Then Ruth heard the gentle soughing of the waves on the strand below the camp, and she took heart again. The sea was so quiet, the wind was so gentle, it scarcely seemed possible that the Isobel could be wrecked. But the wind and the current were both driving the motor-boat away from Palm Island if, by chance, she was not cast away.
The fact of disaster Ruth tried to deny. The sea was so gentle even the lightest bark must be safe upon it. There was practically no surf. The waves merely lapped against the strand with a very soothing and reassuring noise.
“Why, a mere raft would not be in danger!” the girl thought.
And with this conclusion there suddenly stabbed her mind the thought that the means of following and rescuing Tess and Dot might lie in the very thing she pictured. A raft.
There were plenty of trees upon Palm Island, as well as much flotsam timber on the shores of it. There was a heavy boat ax and a few other tools that had been removed, fortunately enough, from the Isobel. In the jungle were green vines and lianas as tough in fiber as commercial rope. She knew just how the raft could be built and where. They could strike the tent and make a big sail of it. If the trade wind continued to blow, and she was sure it would do so, for its direction had been the same since they had left St. Sergius, the raft would be propelled in the same general direction as the Isobel.
She sat up and threw off her coverings. She could not wait until morning to discuss this thing with Luke. When she peered out through the tent opening only the blinking embers of the fire gave any light in the wood at all. But she heard her friends breathing near her.
Luke was nearest. She crept over to him and shook the young fellow by the shoulder.
“All right!” muttered the collegian. “What’s up?”
“I am,” said Ruth, in a shaky whisper.
“Is anything the matter?”