CHAPTER IX
A PERFECT PIRATICAL PLAYROOM
Stuart began: “We shan’t care to be disturbed, so we’d better build under water. That stretch of river between Cliveden and Cookham would make quite a good ceiling. Nor will we take it on a repairing lease, but leave the Thames Conservancy responsible for damages.”
Merle at this juncture wanted to know how he saw the Thames Conservancy; in her eyes, it wore very bright blue with lots of gilt buttons, and was always sitting round a table.
“One person?” asked Peter curiously.
“Yes. One wide person that could be stretched all round the table and be joined with a button when it met itself.”
Stuart reminded them that, so far, the room consisted of a ceiling floating on a vacuum, and that if they dawdled so long over Thames Conservancies, they’d never get the walls up before dinner.
“It’s my dinner-hour now,” said Peter, thinking herself a British workman. And Merle remarked that putting up walls was a tough job, and she hadn’t got the right tools, and must fetch her mate.
“We can’t tell yet just how big the Room will need to be, so I vote for elastic-sided walls.”
“Like boots,” Peter murmured. Then roused herself to ask for the height of the Room.