Palmetto Island was connected with the mainland by a long causeway across the marshes. This made the bus trip about three times the length of the boat ride. The second evening, as the girls were returning home about ten-thirty the bus stopped near the oyster cannery to pick up some passengers. One of them was a sailor, wearing the crescent of the galley service. He impressed Kitty as being a raw recruit. Though Kitty was preoccupied with her own thoughts about the Canteen work, she had the fleeting idea that the boy must be on his way back to Bernard Hospital. She probably would never have thought of him again had not something rather peculiar happened. The sailor stood just in line of her vision on the crowded bus. The man next to him had been smoking a cigar when he came aboard, and now held it in his hand. Suddenly as the bus lurched around a corner red-hot ashes from the end of the cigar fell on the sailor’s shoe. Instantly a spurt of flame ran diagonally across the boy’s shoe, as if some inflammable liquid had been spilled on it. Hastily the sailor stamped out the flame with his other foot. It all happened and was over in a flash. Kitty was impressed enough by the incident, however, to notice that the young man got off the bus at the hospital station. Even then she would probably have forgotten the incident but for the strange events of the following day. She was roused at dawn by the telephone. It was Mrs. Evans, Chairman of the island Canteen unit. “There was a big fire over at the oyster cannery last night,” she told Kitty. “Practically every shack on the point was burned down.” “Oh, how terrible! Can I do anything?” Kitty knew that the oyster cannery district was the poorest housed section of town. “Indeed there is! We need every Canteen worker we can get to help prepare for these homeless people.” “I’ll be right down,” said Kitty promptly. “Could we use your launch?” “Oh yes. I’m sure Dad won’t object.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: _A Spurt of Flame Ran Across the Boy’s Shoe_] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ “We are already loading the station wagon, but that won’t hold all we need. Miss Pearson phoned from Bayport for us to bring dishes, equipment and all the help we can get.” “I’ll be down as soon as I can put on my clothes,” Kitty promised. How thankful she was that they had arranged for Jane to have the small room behind the kitchen. Kitty roused her and gave careful instructions about the house and Billy, in case she would have to be gone all day. Then she told her father about the call, and in ten minutes was on her way down to the Canteen.