“A fine scare you’ve given us,” cried Rob, as they landed and flung down their afternoon’s catch.  “We were afraid for a time that you were lost in that black squall—­it blew two of our, tents down, and we were mighty anxious about you, I can tell you.”

“You did not alarm our folks?” asked Hiram anxiously.

“No, I thought that it would be best to wait.  Somehow, I thought you’d turn up safe.  Where on earth have you been and what has happened?  You look as pale as three ghosts.”

“Towed to sea by a shark—­caught in a squall—­almost run down by a liner—­and so hungry we can’t talk now,” sputtered out Tubby comprehensively.

“All right; come on up to the fire and get dried out and pitch into the grub.”

After such a meal as it may be imagined the young scouts indulged in, they told their whole yarn of their adventures to the listening Patrol.  A short time after they concluded—­so long had it taken to relate everything and answer all questions—­the mournful call of “Taps” sounded and it was time to turn in.  Little Digby alone, who was to do sentry service, remained on duty.

Merritt’s dreams were a strange jumble.  It seemed to him that he was being towed to sea on the back of a huge shark, by a big liner with a row of blazing portholes that winked at him like facetious eyes.  Suddenly, just as it seem he was about to slip off the marine monster’s slippery back, he thought he heard a loud cry of “Help, scouts!”

So vivid was the dream and so real the cry that he awoke trembling, and listened intently while peering out through the tent flap.

There was no sound, however, but the ripple of the waves on the beach and the “hoot hoot” of an owl somewhere back in the woods on the island.

“Funny,” mused the boy, as he turned over and dozed off again, “that certainly sounded loud enough to have been a real, sure enough call for help.”

CHAPTER XVIII

JOE DIGBY MISSING

“Merritt!  Merritt, wake up!”

The boy sleepily opened his eyes and saw bending over him the pale features of Rob, whose voice quivered with suppressed excitement as he shook the other’s shoulder.

“I didn’t hear reveille blow yet.  What’s up?  Have I overslept?” murmured the young corporal.

“No, it’s not six-thirty yet—­barely after half past four, in fact.  But young Digby—­he had the night watch, you know—­and was to have been relieved at three o’clock.  Well, Ernest Thompson, his relief, roused out at that hour, but not a trace of Digby was to be found!”

“What!” The sleepy boy was drowsy no longer.  “Digby gone?”

“Hush!  We don’t know yet.  Don’t wake any of the others.  Thompson and I have skirmished around ever since it began to get light, and we have not been able to find a trace of him.”

Merritt was out of his cot while his leader was still speaking, and ten minutes later, during which time the boys exchanged excited questions and answers, he was in his uniform and outside the tent.