"Anyhow I was in Canada once."
"Don't mind Billy," Phil interrupted. "I'm really serious. There must be some way I could get into it. You know, Mother, how much I've always wanted to."
"Yes, my boy; I do know," Mrs. Thatcher answered. "Ever since you were old enough to play with toys it has always been soldiers and wars. I have thanked God that war was a horror of the past, for I know how hard it would be to hold you back if the opportunity offered."
"If he goes, then I go with him," Billy said with decision.
"You both had better wait until war is declared by somebody against somebody else," Cosden suggested.
"You don't think they'll patch it up, do you?" Philip inquired anxiously.
"Let us hope so," Mrs. Thatcher answered; "but this is a pleasure expedition. Let us banish thoughts of war."
As the launch rounded a rocky promontory a roaring fire was disclosed burning on the beach, around which several of the house servants were already busied in preparing supper. Back from the beach, beneath great spreading oaks, a cloth was laid on the ground, to which the contents of the hampers were being transferred. The usual limitations of camp life were conspicuous by their absence, the fascinations were emphasized by the marvelous smoothness with which everything was conducted.
"I don't call this picnicking," Edith declared, after her first taste of chowder. "Plant a forest of trees in Sherry's ball-room, paint an ocean on the wall, fake a moon rising over the orchestra stage, everybody sit cross-legged on the floor,—and there you have it. Sherry certainly couldn't improve on the service or the food."
"I can't find even an ant on mine," Billy complained, corroborating Edith's praise.