"Now, don't be common, Neale O'Neil!" hissed Agnes angrily, prettier than usual when her cheeks flamed so.

She smiled very winningly and looked straight into Nalbro Hastings' eyes as the latter came down the deck again. The daughter of the Back Bay millionaire was not unattractive herself. And she was dressed in the very best of taste. But she was not a person to gain unbounded admiration.

She looked coolly at Agnes in return. She must have noticed the change in the Kenway girl's expression since she had pa.s.sed her and Neale before. As Agnes smiled and bowed Nalbro Hastings returned the greeting with the very faintest of nods and walked on immediately as though having no desire to improve shipboard acquaintance.

Neale began to shiver and his teeth chattered. Agnes stared at him sternly.

"I believe if you would behave, Neale O'Neil, I'd get on better in the world," she sighed. "I believe you were laughing when Miss Hastings went by. Well, now, listen! I am going to get acquainted with her. Maybe she will go to the St. Sergius Arms where Mr. Howbridge has got reservations for us. It is the most fashionable hotel on the island."

"Do I have to put on full dress for dinner at night?" demanded Neale, not at all pleased.

"You do," said Agnes wickedly. "And I shall insist upon your going to the manicure every other day."

"Ow! Ow!" groaned Neale. "Lucky I don't have to frequent the barber shop as Luke does. I suppose you would then insist upon facial ma.s.sage, my lady?"

"Be still!" commanded the girl half in laughter and half serious. "I mean to become very snug with Nalbro Hastings, now you see."

"I can see you've got a crush on her," grumbled Neale, "just because you think she's of the smart set. I wish you wouldn't get these fits, Agnes.

You are such a jolly good sport otherwise."

At that Agnes Kenway took real offense and would not speak to him again for half an hour.

CHAPTER IX

THE GIRL FROM THE BACK BAY

Neale O'Neil tried to keep his eye on Tess and Dot, as he had promised Mr. Howbridge and Ruth, and he succeeded pretty well in doing so. But the children made their own friends very soon, and when Neale saw them conversing with some of the pa.s.sengers, or making inquiries of the men working about the deck, he felt sure that they really could be in no mischief.

Just what they talked about, and all the wonderful things they learned of ships and shipgoing, they found little time to tell the other girls or Neale and Luke. But from a certain deeply tanned and quizzically smiling deckhand, whom they first met polishing bra.s.ses, Tess and Dot gained a deal of what Dot insisted upon calling "inflammation" about various things.

Some of this knowledge "spilled over," as Neale said, at the cabin concert, without which no pleasant steamship voyage would be complete.

Agnes saw that "Nalbro Hastings" was written at the head of the list of patronesses of this concert, and she sighed bitterly because her name or Ruth's was not there at all. The charity for which the concert was held was worthy, and Ruth said that was enough. But it was not enough for her social-striving sister.

However, to plan for a concert and for its object was one thing; to find talent to offer a fairly interesting program, was another.

"And that stuck-up Nalbro Hastings will never get anybody to work for her in this show," declared one girl to the equally outspoken Agnes.

"Is she really stuck-up?" queried Agnes.

"When I asked her a question just now she only mumbled and turned away,"

declared the critical girl. "She'll spoil the whole thing."

"We won't let her," Ruth said quietly. "If they have used her name as patroness because her father is a big man, as they say he is, in the steamship company, it is not her fault. You know, she may be bashful."

"Bashful!" exclaimed Agnes.

"And you see her name in all the Boston papers," gasped the other girl.

"She is just stuck-up."

Ruth had no opportunity of speaking to Miss Hastings herself. The daughter of the shipowner did not eat in the cabin with the other first-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers. The very fact that she had her meals served to her in her stateroom seemed to support the idea that had got about pretty generally, that Nalbro Hastings was a very sn.o.bbish girl.

"I hope that idea will not serve to ruin the concert," Ruth said more than once.

"I don't know where she expects to find her talent," sniffed Agnes.

Then, twinkling: "She hasn't asked me to sing or dance."

"I know a couple of stokers who do a regular double-shuffle," said Neale. "Caught 'em at it on one of the ventilators, below. Say! No stage dancer ever turned 'em off better."

"Stokers! Grimy coal-pa.s.sers?" sniffed Agnes.

"Why wouldn't it be a good thing-and a novel thing, too-to get the talent for this concert from the steerage, stokehole, and forecastle?

Usually the concert is given by the cabin pa.s.sengers and the workmen aboard listen out on the edges of the crowd. Why not let the poor fellows give the concert and then everybody in the first and second cabins can be asked to pay a round sum for tickets."

Agnes said not a word, but Neale threw up his hat.

"I'm going to ask those fellows--"

"No, no!" cried Ruth. "You have no right to do anything of the kind. The suggestion should be made to Miss Hastings."

"Well, I guess n.o.body will dare do that," said Agnes, and settled back into her chair with more satisfaction.

Neale went off at once, however, without saying another word to the sisters. He had noticed Nalbro Hastings leaning against the rail, forward. He marched up to her and pulled off his cap. Miss Hastings looked rather startled and Neale wondered if she was bashful, as Ruth had suggested.

"Beg pardon, Miss Hastings," said the boy, quite untroubled himself, "have you got all the talent you need for the concert?"

The young girl (she was not far from Agnes' age, after all) stared at him. Her lips moved, but at first no sound came forth. She really looked scared.

"For if you haven't," Neale O'Neil went on to say, "I've found a couple of fellows who might help out. If you are going to have sort of a vaudeville entertainment, I mean."

"Would-would that be thuitable, do you thuppoth?" lisped Nalbro Hastings. "I couldn't imagine what thort of conthert would be exthpected, don't you know."

"Oh, my aunt!" thought Neale. "She lisps. Wow!"

Aloud he said, keeping a perfectly straight face: "Who have you got already and what do they do?"

"I-I haven't done a thing," admitted Miss Hastings, in evident desperation.

"Whew!" whistled Neale.

"I-I don't know what to do," she added. "I-I can't talk to people, Mithter-er--"

"My name's Neale O'Neil. I'm with the Kenways and Mr. Howbridge."

"Oh, with that pretty, pretty Agneth Kenway?"