because I've just heard that I'm the Queen of the Sunshine Islands!"

"My goodness!" exclaimed the surprised librarian, and she found Tessie all the books which mentioned the islands in the Pacific Ocean. "There!" she said. "If you read all these you'll learn something about your kingdom. The best book," she remembered with a frown, "the one that tells all about the Pacific islands is out. A man came in after dinner and took it."

"What kind of a man?" asked Mr. Bill, not because he cared but because the librarian seemed to expect something to be said.

"A tall man, young and thin, with rough brown hair and brown eyes and rather shabby clothes." The librarian appeared to describe her client by looking at Mr. Bill and seeing his opposite.

"It must have been Joe Cary!" exclaimed Tessie. "It would be just like Joe to learn everything about my kingdom before I can read a word!" She looked vexed.

"Save you a lot of trouble," suggested Mr. Bill. "He can tell you what he learns, and you won't have much time for reading now."

"That's true!" Tessie stopped frowning to smile. "I'll let Joe do my reading for me. That's the way queens do, isn't it?—have some one do things for them? Thank you for the books." She turned politely to the librarian, who was staring at her with unbelieving amazement.

"My goodness! I'm much obliged to you for coming in for those books even if you never read them. I've been librarian at this branch station for three years now, and nothing as interesting as this ever happened. I hope you'll be a very happy queen!" And the librarian drew a long breath. She had never supposed that she would ever tell a queen to her face that she hoped she would be happy. Such things might happen in books, but surely they had never happened before in a real library.

"Thank you," said Tessie, putting out her hand to shake the librarian's lean fingers. "I'm going to try to be a good queen."

"My goodness!" repeated the librarian, as Tessie, Mr. Bill and the books went to join Granny and Johnny. "My goodness, but I'm glad I didn't close up a minute earlier than I did!"

There were no lights in the narrow street when Mr. Bill turned his car away from the avenue. In contrast to the brilliantly lighted thoroughfare, the street seemed darker than a pocket. The city fathers depended on the moon for illumination on certain nights designated by the almanac, and if the moon was dilatory or negligent, that was not their fault. The lights on Mr. Bill's car were all he had to show him the way, but with their aid, he found the shabby little cottage without any trouble at all.

"It's been a very pleasant evening," Granny said politely, as she stepped from the car. "I'm sure we've all enjoyed it, and we have the liver and onions for to-morrow night when we've had time to calm down a bit. Good night, Mr——" She discovered she had forgotten Mr. Bill's name. She was horrified.

"Call me Bill!" begged Mr. Bill in the friendliest way. "I'm such a friend of your granddaughter's—at least I'm going to be such a friend—we belonged to the same family, you know, the Evergreen—that I want to be a friend of yours, too."

"You've proved yourself a friend," beamed Granny. "I declare I'm that tired I'll be glad to go to bed. I'm not as young as I was, and it's a good deal of a strain for an old woman to hear all in one day that her son was a king and that her granddaughter is a queen. Come, Johnny, we'll go right to bed. Good night, Bill, and thank you kindly."

She was tired, and her step was heavy as she went along the walk and up the steps. On the narrow porch her foot touched something that gave beneath her weight. It was soft, and yet it wasn't. Granny drew back her foot, stood still and screamed. There was—yes, there was something on her nice clean porch that did not belong there!

"I'll make a light," offered the resourceful Scout.

"Not with two sticks of wood," objected Tessie, who had run to her grandmother and was staring at the black shadow on the porch floor. "It takes too long!"

"I got a match, silly!" retorted her brother. "We can use matches when we got 'em!"

But Mr. Bill had struck a match, and by its feeble light they could see that the black shadow was the body of a man, huddled on Granny's nice clean porch. Granny shrieked again.

"My soul and body!" she cried. "This is too much!" And she sat heavily down on the step. "I don't like men murdered on my front porch!" she wailed.

"Murdered!" Tessie shrieked, too.

"He isn't murdered," declared Mr. Bill, who had been bending over the body. "At least I don't think he is. Darn it!" For the match flickered and went out.

"Who—who is it?" whispered Tessie, and she trembled so that Mr. Bill had to put his arm around her. "Who is it?"

"I don't know. He looks like a black man—at least he isn't a white man. And I caught a glimpse of an earring as the match went out. We must get some light!" He looked about for some light, but the resourceful Scout had taken the key from Granny's limp fingers, thrown the door open and turned on the light in the hall. There was a white stream through the doorway, and as it fell on the dark face of the man on the porch, he moved slightly and moaned.

"Thank the good Lord he isn't dead!" Granny stumbled to her feet. "Who are you and what do you want?" she asked the stranger sharply. "I'll bet he was after that Tear of God, Tessie," she said, as the dark head moved away from her, and she, like Mr. Bill, caught a glimpse of an earring.

"Oh!" Tessie's fingers felt for the royal jewel. It was there in her pocket, and she grasped it eagerly. Just suppose she had lost it!

"I'll take him away," offered Mr. Bill. "You don't want him here. I'll take him away."

"Hello! What's up here, Mrs. Gilfooly?" And there was Officer Clancy peering at them. "What's the matter here?"

"Well, Mr. Clancy!" Granny turned eagerly around. "I'm sure glad to see you to-night. We go out for a pleasant dinner with a friend of my granddaughter, who's just learned that her Uncle Pete, my eldest, has made her Queen of the Sunshine Islands, and we come home to find this dark-complected gentleman on my nice clean front porch. I almost stepped on him." She shuddered as she recalled her sensations when she put her foot on the dark-complexioned gentleman. "I couldn't think what it was, but it was him!" And she waved her hand toward the stranger who had managed to sit up, and was staring around with dull eyes.

It was no wonder that Officer Clancy was dazed and bewildered to hear Granny talk so glibly of queens and porches, but he stooped over the stranger, who curled up like a snail.

"Now then, my man, what are you doing here, frightening the ladies out of their wits?" asked Clancy sharply.

The stranger shrank away and muttered something. The words sounded like "The Shark! The Shark!" but Granny thought that her ears must have deceived her. A shark was a fish that lived in the ocean. There were no sharks in her neighborhood.

"The shark! The shark!" was all the stranger would say that any one could understand, although he stammered a lot of words that sounded like anything but language to the little group gathered around him.

"I can't make head nor tail of what he says!" Officer Clancy exclaimed helplessly. "I'll try him again. Now then, my man, what were you doing here?"

"On my nice clean porch!" added Granny shrilly.

But the man only muttered some more of the unintelligible gibberish jumbled around the word "Shark." Officer Clancy jerked him to his feet, and he stood leaning weakly against the policeman.

"I better take him along to the station," the latter suggested. "He hasn't done any harm, has he? Maybe he was taken sick as he was passing by, and came in to get help," he suggested eagerly.

"He's got a lump as big as an egg on the back of his head," declared Mr. Bill. "Looks to me as if somebody had blackjacked him!"

"That so?" Officer Clancy looked at the head whose black thatch was unlike any hair he had ever seen before. "There is a lump there! I expect that was it, Mrs. Gilfooly. Somebody slugged him, and he crawled up on your porch and fainted. And I bet I saw the guy that did it! I passed a queer-looking chap not ten minutes ago. He was dark like this fellow, and his hair was frizzed for fair, and he was in his bare feet. He was walking fast and looking straight ahead of him. I remember I thought he was a fine figure of fun. I never saw anybody just like him."

"Could it have been Ka-kee-ta?" Tessie asked Mr. Bill in a frightened whisper. "He was in his bare feet." She shivered.

"Ka—oh, the chap Mr. Marvin spoke about. I wonder!" And Mr. Bill looked at Tessie.

Clancy's sharp ears heard their whispers. "Friend of yours?" he asked quickly.

"No, not a friend," Mr. Bill answered just as quickly. "Just a messenger of some sort. I think you're right, Officer, you better take this man away."

"I'll take him to the station until his mind clears up and he can tell us how it was. You can drive us over." He nodded to Mr. Bill.

"I would be glad to." But Mr. Bill sounded anything but glad. "Only I hate to leave Mrs. Gilfooly and Miss Gilfooly here alone."

"I guess I'm here!" shouted the insulted Boy Scout. "I guess I know what to do if anything happens!"

"There won't anything happen," promised Clancy. "It's happened. And I'll have the sergeant send a man right over to keep an eye out. I'm sure glad to hear of your luck, Miss Gilfooly." He turned to Tessie and solemnly shook her hand. "You'll make a fine queen!"

"I don't know as I want to be a queen if it means finding strange men fainting on our front porch," Tessie murmured almost tearfully.

"Perhaps I'd better stay," suggested Mr. Bill, as he saw how she trembled. "I can sit downstairs and read your books."

"You need your rest as well as we do if you're going to be any help to your pa to-morrow," objected Granny. "We'll be all right with Johnny and the man Officer Clancy sends up. You take that stranger to the station, Mr. Clancy, and lock him up tight. I'll bet he knows more than he's letting on." She peered into the dark face. "Thank the good Lord tattooed noses ain't fashionable in Waloo," she murmured. "Tessie, you ought to go to bed. There's Joe Cary!" She stopped as she heard a whistle up the street. "Joe! Joe Cary!" she called.

"Here!" answered Joe. "What's up?" he demanded as he came up the walk. "You can run along," he told Mr. Bill and Officer Clancy, when he heard the story. "I'll look after things here." When Mr. Bill had reluctantly said good night, holding Tessie's fingers until Joe took them from him, and gone away with Clancy and the stranger, Joe turned to Tessie.

"You'd better go to bed, Tess. You must be all tired out!"

"She is!" Granny answered for her. "We're all tired. I declare it does take it out of a body to have such wonderful things happen. Can you believe it, Joe? We had a nice dinner at the Waloo," she said, following him into the house. "And that Mr. Bill is a real pleasant young fellow. My soul and body!" she exclaimed, staring around in amazement, for the house which she had left as neat as wax was now in disorder. Drawers had been pulled out and their contents dumped on the floor, closets emptied in a way that startled and angered Granny. "Somebody's been here, Joe! Somebody has been all over this house!" She stared at Joe. "I expect they came to get that jewel of yours, Tessie," she guessed loudly. "That Tear of God! Thank goodness I didn't put it in the baking-powder can. Thank goodness you got it in your pocket! Well, this is too much!"

"There, there, Granny!" soothed Joe. "They didn't get anything. You trot up to bed, and Tess and I'll straighten things out."

It took some time before Granny could be persuaded to leave them and more time before the drawers were pushed into place and doors shut on the disordered closets. Joe looked at Tessie. Her face was milk-white and her eyes were heavy and tired.

"Well, Tess!" He put his hands on her shoulders so that she would look into his face. "What do you think about queens now? Are you still glad that you are such an old-fashioned, wornout thing as a queen?" He bent to peer into her eyes.

"I don't know," she faltered. She put up her hands to clasp his strong fingers. "It isn't what I thought it would be, if things like this are going to happen."

"All sorts of things happen to queens," prophesied Joe. "You have only to read the papers to know that. The world doesn't need queens any more. I'm sorry, Tessie," his hands slipped from her shoulders to her waist and he drew her to him. "I'm sorry you're one!" His voice was soft as velvet and honey-sweet.

But Tessie pushed him away. "Why, Joe Cary!" she exclaimed indignantly. "If that isn't just like you! You never want me to have any fun! You only want me to go to the Y. W. C. A. gymnasium, and to study shorthand!"

"I don't want you to be a queen!" he insisted stubbornly, his face flushed, his eyes snapping.

"Why not?" she asked defiantly, and when he did not answer her at once, she asked him again, more softly this time. "Why not, Joe Cary?"

"Because," he said, and he folded his arms across his chest and looked at her scornfully, "queens always think they are a darned sight better than other people. I'm one of the other people, but you needn't think you are any better than I am, Tessie Gilfooly, even if you are queen of a lot of cannibals. Queen!" He had nothing but hot scorn for the word.

She turned away from him impatiently. "You never want me to do anything but work," she pouted. "The idea of talking to me like that, as if a queen wasn't any more than a scrubwoman. I shan't listen to you another minute. I'm going to bed. But before I go, I'll tell you one thing, Joe Cary: if I had heard you were a king, I wouldn't have been so nasty. I would have been proud and glad for you!"

"Tessie!" he cried. But she tossed her head and ran up the steep stairs.

She would not look back at him even if he did stand at the foot of the stairs and call to her. He had hurt her when he had said that queens were no better than other people. The very idea! Mr. Bill never talked that way. Indeed, he never did! Tessie stopped thinking about disgruntled Joe Cary so that she could think of the wonderful Mr. Bill. Oh, wasn't he the most wonderful!

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