“I wish our dressmaker was up to ‘frocks,’ don’t you, Ruth?” Agnes asked, with a half envious sigh. “But poor Miss Titus, though she does have a sign reading ‘Modes,’ has never risen above a gown—and she used to call everything a dress.”
“Sickening—that’s what I call it,” grunted Neale. “What say you, fellows?”
“Oh, you boys make me tired!” declared Agnes. “You’re fussier over one necktie than we are over two dresses! Aren’t they, Nally?”
“I should say so!”
And so the merry quips were exchanged.
“Speaking of water,” remarked Luke, as he came out with a glass which Ruth had requested him to get, “are you girls going to do anything about those strange men?”
“What can we do?” demanded Ruth. “We don’t know who they are, and we aren’t even certain that they did anything more than make a mistake.”
“It might have been a mistake, getting into your cellar once,” commented Neale. “But when the same men have been seen hanging around the Corner House—well, it’s time something was done, in my opinion.”
“What would you do?” inquired Ruth. “I have thought of speaking to Mr. Howbridge about it.”
“Let me mention it to the police,” offered Neale. “I know the chief and all the officers who have this beat—there are different ones on different nights. I’ll tell them to keep their eyes open for suspicious characters.”