George stuffed the parcel of papers under the tarpaulin as she spoke. “It’s Fisherman Connell’s boat, called Gypsy,” she said, reading the name on the boat by the light of her torch. “He won’t mind me hiding something in it!”

She covered up the papers with the tarpaulin, and then looked over to the island again. Yes — that light was still there. Anger welled up in George again, and she went to look for her own boat, which should be somewhere near where they were.

“Here it is,” she said to Timmy, who leapt in at once. She ordered him out for she had to pull the boat down to the water. Fortunately it was a small, light boat and as the tide was almost fully in, she didn’t have very far to drag it. Timmy took hold of the rope with his teeth and helped too. At last it was on the water, bobbing gently about in the dim light of the half-moon. Timmy leapt in, and soon George was in too, though with very wet feet!

She took the oars and began to pull away from the shore. “Tide’s almost on the turn,” she told Timmy. “It won’t be too hard a row. Now we can find those campers and tell them what we think of them. You’re to bark your very loudest and scare them, Timmy — in fact, you can chase them to their boat, if you like.”

Timmy answered with a small bark. He knew quite well that George didn’t want him to make much noise. He thought it very queer that she was going over to her island tonight, all by herself. Why hadn’t she taken the others? He was sure that Julian would be very cross!

“Now don’t bark or whine, Timmy,” she said, in a whisper. “We’re almost at my landing-place — but I’m going under those trees there, not landing here. I want to hide my boat.”

She guided the boat towards some trees whose branches. overhung a tiny creek that ran a little way inland. She leapt out, and flung the mooring rope round the trunk of the nearest tree, and made it fast.

“There, little boat,” she said. “You’ll be safe there. No one will see you. Come on, Tim — we’ll tackle those campers now.”

She turned to go, and then stopped. “I wonder where their boat is,” she said. “Let’s have a look round, Timmy. It must be here somewhere.”

She soon found the boat lying on the sands, its rope thrown round a nearby rock. The tide was almost up to it. She grinned to herself. “Timmy!” she whispered. “I’m going to untie this boat and set it loose on the tide. It will soon be far away. Ha — what will those awful campers say?”

And, to Timmy’s amazement, she undid the rope from the rock, rolled it up, and threw the coil inside the boat. Then she gave the boat a push — but it was still embedded in the wet sand.