It was strange to watch them. There seemed to be a dozen or more, about three or four feet long, and as they played and frolicked in the leaping spray from the cutwater, they would roll and toss and turn half over like kittens. Underneath, their bodies were a deep shell-pink, and the rest was brownish-green.
While they were watching them, Marbury came along deck holding something in his hand.
“One of the sailors found it back there on the aft deck while he was swabbing it just now,” he called. “It’s a flying fish.”
The girls examined it with eager interest, pulling out the delicate, bat-like wings that folded close to its sides, just like a junk boat’s sails, as Polly said. Then they had the fun of letting it go over the side of the boat, and it sank out of sight.
“But it’s half dead now,” said Marbury. “There’s not much use in putting it back.”
“Yes, there is,” answered Polly, cheerfully. “It will have the fun of telling all the other fish its wonderful adventure, and will die happy. I can see a ridge of land way off there to the west, can’t you?”
“Barnegat, and the Jersey coast, I think,” Marbury told her. “There’s bully yachting all along there, on account of the inlets. I camped out near Cape May one summer with a crowd of boys from the naval ‘Prep.,’ and we had fine fishing and sailing. The beaches are long and shallow. Up in Maine you’ll find them short with plenty of rocks.”
“Short around where the rocks are, you mean,” said Ruth. “There are long, flat reaches of sand up there, too.”
“Anyway, we like rocks,” put in Polly, comfortably. “I don’t think a long, shallow beach is good for yachting. Where are you at low tide? Up in the sand somewhere. And where are you at high tide? Swamped.”
Marbury laughed at her, heartily. He was a tall, stalwart naval cadet of nineteen, with the Senator’s own merry eyes and quick gift of understanding.