"And fatten 'em up till they're fit to eat," drawled Tubby Blaisdell. "Stop it, Tub!" cried one of his mates. "We're not going to play cannibals, but pirates." "Well, in either case," declared Bess, "you will not get captives at Green Knoll Camp." "Is that what you call this pretty hillock?" cried Dave. "Well, it _is_ a beauty spot! And how nice you girls have made everything. Why! you don't need any boys around at all." "That's what I've always told them," murmured Bess. "They're only a nuisance." "We came over to see if we could help you," continued Dave. "Here's my cousin, Frank Dumont, girls. Some of you know him, anyway. This is his motor boat, and if there really is nothing we can do to help you here, why, Frank wants to take you all--with Mrs. Havel, if she is agreeable--for a trip around the lake. We've got supplies aboard and we'll stop somewhere and make a picnic dinner." "Goody!" cried Mina. "Then we will not have to make dinner here, Bess." "Agreed!" announced Grace. "There will be no more dishes to wash until evening, then." "Well, I don't know," Dave said, slowly. "Of course we like to have you girls go along; but usually girls do the grub-getting and dishwashing on a picnic." "Nothing doing, then," declared Frank, laughing at him. "This crowd of girls are going as invited guests, or not at all. We promise to be ornamental, but not useful." "You're ornamental, all right, in those blouses and bloomers," declared Ferd, for the girls had discarded skirts about the camp, and felt much more free and comfortable than they usually did. "If worse comes to worst," said Mrs. Havel, smiling, "_I_ will be the camp drudge, boys, for I want to see the lake shore in panorama." "Oh, let 'em come," drawled Tubby, still lying on his back on the little deck of the _Happy Day_. "They'll get hungry some time and _have_ to cook for us." And so, amid much bustle, and laughter, and raillery, the girls of Green Knoll Camp joined the boys of Cave-in-the-Wood Camp in the motor boat for a trip around the big lake. CHAPTER XI WHERE THE ACCIDENT HAPPENED "And where is Professor Skillings?" asked Mrs. Havel, as the well-laden launch drew away from the little natural landing which defended one end of the girls' bathing beach at Green Knoll Camp. "Bless your heart, ma'am," said Ferdinand Roberts, laughing, "the old gentleman is trying to figure out one of Tubby's unanswerable arguments--that is, I believe, what you'd call it." "One of Tubby's unanswerable arguments?" cried Wyn. "For pity's sake! what can that be?" "Why, at breakfast this morning the professor got to 'dreaming,' as he sometimes does. He tells us lots of interesting things when he begins talking that way; but sometimes, if we are in a hurry to get away, we have to put the stopper in," chuckled Ferd. "Tubby usually does it. Tubby really _is_ good for something beside eating and sleeping, girls--you wouldn't believe it!"