"We wouldn't have been so foolish as to stay on it if it had been sinking," laughed Harriet. "Besides all of us can swim. Our enemy took good care to set fire to the boat when we weren't on it."

"I wonder what his object is in persecuting us so," mused Hazel. "None of us have ever harmed him."

"Ask Dee Dickinson," advised Jane dryly.

"We certainly shall do so, this very night," returned Miss Elting, with compressed lips.

Meanwhile the Tramp Club had pursued what bade fair to be a fruitless quest. Search as they might they could find no trace of their quarry. Late in the afternoon the launch reached the entrance to the hidden creek where the "Red Rover" had recently lain snug and secure.

"This is certainly an ideal hiding place," declared George, as he scanned the bank on both sides. "I don't wonder—"

He was interrupted by an excited shout from Larry, who had also been keeping a sharp lookout. "There he goes!" he yelled.

A long dark green canoe had shot out from under an overhanging ledge of rock. The sole occupant was paddling with swift, noiseless strokes toward the mouth of the creek, intent on reaching the lake and making his escape.

"It's the half-breed!" yelled Larry excitedly.

"He's been hiding up here waiting for night to come. He thought that we didn't know about this place. Now that we've hunted him down, he's trying to make a quick get-away. Once out of the creek he can give us the slip. Fellows, we've got to get him!"

Billy, who was at the wheel, began backing the launch toward the mouth of the creek. Not for an instant did the boys lose sight of their man, and the moment the boat reached open water it was sent ahead at full speed. Soon they began to gain on the fugitive, who was paddling with a speed little short of marvelous.

"Hold on there!" shouted George. "We've got you anyway. You might as well surrender!"

The man in the canoe refused to halt at command, but continued to paddle desperately, until Billy deliberately ran him down. An instant later George was holding on to their captive with an iron grip.

"Shut down. I've got him!" he yelled. Billy obeyed, and the half-breed was hauled into the launch, kicking and struggling furiously.

"Get a rope," commanded George. "There's a coil of it in the bow of the launch."

Five minutes later the Indian was lying in the bottom of the boat tied beyond all possibility of escape, and the boys were triumphantly heading for camp.

"We've got the Indian!" yelled Larry to the little group on shore as the launch neared the landing in front of the Tramp Club's camp.

"We've been watching for you," called Harriet. "We saw you when you were away up the lake. Have you really got him?"

"Indeed we have, and tied so that he'd have hard work getting away," laughed Gordon.

"What shall we do with him?" asked Larry as they bore the Indian ashore in triumph.

"Stand him up against that tree for the present," ordered George, then grimly wound coil after coil of rope around the half-breed, securing him with many a hard knot. At last George stood back to survey his work with admiration.

"I'd like to see even an Indian get out of that harness," Baker remarked complacently.

Harriet and Jane walked over to the tree and looked searchingly at the captive. Both recognized him as the man they had seen while the "Red Rover" lay hidden in the creek.

"Larry and I are going up to the village at once to notify the authorities," announced George. "We want to get rid of this fellow as soon as possible."

"And I am going with you," announced Miss Elting firmly, "to hunt up Mr. Dee Dickinson. He knows all about this man and the time has arrived for him to tell me the truth."

* * * * *

Dickinson at first refused flatly to give Miss Elting any satisfaction concerning the Indian.

"Then I shall have you arrested as a suspicious character, also," declared Miss Elting sternly. "Unless you give me a full explanation of this whole affair I shall have you taken in custody by the authorities. Understand you are to tell me everything."

Dickinson, however, seeing that Miss Elting would admit of no trifling, decided that it would be better to make a clean breast of the matter.

"The Indian's name is Charlie Lavaille," he began sullenly, "though he's commonly called French Charlie. He makes a sort of living at fishing, and he hired the houseboat from me."

"Then you rented the boat to some one else, and afterwards turned it over to us without letting us know?" asked Miss Elting.

"He rented the houseboat after a fashion," Dickinson explained lamely, "though he didn't pay any rent down, and hasn't paid a penny since. He was going to pay me, he said, at the end of the season. Now, of course, when you came up here with a message from your brother, and claimed the boat, I had to let you have it. If Charlie had paid any money, I would have refunded it to him; but as he hadn't paid a cent there was nothing to do but to turn the boat over to you."

"And you left us in ignorance of all this, when the knowledge of it might have saved us much trouble, let alone the danger we ran and the final loss of the boat?" Miss Elting asked accusingly.

"Well, you see, it was hard to explain," replied Dee Dickinson reluctantly. "At any rate, at the time I thought it would be hard to explain, so I let it go without telling you. I tried to make it all clear to Charlie that, having paid no money, he had no claim on the boat, but you can't explain a thing like that to an Indian. So Charlie wouldn't listen to anything I could say. The half-breed isn't right in his head, anyway, I'm inclined to think."

"So, without warning, you left us at the mercy of a possibly insane Indian?" Miss Elting persisted. "Mr. Dickinson, you have acted in a very cowardly fashion toward women who had been sent here believing that they were to be in a measure under your protection. You should be compelled to suffer for it. I shall write to my brother at once and tell him just what sort of man you are."

Dickinson cringed at Miss Elting's severe words and fairly slunk from the guardian's presence at the close of the interview.

The village constable and one of his men returned to the camp with Miss Elting and the boys to take charge of the Indian. He was locked up for a few days by the authorities at Wantagh, then subjected to a rigid examination by a medical board, and being pronounced insane, was sent away to one of the state institutions for the demented.

The Meadow-Brook Girls and Miss Elting said good-bye to the Tramp Club that evening and spent the night at the village hotel.

"We've had a fine time at any rate," said Jane McCarthy as they discussed all over again the exciting happenings of the day before, at breakfast the next morning. "Where are we going next? Vacation isn't half over yet."

"Why we're going home, aren't we?" asked Harriet, turning to Miss Elting.

"Not so you could notice it!" exclaimed Jane slangily. "That is not if Miss Elting will listen to my plan. Promise me you'll do as I ask, Miss Elting."

"I never make rash promises," laughed Miss Elting. "Tell us what you wish to do and then we'll see about it."

"I want to take you all for a week's drive in my car. You've been through so much here at the lake that my peculiar style of driving will hold no terrors for you. What do you say? Will you go?"

"If I thought you could be depended upon, for once, to drive safely—" began Miss Elting somewhat dubiously. "What is your pleasure, girls?"

"We want to go with Jane," was the chorus.

"Hurrah!" cried Jane. "It's settled. I'll promise to bring you back home all safe and sound."

The day was spent in shopping at the village store, as their belongings had all been aboard the ill-fated "Red Rover." The Meadow-Brook Girls decided to get along as best they could with their limited supply of clothing, and depended on buying their meals at the various hotels and farmhouses along the way. After a happy week on the road, during which time Jane McCarthy proved herself to be a safe and careful driver, they turned their faces toward their own town.

Once home, Miss Elting lost no time in sending in a report, to the Chief Guardian of the Camp Girls' Association, of the "honors" won by the Meadow-Brook Girls. In due time the girls received their honor beads, which added considerably to the length of the strings of beads they had already won for achievement and bravery.

The Meadow-Brook Girls were destined, however, to win many more of the coveted beads, and shortly after their return home, Jane McCarthy held a lengthy consultation with her father; then invited them and Miss Elting to be her guests on a trip to the White Mountains. What befell them during their outing in the New Hampshire hills will be fully set forth in the next volume of this series entitled, "THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS IN THE HILLS; Or, The Missing Pilot of the White Mountains."

THE END