“Jack! There are some getting ripe already!” cried Nora, in delight. She pointed to where spots of bright red dotted the canes. The children squeezed their way through and began to pick the raspberries. How sweet and juicy they were!
“We’ll have some of these with cream each day,” said Peggy. “I can skim the cream off the cow’s milk, and we will have raspberries and cream for suppers. Oooh!”
“Oooh!” said everyone, eating as fast as they could.
“Are there any wild strawberries on the island, too?” asked Nora.
“Yes,” said Jack, “but they don’t come till later. “We’ll look for those in August and September.”
“I do think this is a lovely island,” said Peggy happily. “We’ve a splendid house of our own - hens - a cow, wild fruit growing - fresh water each day!”
“It’s all right now it’s warm weather,” said Jack. “It won’t be quite so glorious when the cold winds begin to blow! But winter is a long way off yet.”
They climbed up the west side of the hill, which was very rocky. They came to a big rock right on the very top, and sat there. The rock was so warm that it almost burnt them. From far down below the blue spire of smoke rose up from their fire.
“Let’s play a game,” said Jack. “Let’s play...”
But what game Jack wanted the others never knew - for Jack suddenly stopped, sat up very straight, and stared fixedly down the blue, sparkling lake. The others sat up and stared, too. And what they saw gave them a dreadful shock!