It was half-past ten of the clock when the two girls left the house; and so they reckoned it must be now several minutes after the next hour. "Suppose it should be far into the night before the ship comes in sight," Mary suggested, for she was beginning to feel cramped and uncomfortable. "Let's not wait for so long a time as that." "No, we will not," Dorothy assented with a yawn. But the next moment she was all alive, with her small fingers holding Mary's arm in a tight clutch as she whispered excitedly: "Look, Mary--there it is! There was one light, and 't is gone. Now there are the two; and there comes the third, as Jack said." The girls arose and stood erect in eager interest, looking out over the water, where, several hundred yards from shore, the lights gleamed and then disappeared. And now their eyes, accustomed to the gloom, discerned a slim blackness, as of a man's form, appear on the highest point of rocks above the cave; and then a soft glow of tremulous light illumined the darkness. While they watched this, they were startled to see a taller figure spring from the shadows, and a second later the two seemed to melt into one enlarged blur, as if they were struggling. Quick as thought the boyish form beside Mary broke from the bushes and sped with flying steps toward the peak. "Dot--Dot--come back!" cried Mary, regardless now of who might hear her. "Whatever are you thinking to do?" A low but clear reply came to her from over Dorothy's shoulder. "The lanterns--they must be put out, else Jack may be hurt!" On, on, she flew, with no fear of the peril into which she might be rushing,--with no heed of her unmaidenly garb. Her mind held but the one thought,--that the lanterns must be extinguished, for danger threatened her brother and his companions if they should seek to land unwarned. So absorbed were the men in their fierce wrestling that neither of them saw nor heard the slight figure that came straight up to them, and then, dashing at the lanterns, sent them flying into the water beneath. Then the larger of the two, catching sight of the intruder, relaxed his hold on the other; and Johnnie Strings, with a derisive whoop, twisted his wiry little body from the slackened grip and sped down the rocks and away into the night. "You young rascal, what does all this mean?" demanded Southorn, for he it was; and seizing the boyish shoulder firmly, he shook the slender form. Dorothy, although greatly overcome by agitation now that her brave deed was accomplished, thought she recognized the voice that addressed her so roughly, and was silent from embarrassment. "Are you dumb?" the Englishman asked angrily, shaking her again. "Speak up, you young rebel, or I may try what a salt-water bath will do for the unlocking of your stubborn tongue." "Stop shaking me, you great--brute," Dorothy gasped indignantly. "Have you no--manners?"