The Meadow-Brook Girls Afloat

"I wouldn't advise you young ladies to take the boat out." Miss Elting instantly recalled the message from her brother. The telegram was in her pocket at that moment, "If you have any trouble, Dee Dickinson will see that you are protected," read the message. It was Dee Dickinson who had spoken to her that moment. Dee had made a distinctly unfavorable impression on Miss Elting, the guardian and companion of the Meadow-Brook Girls. Her brother's fishing boat had been left in the care of this man by her brother Bert, who had now turned it over to his sister and the Meadow-Brook Girls for their summer vacation. "Why not?" questioned the young woman in answer to his words of warning. "Isn't the boat in good condition?" "Oh, yes. That is, it isn't by any means in a sinking condition." "Then why do you advise us not to use it?" "The lake gets rather rough at times, you know," he replied evasively. "My brother wrote you that we were coming up here, did he not?" "Oh, yes. But you see it's been a year since he used the old scow. She is a year older, now, and—"