“Oh!” cried Peggy, suddenly. She was some yards away from her companion.
“Now you’ve done it,” said the boy. “You want to be a mermaid yourself, Peggy, I think.”
But he fished her out of the pond at once, and tried to wring her frock.
“No good,” sighed Peggy. “I must take it off and spread it in the sun to dry.”
Johnnie helped her, and then made a tippet for her of his own merino muffler to cover her bare shoulders.
“Oh, if you are going to dress me,” said Peggy, pouting, “I must have something more than your merino wrap, though that does feel soft and warm.”
She ran away a little distance shorewards to a spot where the rocks were higher, only stopping just for a moment to wave her hand back to him.
“Go on shrimping, Jack. I’m going to the green-room to dress.”
When Peggy called Johnnie “Jack,” then Johnnie knew that Peggy meant business.
But as she stood there for a moment on the top of a boulder, with bare brown limbs and laughing face, Johnnie had to allow that she looked a very pretty and a very provoking picture. Then she dropped down behind the great boulder, and he saw her no more for a time.