She had finished her shopping, and did not like to linger, but as she was going out she said:
"If we were boys, we could chum up together, but we're girls."
"Yes," said Lionel, with an awkward laugh; "I suppose you don't fish? Girls never do."
"We could learn," said Charity. "Good-bye!"
Then she walked out of the shop; and wished harder than ever that she was a boy.
"They're too big for us," said Hope dejectedly. "Charlie is more our sort. I wish he would make haste and get well."
They did not see the boys again for some days, and then Charity met with a nasty accident, and Fairfax came to her aid. She was trying to get some marshmallows that grew by the side of the river, and in stretching out for them, she fell in. Happily a tree stretched over the water, and she managed to get hold of a branch, and cling on to it, whilst she called wildly for help. Fairfax and Lionel were fishing a short distance off, and Fairfax came up and soon pulled her up to the bank again.
"What a little duffer to fall in!" he said.
Charity stood and shivered in her wet clothes, but resented his tone.
"Anybody may have an accident," she said loftily.