They settled down into the easy chairs and Louise poured the iced-coffee. The evening was hot, but there were large windows on three sides of the sitting-room, and a lovely breeze was blowing. Mr. Carlton brought out cigars and offered one to Ted.
"But I suppose you'd rather have a cigarette," he said, when Ted refused.
"No thank you, Sir. I never smoke. A great many of us pilots don't. We want to keep as fit as possible."
Mr. Carlton nodded. Linda had never expressed any desire to smoke, and he supposed it was for the same reason.
"There are two places where the girls might be," he said slowly, as he puffed on his cigar. "On another of those small islands, off the coast, or in some boat—on the ocean. If they had reached the coast, we should have heard of it."
"A boat!" repeated Louise, with sudden inspiration. "There was that broken down motor-boat, that the girl and the gangster used to get to the island! Could Dot and Linda have gone off in that?"
"What boat?" demanded Mr. Carlton and Mr. Crowley, both at once.
Louise explained by repeating most of the story which they had heard from Susie that morning.
"Funny we didn't think of that before," observed Ted. "Come to remember, I didn't see any boat this afternoon. Did you, Lou?"