"You'll have to excuse me this time, Thad," declared the other, earnestly. "But are you sure it was only the wind that carried her off?"
"You can see for yourself that there's no one in the boat, using the paddle," the scout-master replied.
"That's so, Thad, but seems as if I c'd see somethin' in the water under her bow; and it looks like two hands holding on to the gunnel above, just as if somebody might be swimmin' along and dragging the boat after him."
Both the others broke out into a laugh at that.
"I see that imagination of yours is working overtime, Bumpus," remarked Thad; and then turning to the Southern boy he went on: "Shall it be you or I, Bob?"
"I hope you'll let me go after her, suh," said the other, quickly, beginning to throw off some of his clothes, as if anticipating a favorable decision on the part of his superior officer in the Silver Fox Patrol.
"Go then, if you want to, Bob," suggested Thad, smiling; for he was being drawn closer to this gallant son of the Sunny South every day; and constantly found new causes for admiring the other's self sacrificing disposition.
Inside of three minutes Bob White went in from the headland with a splash, and swam toward the floating boat like a water spaniel. Reaching the runaway he was seen to clamber aboard, after which he picked up the paddle, and started to urge the boat toward the shore again.
Not until then did Bumpus seem to heave a sigh of relief. Evidently the poor fellow had really expected to see some dreadful enemy clasp Bob around the neck as he started to slip over the side of the boat.
After Bob had resumed his clothes, they entered the boat, and left the vicinity of the island. Thad kept looking it over as they gradually moved further away, as if not satisfied, by any means, with what little he had seen of the place.