“Good! The sloop could live through a hurricane, ‘so let the wild winds blow-ow-ow.’”
They stood in for Rincoteague pier. The excursion steamer had just disgorged its passengers there, and the sight of the horde convinced the party on the Wisp that the inevitable fish-and-oyster dinner at the hotel was not likely to prove a thing of beauty. Accordingly, Betty took the wheel and skilfully put the sloop alongside a smaller pier—rather rotted and insecure, to be sure—on the lee or ocean side of the island.
While Fessenden was making the Wisp fast, Mrs. Landis and Betty explored the larder, with highly satisfactory results. Potted slices of chicken, strawberry jam, boxed crackers, pickles, and aerated waters of several sorts, furnished “eatin’ stuff enough for anybody,” as Mrs. Landis avowed. She herself had thought to bring half a dozen wooden picnic plates and a complement of knives, forks, and spoons.
“Did you stock the Wisp for a polar expedition, Bob White?” asked Betty.
“Oh, all this stuff was left in her by the man I bought her from. I suppose it would have been more trouble to move the stores than they were worth. Have you everything you want? Then ‘all ashore that’s going ashore!’”
They ate their luncheon in a sheltered hollow at the lower end of the islet. A projecting clay bank, a huge stranded log, and an overhanging holly-tree made almost a cave of it. Aunty Landis was a highly satisfactory chaperon. After luncheon, when she was not darning, she was perusing a pamphlet of Sunday School lessons. And when this was finished, she brought a leather-bound memorandum-book from the bottomless work-bag, and entered upon an intricate calculation of household accounts.
Fessenden chatted with Betty. He had not yet begun to analyze the reasons for the pleasure he felt in her company, or hardly to understand that the farmer’s daughter who could hold a man of his experience by her side for the better part of three days must possess extraordinary charm.
“Now we are in the pirates’ den,” said Betty, “and that log is a treasure-chest full of—of what?”
“Of doubloons and pieces of eight. I’m the pirate chief, and you are my captured bride.”
“Oh, goodness!”