"I wish I had more of these," said Polly, pointing to a little heap of oddly shaped shells, white in color, with here and there markings of soft brown.
"I wish so too," Rose said. "We've less of that kind than we have of any of the others. I wonder how it happened that we didn't get more of those?"
"I don't know, but if it is pleasant to-morrow, let's hunt for some," said Polly.
Mrs. Sherwood called, and Polly putting the tray full of shells upon the table, went out across the hall to reply.
Rose hurried down stairs to the hall, out onto the piazza, along the flower bordered path to the gate, then out and off down the beach.
Polly never liked to be out when the sky was cloudy and the wind raw, but Rose cared not a bit, and she had gone out thinking to give Polly a surprise.
She meant to find some of the coveted shells, and run home with them before Polly should have missed her.
She looked back at the Sherwood cottage. How pretty it was, and quite like a country house with its well kept lawn, its flowers in the gardens, and even at the gate, a rose vine clambering over.
Swiftly she ran along the beach to a spot where usually they had found the most shells.
A few there were, but none like those that Polly wanted, and she trudged along, looking sharply at every shell that lay imbedded in the hard, wet sand, from which the tide had receded.