"No, I don't!" choked Granny. "But I think people should know the truth. I'm not as pleased with this queen business as I was, Joe. I used to think it was grand to be a queen, and there are parts of it that are pleasant, I must say, but there are other parts that I don't hold with at all. I don't see how Pete stood it all alone, away off there in the Pacific Ocean. I've just about made up my mind that Tessie shan't ever go there. She's too little and helpless. What could she do, if those savages should turn against her? You don't think any one would hurt little Tessie, do you, Joe? She's all right, isn't she?" And she went closer to Joe and peered into his face so that her eyes, as well as her ears, could tell her what Joe thought. "You'll find her for me, won't you, Joe?"
"Sure, we'll find her!" declared Joe, with far more confidence than he felt. "The police—every officer in Waloo!—is trying to find her!"
"I'll bet the Boy Scouts can find her!" bragged Johnny, who was thrilled to the very marrow to think that his sister—his own sister who was a queen—had been kidnaped. Gee whizz! what would the fellows say!
Joe gave a start and looked at Johnny. "Thunder!" he said slowly, and then he added more quickly, "Johnny, I believe you've said something! Who's at the head of your Scouts?"
"We got a Scoutmaster for every troop," boasted Johnny, but Joe did not wait for him to finish. Joe was at the telephone impatiently asking Central for heaven's sake to give him the number he wanted, and not half a dozen numbers he couldn't use.
In an incredibly short time, each Scoutmaster in the city had been asked to have the boys in his troop help find the missing queen of the Sunshine Islands.
"Your boys have been taught to observe," Joe eagerly told the Scoutmasters. "Perhaps one of them saw the car which carried off Miss Gilfooly." Joe never could speak of Tessie as Queen Teresa. It was too ridiculous, and then he did not believe in queens. "The number is 13,023. Just get in touch with your Scouts, and ask them if they have seen it. I know it's just a chance, but Waloo is so big and Miss Gilfooly is so little that we have to snatch at every chance. Her brother is a Scout, you know," he added, while Johnny stood beside him all puffed with pride.
"We'll do our best!" promised the Scoutmasters. "And our boys are all over town. If one of them saw the car, I'm sure he'll report at once. Sorry about the queen. She seemed a nice little girl!"
"She is a nice little girl!" declared Joe, with considerable emphasis.
"You'll find her all right," prophesied the Scoutmaster. "Queens can't be kidnaped in this country."