When Felix got as far as their knocking at the lighthouse door, the story was turned over to Johnny, who gave a very interesting account, to begin with, of their visit with Ruth.
"I must get acquainted with Ruth, just as soon as ever I can!" exclaimed Sue; "and I want to see the blue dress. That will be two girls,—Julia and Ruth; and it will be a nice ride to the lighthouse for Julia and me, in the dog-cart."
When Johnny came to their wandering about in the storm on foot, having lost the road, and being so drenched and despairing, Mrs. Le Bras exclaimed,—
"Why, this is perfectly dreadful! My dear, how could you rest easy with these boys away from home? If you had told me, I should have insisted upon some one being sent to look for them. They might have taken their death-cold. Are you certain, boys, that you feel quite well? I am not sure but you ought to be put to bed this minute, with hot drinks, and wrapped in blankets."
The boys laughed at this: they said they never felt better in their lives.
"I think it will not, apparently, endanger their lives to finish the account before going to bed; as I judge that Johnny is nearly through now," replied Mr. Le Bras, smiling.
"Well," continued Johnny, "we were feeling about, trying to find the road again, when I knocked my head against something. I felt of it, and found it was some sort of a building. We both examined it with our hands, and concluded it was a barn; as it was smooth, and didn't have any windows as far as we could reach. We felt our way around to the other side, and came to a door which we managed to open. We went in, and pulled the door together, to keep out the rain, and felt our way around for the hay-mow. We couldn't find any mow, but we came across a lot of nice clean straw on the floor; and we lay down in it, and covered ourselves up with it, and, after talking a while, we fell asleep."
"You said your prayers first, didn't you?" said Sue.
"Why, no!" replied Johnny, as if the omission had just occurred to him; "I don't believe I did; I guess we were so excited that we forgot to say our prayers. We didn't say them, did we, Felix?"
"No. Let's see: one of the last things I said was to remind you of what you said, one day, about there couldn't be any fire, unless the carbon and hydrogen had oxygen to combine with it, and I asked you how it happened, then, that the men at the quarry rammed the powder down in a hole, with a lot of stuff jammed on the top of it, as if they were trying to keep the air out on purpose."