Bertha began to cry, and though Patty felt like it, it seemed really too babyish, and she said, “Don’t be a goose, Bertha, we’re not lost on a desert island, and of course somebody will come after us, anyway.”
But Patty was worried more than she would admit. For no one knew where they had gone, and the empty boat was drifting away from Sandy Cove instead of toward it.
At first, the girls were buoyed up by the excitement of the situation, and felt that somebody must find them shortly. But no other boat was in sight, and as Patty said, everybody was getting ready for the fair and no one was likely to go out rowing that day.
One o’clock came, and then half-past one, and though the girls had tried to invent some way out of their difficulty they couldn’t think of a thing to do, but sit still and wait. They had tied their handkerchiefs on the highest bushes of the island, there being no trees, but they well knew that these tiny white signals were not likely to attract anybody’s attention.
They had shouted until they were hoarse, and they had talked over all the possibilities of the case.
“Of course they have missed us by this time,” said Patty, “and of course they are looking for us.”
“I don’t believe they are,” said Bertha disconsolately, “because all the people at the house will think we’re down at the fair grounds, and all the people there will think we’re up at the house.”
“That’s so,” Patty admitted, for she well knew how everybody was concerned with his or her own work for the fair, and how little thought they would be giving to one another at this particular time.
And yet, though Patty would not mention it, and would scarcely admit the thought to herself, she couldn’t help feeling sure that Mr. Hepworth would be wondering where she was.
“The only hope is,” she said to Bertha, “if somebody should want to see me especially, about some of the work, and should try to hunt me up.”