“I ain’t going to tell nothing,” Crocker said sullenly.
Moving so quickly that both Jerry and Mr. Parker were caught off guard, [he wheeled and ran out the open door.]
“Get him!” the editor barked. “Unless he’ll testify against Bill McJavins we may lose a big story!”
Penny waited anxiously at the shack while her father and Jerry pursued the fleeing man. Ten minutes later they stumbled back, completely winded, to report their failure. The laborer had hidden somewhere among the bushes dotting the hillside, and they could not hope to find him.
“Without Crocker’s story we have no more evidence than we ever had,” Mr. Parker declared in disgust.
Penny tapped the big rock with the half-completed carving. “You have this stone, Dad. If you could photograph it in this unfinished state, wouldn’t it tell its own story?”
“We have no camera here, and the river is rising fast. How long would it take you to get to town and back, Jerry?”
“I might make it in thirty minutes.”
“Before that time, this shack will be under water.”
Anxiously, Mr. Parker gazed at the dark, angry flood which swept so close to the door of the cabin. Inch by inch it was eating away a board walk which led to a pier and a boat tied to it.