"Where the deuce have they gone to?" asked Charlie, staring at the vacant spot where the canoe had disappeared.
"Great heavens!" cried Fanny, who, like her brother, used a very exclamatory style of speech; "why, they have all vanished into thin air!"
As I could not contradict this assertion, I proposed that we should follow, and examine into the mystery; but Fanny cried out, "O, for goodness' sake, don't! I'm afraid. If they have the power to make themselves invisible, they may be hiding to do us harm."
"It is only visible harm that I'm afraid of," answered Charlie, with his eyes still fixed wonderingly on the point of space where they had so lately been; "pull fast, Pierre, let us find out what the rascals are up to."
Thus urged, I threw what force I could into my oar-stroke (for I was but a convalescent), and very soon we came to the long sloping point of mossy rocks where we had expected to see the canoe's passengers land. I own that I approached it with some caution, thinking it possible that a whirlpool might have sucked the boat and its freight of fifteen lives out of sight, in some point of time when our eyes were for an instant averted. But the water was perfectly quiet, and the whole place, both on water and on land, silent, sunny, and not in the least uncanny or alarming. We dropped our oars and gazed at each other in amazement.
"Well, if that don't beat the Dutch!" was Charlie's comment; and I fancied that his brown cheek grew a shade less ruddy than usual. As for Fanny, she was in a fright, paling and shrinking as if from some terrible real and visible danger; and when I proposed to land and investigate the mystery, fairly mustered quite a copious shower of tears with which to melt my resolve.
"O, Pierre—Mr. Blanchett, I mean—oh, please don't go ashore. I am sure either that these dreadful savages are lurking here to destroy us, or that we have been deceived by some wicked conjuror. Oh, I am so frightened!"
"My dear Miss Lane," I answered, "I give you my word no harm shall come to you. Shall we let a lot of blanketed savages perform a conjurer's trick right before our faces that we do not attempt to have explained? By no means. If you are too nervous to come ashore with us, Charlie may stay with you in the boat, and I will go by myself to look into this matter." Whereupon Fanny gave me so reproachful a look out of her great brown eyes that I quailed beneath it.
"Do you think Charlie and I would leave you to go into danger alone? No, indeed; if you will be so rash, we will accompany you; and if die we must, we will all die together." That last appeal being made with a very touching quaver of a very melodious voice.
For answer, I assisted her out of the boat, which Charlie was already fastening by the chain to some bushes near the bit of beach; and tucking the little gloved hand under my arm, seized an opportunity to whisper something not particularly relevant to this story.