Old Fort Skammel, built before the Civil War, has been abandoned for years to the rats and bats that have found a home there. Yet there is something suggestive of grandeur and protecting power hovering over it still.
Ruth had felt this as she sat with Betty and Pearl at the foot of its massive masonry and ate her Fourth of July evening lunch.
Following out her plan of the morning, they had rowed over here, she and Betty Bronson and Pearl Bracket, for a little picnic. Having been brought up on the island across the bay, the abandoned fort did not inspire in Ruth the awesome fear that it did in some others.
“Rats in there,” Ruth had said, munching at a bun.
“Big as cats,” said Pearl.
“’Fraid of fire, though,” said Ruth. “Won’t hurt you if you have a light.”
“Betty,” said Ruth, changing the subject as she watched the red glow of the sunset, “I never see a sunset but I feel like I’d like to get on a ship and go and go until I come to where that red begins.”
“Yes,” said Betty, “I sometimes feel that way myself.”
“But you’ve traveled a lot.”
“Not so much.”