“It’s fast enough for cruising,” answered Nelson. “Are we all out? Where’s Barry?” He put his head back into the engine room. “Barry, where are you? Oh, I see; sniffing around the ice chest, eh? Well, you’d better wait until to-morrow, if you want anything to eat out of there. Come on!”
Nelson locked the doors and the four boys climbed back to the wharf, pausing for a parting look at the Vagabond ere they turned toward home.
Possibly you have met these boys before, either at Camp Chicora two summers before, when they came together for the first time and gained the title of the Big Four, or a year later, when in a walking trip on Long Island they met with numerous adventures, pleasant and unpleasant, all of which helped to cement still closer the bonds of friendship, and when they secured an addition to their party in the shape of a wire-haired terrier. If Bob and Nelson and Tom and Dan are already old acquaintances, I advise you to skip the next few paragraphs, wherein, for the benefit of new friends, I am going to introduce my heroes all over again.
First of all—if only because he is the oldest—there is Robert Hethington. I call him Robert, though nobody else does, as a mark of respect. He is seventeen years of age, and a full-fledged freshman at Erskine College; and if that doesn’t call for respect, I’d like to know what does! Bob—there! I’ve forgotten already; but never mind—Bob comes from Portland, Maine. He is a very good-looking chap, tall, broad-shouldered, and healthy. He has nice black eyes, somewhat curly black hair, and is at once quiet and capable.
Then there is Nelson Tilford, of Boston. He, too, is booked for Erskine in the autumn. In fact, they all are, with the possible exception of Tom. (Tom has just taken the examinations, in spite of the fact that he has only finished his third year at Hillton Academy, and has yet to hear the result.) Nelson is fairly tall, slimly built, lithe and muscular. He isn’t nearly so well-behaved as his thoughtful, sober countenance promises. He is sixteen years old, and has just finished at Hillton.
The third member of the quartette is Dan Speede, of New York. Dan has decidedly red hair, the bluest of blue eyes, and is somewhat heavily built. Dan, as the mischievous twinkle in his eyes suggests, is fond of fun—any kind of fun. He is generally on the lookout for it, and generally finds it. Dan is sixteen, and has just finished, not too brilliantly, I fear, his senior year at St. Eustace Academy.
And last, but not least, there is Tom—otherwise Tommy—Ferris. Tom lives in Chicago (but Dan declares that that is his misfortune and not his fault) and is sixteen years old—almost; so nearly sixteen that he gives his age as that when Dan isn’t by to correct him. Tom is inclined toward stoutness; also laziness. But he’s a nice boy, just the same, with gray eyes, light hair, and a cheerful, good-natured disposition which the other members of the party are inclined to take advantage of.
There you have them all—the Big Four. But I am forgetting the little fifth, which Dan wouldn’t approve of at all. The fifth is Barry. I suppose that his last name, since he is Dan’s property, is Speede—Barry Speede in full. Barry is an aristocratic member of the fox terrier family, a one-time prize winner. As to age, he is about two and a half years old; as to looks, he is eminently attractive; as to disposition, he is undoubtedly as well if not better off than any other member of the party. In short, he is a nice, jolly, faithful, and fairly well-behaved little dog, and Dan wouldn’t part with him for any sum of money that has ever been mentioned.
Last summer the four had made up their several minds that this summer they would again be together, and when Nelson announced in May that his father had at last consented to lend them his launch for a cruise along the coast, the manner of doing so was settled. And so, when school was over, Bob and Dan and Tom had joined Nelson at his home in Boston, prepared for the biggest kind of a good time.