If Julia was really nervous, the laugh and merry-making that followed her naïve remark must certainly have dispelled the quakes, for presently she was shaking with laughter rather than with nerves.
"But the crabs!" insisted Grace. "Let's draw for them," and she dragged the girls over to a little terrace where they unceremoniously squatted down.
"Here are nice long and short straws," offered Louise, breaking off some tall grass ends. "Julia, you can say which wins, long or short?"
"Please don't ask me to decide anything about those crabs," protested Julia. "And if you don't mind I'll just run along. Mother expects folks to dinner. I had a lovely time—" she stopped to allow the girls' laugh time to penetrate. Force of habit in "having a good time" seemed too absurd now, when all were just recovering from the accident shock.
"Oh, we know what you mean, Julia," teased Grace. "You had a lovely time holding Willie's foot—hand I mean, I forgot it was his hand."
But Julia was off, down the avenue, her light hair floating like a cloud about her shoulder, and her slim figure—the girls called it svelt—still proclaiming her the little girl, in spite of her grown up manners. Every one liked Julia; she was pensive and temperamental, but distinctively individual withal.
"No use my winning those crabs," said Margaret, "we haven't any one to shell them, or cook them, or do anything with them."
"You can put them in a tub of water and let them grow up," suggested Cleo, drawing a long straw, when a short one would decide the crabs.
"There, Louise, you have them. Take them! I hope they make you a lovely salad, and that they don't make you sick."