"It means that you were right, and that I was wrong," replied Dory candidly. "I should have done better if I had left the schooner where she was."
"I don't say that; and if I had thought so at the time, I should have spoken. We will deal with the present situation," added the instructor.
"I thought the plan would work all right, and I am disappointed," said Dory. "Those fellows believe that Sang and Wick, as they call them, have gone ashore in the boat, and they have started to look for them. My strategy has failed, and I am disgusted with it."
"What shall we do? That is the question now," suggested the machinist.
"I don't like to go back to Beech Hill without those fellows, after we have spent so much time in hunting them down," added Dory.
"They will come back when they fail to find their companions."
"But I don't care about waiting all day for them. If you will go with me, we will go on shore, and take the bull by the horns. We can handle them."
"All right, Dory; but how can we get ashore? We have no boat," replied the machinist, who was quite as impatient as his younger companion.
"I will bring off the boat for you, and I will go ashore on one of the fenders."
Dory handed his revolver to the instructor, and prepared for his trip to the shore by taking off his coat and shoes. It was a trifling feat for him, and in a few minutes he was on the beach. It was a harder matter to get the boat into the water; but he had carried a line to the shore with him, so that his companion could assist in the work. The machinist hauled the boat alongside the schooner as soon as it put into the water.
They embarked, and were on the beach in a minute more. They hauled the tender to a safe place, and then walked along the beach towards the place where Mack and Chuck had disappeared in the woods. But they had proceeded only a short distance before Dory discovered a small steamer buffeting the sea beyond Bluff Point. But she leaped the waves, and seemed to be making good weather in spite of the roughness of the water.
Both of them were satisfied that the steamer was the Marian.
"That's the Marian, without a doubt," said Mr. Jepson. "She is going down the lake."
"She is not headed for Split Rock Point, as she would be if she were going down the lake," added Dory, after they had watched the steamer for some time. "There! She is changing her course now, and she is headed directly for Camp-Meeting Point. It looks as though she intended to take a hand in this business."