“It was all my fault for insisting upon landing there. Lou, I feel awful.”
“You needn’t.”
Louise forced herself into a cheerful tone. “Maybe we’ll find him again or he’ll come home. If not—well—” her voice broke.
Both girls fell into a gloomy silence. Water swished gently against the skiff as Louise sent it forward with vicious stabs of the oars.
With growing distaste, Penny eyed the mass of flowers in the bottom of the boat. Already the blooms were wilting.
“I wish we never had come to the swamp today, Lou. It was a bum idea.”
“No, we had a good time until we met that man. Please, Penny, it wasn’t your fault.”
Penny drew up her knees for a chin rest and gloomily watched her chum row. A big fish broke the surface of the still water. Across the channel, the sun had become a low-hanging, fiery-red disc. But Penny focused her eyes on the receding island.
“Lou,” she said, “there were two men on the point. Did you hear what they were saying?”
“No, only a murmur of voices.”