Dories looked at her aunt with new interest when she went into her room fifteen minutes later with the tray, but the old woman, who was again lying down, motioned her to put the tray on a small table near and not disturb her. As Dories was leaving the room, her aunt called, “I won’t need you girls this afternoon.”
“Just as though she divined our wish to go somewhere,” Nann commented, a few moments later, when Dories had told her.
“I’ll tell you what let’s do,” the younger girl suggested, “let’s pack a lunch of sandwiches and olives and cookies. Then when the boys come we can have a picnic. It’s noon and they didn’t have a lunch with them, I am sure.”
“Good, that will be fun,” Nann agreed. “I’ll look now and see if they are coming. We don’t want them to escape us.”
A moment later she returned from the front porch shaking her head. “Not a trace of them,” she reported. Hurriedly they prepared a lunch and packed it in a box. Then, after donning their bright-colored tams and sweater coats, they went out the back door and were just rounding the front of the cabin when Nann exclaimed, “Here they come, or rather there they go, for they do not seem to have the least idea of stopping here.”
Nann was right. The two lads had appeared, scrambling over the point of rocks, and away they ran along the hard sand of the beach, acknowledging the existence of the girls merely by a hilarious waving of the arms.
Nann turned toward her friend, her large eyes glowing. “They’ve found a clue, I’m sure certain! You can tell by the way they are racing that they are just ever so excited about something.” As she spoke the boys disappeared over a hummock of sand, going in the direction of the inlet where Gibralter kept his punt hidden.
Dories clapped her hands. “I know!” she cried elatedly. “They’re going out in the punt. The tide has turned! Oh, Nann, what do you suppose they saw?”
“I believe they saw the pilot of the airplane enter the old ruin, so now they are going to get the punt, and they’re in a great hurry to get back to the creek before the airplane leaves.”
“Oh! How exciting! Do you suppose they will make it?”