“I don’t like her father, either,” Terry went on. “He’s the meanest man I ever saw, and I don’t believe a word he says!”
“Now, Terry,” Mrs. Landry rebuked, “you know nothing about him. He’s just not like the city people we’re used to, and you probably misjudge him.”
“But he seems so cruel and crafty. I wonder if he punished Melissa for staying away the other night? The night she stayed in the garage.”
“Oh, he couldn’t!” Arden exclaimed. “I’ll ask Melissa the next time I see her. I wonder where she went just now? I don’t see her boat anywhere. She seems to have disappeared all of a sudden.”
“Playing hide and seek with us, maybe,” Terry suggested. “Hope we don’t catch any of this queer business,” she finished, easing a little to look at her burning hand.
“I think this whole place is queer,” Sim said, looking over the untroubled bay. “I don’t like that Olga, nor George Clayton, either, and I’m sure he’s up to some shady business—not to say dark and dangerous.”
“Now, Sim,” Mrs. Landry said gently, “you mustn’t make a mystery out of everything. He’s probably just an ordinary crabber and fisherman with a difficult daughter to look out for, and in these wild places girls cannot be allowed to run wild, you know.”
They were almost home, and everyone seemed willing to think a little and stop talking. “Buckingham Palace” stood out with reassuring friendliness against the late afternoon sky and looked decidedly more inviting than the moldy houseboat.
“You may be right, Mother,” Terry said, pulling the oars gently as they drifted up to their little dock. “But there’s something going on, I’m sure. Something we don’t know anything about—yet,” she ended significantly.
And no one there was to say “nay” to that possibility.