"Beryl, Beryl!" cried Mr. Hollys in despair; and the hollow roof mocked him with a dull echo of his words.
Meanwhile Joe's quick eye had caught sight of a sheet of paper floating on the surface of the water. He leant forward, and with his oar drew it towards him.
"What is that?" asked Mr. Hollys, as he saw Joe take something from the water.
Joe unrolled the paper, and handed it to him. Wet and stained though it was, Mr. Hollys recognised it at once as one of the coloured pictures he had purchased at Beryl's request. The sight of it seemed to confirm his worst fear, and he dropped it with a groan.
"Joe," he said presently, as if clinging to hope in the very face of despair, "Beryl could swim; is it quite impossible for her to have escaped?"
Joe shook his head. He shrank from the thought of the pain he must give, yet he spoke what he believed to be the truth. "I canna think her swimming would help her much, sir. The rocks are sharp and steep here, and she would need to swim a long way to find a dry footing. Besides, there is a strongish undercurrent just here."
"God help me!" cried her father, shuddering at the thought of his darling Beryl lying cold and dead in the depths of the sea.
For some minutes neither of them spoke, then Joe said gently, "We can do no good by staying longer in the cave. Don't you think, sir, I had better row you back to the shore? If it is as we fear, it is not here that we shall find the young ladies."
And Mr. Hollys knew that Joe meant him to understand that if the children were drowned, the swiftly-ebbing tide must have carried their bodies far out to sea.
He could not speak; but the boatman took his silence for consent, and without another word, rowed the still, sorrow-stricken man to the landing-place.