“Oh, no need thank,” smiled Stumpy. “Everybody help friend in trouble. But now other trouble begin. Got to go home and tell boss what you do and Lesley tell she forgot to watch like Mother say.”
Both children hung their heads and blushed, but they knew their duty well enough and had known it without Stumpy’s reminder, so they set off for the Lighthouse, hand in hand, with a sorrowful good-bye for Stumpy.
The soft-hearted old man watched them go with a half-smile and a half-sigh. “Good children!” he said. “Good boy, that Ronnie, but too much like little cat. Climb up so far she can go; never think how she get down!”
Mr. and Mrs. McLean heard the children’s story quietly and laid the blame on Ronald, where it rightfully belonged.
“You must learn to be more careful, son,” warned his father. “It’s no good for me to punish you. You must find out how to punish yourself so that it will make you remember.”
“I’ll give up the murre’s egg!” cried Ronald, who had carried it safe home in the breast of his jacket, in spite of his adventures.
“That would be a foolish thing,” objected his mother. “You did no wrong in trying to get the egg, only in not asking Stumpy if it was safe for you to go up the Gateway Rock alone.”
“I won’t go down to Stumpy’s for a month, then,” sniffed the culprit.
“That would be punishing Lesley as well as yourself,” said his father, severely. “Think again!”