Therefore the girls and boys who had started for the rendezvous at the lone pine, were able to put the wooded ridge between them and the constable's party, and so make their way unobserved toward the western end of Cliff Island.
"They may come back and follow us," growled Tom. "But they'll be some way behind, and we'll hurry. I have a note in this tin box warning Jerry what he must look out for. As long as that Lem Daggett is on the island, I suppose he will be in danger of arrest."
"It is just as mean as it can be!" gasped Helen, plodding on.
"The boys wouldn't leave much o' that constable if they caught him playin' tag for such a man as Blent, at Bullhide," Ann Hicks declared, with warmth.
"This Blent," said Bobbins, seriously, "seems to have everybody about Logwood buffaloed. What do you suppose your father will say to the constable taking the men with him this morning to hunt Jerry down?"
This question he put to Ralph Tingley and the latter flushed angrily.
"You wait!" he exclaimed. "Father will be angry, I bet. I told mother not to let the men have anything to do with the hunt, but you know how women are. She was afraid. She said that if Blent and the constable were within their legal rights——"
"All bosh!" snapped Isadore Phelps.
"I do not think Mrs. Tingley would have let them go with Daggett if she'd had the least idea they would be able to find Jerry," observed Helen, sagely.
"And they won't," put in Ruth, with assurance. "I know he can hide away on this island like a fox in a burrow."