“Well,” said Henry Burns, more calmly, “it means that we’ve got a twenty-five thousand dollar hotel to pay for.”
The proposition was so absurd that they burst out laughing; but it was a short-lived and bitter merriment, and they could just as easily have cried.
“What would our fathers say?” said Arthur Warren. “Ours told us we’d have to make our pocket-money go a long way this summer, because he rigged the boat all over for us. There couldn’t any of us pay for the hotel in all our lives.”
“Perhaps they’d send us to jail,” suggested young Joe.
This happy remark was received with howls of indignation, and the originator of it was invited to clear out if he couldn’t keep quiet.
“They couldn’t send us to jail,” said Arthur, gravely, “for, at the worst, we could convince them that it was accidental. We may be nuisances, but we’re not criminals. Wouldn’t it be better, on the whole,” he concluded, “to make a clean breast of it to father, and do whatever he says is best?”
“I’d do it in a minute,” said George Warren, “but when I know we didn’t set the fire, even accidentally, I hate to put all that trouble and worry on father; because, you see, we might not be able to convince him absolutely that we may not, in some way that we don’t know of, have been responsible. Of course, if it comes to it, we’ll tell him all,—and he’ll believe it, too. That is, he’ll believe that we are telling what we think is right, for we’ve always done that way, because he puts confidence in us.”
“Then,” said Bob, “we’ve got to keep out of the way for awhile till this thing blows over some. Everybody that sees us now will stop and ask us how we first saw the fire and all about it.”
“They’ve done that already to us,” said George Warren. “And, luckily, we could say truthfully that we first saw the fire from our cottage piazza. And we said we ran down to your camp and roused you boys. Now that is all right for a touch-and-go conversation, but suppose they see fit to follow it up, we’ll soon find ourselves either obliged to lie or to confess.”
“Then what are we going to do?” asked Tom.