“What would an ice-boat be doing out here on a day like this?” scoffed Chet. “You certainly must have been dreaming.”
The boys gazed out into the blinding wall of snow. They saw nothing, and they were just about to turn away, branding Joe’s statement as a false alarm, when they heard a loud crash.
“What’s that?”
The noise came from somewhere out in the storm, but it was so loud that the lads knew it had been caused by something not far from shore.
“There is something out there!” cried Joe.
“If it was an ice-boat it must have been wrecked,” Frank declared. “I guess we had better investigate.”
They went on down the shore a short distance, still gazing out into the driving snow, but there was no solution to the mystery. They could see nothing, and they heard nothing but the howl of the wind. Frank turned up his coat collar.
“I don’t care to venture very far away from the island,” he said doubtfully. “It would be mighty easy to get lost out there.”
“I wonder what caused that crash!”
They were just about to give up the search when they heard a faint cry.