Even with her crippled mainsail, the Ghost kept ahead of the schooner for a long while, and the latter did not overtake her until she was half way from Sandy Hook to the Narrows. Now that home was so near, and the dangers of the cruise were over, the boys regretted that they had not cut loose from the schooner when she was within sight of Fire Island inlet. They could have entered the Great South Bay through the inlet, and carried out their plan of crossing from Shinnecock Bay to Peconic Bay.
"It is a shame," said Harry, "to go home when nobody is expecting us. We told them we should be gone for at least four weeks."
"What is a greater shame, if you look at it in that way, is our giving up the brig to the schooner's people," remarked Charley.
"Why, what else could we do?" asked Tom. "You said yourself that we couldn't work the brig in, and that we must abandon her."
"Why couldn't we have hired the captain to send us a steam-tug? We could have staid on board the brig just as well as the mate and the two men, and if the steam-tug tows them in, why couldn't we have been towed in?"
"I never thought of that," exclaimed Tom.
"Nor I," said Harry and Joe, both together.
"Well, I did think of it," resumed Charley, "and if I'd been alone on the brig, I would have done it. But then Uncle John expected me to take care of the Ghost and her crew, and I wasn't instructed to run any risk for the sake of bringing abandoned vessels into port. We did right to give up the brig, but at the same time we did lose a fair chance of making a good big sum of money."
"Why shouldn't we keep right on through Hell Gate into the Sound, and cruise round that way to Canoe Place, and come back through the South Bays?" said Harry. "We can do it easily enough in four weeks."
"And not go home at all?" asked Tom.