“Don’t call them by such horrid names, Guardy, or I shall not want to eat them,” begged Agnes.
“And who is going to do the preparing?” Luke wanted to know. “How do you get them out of their shells, Neale? That looks like a formidable task.”
“You can read poetry to them, if you like,” grinned Neale, “till they get disgusted and shuck their shells to get away. Or you can tickle their toes with a straw until they laugh so heartily that they split their shells.”
“Now, Neale!” exclaimed Ruth, while the others laughed with and at him.
“Never mind. Give me the boat-ax,” said the joking boy. “I don’t need any help. We will have stewed turtle for dinner if you leave it to me.”
Mr. Howbridge and Luke immediately went aboard the Isobel and began a thorough overhauling of the engine. They had tools in plenty; and now that the motor-boat was in quiet water they thought they would be able to correct the mechanical difficulties. Luke knew considerable about an engine, and the lawyer was not unhandy himself.
Ashore, the bigger girls proceeded to make the tent more comfortable, so that if they should be obliged to stay another night it would be better for the children. There were certain pans and dishes to wash, and washing them in salt water was not an easy matter.
Nobody had said much about the small amount of drinking water; but Ruth had thought of it and she forbade Agnes to use any of the supply that had been brought ashore unless she was actually obliged to. If Tess and Dot said anything about being thirsty, Ruth gave them fruit, the juice of which made up for the lack of water which they would have drunk under other circumstances.
As for Tess and Dot, when they had sated their curiosity in looking at the three turtles on their backs with their flippers waving in the air, they wandered away on a tour of exploration, the smaller sister bearing her Alice-doll, which was almost as much her companion as her own head.
The two little girls wandered afar that morning. The others were so sure that Tess and Dot could not get into trouble that they did not limit the bounds of their wanderings, so long as they kept to the easterly side of the mound on which grew the great palm tree.