“Going out after him now, eh?”
“Oh, sure! They wouldn’t have left that boat unguarded, and I guess that one boy is on board. We’ve got to go out there and take the boat away from him. We had better get started before this other kid swims out there and warns him.”
With that they moved away, leaving Jim with a relieved mind, but with another problem confronting him. He knew that he must get back and warn Terry of the coming danger; in fact, if he could get back before the men got out to the boat he and the red-headed boy could sail out to sea. The question now was to find his way back to the house, from there to the hill, and then swim back to the boat. Carefully, he worked his way free of the vines and stood out in the woods, looking for his path.
This was not as easy as he had at first supposed, for he had turned and twisted so much in his flight that he was by no means sure of his direction. He walked in the direction that he supposed the two men had taken, but even that was guesswork, for they had made very little sound as they went away. Trusting to a sense of direction more than anything else Jim began to work his way back toward the house.
But after a half hour of such traveling he was sure that he was wrong. Admitting that he had been running quite fast when leaving the vicinity of the house, he was sure that he should have been back by this time. He stopped and looked around him, but was not able from this to tell anything, so he kept on walking, in hopes that he would come out somewhere near the house. But it seemed to him that the undergrowth became thicker and thicker and at length he realized that he was lost.
He stopped now in earnest and pondered his problem. He had lost so much valuable time that he felt he would be too late to help Terry. While he was reflecting he noticed a booming sound that he had disregarded completely up to that time. Hope awoke again as he recognized it.
“Why, that’s the sea pounding on the shore,” he murmured. “I must be near the water after all.”
Guided by the sound Jim forced his way through the brush and after another fifteen minutes’ walk he was close to the shore. Breaking at last through the grass and scrub he found himself on the top of a small hill, looking down on the tumbling water. But as he looked up and down the shore line a bitter conviction was forced upon him.
“I’m on the other side of the island,” he cried. “I’ve walked completely across the place.”
For a single instant he felt crushed under the realization and then he made up his mind. The island was not very big, and might in reality be only a mile or little more from where the Lassie was anchored. By hastening along the shore he might see her any minute and he could swim out. In any case it was better to be moving than to be standing still undecided. Accordingly, he hastened down the sand hill and began a rapid walk along the beach.