With the daylight came girls and women to the beach.
Mrs. Bobbsey, Mrs. Minturn, Nellie and her mother, besides Dorothy and Nan, were all there; Flossie and Freddie being obliged to stay home with Dinah and Susan.
Of course the girls asked all sorts of questions and Bert and Hal tried to answer them as best they could.
It seemed a long time before any movement of the cable showed that the buoy was returning.
"Here she comes! Here she comes!" called the crowd presently, as the black speck far out, and the strain on the cord, showed the buoy was coming back.
Up and down in the waves it bobbed, sometimes seeming to go all the way under. Nearer and nearer it came, until now a man's head could be seen.
"There's a man in it!" exclaimed the boys, all excitement, while the life-guards pulled the cord steadily, dragging in their human freight.
The girls and women were too frightened to talk, and Nellie clung close to her mother.
