Page:Barbour--Joan of the ilsand.djvu/153

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PERILS SHARED
141

ago, that he had a sort of notion of seeing Moniz."

"Why didn't you tell me?' the girl asked.

"Well, it was only a surmise. I put two and two together and concluded that was what he was hankering for, but I thought perhaps the mood would pass off."

Chester Trent did not return to Tao Tao that night, and both his sister and Keith felt restless in his absence. The very fact that he had not spoken of his intention was ominous. Keith paid scant attention to the plantation next day, but remained about the bungalow with the girl, whose uneasiness increased hourly. Personally he was not greatly concerned with Keith's absence, although he was heartily sorry that the youngster was making an idiot of himself again. It was because of the girl that he looked out over the sea to the south so often and occasionally muttered under his breath things which were far from complimentary to Chester Trent.

"This won't do," he declared to the girl as evening approached. "I'm going to get a crew together and row over to Tamba in the whale-boat."

"If you go I go too," the girl said resolutely.

"No," replied the man with an assumption of authority. "It's no trip for a girl in an open boat, and Heaven only knows what sort of trouble we may have there. I shan't come back without him, and there may be some delay."