lier.

"She didn't think anything of it; he often did that. We felt he
was safe, the water is too shallow to drown between here and the
float. But--"

Her arms went about him convulsively and she broke into violent
sobbing. She calmed herself in a moment and continued:

"I tried to reach you in New York, but you had gone. Mr. McCall
advised against notifying the police. He thinks that is perhaps
the worst thing we can do. He went down to the other camp and to
Lentone to see what he can do. Oh, Jack--"

Professor Brierly stood wide-eyed as he heard the news. This was
more than the mere solution of a problem. His little friend had
become very dear to him. He looked at the expanse of water
rippling and glinting in the mid-day sunlight. Then he looked up
and down the shore line. The irregularity of it at this point was
such that one could not see a great distance in either direction.

He stared at the growth on each side of the house. Impossible that
Tommy could have penetrated more than a few yards in either
direction. And Professor Brierly too, remembered that the little
boy had shown a disinclination for going into the woods alone.
Back of the house stretched the trail leading through the woods
and fields, plowed and un-plowed, to the main road. Norah and
McCall had been over that.

Professor Brierly went into the house. Norah was going about
distractedly from room to room, looking in impossible places for
the missing boy. Matthews had gone up the road. The young man
returned shortly and they all went down to the water. Jack, his
usually smiling features set in lines of care, got into the canoe
and paddled slowly toward the float, his eyes fixed on the water.

Here, as was the case for some distance out, the water was so
clear that the pebbly bottom was distinctly visible, with its tiny
fish darting in flashing schools, from shadow to shadow.

Jack waved his hand and went roaring toward Lentone in the sea
sled. This blow, he felt, coming to his sister so soon after the
late tragic loss of her husband was more than one person should be
called upon to bear. He went to the post office and barely glanced
at the mail and newspapers the clerk handed him. He met Jimmy as
he left the post office. With set face and dead tones he apprised
his friend of the calamity that had visited their camp. Jimmy, in
silence, too grief stricken to think of it in terms of a story,
accompanied his friend to their camp.

McCall had re