CHAPTER
23
FIRE!
Sick at heart, the two girls realized with the Harper house aflame, their last chance of proving the guilt of the brass thieves might be gone. As they stood at the railing of the Queen, gloomily watching the spreading, creeping line of fire, a motorboat chugged up.
“Ahoy!” shouted a familiar voice. “Can you take aboard three more survivors? They’re the very last we can find on the river.”
“It’s Jack!” Penny cried, recognizing his voice though unable to see his face in the dark. “After we get the passengers aboard, perhaps he’ll take us upriver to the Harpers!”
The girls ran to help with the new arrivals, but sailors already had lifted them from the boat and carried them aboard the Queen.
“This is my last load,” Jack called out. “Nearly everyone was saved. Coast Guard boats are patrolling now, and if there are other survivors, they’ll be taken ashore.”
“Jack!” Penny called down to him.
“That you, Penny?” he demanded in astonishment. “Why didn’t you come back to Shadow Island this afternoon? We’ve all been worried about you!”
“It’s a long story, and there’s no time to tell it now! Jack, will you take us to the Harpers’ in your motorboat?”
“Now?”