"Well," said Barbara presently, jumping up, "you'll want some sleep. If you hear us rushing about, at the screech of dawn to-morrow, it's because some of us may go out with Dad in the Crow, if there's a breeze. Do you like yachting? Would you care to go?"
"I've never been," said Julia.
"Oh, well, then, you ought to!" Barbara said with round eyes. "I'll tell you—I'll peep in here to-morrow, and if you're awake I'll give you a call!" she arranged, after a minute's frowning thought.
"I sleep awfully sound!" smiled Julia.
But she was awake when Barbara, true to her plan, peeped in at five o'clock the next morning, and presently, in a bluejacket's blouse and brief blue skirt, with a white canvas hat on her head, and a boy's old gray jersey buttoned loosely about her, followed muffled shapes through the cold house and into the wet, chilly garden. Richie was going, Sally had the gallant but shivering Jane and the dark-eyed Keith by the hand, and Barbara hung on her father's arm.
The waters of the bay were gray and cold; a sharp breeze swept their steely surfaces into fans of ruffled water. The little Crow rocked at her anchor, her ropes and brasswork beaded with dew. Julia, sitting in desperate terror upon a slanting upholstered ledge, felt her teeth chatter, and wondered why she had come.
Barbara, Sally, Richie, and their father all fell to work, and presently, a miracle to Julia, the little boat was running toward Richardson's Bay under a good breeze. Presently glorious sunlight enveloped them, flashed from a thousand windows on San Francisco hills, and struck to dazzling whiteness the breasts of the gulls that circled Sausalito's piers. Everything sparkled and shone: the running blue water that slapped the Crow's side, the roofs of houses on the hillside, the green trees that nearly concealed them.
Growing every instant warmer and more content, Julia sat back and let her whole body and soul soak in the comfort and beauty of the hour. Her eyes roved sea and sky and encircling hills; she saw the last wisp of mist rise and vanish from the stern silhouette of Tamalpais, and saw an early ferryboat cut a wake of exquisite spreading lacework across the bay. And whenever her glance crossed Sally's, or the doctor's, or Richie's glance, she smiled like a happy child, and the Tolands smiled back.
They all rushed into the house, ravenous and happy, for a nine o'clock breakfast, Julia so lovely, in her borrowed clothing and with her bright, loosened hair, that the young men of the family began, without exception, to "show off" for her benefit, as Theodora scornfully expressed it. And there was bacon and rolls and jam for every one, blue bowls of cereal, glass pitchers of yellow cream, smoking hot coffee always ready to run in an amber stream from the spout of the big silver urn.
"And you must eat at least four waffles," said Ned, "or my father will never let you come again! He has to drum up trade, you know—"