"Oh, pineapple by all means!" Florence exclaimed.
"Good enough for me," smiled Lucile.
"All right. Here goes." Marian stabbed one of the unknown quant.i.ties with the can-opener, then applied her nose to the opening.
"Corn!" she exclaimed in disgust.
"Oh, well," consoled Florence, "we can eat corn once. Lucile doesn"t care for it, but she can have something else. Here"s a bowl; pour it out in that. Then open the loganberries. They"ll do."
Again the can-opener fell. Again came the disgusted exclamation, "Corn!"
Lucile giggled and Florence danced a hornpipe of joy. "That"s one on you, Marian, old dear," she shouted. "Oh, well, just give us plain peaches.
They"ll do."
"Here"s one that has a real gurgly sound when you shake it," said Lucile, holding a can to her ear and shaking hard. "I think it"s strawberries."
When Marian opened that can and had peered into it, she said never a word but, walking to the cabin door, pitched it, contents and all, over the rail and down to the crusted snow twenty feet below. There it bounced about for a time, spilled its contents upon the ground, then lay quite still, a new tin can glistening in the moonlight. But watch that can. It is connected with some further adventure.
"Corn! Corn! Corn!" chanted Marian in a shrill voice breaking with laughter. "And what a bargain."
"But look what I drew!" exclaimed Lucile, pointing to a can she had just opened.
"Pineapple! Sliced pineapple!" the others cheered in unison. Then the three cans of corn were speedily forgiven. But the empty can lay blinking in the moonlight all the same.
The other affair, which occurred a few days later, might have turned into a rather serious matter had it not been for Lucile"s alert mind.
Lucile had what she styled a "bug" for creating things. "If only," she exclaimed again and again, "I could create something different from anything that has been created before I know I should be supremely happy.
If only I could write a real story that would get into print, or discover some new chemical combination that would do things, that would be glorious."
From these words one is not long in concluding that Lucile was specializing in English and chemistry.
The yacht afforded her exceptional opportunities to pursue her study of chemistry out of regular school hours, for Dr. Holmes, who devoted much time to delving into the mysteries of organic chemistry, had installed in a triangular s.p.a.ce at the back of the cabin a perfectly equipped laboratory. Here, during the days of the summer tour, he spent much of his time. This laboratory he turned over to Lucile, the only provision being that she replace test-tubes, retorts and other instruments broken during the course of her experiments.
Here on many a stormy afternoon, and often long into the night, she worked over a blue flame, concocting all manner of fluids and gases not required by the courses she was taking.
"If only I could create--_create_!" she whispered to herself over and over. "Memory work I hate. Imitation I like only because it tells me what has been done and helps me to discover what has not been done. But to create--Oh--Oh!" She would at such times grip at her breast as if her heart were paining her at the very excitement of the thought.
On one particular afternoon, she did create something--in fact she created a great deal of excitement.
She had taken down a formula which Dr. Holmes had left in a notebook.
"Looks interesting," she whispered to herself. She had worked herself up, that day, to a feverish heat, to a point where she would dare anything.
As she read a closely written notation beneath the formula, her eyes widened. "It is interesting," she exclaimed. "Tremendous! I"ll make it.
Wouldn"t dare try it on anyone, though."
"Better have a gas mask," she told herself after a moment"s thought.
Digging about in a deep drawer she at last took out a strange canvas bag with a windpipe-like attachment. This she hung upon a peg while she selected the particular vials needed.
After that she drew the gas mask over her head and plunged into the work.
"Ten grains," she murmured; "a fluid ounce; three drams; three fluid ounces; heat this in a beaker; add two drams--"
So she went on mumbling to herself in her excitement, like some witch in a play.
"Too bad! Too bad! Won"t hold it," she mumbled at last, after waiting for her concoction to cool. "Won"t go in one vial. Have to use two."
Having filled one thin gla.s.s vial and closed it with a gla.s.s-stopper, she was in the act of filling the second when the half-filled vial slipped from her hand and went crashing to the tile floor.
"Oh! Help!" she uttered a m.u.f.fled scream, and, before she realized what she was doing, threw the door leading into the main cabin wide open.
Before her, regarding her in great astonishment, were Marian and Florence. For a few seconds they stood there, then of a sudden they began to act in the most startling manner. Jumping up and down, waving their arms, laughing, screaming, they vaulted over tables, knocked chairs end-over-end and sent books and papers flying in every direction.
Having recovered her power of locomotion, Lucile dashed for the outer door. This she flung wide open. Then, watching her chance, she propelled her two delirious, dancing companions out into the open air.
There, for a moment, she was obliged to cling to them lest they throw themselves over the rail, to go crashing to the frozen earth below.
In another moment it was all over. The two wild dancers collapsed, crumpling up in heaps on the deck.
"Oh, girls, I"m so sorry. I really truly am." Lucile"s mortification was quite complete, in spite of the fact that she was fairly bursting with a desire to laugh.
"What--what--made us do that?" Florence stammered weakly.
"Gas, a new gas," answered Lucile. Then, seeing the look of consternation on the girls" faces, she hastened to add, "It"s perfectly harmless; doesn"t attack the tissues; works on the motor nerves like laughing-gas only it gets all the muscles excited, not just those of the face."
"Well, I"ll say," remarked Marian, "you really created something."
"I only wish I had," said Lucile regretfully, "but that chances to be a formula worked out by Dr. Holmes. I merely mixed it up. The bottle slipped from my hand and smashed on the floor--I didn"t aim to try it out on you."
After the cabin had been thoroughly aired, the three girls went back to their work. As Lucile put the laboratory in order she noted the vial containing the remainder of the strange fluid. Having labeled it, "Quick action gas," she put it away on the shelf, little dreaming that she would find an unusual use for it later.
It was two weeks after Lucile"s mysterious experience in the old Mission building. Things had settled down to the humdrum life of hard work and faithful study. On Sat.u.r.day night two girls from the university dormitories skated down the lagoon and walked down the beach to spend the evening at the "ship," as they called it.
They were jolly Western girls. The five of them spent a pleasant evening popping corn, pulling candy and relating amusing incidents from their own lives. At eleven the visitors declared that they must go home.
"Wait, I"ll go a piece with you," suggested Florence, reaching for her skates.
At the end of the lagoon the three put on their skates. Florence"s were on first, for she wore a boyish style which went on with a clamp.
Gliding out on the ice, she struck out in a wide circle, then returned to the others. Just as they came gliding out to meet her, she fancied she caught a movement in the branches of some shrubs at the left which grew down to the edge of the ice. For a second her eyes rested there, then she was obliged to turn about to join her companions.
It was a glorious night; the skating was wonderful. Keen air caressed their cheeks as they shot over the glistening surface to the tune of ringing steel. Little wonder she forgot the moving bushes in the joy of the moment.
Florence was a born athlete. Tipping the scale at one hundred and sixty, she carried not a superfluous ounce of fat. Four hours every day she spent on the gym floor or in the swimming pool. She was equipping herself for the work of a physical culture teacher and took her task seriously.
She believed that most girls could be as strong as boys if they willed to be, and she proceeded to set a shining example.
It was on her return trip that she was reminded of the moving bushes.
Catching the distant ring of skates, she saw a person dressed in a long coat of some sort coming rapidly toward her.