“Let Molly go!” repeated the girl mockingly.  “Only question is whether she will let you go.  But I thought you said it was business.  That isn’t business; it’s fun.  We choose the small boat and the crocodiles.  That will be new.  I know all about the Gypsey now.”

“Shall we let it go at that, Dick?”

“Sure.  Wonder if we can find my crocodile again.”

CHAPTER XXIII

MOLLY AND THE MANATEE

A week later the party of five (for both Molly and Dick insisted that Tom belonged) was sailing down the coast in the Irene, a half houseboat with auxiliary engine, which was sailed by Captain Hull.  An engineer and a darky cook had been engaged, but the three young folks held a meeting and then announced that Dick had been elected engineer and Molly chief cook, with Ned as assistant.  They added that the man engineer and the darky could “go bounce.”  When they notified Mr. Barstow of the result of the meeting he told them to see Captain Hull and that if they could stand their own cooking and engineering he thought the captain and himself might manage to live through it.

The captain grimly assented; said that he had been wondering where he could sleep his cook when it rained; that Dick couldn’t be a worse engineer than the one he had engaged, and that he hoped he would keep sober more of the time than the other one was in the habit of doing.

The Irene was of less than three feet draft, and towed or carried on her davits a small launch and a skiff.  Excepting when the wind was especially favorable, the sails were kept furled, and an awning stretched above the cabin-top made of it a pleasant lounging place.  When the Irene was opposite the mouth of Broad and Rodgers rivers, the whole party, including Tom, who kept beside Dick, were sitting on the cabin roof, and Mr. Barstow said to his son, as he pointed to Broad River: 

“Is that the river where you caught your phantom manatee, that wasn’t there when you brought a fisherman to get it?  You know the story is all over Myers that you saw a porpoise and imagined the rest.  How was it, Ned?”

“Yon’ve made a lot of fun of me, Dad, and Molly has bothered the life out of Dick about that manatee ghost.  Now, if you will let Dick and me boss this boat for three days, no questions to be asked, we’ll show you a sure-enough manatee and give some folks a chance to think up real handsome apologies.”

“But supposing you don’t make good?”

“Then Dick and I will do a whole lot of kow-towing ourselves.”

“What do you say to that, Molly?”

“See here, sis,” interrupted Ned, “it’s up to you to put up or shut up.  If you don’t give us this chance to make good you are not to say ‘manatee’ again on this trip.”

“Give ’em what they want, Daddy.  They can’t do much harm in three days, and just think of the fun I’ll have with them afterwards.”