Ellen said in her quiet way, “I have just been looking at the chart and Vinal Haven is only a short distance from here. Why can’t Mabel and Charlie and Jack and I take the tender and go to Vinal Haven and send a telegram to the fond parents? I know that they have laid a cable to Nantucket from Martha’s Vineyard. We could be back in time for lunch.”
“Isn’t that a good idea?” asked Jack proudly.
“It is if you four can remember what you are going for,” teased his sister. “Mr. Wing, will it leave you too stranded if I get Breck to row me over to Hurricane Island in the dinghy? I am wild to know why there are so many deserted houses there. So far, I haven’t seen a sign of life.”
“Would you mind very much rowing round the island I stumbled over and see if my boat is still there? I put over the two anchors; she ought to hold,” Tim said to Breck.
“And what are you going to do about getting her home?” Frances asked Tim, coming over to sit on the companion steps as the others went above.
“We’ve decided enough for one day. Let’s worry about that tomorrow. Why don’t you tell me how you and Jane happen to be such quick thinkers and how you happened to have enough grit to get me down that long hill?”
There was a great noise and bustle on deck, as was always the case when Mabel was about to do anything. Soon the sound of the tender’s motor was heard and its wash licked against the “Boojum’s” sleek black sides. Jane peered down the hatch with intent to ask Frances to come along with Breck and herself, but on seeing the pleasant conversation that was beginning, she decided not to interrupt it.
“Let’s go over to Hurricane Island first and come back by the island of adventure to see if Tim Reynolds’ boat is there,” suggested Breck, as he pulled the dinghy along with sure strokes.
Watching him, Jane thought how very well he did whatever he set his hand to do. This was their first moment alone since the startling disclosure Breck had made about himself the day before. Not that it had come as a very great surprise to Jane, because she had always felt that he was some one other than a deck hand and she might have known that he would have been among the first to offer himself to serve humanity.