“Well, I guess they have gotten enough of this place,” Tom conceded.
“But the men are getting ready to pursue them—and—”
“Don’t let them!” Tom cried. “We saved them last night. Tell the chief it is Big Boy Tom’s will that they be allowed to go.”
Margery sped away on her light feet.
“That returns good for evil,” Tom said to Cliff and Nicky. “They only want to escape. They don’t know what we know!”
But—they did!
CHAPTER XXVII
AGAINST ODDS
Out from the mainland came a canoe. In it were two white people. They paddled stolidly and steadily, although several other canoes were close behind them, and at their sides, their occupants screaming and demanding in their high, shrill women’s voice, the return of the commandeered canoe.
Bill, Andy, Jack, Mr. Gray and Bob, on the cruiser, at anchor not far from a dingy, white sloop, watched curiously, and a little anxiously. Who were the men? They were men, not boys! But they were too far away to be recognized, if they were known, even with glasses trained on them. All that was to be seen was the anger of the canoeists around them and the lifting of an oar, with which they drove back too venturesome canoes.
The cruiser’s party, having made every effort to locate the missing Tom, Cliff and Nicky, even at risk of getting lost in the jungles themselves, had finally been forced to give up the search. They were lying at anchor, simply waiting, hoping against hope that something would give them a clue to the youths.