Explore "Seek and Find" by Oliver Optic on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
FORTUNATELY the day was warm and the sun shining brightly, or our gentle passenger must have suffered severely from the effects of her voluntary bath. I do not know that I ever felt more embarrassed and perplexed than I did when I sat in the Splash that day, with Miss Kate Loraine at my side, her dress hanging "slinky" and dripping upon her. Certainly there was nothing sentimental in the affair, for, though I was willing to become a knight errant in a good cause, the situation was so awkward that I could not enjoy it.
Bob Hale was as much in trouble as I was, and he could not tell what to do any better than I could. Neither of us was willing to assume the responsibility of taking the young lady from her home on the strength of her own assertion that her step-mother abused her. There were two sides to every question, and with the brighter example of Mrs. Hale before us, we were not disposed to regard her as a monster without giving her a hearing.