ROBINSON CRUSOE
A long stretch of white, fine sandy beach, packed hard; an orderly procession of waves, each one breaking in seething, snowy foam that ran or crept after a child's bare feet as she skipped back and forth, playing with them; that was Long Island to Jewel.
Of course there was a village and on its edge a dear, clean old farmhouse where they all lived, and in whose barn Essex Maid and Star found stables. Then there were rides every pleasant day, over cool, rolling country, and woods where one was as liable to find shells as flowers. There were wide, flat fields of grain, above which the moon sailed at night; each spot had its attraction, but the beach was the place where Jewel found the greatest joy; and while Mr. Evringham, in the course of his life, had taken part to the full in the social activities of a summer resort where men are usually scarce and proportionately prized, it can be safely said that he now set out upon the most strenuous vacation of his entire career.
It was his habit in moments of excitement or especial impressiveness to address his daughter-in-law as "madam," and on the second morning after their arrival, as she was sitting on the sand, viewing the great bottle-green rollers that marched unendingly landward, she noticed her father-in-law and Jewel engaged in deep discussion, where they stood, between her and the water.
Mr. Evringham had just come to the beach, and the incessant noise of the waves made eavesdropping impossible; but his gestures and Jewel's replies roused her curiosity. The child's bathing-suit was dripping, and her pink toes were submerged by the rising tide, when her grandfather seized her hand and led her back to where her mother was sitting.
"Madam," he said, "this child mustn't overdo this business. She tells me she has been splashing about for some time, already."
"And I'm not a bit cold, mother," declared Jewel.
"H'm. Her hands are like frogs' paws, madam. I can see she is a perfect water-baby and will want to be in the waves continually. She says you are perfectly willing. Then it is because you are ignorant. She should go in once a day, madam, once a day."
"Oh, grandpa!" protested Jewel, "not even wade?"
"We'll speak of that later; but put on your bathing-suit once a day only."
Mr. Evringham looked down at the glowing face seriously. Jewel lifted her wet shoulders and returned his look.
"Put it on in the morning, then, and keep it on all day?" she suggested, smiling.
"At the proper hour," he went on, "the bathing master is here. Then you will go in, and your mother, I hope."
"And you, too, grandpa?"
"Yes, and I'll teach you to jump the waves. I taught your father in this very place when he was your age."
"Oh, goody!" Jewel jumped up and down on the warm sand. "What fun it must have been to be your little boy!" she added.
Mr. Evringham refrained from looking at his daughter-in-law. He suspected that she knew better.
"Look at all this white sand," he said. "This was put here for babies like you to play with. Old ocean is too big a comrade for you."
"I just love the foam," returned the child wistfully, "and, oh, grandpa," eagerly, "I tasted of it and it's as salt!"
Mr. Evringham smiled, looking at his daughter.
"Yes," said Julia. "Jewel has gone into Lake Michigan once or twice, and I think she was very much surprised to find that the Atlantic did not taste the same."
"Sit down here," said Mr. Evringham, "and I'll show you what your father used to like to do twenty-five years ago."
Jewel sat down, with much interest, and watched the speaker scoop out a shallow place in the sand and make a ring about it.
"There, do you see these little hoppers?"
Julia was looking on, also. "Aren't they cunning, Jewel?" she exclaimed. "Exactly like tiny lobsters."
"Only they're white instead of red," replied the child, and her grandfather smiled and caught one of the semi-transparent creatures.
"Lobsters are green when they're at home," he said. "It's only in our homes that they turn red."
"Really?"
"Yes. There are a number of things you have to learn, Jewel. The ocean is a splendid playmate, but rough. That is one of the things for you to remember."
"But I can wade, can't I? I want to build so many things that the water runs up into."
"Certainly, you can take off your shoes and stockings when it's warm enough, as it is this morning, if your mother is willing you should drabble your skirts; but keep your dress on and then you won't forget yourself."
Jewel leaned toward the speaker affectionately. "Grandpa, you know I'm a pretty big girl. I'll be nine the first of September."
"Yes, I know that."
"Beside, you're going to be with me all the time," she went on.
"H'm. Well, now see these sand-fleas race."
"Oh, are they sand-fleas? Just wait for Anna Belle." The child reached over to where the doll was gazing, fascinated, at the advancing, roaring breakers.
Her boa and plumed hat had evidently been put away from the moths. She wore a most becoming bathing costume of blue and white, and a coquettish silk handkerchief was knotted around her head. It was evident that, in common with some other summer girls, she did not intend to wet her fetching bathing-suit, and certainly it would be a risk to go into the water wearing the necklace that now sparkled in the summer sun.
"Come here, dearie, and see the baby lobsters," said Jewel, holding her child carefully away from her own glistening wetness, and seating her against Mrs. Evringham's knee.
"If lobsters could hop like this," said Mr. Evringham, "they would be shooting out of the ocean like dolphins. Now you choose one, Jewel, and we'll see which wins the race. We're going to place them in the middle of the ring, and watch which hops first outside the circle."
Jewel chuckled gleefully as she caught one. "Oh, mother, aren't his eyes funny! He looks as surprised all the time. Now hop, dearie," she added, as she placed him beside the one Mr. Evringham had set down. "Which do you guess, Anna Belle? She guesses grandpa's will beat."
"Well, I guess yours, Jewel," said her mother; but scarcely were the words spoken when Anna Belle's prophecy was proved correct by the airy bound with which one of the fleas cleared the barrier while Jewel's choice still remained transfixed. They all laughed except Anna Belle, who only smiled complacently.
Jewel leaned over her staring protégée. "If I only knew what you were so surprised at, dearie, I'd explain it to you," she said. Then she gently pushed the creature, and it sped, tardily, over the border.
They pursued this game until the bathing-suit was dry; then Mr. Evringham yawned. "Ah, this bright air makes me sleepy. Haven't you something you can read to us, Julia?"
"Yes, yes," cried Jewel, "she brought the story-book."
"But I didn't realize it would be so noisy. I could never read aloud against this roaring."
"Oh, we'll go back among the dunes. That's easy," returned Mr. Evringham.
"You don't want to hear one of these little tales, father," said Julia, flushing.
"Why, he just loves them," replied Jewel earnestly. "I've told them all to him, and he's just as interested."
Mrs. Evringham did not doubt this, and she and the broker exchanged a look of understanding, but he smiled.
"I'll be very good if you'll let me come," he said. "I forgot the ribbon bows, but perhaps you'd let me qualify by holding Anna Belle. Run and get into your clothes, Jewel, and I'll find a nice place by that dune over yonder."
Fifteen minutes afterward the little party were comfortably ensconced in the shade of the sand hill whose sparse grasses grew tall about them.
Jewel began pulling on them. "You'll never pull those up," remarked Mr. Evringham. "I believe their roots go down to China. I've heard so."
"Anna Belle and I will dig sometime and see," replied Jewel, much interested.
"There are only two stories left," said Mrs. Evringham, who was running over the pages of the book.
"And let grandpa choose, won't you?" said Jewel.
"Oh, yes," and the somewhat embarrassed author read the remaining titles.
"I choose Robinson Crusoe, of course," announced Mr. Evringham. "This is an appropriate place to read that. I dare say by stretching our necks a little we could see his island."
"Well, this story is a true one," said Julia. "It happened to the children of some friends of mine, who live about fifty miles from Chicago." Then she began to read as follows:—