"Do you see
them, too?"

"Why--why, they are children!" cried Laura. "Oh, Billie, do you suppose
they're alive?"

"I don't know," said Billie, dropping to her knees beside the three
pitiful little figures. Two of them were girls, twins evidently, and the
third was a smaller child, a boy. Something in their baby attitudes,
perhaps their very helplessness, stung Billie to sudden action.

"Help me get them loose!" she cried to the other girls, who were still
staring stupidly. "I don't know whether they're dead or not yet. But they
will be if we don't hurry. Oh, girls, stop staring and help me!"

Then how they worked! The slippery wet rope that bound the little forms
was knotted several times, and the girls thought they must scream with
the nightmare of it before they got the last knot undone.

"There! At last!" cried Billie, flinging the rope aside and trying to
lift one of the little girls. She found it surprisingly easy, for the
child was pitifully thin. She staggered to her feet, holding the little
form tight to her.

Laura and Vi each took one of the children and Connie offered to help
whoever gave out first. Then they started back to the lighthouse. Luckily
for them, the wind was at their backs, or they never could have made the
trip back.

When they reached the Point they found that most of the crowd had
dispersed. Only a few stragglers remained to talk over the tragedy in
awed and quiet whispers.

These stared as the girls with their strange burdens fought their way
toward the door of the lighthouse. Some even started forward as though to
offer assistance, but the girls did not notice them.

Through the window Billie could see Uncle Tom standing before his
mantelpiece, head dropped wearily on his arm. Then Connie opened the door
and they burst in upon him.

"Oh, Uncle Tom!" she gasped. "Please come here, quick!"

CHAPTER XXIV

THREE SMALL SURVIVORS

It did not take Uncle Tom very long, experienced as he was, to bring the
three children back to consciousness. As it was, they had been more
affected by the cold and the fright than anything else, for the raft,
crude as it was, had kept them above the surface of the waves and saved
their lives.

As the girls bent over them eagerly, helping Uncle Tom as well as they
could, the faint color came back to the pinched little faces, and slowly
the children opened their eyes.

"Oh, they are aliv