'Oh! oh! he's my cousin. I must see him!' cried Gertrude, with a scramble and a laugh, which ended in a sudden slip—luckily, not into the open sea, but into a very steep-sided bath-like pool; and Lance, whom of course she gripped hard, was pulled after her, both over head and ears; and though they scrambled on their feet in a moment, there they stood up to their shoulders in water.
'Get the Daisiana now you are there!' shouted Frank.
'How are we ever to get out?' said Gertrude, looking up the walls, six feet at least on the lowest side.
'If we had a rope,' said Charlie.
'Make signals—call,' said Somerville, all suiting the action to the word. 'No, they don't hear! they are all singing away. You, Franky, you're too little to be any good, make the best of your way to call somebody.'
'The tide will come in!' said Frank. 'Mamma and Aunt Emmie were once shut in by the tide, and Uncle Edwin. And there was a fellow who was quite drowned—dead—and that was why I was named Francis.'
'That's what you may call a cheering reminiscence at a happy moment,' said Lance, recollecting that he was far more nearly a man than any one present, and instinctively feeling the need of brightening all into cheerful activity, for the girl looked thoroughly frightened. 'Yes, Lord Frank, the best thing you can do is to go for somebody; but we'll be out long first. Can't we make a rope? Have you a sash or anything, Miss Gertrude? Don't fear, we'll soon be out.'
Happily she had both a sash and a broad ribbon round her hat; and Lance tore off his puggery.
'I can do it best,' called Charlie. 'I know all the sailors' knots.'
'It will never bear,' said Gertrude.