"We all do!" declared Hazel.
Then they were silent. The first canoe was almost in, and it was the one called the Gerkin, paddled by the boys.
"Go it girl!" screamed the boys from the Peter Pan.
"Beat them, girlie!" called the girls from the Petrel.
For one brief second the wild-looking girl turned in the direction from which the voices had come. Hats were waved to her, handkerchiefs flaunted and then she paddled—paddled straight ahead and came into the finish first!
"Hurrah! Hurrah!" went up shout after shout.
"I knew it!" cried Cora joyously. "Now let us watch her."
"There's that dark man!" Bess told them. "Oh! I just wish he would keep away from her."
But he did not. The girl in the light canoe turned from the spectators as if she had been deaf and dumb. And it was the dark man—the fellow called Tony Jones—who went up to the judges to get their verdict.