Part 28 (2/2)

”Let's check,” Rick said

The boys hurried to the roos and the blue and white equipone So was the cart A quick look at Pirate's Cove showed no cart in sight

Where could they have gone? The boys hurried to the front of the lab building again and found Joe Blake still getting a bit of sunshi+ne

”Did you see the girls?” Rick asked hurriedly

Joe nodded He s and hauled the cart across to the north side They're probably swi over there”

Rick doubted it He doubted it very much The currents on the north side kept the botto

Without the need of exchanging a word, Rick and Scotty were suddenly running As they passed the house Rick had a sudden thought He went in and ran up the stairs to his roorabbed his radio unit and turned it on

”Barby!” he called frantically ”Barby!”

There was no answer Tucking the unit into his pocket, he ran out and joined Scotty again If Barby had her set she wasn't using it

”Come on” He led the way to the boat cove and stopped short The speedboat was there, and so was the Scuba cart, but the rowboat wasn't Anxiously he scanned the water There was no sign of the girls

Where were they? Where? The thought struck hiht before

_Had they gone to the houseboat?_

CHAPTER XVII

Pointer to Disaster

Scotty ran to the speedboat and yelled, ”Co off without knoe're doing”

Scotty turned, puzzled ”What do you irls have soing around in the speedboat, we ht throw a monkey wrench into the works”

”But we can't just stand here and do nothing,” Scotty said desperately

”We won't Go get the plane warmed up and wait for me”

Rick hurried into the house and ran up the stairs to Barby's rooh the dresser, then through the shelves in her closet Not finding what he wanted, he paused to look around in case he ht have overlooked a possibility

He didn't knohere girls kept things, and he suspected that soht pick But he could see no possible place that he hadn't searched