They chanced to get well over toward the Jarley boat landing and suddenly Wyn set up a shout:
"Polly! Polly Jolly! I never knew you had a canoe. Come on over here!"
She had caught sight of the boatman"s daughter paddling near the sh.o.r.e in an Indian canoe. It was of birchbark and Polly shot it along under the stroke of her paddle as though it had the weight of a feather. And, indeed, it was not so heavy by a good deal as the cedar boats of the Go-Ahead girls.
Polly waved her hand and turned the canoe"s prow toward Wyn. Not until she was right among the other canoes did she realize that in one of them sat Bessie Lavine.
"We are very glad to see you, Polly," declared Wyn. "Are you going to enter for the girls" races?"
"Good-morning, Polly," cried Grace, equally cordial. "What a pretty boat you have!"
Polly stammered some words of welcome and then looked from Bessie to Mr.
Lavine. Evidently the boatman"s daughter suspected who the gentleman was.
Mr. Lavine was a pleasant enough man to meet socially. It is true that both he and his daughter were impulsive and perhaps prided themselves on being "good haters." This does not mean that they were haters of that which was good; but that if they considered anybody their enemy the enmity was not allowed to die out.
"I am glad to see you again, Polly," Bess said, driving her canoe close to that of the boatman"s daughter. "Won"t you speak to me at all?"
"Oh, Miss Lavine! I would not be so rude as to refuse to speak to you,"
Polly replied. "But--but it doesn"t do any good----"
"Yes, it does, Polly," Bess said, quickly. "This is my father and he wants to thank you for saving my life."
"Indeed I do!" exclaimed Mr. Lavine, heartily. "I can"t tell you how much I appreciate what you did----"
"Oh, yes, sir," said Polly, hurriedly. "I know all about that. You told me how you felt in your letter. And I"m sure I am obliged to you----"
"For what?" demanded the gentleman, smiling. "I have done nothing but acknowledge in empty phrases your bravery and good sense. I think a deal of my Bessie, and I must show you in some more substantial way how much I appreciate what you did for her."
"No, sir; you cannot do that," declared Polly, very much flushed, but with firmness, too.
"Oh, come, now I My dear girl! Don"t be so offish----"
"You have thanked me sufficiently, sir," declared Polly. "If I did not know better than to accept anything more substantial myself, my father would not allow it."
"Oh, come now! Your father----"
"My father, sir, is John Jarley. He used to be your friend and partner in business. You have seen fit to spread abroad tales about him that he denies--that are untrue, sir," pursued Polly, her anger making her voice tremble.
"From you, Mr. Lavine, we could accept nothing--no charity. If we are poor, and if I have no advantages--such advantages as your daughter has, for instance--_you_ are as much to blame for it as anybody."
"Oh! come now!"
"It is true. Your libelling of my father ruined his reputation in Denton. He could get no business there. And it worried my mother almost to death. So he had to come away up here into the woods."
"I really was not to blame for that, Polly," said Mr. Lavine.
"You were! Whether you realize it yourself, or not, you are the cause of all our troubles, for they began with your being angry with father over the Steel Rivet Corporation deal. I know. He"s told me about it himself."
Mr. Lavine was putting a strong brake upon his temper. He was deeply grateful to Polly; but he was a proud man, too.
"Let us put aside the difference of opinion between John Jarley and myself, my dear girl," he said, quietly. "Perhaps he and I had better discuss that; not _you_ and I. Bessie, I know, wishes to be your friend, and so do I. Had you not rescued her from the lake as you did, Polly, I should be mourning her death. It is a terrible thing to think of!"
Polly was silenced by this. But if she did not look actually sullen, she certainly gave no sign of giving way.
"So, my dear, you must see how strongly we both feel. You would be doing a kind action, Polly, if you allowed Bessie to be your friend."
"That is true, Polly," cried Bessie, putting out her hand again. "Do, _do_ shake hands with me. Why! I owe you my life!"
"Don"t talk that way!" returned the boatman"s daughter. But she gave Bess her hand. "You make too much of what I did. And I don"t want to seem mean--and ungrateful.
"But, truly, you can do nothing for me. No, Mr. Lavine; there is nothing I could accept. You have wronged my father----"
He put up his hand in denial, but she went on to say:
"At least, _I_ believe so. You can do nothing for me. I would be glad if you would right the wrong you did him so long ago; but I do not want you to do _that_ in payment for anything I may have done for Miss Bessie.
"No, sir. Right my father"s wrong because it _is_ a wrong and because you realize it to be such--that you were mistaken----"
"I do not see that," Mr. Lavine returned, stiffly.
"Then there is nothing more to be said," declared Polly, and with a quick flirt of her paddle, she drove her birchbark out of the huddle of other canoes and, in half a minute, was out of earshot.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE REGATTA
The late July morning that broke upon the scene of the last preparations for Honotonka regatta promised as fine a day as heart could wish.
There was a good breeze from early morning. This was fine for the catboat races and for the sailing canoes. Yet the breeze was not too strong, and there was not much "sea." This latter fact made the paddling less difficult.
The camps on Gannet Island and at Green Knoll were deserted soon after breakfast. The Busters took their canoes aboard the _Happy Day_, while Mr. Lavine"s launch, the _Sissy Radcliffe_, carried the girls" canoes as well as the girls themselves.
They were two merry boatloads, and the boats themselves were strung with banners and pennants. As they shot up the sunlit lake they sighted many other craft headed toward Braisely Park, for some contestants had come from as far away as the Forge, at the head of the Wintinooski.
Suddenly Wyn, looking through the camp spygla.s.s, recognized the patched sail of the _Coquette_, the little catboat in which Polly Jarley had come to the rescue of the two members of the Go-Ahead Club on that memorable day.
"Polly is aboard," she told Frank Cameron, pa.s.sing the gla.s.s to her friend. "But who is the boy with her?"
"That"s no boy!" declared the sharp-eyed Frankie. "Why! he"s got a mustache."
"It"s never Mr. Jarley himself?" exclaimed Wyn, in surprise.
"That"s exactly who it is."