Nan, doing the crawl with her head under water, came up directly in front of this unpleasant-looking person and was so startled and surprised in consequence that she almost forgot to keep herself afloat.

Her paralysis remained only a moment, however, and in a flash of time she was swimming back toward her companions.

As for the man, having given Nan a careful look, he suddenly made a dash for the sh.o.r.e and one of the bathhouses.

"I reckon this is my chance," he said, as he got into his clothing with all speed. "I'll do the trick while she is in bathing."

Nan was almost out of breath when she reached her chums.

"Listen to me!" she gasped. "I've got to get up to the hotel--and at once!"

"Nan Sherwood, is it serious this time, or is this only another of your attacks?" asked Bess impatiently. "Here you are the one who dragged us into the water at this early hour, and now you want to spoil all the fun by breaking up the party. For goodness' sake, listen to reason," she wailed, as Nan, with a determined shake of her red-capped head, started in toward sh.o.r.e.

"Haven't time," she flung back.

"You can at least tell us what the matter is," called Grace, as reluctant as Bess to cut short the fun.

"Haven't time," Nan repeated, half way in to sh.o.r.e now.

Bess and Grace paddled the water and looked at each other helplessly.

"Don't you think we had better go, too?" asked Rhoda uncertainly.

"No, I don't," was Bess's cross answer. "Nan's acting awfully funny these days, anyway. I think she has another secret."

As for Nan, she did not wait to see whether the girls were following her or not, but ran posthaste to her bathhouse, where she exchanged her bathing suit for more formal attire. Then she hurried on to the hotel.

She had not seen this man since his arrival at Palm Beach, and the sudden appearance of his face so close to hers in the water had startled her horribly. Her first thought had been of the doc.u.ments in her suitcase and her one desire to get to them as soon as possible.

"Oh, what a fool I was not to give those papers to Mr. Mason, or have them placed in the hotel safe," she scolded to herself. She called herself several kinds of a goose as she ran down the quiet corridor to her room. As she stood before the door a slight noise within sent her heart suddenly into her mouth, and she hesitated before turning the k.n.o.b.

Then, with desperate courage, she flung the door wide and stepped into the room. Before her bed a tall, thin man was standing, and on the bed was a bag, her bag, partly open, with the contents showing!

In a moment her fear changed to flaming indignation, and she sprang forward, flinging herself before the bag and pushing the man away from her with furious, impotent little fists.

"You little imp!" the fellow snarled, catching her wrists and holding them in an iron grip. "You just dare make a noise, and I'll show you who's boss. You little----"

"Nan! Oh, Nan, what's the matter?"

The voice held a frightened note, and its owner was evidently running along the corridor toward Nan's open door. The man said something under his breath, released Nan's wrists, and darted toward the window.

Nan, conscious of a stabbing pain in her wrists, followed him, but not in time to stop his flight. She saw him disappear down the fire escape and then, with a little stifled sob, turned back into the room and found herself face to face with her startled chums.

"Nan! you look like a ghost," cried Bess, flinging an arm about the girl and drawing her to the bed.

"We thought we heard a man's voice," added Rhoda, staring with fascinated eyes from Nan to the half-opened bag on the bed.

Grace was plainly frightened. "Nan! was that man here?"

"Yes," said Nan faintly. "He was here and he--oh, girls, it was dreadful! I can't talk about it." And she broke down with a sob and buried her head on Bess's shoulder.

CHAPTER XXV

MOONLIGHT

When Nan told her story to the Masons a little later they were not only indignant but very genuinely worried. Walter declared that he would "catch that man and wring his neck before the day was up," which boast, though extremely extravagant, brought strange comfort to Nan, shocked as she had been by the events of the morning.

Mr. Mason wanted to shadow the man, but Nan begged him not to do that until after they had had a chance to look up Mrs. Bragley's property for her and see what it was worth.

"If that's the way you feel," Mr. Mason decided sympathetically, "it seems to me the best thing to do is to get to Sunny Slopes as soon as possible, take a look at this land, and employ an attorney, if need be, to be sure her t.i.tle is clear. Then if this man is illegally trying to wrest the land from its rightful owner, we will employ a detective and see that the fellow is brought to justice. I want to lift the load from these young shoulders," he said, looking down at Nan with the nice smile that made everybody like him. "They are too young to carry the troubles of other people yet."

Nan smiled up at him gratefully, and perhaps the interview might have ended there had Walter allowed it to. But Walter was still tremendously worried about Nan.

"But Dad," he said, turning to his father accusingly, "you certainly can't mean that you are going to let that man wander around loose so that he can worry Nan all he wants to. Why, this is four or five times already that he has nearly frightened her to death. Why," he continued, waxing more excited as he thought about it and glaring at the anxious group of people as though it were in some way all their fault, "he isn't going to stop when he so nearly got what he wanted to-day. He may come back again to-night----"

"That is very unlikely," Mr. Mason broke in, in a cheerful, matter-of-fact tone. "He knows that we are on our guard now. For all he can tell, we may have detectives in every corridor and he will be very careful how he ventures near Nan's room to-night. No, he will try some other way since this one has failed. And in a day or two we will motor down to Sunny Slopes and relieve Nan's mind about this woman's property."

In spite of Mr. Mason's very reasonable conviction that the man would not return to Nan's room, the girls were nervous that night, especially Bess, and they were all glad when the sun, creeping in through the window, announced that another beautiful day had begun.

"Goodness!" said Bess, stretching fretfully, "if this keeps up much longer, Nan Sherwood, I'll just be a wreck, that's all."

"Get your cold water plunge and you will feel better," said Nan, at which practical suggestion Bess merely grunted.

They were to play a tennis match that day, Rhoda and Walter against Nan and Grace, and naturally they all had set their hearts upon winning.

Bess had begged off on the ground that it was too warm to play.

It was a glorious morning for the sport, sunshiny and clear, yet cool, and the girls forgot their restless night as they stepped out upon the court.

It was not till they started to "warm up" and Nan wound up for her usual swift serve that they had an inkling of the thing that was to spoil the fun for that morning, at least.

Nan struck weakly at the ball, which landed ignominiously in the net and then dropped her racket with a little cry of pain. The girls and Walter ran to her anxiously, Walter jumping the net and scooping up the ball as he came.

"What is the matter, Nan Sherwood?" Bess wanted to know. "That's the funniest ball I ever saw you serve."

"It's my wrist," said Nan apologetically. "It turned just at the wrong minute. I don't seem to have any power in it."

"Let me see," Walter demanded masterfully, and as he held her little wrist in his hand Nan noticed that it was red and swollen.

"Oh-h!" she said impulsively, "that must be where the man grabbed me so tight yesterday. I'm dreadfully sorry to spoil your game," she added, thinking, as always, more of every one else than of herself.

"Hang the old game," said Walter explosively. "We can play that any time. But if I could get my hands on that--that----"

"Don't say it," begged Nan, with a little laugh. "You mustn't talk about people behind their backs, you know."

"But now our game is spoiled, and we have a whole long morning on our hands," wailed Grace. "I wish I had slept a couple of hours longer."