"It is lucky," he said to himself, "that I did not try with
Ruthven. It's a very different thing carrying fellows who can swim
and fellows who can't. What fools we've been to let ourselves he
caught here! I had no idea the tide came so high, or that it was
so dangerous, and none of us have ever been round here before. Now
I must go back to Ruthven."

Frank found it even harder work to get back than it had been to
come out from the bay, for the tide was against him now. At last
he stood beside Ruthven and Childers.

"We can only find one place, Frank, where there is any projection
a fellow could stand upon, and that is only large enough for one.
See!" he said, pointing to a projecting block of chalk, whose upper
surface, some eight inches wide, was tolerably flat. "There is a
cave here, too, which may go beyond the tide. It is not deep but
it slopes up a bit."

"That will never do," Frank said; "as the waves come in they will
rush up and fill it to the top. Don't you see it is all rounded by
the water? Now, Childers, we will put you on that stone. You will
be perfectly safe there, for you see it is two feet above this
greenish line, which shows where the water generally comes to.
The tides are not at spring at present, so though you may get a
splashing there is no fear of your being washed off."

The water was already knee deep at the foot of the rocks, and the
waves took them nearly up to the shoulders. Ruthven did not attempt
to dispute Frank's allotment of the one place of safety to Childers.
Frank and he placed themselves below the block of chalk, which was