"Well, then, there are only two or three things left that might have happened," said Mollie, her lips quivering. "It's barely possible they may have wandered off into the woods and gotten lost. In that case somebody will have to hurry up and find them or they will just stay there and s-starve! And that's almost worse than being run over." "Well, with everybody in Deepdale, civilians as well as police, searching for them," said Betty confidently, "I don't think there is very much chance of their starving to death. If that's the solution, I shouldn't wonder but that they are safe at home now with everybody rejoicing." Mollie's face brightened a little at this picture, but almost immediately clouded over again. "But we don't know that," she said. "And until we do, I'm not going to let myself get too happy." "I wonder," she said suddenly, after the girls had cleared away the lunch and had perched themselves on the porch railing, "just what I ought to do first. Send a telegram to mother, I suppose," answering her own question. "Yes, I think I would," said Betty, adding, as Mollie got up with characteristic impulsiveness and started for the house: "Do you mind telling us what you are going to say in it--about going home, I mean?" Mollie paused uncertainly. "I--I don't just know," she admitted. "One minute I think there's no question but what I ought to go, and the next, I wonder if I wouldn't only be in the way." "There's another thing to consider," Mrs. Ford put in. "It is almost a certainty that the children will be found in a day or two, perhaps are found already, and in that case you would have all your trip for nothing. I don't like to advise--" "Oh, please do," Mollie begged, adding with a pathetic little smile: "I feel so awfully lonesome, trying to decide everything all by myself." "You poor little girl," said the woman tenderly, then fearing lest sympathy would only make the girl feel worse, added hurriedly: "In that case I should most strongly advise that you wait a day or two at least and give things a chance to straighten out. At the end of that time, if they haven't been found and you still think you ought to go, we'll pack up everything and go along with you, of course." "That's what I'll do then," agreed Mollie, relieved to have the question settled for her. "And now," she added, making for the door once more, "I'm going to get into my street things and wiz down to that station in record time. Who wants to come with me?" It seemed everybody did, and in a very short time the girls had changed from their bathing suits to their street clothes and were ready for the dash to the station, which was about two miles from their house. They all climbed into Mollie's car, and the big machine started slowly backward down the steep incline.