Cricket at the Seashore

by Elizabeth Weston Timlow

At the supper-table Will announced that he and Archie and the Gentle Jane were all ready to take a sailing party to the Gurnet Lights the next day, if the party so desired. By the clapping of hands it was judged that the party did so desire.

"But about grandma?" asked Mrs. Somers, when she could make herself heard. "I can't go and leave her for all day when she is so helpless."

Cricket coloured at the allusion, but she instantly said, bravely:

"If you will go with the others, auntie, I'll stay with grandma."

"If you stay, Cricket, I'll stay, too," said Hilda, quickly.

"But you can't, Hilda. You're the party, don't you see? We've all been to the Gurnet, and we're going to get up this picnic on purpose for you. You've got to go."

"Yes, you've got to go," struck in Archie. "It's like the man who was on his way to be executed. He saw people all running along the street, and he called out to some one, 'No hurry, friend. It can't go on till I get there. I'm the man to be hung.'"

"Then, since Hilda is the man to be hung she'll have to go. That's certain. And besides, children, you can't go to-morrow, for we must give cook a day's notice if she is to provide luncheon enough to last you entirely hollow young people for a whole day. Then I'll see Mrs. Emmons, and perhaps she will come and spend the day with grandma on Wednesday, and we'll set sail then for the Gurnet Lights. Will that do? I'll go over directly after supper and see her, so you can put your minds at rest."

Mrs. Emmons would be delighted to come and spend the day with grandma, it proved, so the plans for Wednesday instantly began, as if they did not have a whole day before them. The hour of the start must be settled at once. As it would be low tide at eleven, they must be off at eight in the morning, to get well over the mud-flats before they were exposed. They would go outside the point for a little cruise, if it was not too rough, and then come back and land at the Gurnet, and show all the sights there to Hilda, and eat their luncheon either before or after, as they liked.

The boys were both good sailors, and understood a boat perfectly. Their grandfather Maxwell had trained them well from the time they were wee bits of boys, and even before his death, three years before, he had trusted them to go out alone.