"Grace says 'nervous,'" whispered Helen, "and she is never nervous. I wonder what she means?"
"Just joking, I guess. No, see they are sending 'a,' that's error, of course," replied Julia, holding her own flag up in the interrogatory slant.
But the signal for the second event precluded any possibility of following out the private messages and presently all were again wrapped in attention at the silent waving contest—that language of distance, copied from the trees, and fashioned from the winds.
"Look! Look!" gasped Julia. "Louise is waving danger! What can be the matter."
Frantically the little scout on the extreme end of the pier was spelling "danger," then shooting her flag out to demand "attention."
"Oh, it's some one on the water," whispered Helen, fearful of causing a panic in that crowd.
"And she is signalling the life boat," gasped Julia. "But how far is it away?"
Suddenly Louise was seen to throw her flag high in the air, and dive from the pier!
Shouts, screams, and yells rent the air!
"The boat, the guard, the life line!" the air itself seemed to form the words, but only that speck at the end of the pier could be seen now, bobbing up and down, then—yes—it was a little boat, a canoe! That was what the scout had dived for!