“Not as splendid as fifty,” answered Judy, assured now that there had been as many as that.
“Seventeen from fifty is thirty—thirty-two,” whispered the Evil Thing in her ear. Evil things cannot be expected to be good in arithmetic or anything else. “So he helped himself to thirty-two, did he! Nice haul! Thirty-two big fellows will bring him in—”
“Don’t!” groaned Judith.
“I don’t wonder you say ‘don’t!’ Thirty-two nice big fellows would have brought you in a pretty little sum. You could have put it away in a stocking in your bureau drawer, for the Blossom-fund.”
“Oh, I was going to! I was going to!”
“Thought so—well, you’ll have to get along with seventeen. That comes of having boys like that for friends!”
“He isn’t my friend!” Judith cried sharply to the Evil Thing in her breast. “He never will be again. If it wasn’t for Uncle Jem I’d never look at him again as long as I live!”
All this little dialogue had gone on unsuspected by the little pink “mastif” in the bow of the little dory. Blossom had been busy edging out of the reach of the ugly things in the bottom of the boat. If Judith had only edged away from her Ugly Thing!
Another surprise was even now on the way—a surprise so stupendous and unexpected that, beside it, the lobster-surprise would dwindle away into insignificance and be quite forgotten for the rest of the day. And oddly enough, it was to be Blossom who should be discoverer again.
“I’m going a little farther out and fish awhile,” Judith announced over her last trap. “I’ve got all my tackle aboard and maybe I can find something Mrs. Ben will want. You sit still as a mouse, Blossom, for I cant’t be watching you and fishing, too.”