The Outdoor Girls at Ocean View Part 7

"Yes, I'm Old Tin-Back," replied the man with a gruff but not unpleasant laugh. "Leastways they all calls me that. I'll take them grips," he went on, as the girls advanced, and into his gnarled hands he gathered the valises.

"Oh, what a delicious smell!" exclaimed Mollie, as they went up the steps.

"That's th' chowder," chuckled the old lobsterman. "I reckoned it'd be tasty. Plenty of quahogs in _that_."

"What?" gasped Amy.

"Quahogs--big clams, miss," he explained. "Old Tin-Back dug 'em this mornin' at low tide. Nothin' like quahogs for chowder, though some folks likes soft clams. But not for Old Tin-Back."

"Is--is that really your name?" asked Amy.

"Wa'al not _really_, miss. It's a sort of nickname. You see, I sell clams, lobsters and crabs, but I don't never sell no tin-back crabs, and so they sorter got in the habit of callin' me that."

"What are tin-backs?" asked Amy, but before the lobsterman could answer, Betty, from within the cottage, called to her chums:

"Come, girls, and select your rooms!"

CHAPTER VI

THE BOYS

Amy remained standing beside the old lobsterman. Mollie and Grace had followed Mrs. Nelson and Betty into the cottage. Mr. Nelson was paying the carriage driver, and arranging to have some things brought over from the station.

"Tin-backs," repeated Amy. "What sort of crabs are they?"

"Soft crabs, just turnin' hard, miss," explained the old man. "If you punch in their backs they spring up and down like the bottom of a tin dish pan. That's why they call 'em that. Tin-backs is tough to eat. I never sell 'em, though some folks do. That's why they call me that, I guess."

"Oh!" remarked Amy. "Then that means you are--honest!"

"Wa'al, miss, I don't lay no special claims to virtue," he protested.

"But if you don't sell tinny crabs--ugh, how funny that sounds--then you _must_ be honest!" Amy insisted. "I'm so glad to know you. Tell me, is there any pirate's treasure buried around here?"

Old Tin-Back looked at her, startled. Then he edged away slightly.

"Exactly," laughingly said Amy afterward, "as though I had announced that I was a militant suffragist, and intended burning his boats."

"Pirate's treasure, miss?" repeated the old lobsterman. "I--er--I never found any."

"But Mr. Nelson said there might be some."

"Oh, there _might_--yes. And I _might_ find a dead whale with a lump of ambergris in him, as big as a barrel," spoke Tin-Back, "but I never _have_."

"What's ambergris?" asked Amy, who rather enjoyed his talk.

"I don't rightly know, miss, but it's something like a lump of suet in a dead whale, and it's worth its weight in gold. It makes perfume!"

"The idea," murmured Amy, with a little shudder. "I don't believe I shall like perfume after that."

"Oh, I don't s'pose they use none of it around Ocean View," spoke Old Tin-Back, with a frank air. "Anyhow, we never see a dead whale in these parts. There was one once, but folks was glad when the high tide carried him out to sea. I guess they're callin' you," he added.

Amy was aware of Betty summoning her within the cottage. She smiled at Tin-Back and entered the house.

"Where were you?" demanded Betty. "I want you to see which room you like best. There are several to choose from."

"I was talking with the lobsterman," explained Amy. "He is called Tin-Back because he never sells that sort of crab, and he hopes he can find a lump of ambergris in a dead whale some day."

"Well, if that isn't a combination!" laughed Mollie. "Oh, but I think my room is the _dearest_ one! Come and see it, Amy."

"Not until she selects her own," decided Betty.

Then began the settling down in the charming cottage of Edgemere at Ocean View. The girls had bedrooms adjoining, and across from one another along a hall that ran the whole length of the house, and ended in a little open balcony at either end. The house stood on a point of land, and from one end a view could be had of the ocean, while the other opened on Lobster Bay. There was a large plot of ground around the Nelson cottage so that other bungalows were not too near. And it was in the midst of a little summer colony of houses, so, though it stood rather by itself, the place was not in the least lonesome.

Trunks were unpacked, valises stripped of their contents, closets and chiffoniers filled, bureaus blossomed with a wonderful collection of combs, brushes, barettes, ribbons, and various bottles and jars. For, though the outdoor girls were not afraid of sun, wind or rain, Betty had warned them that sunburn was not an ailment to be rashly courted, and that cold cream, or talc.u.m powder, judiciously used, might lessen many a smart.

Behold our friends then, a little later, well fortified within with clam chowder and other dainties prepared by 'Mandy, the wife of Old Tin-Back, strolling along the ocean beach. Mrs. Nelson was superintending the efforts of the maid to bring some order out of chaos at the cottage.

"It is perfectly lovely!" murmured Mollie, as she and her chums walked along the strand. "Charming."

"And so sweet of you to ask us down, Betty dear!" declared Grace.

"Oh, it was partly selfishness," Betty admitted. "I didn't want to stay here all summer alone."

"May we always meet with that sort of selfishness," observed Amy.

"I wonder when the boys will come," went on Grace.

"Lonesome already?" asked Betty, smiling.

"No. But Will promised to let me know what new plans he had when he came, and I've tried so hard to guess his secret that I'm tired."

"Give it up," advised Mollie. "Oh, look what pretty sh.e.l.ls!" and she gathered several from the sand.

"How damp it is!" exclaimed Grace. "Positively, there isn't a bit of curl left in my hair. But just look at Amy's! I never saw it so pretty!"

"The salt air agrees with hers," said Betty. "We'll all have nice complexions if this Newport fog continues," and she indicated the mist arising from the sea.

"Let's sit down and just look at the ocean," suggested Amy, when they had walked some distance down the beach, and while they were thus idly employed, and when the afternoon was waning, they spied a solitary figure approaching them down the stretch of sand.

"It's Old Tin-Back," said Betty. "I wonder if he is looking for us?"

"He seems to be looking for something on the beach," commented Grace, "and unless he thinks we have slipped down one of those funny little holes the sand fleas make, I can't see how he could be searching for us."

But the old lobsterman had a message for them, nevertheless, for when he came within hailing distance he called hoa.r.s.ely: