A great deal of labor had gone into the making of that landing and the steps leading down to it. His trained eyes could see where an inner portion of the jagged point had been cleverly blown off in such manner that the huge fragments formed a most natural appearing breakwater, making quiet water within instead of a moiling swirl. If the Cramers wanted a secret landing on the river, here was one ideally suited to their needs. But the Cramers had another landing, in plain sight of the flat rock at the rim of the basin. At that landing also a launch was tied; a very ordinary launch of a type sufficiently sturdy to combat easily enough the strong river current. It was that other launch that was out of repair so that a trip to Needles had been declared impossible. True enough, this launch might also be out of commission, but Rawley did not think so. Stopping and looking in at the engine, he judged that it was in very good working order indeed, and from certain little, indefinable signs, he believed that it had been lately used. By whom he did not know, although he remembered now that Young Jess--who was not so young as he sounded, since he was well past forty--had not been in evidence lately among his family. He saw all that was to be seen and retraced his steps up the rock stairway. It could not matter, one way or the other, if the Cramers kept a dozen secret landings on the river. Nevertheless, Rawley was frankly puzzled. He thought he could guess why his Uncle Peter had not wanted to take them to Needles in this large boat. If he really meant to keep this boat a secret, it would scarcely do to run it down to the house landing, alongside the smaller, crippled launch. Rawley and Johnny might come back, some time, and they might ask about the second launch, seeing only one down there at the other landing. Some one must want absolute freedom to come and go by the river without observation, he decided. With the smaller launch innocently swinging in the eddy at the lower landing, the Cramers would naturally appear to be at home, or ranging in the hills; whereas one or two of them might be absent in this boat here. It was very simple,--and very mystifying as well. The rock landing stage was built to make safe anchorage in high water as in low; which proved conclusively that this was an all-year landing.