But suppose it was not a will-o’-the-wisp, but a light!
He sat thinking and trying to trace which way his father had gone; and as far as he could make out, he had gone right down to the nearest spot to the water, where, about a hundred yards away, there was fair landing, by one of the many clumps of alder.
Dick had just come to the conclusion that he ought not to watch his father, who was angry enough with him as it was, and who would be more suspicious still if he again caught him at the window dressed, and he was about to close it, after wondering whether anyone would be on the water with a light—Dave, for instance—and if so, what form of fowling or netting it would be, when there was a low hiss—such a sound as is made by a snake—just beneath his window.
“Dick!”
“Hallo!”
“Couldn’t come before. Ready?”
“No,” said Dick shortly, for the plan to run away seemed now to belong to some project of the past.
“I couldn’t come before,” whispered Tom. “I was all ready, but father did not go to bed for ever so long; and when at last I thought it was all right, and was ready to start, I heard him go down and open the back-door.”
“And go out?” whispered Dick.
“Yes. How did you know?”