"Look, look; I can make the boat rock," cried the excited Jack.
"Oh, isn't it fun?"
"Now," said Lulu, as usual taking the initiative; "we are a party of shipwrecked people, escaping in a lifeboat from a sinking ship. We are away out in the middle of the ocean. All the other people in the ship have been drowned, and we have escaped in the only boat there was. I am a widow lady traveling with my little boy. You are my little boy, Jack, and you are very ill. You must put your head in my lap, and keep your eyes shut as if you were suffering a great deal. Winifred is our faithful maid, who has been everywhere with us, and has divided her last ship biscuit with us."
"And what am I?" inquired Betty, beginning to enter the spirit of the new game. "Don't make the boat rock quite so hard, Jack, dear, please."
"You are the kind old sailor, who has saved us all. Some bad men on the ship wanted to take this lifeboat, and leave us to drown, but you shot them all down, and now you are taking us to an inhabited island you know about. We have been three days without food, and without seeing a sail, but I have promised that if you will bring us safely to land I will make you very rich."
"Are you very rich yourself?" inquired Betty.
"Of course, I'm a very great lady. No, I think I will be a princess; that will be nicer, and when people do brave things I make them my knights."
"But there aren't any knights now," Winifred objected.
"Well, then, it isn't now; it's a long time ago, about the time of Queen Elizabeth, I guess. Now come on, let's begin."
The next half-hour was one of the most delightfully exciting periods the children had ever enjoyed. Lulu's vivid imagination carried them all along with it, and even practical Betty forgot everything else in the interest of the shipwreck. Jack played the suffering child to perfection; moaned pitiously, and implored his mother in feeble whispers for a crust of bread or a drop of water. The food was all gone, Lulu said, but Winifred endeavored to procure the desired water by dipping her hands in the river, and splashing salt water over Jack's face. Some of it ran into his eyes, which was not pleasant, but Jack was too polite to complain. Betty spoke words of encouragement and cheer, while she scanned the horizon through an imaginary telescope. Lulu hung over her suffering child, soothing his woes by the tenderest caresses and promising innumerable purses filled with gold to Betty and Winifred, as rewards for their faithful services, if ever they should reach the shore alive.