"We'll wade," she said.
Orissa peered over the side.
"It's very shallow. I think we can wade to shore, Syb, and pull the Hy in after us. We must get the whole thing high and dry on the beach, if possible."
Sybil plumbed the water by tying a can of sardines to a cord from around one of the parcels.
"I guess we can make it all right, Cap'n," she said. "It's not very deep."
"It may be a lot deeper closer in. But I guess we'll have to take a chance on it. And if the worst comes to the worst we can dry our clothes on the beach."
The sun was showing brilliantly above the horizon as the two girls stepped into the water. Both could swim fairly well, but where the boat was grounded on the sand bar the water was scarcely knee-deep. They dragged Steve's invention over the bar with little difficulty, the wheels materially assisting their efforts. Beyond the bar the water deepened in spots, and once, as they drew the wrecked Hy after them, the waves reached perilously high. Then they struck the shelving beach and found hard sand under their feet.
By pushing and hauling energetically they managed to run the boat, with its attached planes, to the shore, where the wheels on either side enabled them to roll it up the slope until, as Orissa said, it was "high and dry."
"Seems to me," remarked Sybil, panting, "we ought to have breakfasted first, for all this exercise has made me ravenous. That'll diminish our precious store of eatables considerably, I fear."
With the machine safely landed they proceeded to dress themselves, after which Orissa arranged upon the sand the entire contents of the aluminum chest. A kit of tools, adapted for use on the Aircraft, together with some extra bolts, a strut or two and a coil of steel wire were first placed carefully on one side.