“I ran—­the—­boat aground, and you jumped overboard, and got—­all wet!” and Hildegarde sobbed afresh.

“You don’t mean—­” said Roger.  “You are not troubled about that?”

But it appeared that Hildegarde was troubled about that.

“My dear child, do you think I did not see that it was not your fault?  You were doing beautifully, if that—­if Miss Everton had let you alone for an instant.  And do you think I mind a wetting, or twenty wettings?  Miss Hilda, I thought you knew better than that.”

“I was so stupid!” said Hildegarde, wiping her eyes, and trying to speak evenly.  “I thought you were very angry, because you were so silent.  I thought you would never—­”

“Silent, was I?  Well, you know I am in a brown study half the time.  Isn’t that why they call me Roger the Codger?  But this time,—­oh, I remember!  I was trying to make out how that shoal came to be there, when it is not buoyed out on the map.  Come, Miss Hilda, you must laugh now!”

And Hilda laughed, and dried her eyes, and looked up,

    “All kinder smily round the lips,
     And teary round the lashes.”

“That’s right!” said Roger, heartily.  “Now you shall be Kitty, and we will—–­we will shake hands and be friends, and eat an apple together.  Kitty and I always do that when we have had a tiff.”

So they did; and the apples on that tree were the best apples in the world.

CHAPTER XIII.

In peril by water.

“All aboard!” said Roger.

“Ay! ay!  Captain!” said Hildegarde, cheerily.  She handed in the groceries which they had bought at the little store, half a mile away, stepped lightly into the exact middle of the canoe, and sank with one motion to her seat.

Roger nodded approvingly.  “You are perfect in your entrances!” he said.  “Some day I shall have to drill you in your exits, as I did the girls.”

“What do you mean?” asked Hilda.  “Don’t I get out properly?”

“Quite well enough for ordinary occasions.  But I made the girls put on their bathing-dresses, and then took them out and tipped them over, so that they would know just what to do.”

“Thank you kindly.  As I have not my bathing-dress on to-day, please don’t give me a lesson just now.”

They paddled on in silence; the two had become fast friends since the day of Madge’s visit, and had had many pleasant paddles together.  Hildegarde looked about her, at peace with all the world.  Pollock’s Cove was a thousand miles away, and there was nothing to break the spirit of peace that brooded over the water.

Are you so sure, Hilda?

The girl’s face was set toward the land; she saw the wooded island with its fringe of silver birches standing like sentinels to guard the water’s edge; she saw the lovely tangle of asters and golden-rod that gave it its name of Royal Island, and the strip of sand on which the waves were lapping gently; but she saw nothing of the west behind her.