But Shirley delayed still longer to put her large camera carefully away. The small one she tucked under her arm to take with her to the river.
It was Kit's first trip to the little beach belonging to Bet's father. The bath house with its tiny dressing rooms pleased her immensely. "Imagine," she exclaimed, "building a house to dress and undress in. A clump of mesquite bushes always served my purpose."
Kit could not pretend to be other than she was. Fearing that these girls, whose homes were so elegant, might look down upon her, she had planned to keep her affairs to herself, but whenever anything unusual came up, she was startled by the contrast and blurted out the queer makeshifts that they had in her crude home in the desert.
She had no need to fear. The girls were as interested in Kit's description of her home life as they were in the exploits of the cowboys that she loved to talk about.
"I'd just love to eat out under a cotton-wood tree by the stream. That must be a lovely way to live," exclaimed Bet.
"I don't think you'd enjoy it for long, after what you're used to. You'd want to get back to all that lovely glassware and beautiful dishes. You'd miss your Manor."
"Of course I'd miss the Manor if I was away from it, but I'd love the other, too, I know I would."
They had just come in sight of the broad Hudson and Kit stopped short to gaze upon that wide flow of water.
"And oh, look at that lovely boat out there! Whose is it?"
"That's Dad's motor boat. I'm not allowed to run it, although I know I could just as well as not. Dad seems to think I'm still a baby and a girl baby at that."