“Have you ever heard of any one who could have locked you up in the old hut that night?” Tom asked as they sailed along.

Madge shook her head.  “No; I have not the faintest idea.  To tell you the honest truth, I had almost forgotten that unpleasant experience.  We have been having such a beautiful time since that we haven’t had time to think of disagreeable things.”

“Do you think it is safe for five women to be aboard that houseboat by themselves?” asked Tom anxiously.  “If your boat were farther out on the water you would be safer.”

Madge laughed merrily.  “Look here, Mr. Curtis, I don’t think it is fair for you to question our safety when there are five of us, Wouldn’t Phil be angry if she heard you say that!  It makes her furious to hear a man or boy even intimate that girls can’t take care of themselves.  Why, we can swim and run and jump, and we could put up a really brave fight if it were necessary.  Besides, Nell and I know how to shoot.  Uncle taught us when we were very little girls.  I have been duck shooting with him along this very bay.  Look at that rowboat back there.  I have been watching it for some time.  It has been trying to follow us.”

Tom turned about.  The boat was only a skiff, and, though it was nearly in their course, there was no chance of its coming any closer, as their boat was sailing before the wind.

“I believe it is the same skiff I saw this morning,” commented Tom.  “I suppose it is some fellow who has been fishing out here.  Just think of the fish in this wonderful bay—­perch and pike and bass and a hundred other kinds!  You must help me catch some of them some day.”

“All right, I will,” promised Madge merrily.  As they went farther out into the bay they grew strangely silent.  The spell of the sea was upon them and they were content to sail along, exchanging but little conversation.  Chesapeake Bay was apparently in one of its most amiable moods and, lured on by its apparent good nature, Tom grew a trifle more reckless than was his wont and did not turn about to begin the homeward sail as soon as he had originally intended.

It was Madge who broke the spell.  “I think we had better start back.  Perhaps I merely imagine it, but it seems to me that the sun isn’t shining as brightly as it shone a little while ago.  I know the bay so well.  It is so wonderful, but so treacherous.  I was once out on it in a sailboat during a sudden squall and I am not likely to forget it.”  Madge gave a slight shudder at the recollection.

“All right,” agreed Tom, “I’ll turn about, but there isn’t the slightest danger of a squall to-day.”  He brought his little craft about and headed toward the beach.

In spite of his assurance that there would he no squall, a black, threatening cloud had appeared in the sky, and now the wind shifted, blowing strongly toward land.  Tom, who was nothing if not a sailor, managed the boat so skilfully that Madge’s apprehensions were soon quieted and she gave herself up to the complete enjoyment of rushing along in the freshened breeze.