“Wal’, ef I’ve got my bearin’s all right, we’ll spend the evenin’ in a right cheerful place.  That’s all I kin say now, but you boys go collect your belongin’s, so’s we kin land fer the night ef my calc’lations hold good.”

Just as the early darkness of the rainy night shut down over the rolling sea, the boys discovered a gleaming light, high and steady, not far off toward the Florida coast.

“Jimmy!” cried Billy excitedly.  “Bet the captain is going to take us to a lighthouse for the night!”

“Can’t be your uncle’s light, Mark, where we saw the spongers on the way down,” commented Chester thoughtfully.  “We’re too near home for that.”

“I have an idea—–­” began Hugh slowly.

“And so have I!” interrupted Alec, glancing at Mark.

At that moment, Roy Norton began to ring the fog bell under the captain’s directions.

“Ding!  Ding!  Ding, ding, ding!” resounded the heavy iron tongue.

There was a pause, and then the signal was repeated.  A longer silence followed and again the slow, clear signal was twice repeated.

By this time, the captain had guided his dauntless little vessel into slightly quieter waters, although she still pitched and tossed in a way that would have alarmed a “landlubber.”

Then came a new sound, louder than the noise of the pounding waves, deeper than the clang of the iron bell.

“Boom!  Boom!  Boom, boom, boom!” An answering signal had broken the silence where the steady light shone.

Mark started, as though recognizing the sound.

“Why, that-----” he began bewilderedly, “that is the signal gun at
Red Key!   Captain, are you signaling to my father?”

“Jest so,” Captain Vinton replied.  “Keeper Anderson knows my knock on his door!”

“How shall we land?” asked Chester excitedly, as he saw Dave making ready to drop anchor.

At that moment a rocket went streaking up toward heaven and a second later a slender rope fell writhing across the deck, where Roy stood swinging a torch.

“Hurray!” called Hugh, seizing the rope just as Norton, at the captain’s orders, also grasped it.  “Hurray!  It’s the breeches buoy!”

It will be recalled by those who followed the adventures of “The Boy Scouts of the Life Saving Crew,” that Hugh and Billy, Chester and Alec had been at the Red Key Station on the night of a thrilling rescue.  They had accompanied and in a slight way assisted the life-savers on their patrols, at the launching of the life boat, and in the final use of the breeches buoy.

It was most exciting to return to the scene of their memorable experience in this unexpected fashion.

The boys hauled willingly on the rope and soon it was taut, the odd conveyance swinging by the deck railing.

“You go first, Mark.  While yer father knows my knock and realizes that I didn’t give my danger signal, still he may be a mite anxious to see you, knowin’ you was comin’ home with me on the Arrow.”