They raised their voices in a shrill cry that carried far.
As the echoes died away there seemed to come, from a distance, an echo of an echo. They all started as they heard it.
"Hark!" commanded Jack, standing at attention.
"It"s a voice all right--an answer," declared Walter.
"Yes," agreed Cora"s brother. "It was over this way. Come on, boys!"
Together they dashed through the bushes, trampling the underbrush beneath their feet. The lanterns they carried gave but poor light and more than once they crashed into trees. But they kept on, stopping now and then to call again and listen for the answer.
"Look! A light!" suddenly cried Jack, pointing off to the left.
"Come on!" shouted Ed, and they changed their course. Five minutes more of difficult going, for they had gotten off the path, brought them to the pine hut. In the doorway stood two girls with their arms about each other.
"Cora!" gasped Walter and Ed in one voice. "And the other may be--Laurel," murmured Jack, and then he too cried: "Cora!"
The next instant he had his sister in his arms, and there arose a confused clamor of joyful voices, each person trying to talk above the others.
"And--and you are really alive!" cried Jack, holding his sister off at arm"s length and gazing fondly at her.
"Yes, Jack," was the glad response. "You see, Jack dear, it takes a good deal to do away with me."
"But--but something surely happened!" he insisted.
"Of course it did, but I"m not going to tell you about it now."
"Yes, make her, Jack!" insisted Walter and Ed.
"And your friend," added Cora"s brother in a low voice.
"Oh, I almost forgot," she replied. "Boys, this is Laurel--Wild Laurel if you like. Laurel, these are the boys, including my brother. You can easily tell who he is," she added dryly. "More formal introductions can wait."
"Tell us what happened," demanded Jack, and then Cora briefly related what had taken place since she came to the island, how she had discovered the loss of her boat and had found Laurel and the old hermit. She told of their parting from Laurel"s father and how she and her companion had returned to the hut.
"And then--then some one came toward the hut after we got here," she finished. "And, oh, how frightened we were! But whoever it was went away again and didn"t bother us. Then we ate something and--and well, you know the rest."
"It"s all right," Ed soothed, realizing that both girls had been terribly frightened. "We just came from the lake by your path. It"s splendid to find you Cora," and he went over to press her hand.
"And I am sure you and your friend are glad to be found."
Cora looked up, and in the dim lantern light she could be seen to smile. "It was all because someone took my boat," she said in a braver voice. "Laurel and I were just going to the main land."
"As soon as you feel able we will take you to the boat," suggested Jack. "It must have been very bad here for you, and with some one else loose in the woods."
"Oh, it was," said Cora. "Jack, I have been in many dreadful places, but on an island with an enemy prowling about seems to be the most fearful."
"An enemy?" repeated Walter.
"Yes, that man Tony, or Jones, took my boat," declared Cora, indignantly, "and this time I will not try to make the laws myself.
I am sure he took your canoe, and now my boat!"
"Well, we have you anyway," said Jack giving his sister a great warm embrace, "and now we are going to take you both back to civilization. Walter, can you care for Miss Laurel?"
And then Jack, seeing a good chance, slipped into Laurel"s hand the envelope he had picked up in the woods. The girl started, stared at him for a moment, and then hid the missive from sight. She did not speak, but looked her thanks to Jack.
So happy were the girls to get away and to be in such safe company, that the shock and exhaustion following it were almost forgotten.
Cora felt much stronger, and so did Laurel. They looked like two very much tossed and tousled girls, but the boys were not thinking of their looks just then.
"Are we going in my own boat?" asked Cora, showing how the ownership of that boat had been so dear to her.
"In the Pet!" replied Ed, "Jack, let me help Cora; you take the light."
Walter, waited for Laurel. She seemed to have things to take with her from the hut. "A queer camp, isn"t it?" she asked, "but it"s a great little place on a warm clay."
"Or a dark night," dared Walter, whereat Ed threatened to take both girls and so leave the wily Walter alone--for punishment.
The girls laughed. "Walter is our champion," explained Cora. "I shouldn"t wonder if it were he who found us."
"Never," contradicted Jack. "I--found you."
"That"s a good, dear, old Jackie," replied Cora a.s.suming something of her old-time lightheartedness. "Of course, Jack, you knew!"
Laurel was fumbling in her blouse. The others noticed the movement.
"Just a picture I want to take," she explained. "You see, this is quite an old camp."
They saw but they did not understand. Then they started out in the darkness.
"Did you ever see such a black night?" asked Cora, "I had no idea Cedar lake was so--so threatening!"
"Never!" replied Ed.
"But the water is just as friendly as ever," declared Jack. "Now let us try it." He untied the boat, and the party stepped in. Cora pressed Laurel"s hand in silent encouragement for she saw her turning her eyes toward Fern Island.
"A lovely boat," Laurel remarked too quietly for the young men to hear her.
"Shall I speed her?" asked Jack opening the gas valve.
"Oh, yes, let us get home," begged Cora. "The girls must be frightened to death."
"They are," Walter a.s.sured her. "Belle was smelling kerosene to keep up, when we left," he went on superciliously.
"And Hazel was looking for a club," Jack announced.
"What about Bess, Ed?" asked Cora.
"Bess--oh Bess, she was puffing--for breath. Bess had the puffs,"
he volunteered in a weak attempt at nonsense.
They were running down the lake. It seemed as if the boat knew exactly where to go, and also that her own mistress was aboard.