They carried their canoe down to the shore, and in a moment were paddling down the island toward the narrows. But they were not destined to go alone. Turning a point of ledge some little distance below Harvey’s camp, they came all at once upon Arthur and Joe Warren, walking along the beach. “Take us in there, Tom,” cried Joe. “I can take one of you,” answered Tom, pointing the canoe inshore with a turn of his paddle. Arthur caught the end of the canoe as it came up alongside a ledge on which the boys stood, and steadied the frail craft. “Might as well let us both in,” he said. “The more the merrier.” “The more the riskier, too,” said Tom; “but if you fellows will take the chance of a ducking, I’m willing. Water won’t spoil anything I’ve got on. Climb in easy, now, and sit cross-legged, so if we tip over you’ll slide out head-first, clear of the thwarts.” The canoe was brought to within nearly an inch of the water’s edge by the addition of the two to its burden. Tom gave a strong push with his paddle, and the heavily laden craft glided away from the shore. There was an extra paddle, which Arthur wielded after a fashion, and it did not take long to come within sight of the narrows. There upon the shore were gathered some fifty or sixty persons. Over against a ledge a fire of driftwood blazed. When they had gotten in nearer they could see a smaller fire at a little distance from the other. Over this was hung a monster iron kettle, and bending over it and superintending the cooking of its contents was a familiar figure. It was Colonel Witham, and he was making one of his famous chowders. At the same time that the occupants of the canoe discerned the colonel, he in turn espied them, and also noted a circumstance which they did not. A half-mile or more distant from them a big, ocean-going tugboat was passing down the bay, without a tow and under full steam. “There come those mischief-makers,” said the colonel, muttering to himself. “I’m blessed if the canoe isn’t filled with them. If there’s an inch of that canoe out of water, there’s no more.” Then, as he noted the tug steaming past, an idea came to him that made him chuckle. “Kicks up a big sea, that craft does,—as much as a steamboat,” he said. “Perhaps they’ll see it and perhaps not. If they don’t just let one of those waves catch them unawares. There’ll be a spill.” The colonel, chuckling with great satisfaction, went on stirring the chowder. The possibility of a wave from a chance steamer had, indeed, not been thought of by Tom or any of the others. The water was motionless all about them, but rolling in rapidly toward them were a series of waves big enough to cause trouble, if they did but know it. The colonel watched the unequal race between the waves and the heavily-laden canoe with interest. He looked out at them every other minute from the corner of his eye. He was afraid lest others on shore should see their danger and warn them.