“Who said we didn’t want to go?” Paul cried.
“Oh, well, don’t bite me!” pleaded Jack, in falsetto accents.
The little excitement caused by Jack’s involuntary bath gradually subsided. He made a final and fairly successful effort to rid his hands of the grime caused by cleaning the carburetor, and then, attired in dry garments, and with one pink and one blue slippered foot resting “nonchalantly” (as he called it) on the rail, he watched the receding, wooded shores of the Chelton.
From somewhere in the distance a factory whistle blew.
“One o’clock!” cried Jack. “Is dinner ready? I say, Cora, I have a wonderful appetite!”
“Never knew you when you didn’t have,” she replied.
“Why, we just had lunch—just before Jack fell overboard!” ejaculated Hazel.
“That won’t make a bit of difference to him—or them,” said Belle, with a resigned air. “We’ll have to serve another meal I suppose.”
“A regular one this time, if you please,” begged Walter. “Those olives, anchovies and the caviar sandwiches only made me a bit keen.”
The girls were nothing loath to put out the food again, for, truth to tell, the river air had given them, as well as the boys, an appetite. They had brought plenty with them, for though they had requested Mr. Floyd to have supper ready when they reached the bungalow (the first meal in camp the boys were to share with the girls), still Cora had feared they would arrive late, and had made arrangements accordingly.