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.

"Take a fishing-trip," suggested young Joe.

They looked at young Joe savagely, for each knew in his own heart that it was running away from danger,-but it was significant that not a boy objected.

"We've been planning one for a week or more," urged Joe, in extenuation of his plan. "And we needn't stay long. We can come back in a day or two and then start right out again, so as not to attract attention by being gone too long."

"I suppose a little trip down among the islands wouldn't be so bad for our health," said Henry Burns, dryly; but it was clear he had no great liking for the plan.

And so, in a vain endeavour to escape from what seemed to them a most unfair and cruel predicament, and without realizing that it was the worst thing they could do, the boys agreed to start early on the following morning in the _Spray_ for a cruise.

Much surprised was Mrs. Warren when informed of their plan.

"And just as everybody is telling what brave boys you were," she said.

"They all say that half the guests would have lost their lives if it hadn't been for you."

This was worse than punishment, and the boys groaned inwardly, for Mrs.

Warren had taught her boys to respect her, and they valued her good opinion more than anything else in the world. They went off to bed soon after supper, "so as to get an early start in the morning," they said.

It was early that same evening, while the boys were at tea, that Squire Brackett stepped ash.o.r.e from his sailboat in a perfect fever of excitement.

"I knew it and I said it," he muttered to himself, slapping one hard fist into the palm of the other hand. "When I saw that blaze across the water this morning, and knew that it couldn't be anything else than the hotel, I says to myself, 'Those boys have done it, with some of their monkey-shines,' and that's just the way of it. By Jingo! but won't Colonel Witham jump out of his skin when I tell him what I saw through that window.

"P'r'aps them 'ere boys won't be' so much inclined to tying other people's dogs to ropes and drowning them when they get caught for setting fire to a fine hotel!"

And so, nearly bursting with the magnitude of his secret, and bristling with more than his usual importance, Squire Brackett hurried up from the landing and lost no time in finding Colonel Witham and escorting him in great haste to his own home.

There on the veranda of Squire Brackett's house sat the two worthies, while the squire poured out his news into the eager colonel's ear.

"Whew!" exclaimed Colonel Witham, when he had heard it all. "We've got them at last and no mistake. What's more," he added, jumping from his chair and stamping vigorously on the piazza floor, "I'll prosecute them, every mother's son, to the extent of the law. It's breaking and entering, too,-forcing their way into my hotel at night,-and the fire was caused by their criminal act. That's serious business, as they'll find before I get through with them. Blow me if I don't take the boat for Mayville this very night, and see Judge Ellis and get the warrants for Captain Sam to serve first thing in the morning!"

"I'll go with you, colonel," cried Squire Brackett. "We'll be back here before midnight, and be all ready at daylight to arrest them. Reckon we'll surprise folks a little."

And so, chuckling maliciously together, the squire and the colonel waited eagerly for the whistle of the little bay steamer, upon hearing which they walked arm and arm down to the wharf and went aboard, with their heads together, in great satisfaction.

Their trip must have been greatly to their liking, for some hours later found them coming ash.o.r.e again, evidently in a most agreeable state of mind; and as they bade each other good night on the veranda of the squire's cottage, the colonel might have been heard once more to exclaim, exultantly: "We've got 'em this time, squire! They can't get away." And so strode away, caressing in one hand some crisp, official-looking papers, which boded no good in their contents to six boys whose names the colonel had given with evil delight to the judge at Mayville.

Very early next morning good-hearted Captain Sam might have been seen at the door of his home, his fist clenched and his face burning with indignation. Colonel Witham and Squire Brackett stood by the stoop.

"Now look here, colonel," exclaimed Captain Sam, hotly, "you surely ain't going to ask me to serve these papers on them innocent young lads?

There's some mistake, somehow, and the way for us to do is to get them up here and just give them a talking to; ask them all the questions you want. I've watched them boys for a good many summers now, ever since they was little shavers no bigger'n mackerel, and I tell you they wouldn't do no wicked thing like setting fire to a hotel full of people, and there ain't n.o.body on this island mean enough to believe it."

"We didn't come here asking you for advice," sneered the squire. "You're a constable of this village, sworn to do your duty, and your duty is to serve these warrants, the same being legally drawn and signed by the judge. That's all your part, and all we ask of you to do. We take all the consequences."

"Well, it's a shame. It ain't the right thing to do, squire, as you ought to know, having a boy of your own. But, as you say, it's my duty if you insist, and I'll do it,-but it's the hardest job I ever done in all my life."

"Let's go down to the tent first," said Colonel Witham. "There's always two of them down there, and sometimes more. If Henry Burns is there, I just want to get my hands on him. I suspect he's been fooling me all along and playing his tricks on me, when I thought him in his room asleep."

The dew was still heavy on the gra.s.s and the sun had not lifted its face above the distant cape when the three men walked down to the tent upon the point. Not a sound broke the early morning quiet, save the cawing of some crows in a group of pines, and the lazy swash of the sluggish rollers breaking on the sh.o.r.e.

"They're fast asleep," whispered Squire Brackett. "We'll give them a little surprise-just a little surprise." And he gave a hard chuckle.

Captain Sam, at this same instant, casting his eyes offsh.o.r.e and hastily surveying the bay with the quick, comprehensive glance of an old sailor, gave a sudden start, and, for a moment, an exclamation of surprise escaped him.

"What is it?" asked Colonel Witham. "Did you remark anything, Captain Sam?"

"Nothing," answered Captain Sam. "I was just a-muttering to myself."

And at this moment the squire threw open the flap of the tent, saying, as he did so, "If you boys will-"

But as he and Colonel Witham poked their heads through the opening, the sentence was abruptly cut short.

"Empty!" gasped the colonel.

"Gone!" cried the squire.

The tent was, indeed, deserted.

"Where can they be?" asked Colonel Witham.

"I know," answered the squire. "Up at the Warrens, of course. They are there half the time. It simply means we capture them all at once and save trouble. Come on, Captain Sam, you don't seem to be in much of a hurry to do your duty, as you're sworn to do."

Captain Sam was, indeed, in no hurry. He loitered behind, stopped to tie his shoes, dragged one foot along after the other slower than he had ever done before, while every now and then, as he followed in the footsteps of the colonel and the squire, he cast a hasty glance over his shoulder out on the bay. What he saw must have pleased him, for on each occasion a broad smile spread over his face and a mischievous twinkle kindled in his eyes.

The colonel and the squire strode along impatiently, pausing now and then for Captain Sam to catch up with them; but as they drew near to the Warren cottage Captain Sam quickened his steps and halted them.

"You two will have to stay here," he said, with an authority he had not shown before. "I'm commissioned with the serving of these warrants, and I'm going to do it; but Mrs. Warren is a nice, motherly little woman, and I don't propose to have three of us bursting in on them like a press-gang and frightening her to death. I'm just going to break the news to her as best I know how, and I don't want no interfering."

So saying, and with face set into a reluctant resolve, the captain walked on alone, leaving the colonel and the squire much taken aback, and too much astonished by the sudden declaration of authority to attempt to dispute it.

What Captain Sam said to Mrs. Warren only she and he knew. There were no boys called in to listen to what was said. There were no boys there to see how Mrs. Warren's face paled and how the tears rolled down her cheeks, nor to hear Captain Sam's words of burning indignation as he tried to comfort her. No boys came to gather about her chair, to a.s.sure her it was all a dreadful mistake. There were no boys to face the colonel and the squire and declare their own innocence.