by Robb White
The rain gradually stopped. Candy put out the fire carefully and they climbed up the slippery path back to the road. The air was clean and wet to breathe and the stars were brilliant and close.
They were lucky, for they hadn't been standing beside the highway for more than fifteen minutes when a car came along. It went past them fast, but then the taillights glowed brighter and it began to back up. When it got to them, a man stuck his head out the window and Candy recognized him.
"Hello, Dr. Thigpen," she said. "Can we ride with you?"
"What in the world are you two doing out here this time of night?" he demanded. "Get in here. Candy Pritchard. Who's that?"
"Tony Strong." She started to say that Tony was bhnd, but then decided that it might cause trouble.
As he started the car, he said, almost angrily, "I don't understand this modern generation. Out here forty miles from home in the middle of the night. Does your father know where you are. Candy?"
"I hope so," Candy said meekly.
The doctor grumbled most of the way home and Candy half listened to him. Tony, however, leaned against her shoulder and went to sleep.
When they got to Beachton, Candy asked the doctor to drop them off at Mr. Carruthers's. ''That's where Tony hves," she said, and secretly worried about what Mr. Carruthers was going to say when she woke him up.
The clock on the courthouse was striking midnight when Candy knocked on Mr. Carruthers's door.
It didn't take him a second to wake up. ''Belay the blarsted hammerinV' he roared. Then he opened the door and looked out at them. "You/' he said. "So you found him/'
"Yes/' Candy said.
"Thought you would. Now, Candy, you go home and on the double—your father's wild. I'll take care of Tony."
"I'll be back first thing in the morning. We've got to go see Mr. Jenkins."
"Righto, but go home now. I'll have breakfast for you— on the mantelpiece."
Candy ran all the way home. It looked as though every light in the house was burning as she slowly opened the door and walked in.
Her father was talking to someone on the telephone. When he saw her, he said, "Never mind, Pete. Here she is. Thanks a lot." Then he hung up and looked at her.
"I'm sorry. Dad," Candy said.
"Okay, skipper," he said. "You all right?"
"I'm fine. We waited under a bridge until the rain stopped."
"Did you find him?"
Candy nodded.
"Where is he. Candy?"
Candy felt a sort of coldness all around her. And everything seemed to be as quiet as three o'clock in the morning. "Dad, he's going to be all right without going to St. Augustine."
For a long moment they stood looking at each other, then he said, "Right you are, skipper. Now run upstairs to your mother and I'll fix us a sandwich before we go to bed/'
CHAPTER
13
In the morning after Candy finished washing the breakfast dishes and straightening up her room, she went around to Mr. Carruthers's house. He and Tony were sitting on the steps talking.
"Hi/' Candy said.
''Hmmm/' Mr. Carruthers said^ eying her. ''Doesn't look like you got much of a walloping after all."
Candy blushed and grinned. ''They weren't mad. Just worried."
"Too bad. I had a special mantelpiece all ready for you to eat your meals off of."
Candy laughed.
"When are we going to see Mr. Jenkins?" Tony asked.
"Right now. Do you think he's up yet, Mr. Carruthers?"
"Should be. But Tony ought to get dolled up first. Ought to be all spit and polish. Clean clothes, et cetera."
"W^ere're your clothes, Tony?" she asked.
"I'm inside 'em," Tony said.
"Won't do at all," Mr. Carruthers growled. "Need new jeans and a shirt. Run get him some, Candy." He dug into his pocket and handed her a ten-dollar bill.
"Ten dollars!" Candy exclaimed. "Thanks, Mr. Carruthers."
'T\ pay you back/' Tony said. ''As soon as we talk to Mr. Jenkins, Fll pay you back.''
"I have no doubt of that whatsoever, Tony."
Candy brought the new clothes and when Tony got them on and came out he looked fine. Candy had gotten him some khaki shorts and a white shirt and blue socks.
She gave Mr. Carruthers his change and pulled the price tag off Tony's pants as they walked down to the beach. Mr. Carruthers rowed them out to the Faraway so Tony wouldn't get wet wading.
As Tony settled down in the cockpit, Mr. Carruthers advised from the rowboat, ''Don't let the old fiddler crab fob you off with less than a hundred a month—and keep, Tony."
Candy laughed as she got the sails up.
In fifteen minutes they were across the Bay and anchored close in to Mr. Jenkins's sea wall. Candy helped Tony out and they walked the long way up to the enormous house.
"I hope that great big man doesn't open the door," Candy said as she let the huge knocker fall. "I don't like him a bit."
"You tell me where he is and I'll cut him down with my walking stick," Tony threatened.
The door opened the way it had before—slowly and wide— and the same tall, cold man came around it and stood in the middle of the opening. In a voice that made Candy feel as though something was crawling on her he said, "I think you are Miss Pritchard. No?"
"Yes," Candy said.
"I presume that you heard what Mr. Jenkins said to you the last time you were here. No?"
"Yes," Candy said. "But I saw him yesterday, and he told me to come here this morning. He wants to see me."
The tall man smiled, and it looked like a piece of concrete with a crack in it. "Absurd," he said. "Mr. Jenkins is not even at home." 118
Candy was burning up inside, but she kept her voice down as well as she could. ''He told me to come. This morning. So he must be here.''
''I said that Mr. Jenkins is not at home, miss. That is all.'' He turned around on his heel and walked to the door. ''Good day," he said, and swung the door shut with a soft whoosh.
That was all Candy could stand. Raging, she went up to the door, lifted the heavy knocker up as high as it would go, and slammed it down so that she could hear the noise echoing inside the house. "He is so here," she told Tony. "Only that mean man doesn't want us to see him."
"If he comes out here again. Til slice his ear off," Tony said, shaking his cane.
Candy raised the knocker once more and whammed it down with all her strength.
She was reaching for it again when the door suddenly opened. "Whoa. Whoa. Whoa," a woman said, sticking her head out.
The woman was big and fat with a round fat face and twinkly blue eyes. "You'll have the house around me ears, darlin'. Now what's the trouble?"
Candy was still so mad she got her words tangled. "Mr. Jenkins told me to come, and that long drink of water said he isn't here and I know he is here because he told be to bring Tony to see him and here we are."
"Well, now, darlin', actually and practically he isn't here. And that's the word o' truth if ever I spoke it. Mr. Jenkins pulled out of here in a high lather early this momin' chasin' off after some poor innocent little flower he'd heard tell of over in the Everglades. So—he isn't here."
Candy felt absolutely defeated. "But—but he told me," she almost wailed. "He said to bring Tony to see him in the morning and now it's morning."
"You just don't know the master," the woman said. "When
he gets wind of a new kind of flower, he's worse than any old bloodhound on a hot scent. He forgets everything and goes tootin' off in all directions."
''Oh, Tony, what are we going to do?'' Candy cried.
''Now don't take on so, darlin'. Come back day after tomorrow. Because Mr. Jenkins will be home from that swamp then, aholdin' some little flower in his hand."
Candy looked at her and decided that she was a lot better than the tall man. "All right," she agreed. "We'll come back." Then she had an idea. "But suppose that big man won't let us in?"
"Hmph," the woman said. "If tha
t Jasper gives you any trouble, you just say to him, say, 'Jasper, stand out of me way, or I'll notify Mrs. Malone.' Just tell him that and the big brute will go cowerin' off in a corner."
Candy had to laugh at the idea, but as Mrs. Malone said good-by she stopped laughing.
Slowly she and Tony walked down the stone steps and on across the lawn toward the sea wall.
After a while Tony said matter-of-factly, "I'm scared again, Candy. They'll catch me if I have to stay in Beachton until Mr. Jenkins gets back."
Candy said fiercely, "No, they won't, Tony. I'm not going to let them. I'll hide you so that they can't ever find you. Then when Mr. Jenkins comes back everything will be all right again."
"Where can I hide. Candy?" Tony asked, defeated.
"Maybe Mr. Carruthers will let you hide at his house. We can ask him, anyway."
"Oh, Candy," he said, "if I could only see. Then nobody would want to chase me all the time and I wouldn't have to run away any more. I could go to school and grow flowers and play ball and everything. I hate being blind. Candy."
Candy suddenly felt that she was a lot more than thirteen years old. She felt a lot taller and stronger, too. "Never mind,
Tony/' she said quietly. "Everything's going to be all right even if you are blind/'
**Hov? How can it be, Candy?"
"Fm not blind," she said. ''I ean see for both of us and I can take care of } ou, too. They won't ever bother you again."
She helped him down the sea wall and into the boat. ''We'll go ask Mr. Carruthers," she said, as she raised sail.
They were halfway across the Bay when she noticed a row-boat with a man in it leaving the beach along Front Street. In a little while she recognized Mr. Carruthers's bushy white hair.
She was surprised at how fast he was rowing, for the boat was slicing along through the water, little waves sparkling at the bow.
Candy tightened her sheets and began to sail closer to the wind. ''There goes Mr. Carruthers now, and he's really traveling. We'll catch him though."
When the boats were only a few hundred yards apart, Mr. Carruthers stopped rowing and began to make signals with his arms. He kept raising them and jerking them down, and Candy watched him, puzzled. Finally she said, "I think he wants us to stop."
She let the sheets fly and the Faraway fell back and began to drift.
Mr. Carruthers rowed alongside and wiped the sweat off his face with a big red handkerchief. "What luck?" he called across the water.
Candy shook her head. "He wasn't even there. He's gone off in the Everglades somewhere."
"Oh, blarst!" Mr. Carruthers said angrily.
"What's the matter?" Candy asked. And suddenly something cold began to grow inside her.
"There's a delegation waitin' for Tony. Mr. Thornton, the Red Cross, the Gray Ladies, the Junior Chamber of Commerce —all hands. Including a lady from the institute."
It knocked all the strength out of Candy, and her hands fell away from the tiller and dangled dowTi. Slowly she looked over at Tony. His faee was white, his lips set in the bitter line she knew so well.
Then he spoke, and his voice was cold and ugly. "They aren't going to take me away. I'll fight them."
''Hold fast, mate," Mr. Carruthers said. ''The time's for thinkin', not fightin'."
"We could stay out here until they go away, and then sneak back," Candy said. "Would you let him hide in your house, Mr. Carruthers?"
"Willingly, Candy, but I'm in trouble with those folks already. They've been accusing me of aidin' and abettin' and other items. Anyway, I just came to warn you, and I've got to shove off or they'll suspect me even worse. You set a course on out of the Bay for a while and I'll see what can be done.'
"All right," Candy said, reaching for the sheets.
"If I think of anything, you'll find me fishin' off the Point. In the meantime you be thinkin', too."
Candy spun the Faraway on her transom and set sail to clear the headland of the Bay. She looked back and saw Mr. Carruthers rowing slowly, a fishing line trolling innocently from the stern.
She also saw a sailboat putting out from the wharf. She started to say something but didn't as she watched the wind flatten out the sails and the boat heeled over, coming fast.
Candy sailed on, glancing back occasionally at the other boat. Soon she felt the tug of the current which swept across the mouth of the Bay. She eased the sheets then and the Faraway slowed down until it was barely under way.
The other boat gained on her fast then, and she sat watch-it carefully, measuring with her eyes how far to windward she was of the other boat.
"What's happened?" Tony asked. "It doesn't feel like we're going very fast."
*'We aren't. A boat's coming."
''Is it going to catch us?"
''Depends on who's in it, Tony. I can't tell yet."
Candy squinted a little and studied the boat. At last she sat back. "It's Hawk MacNair and there's a man in a brown suit with him."
"Is it Mr. Tliornton?"
"Probably is," Candy agreed.
"Let's go! Can't we go any faster?"
Candy laughed. "Don't worry, Tony. I'm going to show that Hawk MacNair something in a minute or so."
She let the other boat come up so close that she could see Hawk's always rumpled hair and squinty eyes. In a moment she could hear him yelling. "Wait, Candy! Wait!" he bawled.
"Now," Candy said quietly to Tony, "we go."
She tightened the sheets, eased the rudder over. The Faraway came to life again and began to sail.
"Wait! Wait!" Hawk yelled. And the man in the brown suit made angry gestures at her.
Candy looked scornfully back over her shoulder, then she patted the Faraway.
"What's happening?" Tony asked, his voice anxious.
"We're leaving them so far behind it'll be next week before they get to where we were."
She looked astern again after a while. Hawk had given up and was sailing back into the Bay.
"That's all," she said. "He's given up."
"W^ere are we now, Candy?"
"Out in the ocean."
"It's kind of rough."
Since no other boat was moving. Candy eased the Faraway so that she swam easily up and down the long blue waves. "You feel all right, Tony?"
"I feel fine. Only I don't know what's going to happen. Where can we go? We can't stay out here."
Suddenly Candy had an idea. 'Tony/' she said gleefully, "we'll go to Mr. Tartiere's."
"Where's that?"
"Down the coast. He'll take care of you, Tony. I Icnow he will."
"Does he live in a town?"
"No. He lives all by himself way away from everywhere. And he's an awful nice old man. He makes things out of driftwood—lamps and tables and things. You ought to see his house. He built it out of driftwood he picked up off the beach, but it's a fine house."
"He won't mind if I'm blind, Candy?"
"No. He's sweet and about a hundred years old, and he'll like having somebody to talk to."
"All right," Tony agreed.
Candy turned the boat south. Off to starboard the coast was green and faint blue where the trees were thick. There were long stretches of sand beaches and dark, shiny green places where the mangroves grew in the water. A gaunt, hollow-windowed building reared up from among some trees like a gray monument. It had never been finished and the weeds and bushes grew all inside it now.
Candy came in closer when she was sure that nothing in her Bay could see her. She kept watching for the two twisted pine trees that marked the mouth of the little river. When she spotted them, she lined them up and sailed straight in toward the coast. For a long time it didn't look as though there was a river, for the whole shore was a solid green, but when she got in close there was the little winding river.
The Faraway lost headway against the current and Candy paddled her slowly up the stream to the small wharf Mr. Tartiere had built. She tied up there and furled the sails.
"Nobody'll ever
find you here," she said as she gave Tony a hand getting out of the boat. She guided him to shore and
then walked beside him toward a low, solid-looking house built among some tall trees.
Candy began calling for Mr. Tartiere when they came close, but as no one answered she and Tony went up on the wide porch.
Tliere was a piece of paper pinned to the door and Candy read it out loud. ''Be back in a little while/' it said. ''Make yourself at home, but don't steal anything. Tartiere."
"He must have gone to sell some lamps or something," Candy decided. "We might as well wait, because he'll come back."
She led Tony to a chair which was really a piece of curved driftwood with the bottom sawed level. She sat down beside him in another chair made of tangled pieces of driftwood, but which was very comfortable.
"You'll be all right here, Tony. Day after tomorrow I'll come get you and we'll go see Mr. Jenkins. Then, as soon as he gives you a job, they can't take you away, can they?"
"I won't let them," Tony said.
"Neither will I!"
"And when I get some money, I can give Mr. Tartiere some for letting me stay with him."
Candy began to feel good again. She chuckled. "We really get around, don't we, Tony? Last night we were under a bridge, and now here we are halfway to Miami in the middle of some woods."
Tony laughed a httle, too. "Do you remember when I didn't want you helping me all the time? Do you remember when I told you to leave me alone. Candy?"
"I remember," she said.
"I wonder where I'd be if you had really gone away?"
"I don't know. But you never would have caught any crabs under that bridge."
Tony said quietly, "I'm glad you found me, Candy. I think everything's going to be all right now."
''I do, too/' Candy looked at her watch. ''Eleven o'clock! I wish Mr. Tartiere would come on back."
''So do I. Ssssh/' Tony said suddenly, leaning forward.
There was a car coming, the noise of it growing louder.
"That's him/' Candy declared, "because no one else ever comes here. Not in a car, anyway. Just people in boats with pieces of driftwood and things to sell."