"Will—I mean skipper," she said, "it's a lovely pussy." Then, "Oh, goodness—William!"
Her tone hovered between horror and admiration.
William stepped jauntily up to her. One corner of the table-cloth trailed on the ground behind him.
"It's a sail," he said, proudly. "I got all my clothes dashed off me in the wreck, an' I'm wearing a sail wot got washed up by the waves. It does jolly well, doesn't it?"
Joan clapped her hands.
"Oh, an' I've found a native savage," went on William, "an' he doesn't mind bein' called Friday——"
"Oh, how lovely! An' the pussy will do for a native wild animal. Oh, William—we've got simply everything, haven't we?"
They went happily down to the river.
There William sustained the first shock of that momentous afternoon. Many more were to follow. The native savage had disappeared. Search in the summer-house revealed the fact that William's clothes had also disappeared.
William's jaw dropped.