“Well, maybe it has,” admitted his friend.  “Anyhow, the bottom’s awful far down.  I didn’t get to it and I was in the water a good while.  It’s a awful deep lake.”

“It isn’t as deep as the ocean,” Freddie said, “and I’m going on the ocean in a ship.”

“Are you?  When?” asked Johnnie.

“When Tommy Todd and I start to look for his father.  His father is lost at sea on a desert island, like Robinson Crusoe, and we’re going to find him.”

“Take me along!” begged Johnnie.  “I’m not afraid of the ocean, even if it’s deeper’n the lake.  Take me with you.”

Freddie thought about it carefully.

“Well, you may come if the ship is big enough,” he said.  “I promised to let Flossie come.  She’s going to cook.  Oh, no, Dinah’s going to cook.  I forgot about that.  We’ll have to get a bigger ship, I guess, so’s to make room for Dinah.  I guess you may come, Johnnie.  I haven’t counted how much money I’ve saved up, but I will soon.”

“Is Tommy Dodd going to help buy the ship?” asked Johnnie.

“His name isn’t Dodd, it’s Todd,” explained Freddie.  “But he can’t put in much money I guess, ’cause he’s poor.  He’s a fresh air boy, but he’s nice.  He runs errands for Mr. Fitch, the grocer.  We met Tommy on the train.”

“Then if you put in the most money to buy the ship more’n half of it will be yours,” said Johnnie, “and you can take as many as you like.”

“No, half of the ship is going to be Tommy’s,” insisted the little Bobbsey twin, “’Cause it’s his father we’re going after, you see.”

“That’s so,” admitted Johnnie.  “Well, I’m coming anyhow.  I’ll put in some money to buy things to eat.”

“That’ll be nice,” said Freddie.  “I forgot about eating.  I’m hungry now.  I think Dinah is making cookies.  Let’s go ’round to the kitchen to see.”

Flossie and Alice were up on the side porch, playing with their dolls, when Freddie and Johnnie ran around to the back door.  Surely enough, Dinah was making cookies, and she gave the boys some.

“Do you think we’d better save any of these for the time when we go on the ship?” asked Johnnie, as he took a bite out of his second cookie.

“No, I don’t guess so,” replied Freddie.  “We won’t go for a week or two anyhow, and the cookies wouldn’t keep that long.  Anyhow, Dinah will make more.  Say, I’ll tell you what let’s do!”

“What?”

“Go down to the lake and sail our boats.”

“All right.  But I don’t want to fall in.”

“We’ll go down to my father’s lumber yard, and if we fall in, near the edge, we can yell and some of the men will pull us out.  Come on!”

Mrs. Bobbsey said Freddie might go, if he would be sure to be careful.  He was often allowed to visit his father’s lumber yard, for it was known he would be safe there.  And Johnnie’s mother said he might go also.  So the little fellows trudged away, leaving the girls to play dolls on the porch.