“You don’t catch me sleeping anywhere except in my canoe,” said Harry. “There isn’t any bed more comfortable than the Sunshine.”
“Can you turn over in her at night?” asked Joe.
“Well, yes; that is, if I do it very slow and easy.”
“The bottom-board is a nice soft piece of wood, isn’t it?” continued Joe.
“It’s pine-wood,” replied Harry, shortly. “Besides, I sleep on cushions.”
“And you like to lie stretched out perfectly straight, don’t you?”
“I like it well enough—much better than I like to see a young officer trying to chaff his Commodore,” returned Harry, trying to look very stern.
“Oh, I’m not trying to chaff anybody!” exclaimed Joe. “I was only wondering if your canoe was as comfortable as a coffin would be, and I believe it is—every bit as comfortable.”
When the time came for “turning in” Joe spread his water-proof blanket on the sand close by the side of his canoe. He had dragged her several yards away from the rest of the fleet, so as to be able to make his bed on the highest and driest part of the sand, and to shelter himself from the wind by lying in the lee of his boat. The other boys preferred to sleep in their canoes, which were placed side by side and close together. The blazing logs made the camp almost as light as if the sun were shining, and the boys lay awake a long while talking together, and hoping that the wind would die out before morning.
Joe, whose sprained wrist pained him a little, was the last to fall asleep. While he had expressed no fears about the tide (for he did not wish to be thought nervous), he was a little uneasy about it. He had noticed that when the tide rose during the day it would have completely covered the sand-spit had it risen only a few inches higher. Long after his comrades had fallen asleep it occurred to Joe that it would have been a wise precaution to make the canoes fast to the bushes, so that they could not be carried away; but he did not venture to wake the boys merely in order to give them advice which they probably would not accept. So he kept silent, and toward ten o’clock fell asleep.