“I tell you what,” said Dan presently. “Let’s go on down the river around that point. Then when Tom wakes up he’ll think we’ve gone off without him. What do you say?”
Nelson laughed and agreed. So they pulled up the anchor, started the engine, and went slowly downstream until a point of woods hid them from the cove. Here they let down the anchor again and had breakfast. They were intensely hungry and spent the better part of half an hour at table.
“We’ll keep something hot for Tommy,” said Bob. “I’d just like to see his face when he wakes up and finds us gone!”
“So would I!” said Dan with a chuckle. “Poor old Tommy! Won’t he be fine and damp?”
“Don’t suppose he will catch cold and have rheumatism, do you?” asked Nelson doubtfully.
“Tommy? Catch anything? He’d never move fast enough,” laughed Dan. “I wonder what he will do, though, when he finds the launch gone.”
“Hope he doesn’t go hunting upstream instead of down,” said Nelson.
“Thunder! That would be awkward,” said Dan. “I say, maybe we’d better go back, eh? He ought to be awake by this time, and looking for us. And if he gets it into his silly head that we’ve gone up the river instead of down——!”
“I don’t believe he’s awake yet,” said Bob. “If he was we’d have heard him yelling for us.”
“I don’t know about that,” answered Nelson. “We must have come a good third of a mile downstream.”