To his dismay, Toddie was gone! and Tip was gone! For a moment he was bewildered; then he called Frank, and off they ran all round and up and down the island, which was certainly not a large one. They shouted again and again, but there was no answer. At long last though, they saw Tippetty at some distance, standing with his paws on the very edge of a dizzy cliff, looking over.
Fred's eyes felt starting from the sockets with fear. He did not even notice that poor Frank had fainted and fallen on the green turf.
On and on towards Tip went Fred—slowly, silently, his hands stretched in front of him—walking as one dreams of walking in a terrible nightmare.
At last—oh, joy!—Tip started away from the cliff with a joyful bark, and next moment, catching by a scraggy bush, Toddie pulled herself up, and quite laden with a curious kind of mauve stonecrop, came rushing to meet her foster-brother.
Fred clasped her in his arms, kissed her face, and burst into tears.
Toddie could not quite understand the terrible danger she had been in, nor the extent of the fright she had given them, till they found Frank. He was just reviving.
"So foolish to faint," he said sleepily.
"Oo is vely, vely white," Toddie said. "O Flank, I'se been a naughty dirl!"
"You are safe, Toddie. Come."
Toddie went and sat by him a short time, and made him laugh at last; then the boys made a "Queen's chair" by interlacing their hands. Toddie sat thereon, and thus, laughing and running, they returned to the cove, Tip barking round them all the time.