All too quickly the August days passed by, and Mr. Trent's three weeks' holiday was nearly spent when he received a letter—as welcome as it was unexpected—from his employer, telling him he could be spared from the office for another week. Everyone was delighted, and Polly fairly lost her head and capered round the dining-room in her excitement on learning the contents of her uncle's letter.
"A whole week longer in this beautiful place!" she exclaimed ecstatically. "Oh, I do hope the weather will continue fine so that we can spend most of the time out-of-doors! What are we all going to do to-day?"
"I intend to hire a pony carriage—there is one to be had in the village—and take your mother and Cousin Becky for a drive this afternoon, Polly," her father informed her. "So you young people will have to find your own amusements."
"We can easily do that," she replied; and the boys agreed.
Accordingly, after dinner, when their elders had started for their drive, the children, left to their own devices, wandered through the village to the beach. The tide was out, and they walked round the cliffs, pretending they were explorers in a strange country where they had to guard against sudden attacks from wild beasts and savages. This game amused them for some time; but it was tiring making their way on the wet sand, and when they came to a pretty little cove, they sat down beneath the shelter of the cliffs to rest.
"We're safe here," remarked Edgar, "because if the tide came in and we couldn't get back to Lynn by the shore, the cliffs are not very steep, we could easily climb them."
"Yes I but it takes the tide a long time to come in," Polly replied. "I don't think it's low water yet."
"Oh yes, it is," corrected her cousin. "Jabez Triggs told me it would be low water at three o'clock, and it must be quite that. Why, it's past four," he amended, as he took out his watch and looked at it. "How the afternoon has flown!"
"And what an age we've been coming here!" exclaimed Roger, surprised at the time.
"We've had a fine game," said the little girl, taking off her broad-brimmed straw hat and fanning her hot face with it. "How we shall think and talk of all the fun we've had here when we get home—to Beaworthy, I mean! I wonder if we shall come to the Mill House another year? I asked Cousin Becky, and she said it was quite possible."