"I won't forget to take you by the neck and pitch you overboard," was what Bill had in his mind, but he did not give utterance to it. He merely scowled and turned his back.
Mary watched the launch as it headed for the yacht club landing and, when it had moved beyond any possibility of hearing, laughed outright.
"The poor man!" she said. "I'd better watch myself. Back in New York I felt as if I were living in a reign of hidden terror. Now the pendulum is at the other extreme and I feel as if I could do anything that pleased me. It's a time for caution, probably. But he is so funny!"
Bill was gone for several hours. He was late for lunch when the launch drew alongside the Sunshine; in fact, everybody else had had lunch long ago. His visit ashore had not been satisfactory and was only prolonged because he felt that the shore, however strange and lonesome, was more congenial than the deck of his yacht.
He spied Aunt Caroline in an easy chair.
"Nobody home, Aunt Caroline!" he said.
"Oh, I'm sorry, William. Well, there's no hurry, of course; we can stay over indefinitely. Probably you'd better go back this afternoon."
Bill had no intention of going back. He had not visited a single house; he had done nothing beyond making several futile attempts to get a telephone connection with Kid Whaley.
He glanced about the deck and saw nobody but a couple of hands.
"Where's Miss Norcross?" he asked.