“Thank heaven,” cried Lee as they looked after his retreating figure. “Before night we’ll all be back in the home that I began to fear we’d never see again.”
“It’s glorious,” agreed Bobby, “but after all, perhaps it’s all for the best that we’ve had to stay in the swamp as long as we have. If help had come yesterday, for instance, we wouldn’t have found the boundary stones. That’s paid us for all the trouble and danger we’ve been through.”
In a few minutes they heard the sound of voices, and soon a party of four men came in sight, with ’Rastus Abimelech Belshazzar Johnson proudly leading the way.
There were broad smiles on their faces as the boys rushed forward to meet them and it was hard to tell which group was the more delighted. All talked together, and there was a general hubbub until the excitement quieted down a little.
The leader of the party was a Mr. Lanfranc, the Parish Clerk of that section, a big, bluff, genial man, who was a great friend of the Cartier family.
“I can’t tell you how relieved we are to find you boys,” he said, as he slapped Lee affectionately on the shoulder. “We’ve been beating the swamp for you for the last two days. But it covers so many miles of territory that it’s almost like looking for a needle in a haystack. But thank God that we’ve found you at last, alive and well. Your poor mother has been almost crazy about you. Here, ’Rastus,” he continued, turning to the little darkey who stood by, all smiles and swelling with a sense of his importance, “you go right away to the Cartier place and tell Mrs. Cartier that we’ve found the boys, that they’re all right, and that we’ll be home before night.”
With another flash of his white teeth, ’Rastus was off on his errand.
“We’d go right away,” explained Mr. Lanfranc to Lee, “only we have a rendezvous with another party to meet them at noon only a little way from here. As soon as they know you’ve been found we’ll have a bit of lunch and then we’ll all make tracks for home. But how did it come about that you got lost?” he continued. “I understand you went away in the motor boat. What became of that?”
“Jim Boolus stole it from us,” replied Lee.
“What!” cried Mr. Lanfranc.