Saboteurs on the River Part 4

"My Aunt!" she exclaimed, leaping out of bed. "All this good time wasted!"

With the speed of a trained fireman, Penny wriggled into her clothes. She gave her auburn hair a quick brush but took time to slap a little polish on her saddle shoes before bounding down the stairs to the kitchen.

"Is that you or a gazelle escaped from the zoo?" inquired Mrs. Weems who was washing dishes at the sink.

"Why didn't you bounce me out of bed two hours ago?" asked Penny. "I have an important business engagement for this morning."

"You're not going to the river again, I hope!"

"Oh, but I must, Mrs. Weems." Penny opened the refrigerator and helped herself to a bowl of strawberries and a Martha Washington pie.

"You're not breakfasting on that," said the housekeeper, taking the dishes away from her. "Oatmeal is what you need. Now why must you go to the river?"

"Someone has to salvage the sailboat. Besides, I lost a valuable object last night--"

The telephone jingled, and Penny darted off to answer it. As she had antic.i.p.ated, the call was from Louise Sidell, who in a very husky voice asked her how she was feeling.

"Fit as a fiddle and ready to go bottle hunting!" Penny replied promptly.

"And you?"

"I hurt in all the wrong places," Louise complained. "What a night!"

"Why, I enjoyed every minute of it," Penny said with sincerity. "If you're such a wreck I suppose you won't care to go with me to the river this morning. By the way, what did you do with that blue bottle?"

"I haven't the slightest idea. I'm sure I had it in my hand when we reached sh.o.r.e, but that's the last I remember."

"Well, never mind, if it's anywhere on the beach I'll find it," Penny said. "Sure you don't want to tag along?"

"Maybe I will."

"Then meet me in twenty minutes at Ottman's dock. Signing off now to gobble a bowl of oatmeal."

Without giving Louise a chance to change her mind, Penny hung up the receiver and returned to the kitchen. After fortifying herself with oatmeal, a gla.s.s of orange juice, bacon, two rolls and sundry odds and ends, she started off to meet Louise. Her chum, looking none too cheerful, awaited her near Ottman's dock.

"Why did you ask me to meet you at this particular place, Penny?" she inquired. "It was a block out of my way."

"I thought we might rent one of Ottman's boats and row down to the bridge. It will be easier than walking along the mud flats."

"You think of everything," Louise said admiringly. "But where's the proprietor of this place?"

Boats of all description were fastened along the dock, but neither Burt Ottman nor his sister were visible. Not far from a long shed which served as ticket office and canoe-storage house, an empty double-deck motor launch had been tied to a pier. An aged black and white dog drowsed on its sunny deck.

"Guess the place is deserted," Penny commented. After wandering about, she sat down on an overturned row boat which had been pulled out near the water's edge.

The boat moved beneath her, and an irate voice rumbled: "Would you mind getting off?"

Decidedly startled, Penny sprang to her feet.

As the boat was pushed over on its side, a girl in grimy slacks, rolled from beneath it. Barely twenty years of age, her skin was rough and brown from constant exposure to wind and sun. A smear of varnish decorated one cheek and she held a can of caulking material in her hand.

"I'm sorry," said Penny, smiling. "Do you live under that boat?"

Sara Ottman's dark eyes flashed. Getting to her feet, she regarded the girl with undisguised hostility.

"Very clever, aren't you!" she said scathingly. "In fact, quite the little joker!"

"Why, I didn't mean anything," Penny apologized. "I had no idea you were working under that thing."

"So clever, and such a marvelous detective," Sara went on, paying no heed. "Why, it was Penny Parker who not so long ago astonished Riverview by solving the Mystery of the Witch Doll! And who but Penny aided the police in trailing The Vanishing Houseboat? It was our own Penny who learned why the tower Clock Struck Thirteen. And now we are favored with her most valuable opinion in connection with the bridge dynamiting case!"

Penny and Louise were dumbfounded by the sudden, unwarranted attack. By no stretch of the imagination could they think that Sara Ottman meant her words as a joke. But what had her so aroused? While it was true that Penny had solved many local mysteries, she never had been boastful of her accomplishments. In fact, she was one of the most popular girls in Riverview.

"Are you sure you haven't a fever, Miss Ottman?" Penny demanded, her own eyes blazing. "I certainly fail to understand such an outburst."

"Of course you do," the other mocked. "You're not used to talk coming straight from the shoulder. Why are you here anyhow?"

"To rent a boat."

"Well, you can't have one," Sara Ottman said shortly. "And if you never come around here again, it will be soon enough."

Glaring once more at Penny, she turned and strode into the boathouse.

CHAPTER 4 _AN UNWARRANTED ATTACK_

"Now will you tell me what I did to deserve a crack like that?" Penny muttered as the door of the boathouse slammed behind Sara Ottman.

"Not a single thing," Louise answered loyally. "She just rolled out from beneath that boat with a dagger between her teeth!"

"I guess I am a little prig, Lou."

"You're no such thing!" Louise grasped her arm and gave her an affectionate squeeze. "Come along and forget it. I never did like Sara Ottman anyhow."

Penny allowed herself to be led away from the dock, but the older girl's unkind remarks kept p.r.i.c.king her mind. Although occasionally in the past she had stopped for a few minutes at the Ottman place, she never before had spoken a dozen words to Sara. Nearly all of her business dealings had been with Burt Ottman, a pleasant young man who had painted her father's sailboat that spring.

"I simply can't understand it," Penny mumbled, trudging along the sh.o.r.e with Louise. "The last time I saw Sara she spoke to me politely enough. I must have offended her, but how?"

"Oh, why waste any thought on her?" Louise scoffed.

"Because it bothers me. She mentioned the bridge dynamiting affair. Maybe it was my by-line story in the _Star_ that offended her."

"What did it say?" Louise inquired curiously. "I didn't see the morning paper."

"Neither did I. I gave my story to a rewrite man over the telephone. I meant to read the entire account, but was in a hurry to get over here, so I skipped it."