“I’m going in swimming with you, Aunt Bessie. Sha’n’t we have fun? Where’s my bathing suit?” cried the excited Sunny Boy.
“Your mother left your suit in the house to the left,” she informed her nephew. “Want any help, dear?”
“I can undress all right,” Sunny Boy reminded her reproachfully. “I don’t take time ’cept when I’m getting dressed.”
Aunt Betty, it seemed, could “swim like a fish” as Aunt Bessie admiringly admitted.
“Let her hold you, Sunny Boy,” she urged her little nephew. “You’ll learn to swim right away if you’re not afraid.”
Sunny Boy wasn’t afraid, not the least bit. Aunt Betty said she would teach him how to float first, and she carried him out to where the water was smoother and put him on his back just as though she were putting him down on his own soft bed.
“Just keep your head up a bit,” she told him. “Never mind if the water does come over your chin—there. I won’t let go, I’m holding you firmly, dear. Now isn’t that fun?”
Sunny Boy agreed that it was. He tried floating several times, and then Aunt Betty carried him back to the beach and he sat down comfortably and let the waves roll over him.
“You’re having a beautiful time,” said Mother’s voice behind him. She had come up and he had not heard her footsteps in the soft sand. “I want you to go in and get dressed now, dear. Why, you’re getting sunburned already.”
Sunny Boy did not want to go in. He wanted to stay and play longer in the water. He scuffled his bare feet impatiently, and a little frown grew on his forehead.