Kategoria BISAC: Juvenile Fiction >> Action & Adventure - General

Polly has lost track of little Phronsie, whom she was supposed to be watching -- and now she and Jasper run into old Mr. Selwyn in the library of the steamer ship bound overseas to England. He seems very ill And who is this boy who seems so cruel to the sick old man? And what about this stuck-up girl Fanny Vanderburgh, who thinks the old man is much too common?

"Shan't we ever have anything else to eat, Polly?" asks the child, gravely. "Oh, yes," says Polly, cheerfully. "Lots and lots -- when our ship comes in " "What'll it be?" asks Phronsie, in the greatest delight, prepared for anything. "Oh, I don't know," says Polly. "Ice cream, for one thing " The little Peppers dream on -- cake, ice cream . . . with pink frosting As they learn, however, sometimes things must get worse before they get better.

Ty Lewis can't believe it when Coach V recruits him for the football team. This is Ty's big chance to prove how fast he is on the field, get a fresh start in a new school, and be like his older brother, Thane "Tiger" Lewis, who's about to graduate from college--and is being courted by the NFL.

But Ty's guardian, Uncle Gus, won't let him play. Uncle Gus needs Ty to scrub floors and toilets for his cleaning business while he cooks up gambling schemes with the local mob boss, a man called "Lucy."

When Lucy hears just how famous Ty's older brother is, he becomes suddenly friendly....

Old Duncan grasps his son's arm and quickens his pace, though already breathing hard from their walk along that path near the sea. At the same time Mrs. Catanach comes gliding along the grass by the side of the road, noiseless as an adder. Wearing black silk gown, white shawl, and a great straw bonnet, she looks the very pattern of Sunday respectability . . . but her black eyebrows gloom ominously, and an evil smile shadows about the corners of her mouth as she passes father and son -- without taking the least notice of them. "I'm telling you, Malcolm," says Duncan, shuddering. "Beware...

Young Malcolm MacPhail has already had his audience in the hall of the richly clad widow -- mother of the mad laird, Stephen Stewart. Malcolm has gained the laird's trust -- and with all the honesty of his heart he will do nothing against the poor man, even if it means pitting himself against the plans of the laird's wealthy mother. So strongly set is Malcolm's conscience it threatens to put him on bad terms, too, with the Marquis, with whom he has found shelter and employment. Yet Malcolm knows the ways of his own heart -- and he knows the mad laird is not the idiot the rest of the world...

There have been more escapes -- engineered by a band of Englishmen of unparalleled daring who, in a mad spirit of sheer meddling, devote their spare hours to snatching away lawful victims destined for Madame la Guillotine No one has seen these mysterious Englishmen. As for their leader, he is never spoken of, save with a superstitious shudder. Scraps of paper appear from some mysterious source -- announcing that the band of meddlesome Englishmen are at work . . . and always it is signed with a singular device drawn in red, of a little star-shaped flower -- called in England the Scarlet...