“Indeed, they would not,” replied Case. “If Clay and the others were tied up in the woods, Captain Joe and Teddy would be there with them. No, it is my opinion that it is Alex making all that racket in the brush. He’s a noisy little chap, and particularly troublesome when hungry.”
The next moment proved Case’s reasoning to be correct, for the undergrowth parted again and the three boys appeared on the bank.
“Ship ahoy!” Alex shouted, wrinkling his freckled nose. “Do you want to take on passengers?”
“I hope,” Case called back, “that you fellows haven’t gone and lost the rowboat. And where is the two-foot fish you were going to bring for breakfast? I don’t see it anywhere.”
“Well,” Jule called out, as the Rambler edged toward the bank, “if we have lost a boat, you seem to have found one.”
“What do you mean by that?” asked Case.
Jule pointed, and Case went to the gunwale of the Rambler and looked down upon the fragile canoe in which Max had paddled up the river.
“I didn’t know that we were towing it,” he said, “but its presence here accounts for Max getting away without being seen or heard. He never stopped to get his boat, and may be swimming under water yet, for all I know. I hope he’s clear down at the bottom.”
“No danger of one of those wharf rats getting drowned,” Fontenelle laughed. “I have seen them remain under water for what seemed to me to be five minutes, and Max is some riverside boy.”
“Shoot the canoe over,” cried Clay, “and we’ll come aboard.”