Until Pen was sixteen the boys were content to share her equally. They were finishing their junior year when Pen's sixteenth birthday arrived. It fell on a Saturday, and Jim and Sara cut Saturday morning classes and invited Penelope to a day at Coney Island. Uncle Denny and Jim's mother were to meet the trio for supper and return with them.
It was a June morning fit to commemorate, Sara said, even Pen's birthday. The three, carrying their bathing suits, caught the 8 o'clock boat at 129th street, prepared to do the weather and the occasion full justice. The crowd was not great on this early boat until the Battery was reached. Then all the world rushed up the gang plank; Jew and Gentile crowded for the best places. Italian women, with babies, dragged after husbands with lunch baskets. Stout Irish matrons looked with scorn on the "foreigners" and did great devastation in claiming camp stools. Very young Jewish girls and boys were the most conspicuous element in the crowd, but there were groups of gentle Armenians, of Syrians, of Chinese and parties of tourists with field glasses and cameras.
"And every one of them claims to be an American," said Jim.
Penelope nudged Sara. "Look at Jim's New England nose," she chuckled. "I don't see how he can see anything but the sky."
Jim did not heed Pen's remarks. Pen and Sara laughed. They were thrilled by the very cosmopolitan aspect of the crowd. They responded to a sense of world citizenship to which Jim was an utter alien.
"Make 'em a speech, Jim!" cried Sara, as the boat got under way again. "Make the eagle scream. It's a bully place for a speech. The poor devils can't get away from you."
Jim grinned. Pen, her eyes twinkling, joined in with Sara. "He's too lazy. He's a typical American. He'll roast the immigrants but he won't do anything. It's a dare, Jim."
Sara shouted, "It's a dare, Still! Go to it! Pen and I dare you to make the boat a speech."
Jim was still smiling but his eyes narrowed. The old boyhood code still held in college. The "taker" of a dare was no sportsman. And there was something deeper than this that suddenly spoke; the desire of his race to force his ideas on others, the same desire that had made his father talk to the men in the quarry at Exham. With a sudden swing of his long legs he mounted a pile of camp chairs and balanced himself with a hand on Sara's shoulder.