“Did they hurt you, my son?” asked Mr. Seymour, his hand on Ben’s shoulder.
“Oh, they banged me around a bit—a few black and blue spots, I suppose, but nothing permanent. What’s been happening, Jo? Tell a feller, quick!”
“We all want to know,” said Mr. Bailey. “What’s been goin’ on here, anyway?”
“Those men were robbing the ship—” began Ann.
“Of what?” demanded her father.
“That’s what we don’t know, exactly,” said Ann.
“I don’t believe that anybody knows the whole of it,” Jo said. “Let’s go back to the cabin; each person can tell what he does know and we can piece it all together.”
“Great idea,” said Mr. Seymour.
They found Warren Bain grinning sardonically at his two captives.
“Well, I swan!” said Bailey. “An’ you’ve been laying by this wreck all these weeks, and no one had any notion of what you were here for. We thought you was a-buttin’ in on our lobster fields.”