“No adventure in sight,” sighed Betsy. “That feather was not a good prognosticator.”
“Hear! Hear!” teased Barbara. “Wouldn’t Miss Torrence be pleased as Punch if she knew that Betsy could use a word of more than one syllable?”
“Not that any of us know whether she used it correctly or not,” she added, laughingly, to conciliate her bristling friend.
“What shall we do now?” Virg inquired. “Since there is nary an adventure below us on the beach, shall we retrace our steps?”
“It’s only three by my little wrist watch,” Margaret put in. “Don’t let’s give up searching for an adventure quite so soon. Betsy, where’s that feather guide of yours?”
“Here it is, and there it goes.” The little red plume again sailed in the air, then slowly fluttered downwards, A brisk breeze caught it, and the gleaming bit of red fairly rushed toward the broken old dock.
“Whizzle! Lookee! Will you? If it hasn’t boarded that fishing smack. Who’s game to go down and take a look at the old boat?”
Sally, who dreaded nothing more than to be considered a doll-baby by Betsy, was the first to reply with a courage she did not feel. “I am,” she said, “if Virg thinks we ought to.”
But there was no time for the oldest girl to give the matter a deciding thought, for Betsy, with Babs closely following, was already fairly sliding down the seaward side of the promintory.
“Watch me, I’m a whiz at this sort of thing!” Betsy looked over her shoulder to call. Unfortunately for the boaster, when she was not watching, she stepped on a rolling stone, and went scudding the remaining way to the beach at a terrifying rate. Luckily she had not far to go. She sprang up, to Virginia’s relief, and laughingly called, “Rather the worse for bumps, maybe, but what’s an adventure without a mishap?”