"Yes, all right!" shouted Walter, taking the basket from the line.
"There! that's all I can do for them," said the mate, reeling in the line. "Now, boys, I'll give you some advice for nothing: Go back to a safer place, and wait for your friends. They will be prisoners for over two hours yet, and if you stay here some of the rest of you will be pretty likely to tumble over to keep them company; only I reckon your company wouldn't be good for much after you got down there."
"All right, sir," said Joe, glad to have some one speak authoritatively.--"Come on, boys! Let's go back and lie around on the rocks and tell stories."
"Agreed, if you will be the teller," cried several, knowing that he had Robinson Crusoe and the Arabian Nights at his tongue's end.
Away went the crowd back to the fishing-place; and Mr. Kramer and the other two men returned to the lighthouse.
CHAPTER XI.
THE ESCAPE.
The time passed much more quickly to the crowd listening to Joe, as they lay on the rocks in every attitude imaginable, than to Walter and Ned under the cliff, with the sea still surging around them.
As soon as their fright was over, they began to blame each other for the trouble they were in.
"It was your idea, hiding from the boys," said Ned, as they paced to and fro as far as their prison would allow.