"I don't think so very quick, missie, and they'll be all safe on the island; they don't come back ever till a good bit later than this. But I don't like to think of them trying to get the heavy old boat home alone, with the wind blowing off shore like this. I don't think as they could do it; and it might get blown out to sea, and they would be skeered like."
Esther was a little scared herself at the bare thought.
She turned things quickly over in her mind. She had to take command of the situation. Genefer was away for the afternoon. Cook was no good in an emergency, as she always lost her head; and it was one of Esther's tenets that her mother must be spared all worry and anxiety.
Whatever was to be done she must do herself, and her thoughts flew instantly to Mr. Earle. He had become something like a real friend to the little girl during these past weeks. She was not without a certain timid fear of his cleverness, his stores of occult knowledge, and the things in which he took part up at the Crag, which made folks shake their heads sometimes, and say that they feared some hurt to somebody would be the result. Yet for all that Esther believed in him thoroughly, and felt that he was certain to go to the aid of the boys if he knew their predicament, and it must be her work to let him know as soon as possible.
She looked up at the threatening sky, but thunder and lightning did not frighten Esther much. She would have been glad of company through the dark pine wood, but she was not really afraid to go alone. She was more afraid of approaching the Crag at a time when it was popularly supposed that the master and his assistant were always engaged upon one of their uncanny experiments; but there seemed nothing else to be done, since the pony carriage had been already sent back by the boy in charge. After dismissing the woman with a small fee and a few words of thanks, Esther put on her hat once more and commenced the climb to the Crag.
She had got about half-way there when she uttered a little exclamation of joy, for there was Mr. Earle himself swinging away down the path as if to meet her.
She ran eagerly forward to meet him.
"O Mr. Earle, did they tell you too?"
"Tell me what?" he asked, stopping short and looking straight at her. "What are you doing here all alone, with a storm coming up?"
"O Mr. Earle, it's the boys. I'm afraid about them. I was coming to ask you what to do." And then she plunged into the story, and told him exactly what the old woman had told her.