wonder it upset you a little."

He was supposedly addressing all the girls, but his eyes were only for
Betty. As for her, she suddenly had a startlingly clear mental picture of
what her father would think were some one to tell him that his daughter
and her chums had been seen at the "Point" with Percy Falconer and a
friend of his.

In days gone by Percy had been very insipid, his mind entirely on his
clothes; now he had become a sport, and the report was that he caroused
around not a little.

Betty turned to the youth with a decided little shake of her head, though
her eyes were smiling.

"I think we shall have to go right back," she said. "It looks as though it
were going to rain. Thank you just as much," and she began to ease her
motor boat gently away from the other craft.

"Oh, I say," Percy cried, disappointedly and a little angrily, for out of
the corner of his eye he could see that his friend was laughing at him,
"we would only keep you for a moment or two. You needn't be afraid of us.
We won't bite, you know."

"We don't know you well enough to be sure even of that," said Mollie,
coming suddenly and flippantly into the conversation.

But Percy took not the slightest notice of her and, as Betty was slowly
but surely widening the distance between the Gem and his boat, he
leaned forward eagerly.