Dare was going back to the Island, having taken her father over to Portsmouth on his way to Boston. The wind was against her, and she had had to beat down the river, and was now going on a long tack to the north. It was not a steady wind, but a fitful gusty blow that warned Dare to keep her hand on the tiller and her eye on the sail. She knew precisely how much wind the boat would take, and she knew too that one's calculations might be upset by an unexpected puff. She looked up at the sky critically, and decided that the wind was shifting. There were clouds in the west indicating a thunder-storm. "It will blow me straight to the Shoals," Dare reflected, bringing the boat a little closer to the wind. The slight change of direction brought into view Tom Suydam's skiff, which, as she looked, seemed to have put about, and to be running on the same tack as herself. Tom had no doubt seen the clouds, and was making for home. It was now a race between the two boats, at a distance of perhaps half a mile apart.
Meanwhile, with every instant the sky darkened and the wind grew fresh. Dare took a reef in the sail, and kept the halyards free, so that she could drop it at the slightest warning. The other boat, however, kept on under a full head of canvas. Was Tom Suydam crazy? Dare wondered. She had hardly framed the thought before a gust struck his boat, and laid it so far over on its side that the mast seemed to touch the water. It righted, however, while Tom, evidently uncertain what to do, hauled the sail over, and attempted to run on the opposite tack. For an instant the sail napped in the wind; then it suddenly filled, and for a second time careened until Dare never expected to see it come up again.
"They'll surely be drowned!" she cried, letting out her own sail another point, while she steered the dory so as to intercept the other's course. The skiff had righted once more, but was lurching wildly, and threatening to capsize with every gust.
"Drop your sail!" she cried, excitedly; but at that instant the skiff lay over again, and Dare saw that this time it would not come up. Dare had already skillfully brought her boat up within a few yards of the skiff, and dropping her sail, she now steered it close enough to take in Tom and the girl, who, though, in the water, had succeeded in clinging to the wreck.
"Well!" she exclaimed, when the two were safely on board, "Tom Suydam, I should think you had lost all the little sense you ever had."
For once Tom was humbled.
"Oh, I say, Dare," he cried, "don't hit a fellow when he's down. Just look after my cousin Mollie, won't you? She's all broke up. I'll sail the boat for you," he added.
Dare gave him a warning look. "You go sit in the bow," she said. "When I ask you to sail a boat for me, I guess you'll know it. There's nothing to be afraid of now," she said, re-assuringly, turning to Tom's cousin, who was shivering with fear and cold. "Only I wonder you ever went out with him. He doesn't even know how to row. Take my coat," she said, producing a heavy jacket from a locker underneath the seat. "I sha'n't need it, and you're just soaked through."
The impulsive little stranger threw her arms around Dare's neck and kissed her.
"You're a dear," she said. "I thought so the minute I laid eyes on you—only I supposed you were a boy."