Part 11 (1/2)
”Oh! I'll withdraw the accusation if you'll only call me Jack! I love to hear you say that, Hazel! Call me Jack.”
”Silly!” muttered Cora.
”Mushy, I call it,” declared Bess. ”Downright mushy!”
”You're jealous,” added Walter.
”Say Jack!” commanded the dripping owner of the name, ”or I'll come over and sit by you, Hazel, and I'm almost sure that blue dress of yours spots.”
”It does! Oh, don't let him come near me!” begged Hazel, trying to retreat into the cabin.
”Say Jack then!” commanded the relentless one, dripping at every step as he pursued her.
”Oh-Jack!” she complied.
”Your brains seem to have gone overboard, and not to have come back with you,” said Cora to her brother. ”Quit your fooling. You're getting the cus.h.i.+ons all wet.”
Jack subsided after blowing a kiss to his sister, and sprinkling her with water from his dripping hair. Then the boat was put back on her course, the dingey was made fast, the life ring put in place, and there was peace and quietness once more, broken only by Jack's grunts and exclamations as he struggled to get off his wet shoes.
”Cora,” called Jack, from the curtained cabin, where he was changing into dry garments, ”I didn't put an extra pair of shoes in your valise; did I?”
”I rather guess not,” was the quick answer.
”Then I haven't any,” wailed Jack. ”I'll have to borrow a pair of you girls' slippers. The biggest I can get-don't all speak at once.”
There were some subdued giggles.
”Did I hear Cora say hers would be too big for me?” asked Jack.
”Oh, do get sensible!” commanded his sister. ”There's a pair of worsted bedroom slippers of mine you can take until your shoes get dry. You can't stretch them any too much. Put your shoes near the m.u.f.fler.
They'll dry there.”
”Yes, and get all out of shape,” objected Jack. ”I'll put them on the forward flag staff and let the gentle breezes dry them. 'Tis Nature's way.”
”You'll do nothing of the sort!” groaned Cora. ”What would people say on seeing a pair of shoes at the top of the staff? Please put them near the m.u.f.fler and they'll dry all right.”
This Jack did, the iron cylinder that received the burned gases from the engine being quite hot, so that the wet garments and shoes bid fair to dry speedily. Jack, meanwhile, donned a pair of his sister's slippers-a pink one and a blue one, Cora not having been able to find mates.
”I don't know what's in him to-day,” Cora confided to Hazel.
”He's awfully jolly, I think,” said Paul's sister.
”Jolly? You wouldn't think so if you had to live with him as long as I have had to.”
”Is he always this way?”
”No, thank goodness; it goes by streaks, like the lean and fat in a piece of bacon.”
”The idea of comparing Jack to a piece of bacon!” commented Bess, who overheard.