“Not at all,” returned her chum calmly, while Nell began to laugh. “It was you who lost the rudder, Amy Drew. Nell and I had nothing to do with that crime.”
“Ouch!” cried Amy. “I wouldn’t have lost it if it hadn’t been for the thunderstorm coming down on us so suddenly. And that old fellow didn’t warn us of any squall.”
“He warned us that squalls were prevalent on the bay,” replied Nell. “He said he knew nothing about the weather. And I guess he told the truth.”
“There is a great lack of unaminity in this trio,” complained Amy. “If I lost the rudder, didn’t we all lose it?”
When they reached the inlet, however, the old fisherman was just as surprising as he had been in the first place.
“Don’t blame me,” he said when the girls came ashore. “I told you I didn’t know anything about the weather. I wouldn’t have been surprised if you’d lost the boat.”
“We only lost a part of it,” said Amy quickly. “The rudder.”
“Well, it wasn’t much good. I can find another around somewhere. Lucky to get the hull of the boat back, I am.”
“You didn’t get the whole of it back, I tell you,” said Amy, soberly.
He blinked at her, and without even a smile, said: