Phil shook her dark head enthusiastically. "No; that is why I think he is so splendid," she argued. "He will make no money, unless our Government chooses to make him a gift, or to give him a higher rank in the Navy. Tom says that several foreign countries have offered Lieutenant Lawton thousands of dollars for his invention. There are American ship-building companies, too, that would give him a great deal of money for it. Two men are at Old Point now trying to tempt Lieutenant Lawton to sell his secret. But Tom says nothing will influence him; he is such a patriot!" "Girls, it is time to dress for your tea-party," announced Miss Jenny Ann. For an instant she experienced a vague regret that her girls were about to come in contact with so many fashionable people. She wished that she could transplant them to the free outdoor life that had characterized their first houseboat holiday. Here was sensible Phil, her head filled with stories of wonderful secret inventions and young inventors. And Phil had been the most dependable of her charges. But Miss Jenny Ann was looking in the wrong direction for trouble. She should have concerned herself with the naughty plan that was forming in Madge's mind. It had never been worth while to pretend that the little captain was always noble and high-minded. She was capable of generous impulses and she loved her friends so dearly that she would do anything in the world for them. But she was proud and a trifle vain. She hated to be snubbed and treated as though she were absolutely of no importance. So she had quite made up her mind to be revenged on Flora Harris. Just at the time she could think of no better way than to make friends with Flora's particular admirer, Alfred Thornton. He was an extremely wealthy young man in prospect, his father being a Pittsburg millionaire. Flora was a snob; she was only seventeen, but her mother was a foolish, flighty woman, who allowed her daughter to think that she was already grown-up. Although Flora was not out of school, her mother never ceased to preach to her that she was not to marry a poor Army officer, so the young girl was pleased to have a wealthy young man as one of her admirers. Madge knew that Alfred Thornton was snobbish and mean-spirited. She did not like him. She decided that on the night of the ball. She had seen him exchanging smiles with Miss Harris behind their backs before Tom Curtis had introduced him as his friend. This merely confirmed her bad opinion of him. But she realized that young Thornton had been attracted by her, and she naughtily resolved to turn his attentions from the elegant Miss Harris to herself. When she went into her cabin to dress for their tea-party it was with the determination to teach the girl she disliked that Madge Morton, country-bred though she might be, was a force yet to be reckoned with.