The old carriage fairly bristled with heads and waving arms as they drove off. Chicken Little sat squeezed in with Katy, Sherm and Carol on the back seat uncomfortable but happy. Even timid Gertie chattered in her excitement.
The youngsters had dressed up especially for the occasion. Sherm was resplendent in a scarlet and white baseball cap that set off his red hair to advantage. Ernest took his straw hat because he said it shaded his eyes, and much reading had made his eyes sensitive. Katy and Gertie, just alike, were trim in blue gingham with smart little blue bows on their flying pig-tails. And Jane was brown, hair, eyes, and tanned skin as well as her dress, with a red coat like a frosted sumach leaf on top. Carol felt quite grown up in an old hunting jacket of his father’s. He had stuck two homemade arrows in his belt as a final touch.
Duck Creek was ablaze with autumn leaves and the hazel thickets were full of the tempting gray-brown clusters, though the nuts themselves when cracked seemed a trifle green.
“They don’t taste like the hazel nuts you buy,” said Katy.
“’Cause they’re not dry yet, Goosie.” This from Sherman.
“Bet you never picked a hazel nut before!” put in Ernest.
“Well, I’ve been hickory-nutting three times, and I guess you’ve never seen Niagara Falls and I have!” boasted Katy by way of keeping her self-respect.
The children worked busily all morning only stopping now and then to chase the squirrels who came scolding the intruders for taking their winter stores. By noon Alice declared they had more nuts than they could stow away in the old carriage, if they hoped to get in themselves.
Sherm and Gertie found a tempting persimmon tree and there were some wry-looking faces till Alice showed them how to find the fruit the frost had sweetened. After that the persimmons became immensely popular, and dresses and jackets alike were liberally stained with the mushy orange pulp to which samples of the picnic dinner were added later. They spread their feast out in the sunshine, using the sacks of nuts for seats, and waging war on intrusive ants and whole colonies of welcoming flies.
“I don’t see what the Lord made so many flies for,” said Sherm disgustedly fishing one daintily out of the butter by the tips of its wings.