Barby studied his face. "I guess you do know," she assented. "Well, they told us later, on the houseboat. They saw us get into the water, then they watched our bubbles come right toward them. So when we got here, they weren't fooled."
"We went through with it, as we planned," Jan said, "and we thought we were getting away with it. They were very nice. Of course we could come up and rest. They were glad to have us stop by. But when we got aboard, one of the women had a gun, and she made us go into the cabin and sit down. Then they started asking us questions."
"About why we had come. We stuck to the story, until they told us they'd seen us. Even then we didn't admit anything. Then Barby started to threaten them."
Scotty chuckled. "I'd like to have heard that."
Rick watched the tip of the cove. The speedboat from Spindrift should be coming shortly. "How about the plane?" he asked suddenly. "What did you do with it?"
Scotty motioned to the other side of the houseboat. "It's anchored. I landed next to the JANIG team and got into the rowboat with them." The Sky Wagon carried a small anchor and a few yards of anchor line in one of the pontoons.
"Okay. Carry on, Barby. How did you threaten them?"
"I was very logical," Barby stated. "Wasn't I, Jan?"
Jan nodded agreement. "You definitely were."
"I started by telling them that they couldn't possibly do a thing to us, and they might as well let us go right away."
"Bet that impressed them," Rick murmured.
"You are," Rick said contritely. "Go ahead."
"Well, I said my brother knew where we were, and they'd better be careful. It didn't work. Then I pointed out that they didn't even dare to kill us, because our bodies could be traced back to the houseboat. Everyone knew we'd just gone for a swim, and everyone knew we could take care of ourselves."
Rick thought privately that any time Spindrift was in danger from then on, he'd make sure his self-reliant sister had a bodyguard at all times.
"I said other things, too, but finally they slapped me and told me to shut up."
"One of the women. It doesn't matter, Scotty. It didn't hurt. Anyway, they said we could stop worrying about what was going to happen to them. Then one of the men asked if we knew what had happened to the three scientists. We said yes. And he said ... he said ..." Barby suddenly turned white.