“Is he there yet?” he asked.
“No, twenty feet this side, I’d say,” shouted Dick, who had climbed part way up the steps to the roof-deck. “If we go down the beach, though, the rope will be plenty long enough.”
But there remained but a scant five feet of rope and to reach the shore without letting go of it would necessitate hauling it in.
“We ought to have done it before,” muttered Chub. But Dick was equal to the emergency.
“Here,” he cried, “let me have it.”
He took a turn with it about his waist and, just as he was, minus only his coat, he jumped off the stern of the boat, swam two or three strokes and then, finding his feet, stumbled up the beach where Roy and Chub had hurried around to reach him.
“Don’t feel much wetter than I did before,” he said as they hurried along in the teeth of the wind, pulling in the slack of the rope. In another moment Roy gave a cry and began to pull hard.
“He’s got him,” he said. “Lend a hand and pull like anything!”
They did, but presently the rope grew taut and came very unwillingly. With two men at the other end and wind and tide both striving to defeat them it was a veritable tug-of-war. But foot by foot the line came in, wet and dripping, as the three boys dug their heels into the yielding sand and put weight and muscle into the task.
“There they are,” muttered Dick in a moment. “I can see them. They’re almost into the calm water.”