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No one came to interfere with the children. They lived together on the island, playing, working, eating, drinking, bathing - doing just as they liked, and yet having to do certain duties in order to keep their farmyard going properly.
Sometimes Jack and Mike went off in the boat at night to get something they needed from either Jack’s farm or Aunt Harriet’s. Mike managed to get into his aunt’s house one night and get some of his and the girls’ clothes - two or three dresses for the girls, and a coat and shorts for himself. Clothes were rather a difficulty, for they got dirty and ragged on the island, and as the girls had none to change into, it was difficult to keep their dresses clean and mended.
Jack got a good deal of fruit and a regular amount of potatoes and turnips from his grandfather’s farm, which still had not been sold. There was always enough to eat, for there were eggs, rabbits, and fish, and Daisy gave them more than enough milk to drink.
Their seeds grew quickly. It was a proud day when Peggy was able to cut the first batch of mustard and cress and the first lettuce and mix it up into a salad to eat with hard-boiled eggs! The radishes, too, tasted very good, and were so hot that even Jack’s eyes watered when he ate them! Things grew amazingly well and quickly on the island.
The runner beans were now well up to the top of the bramble bushes, and Jack nipped the tips off, so that they would flower well below.
“We don’t want to have to make a ladder to climb up and pick the beans,” he said.
“My word, there are going to be plenty - look at all the scarlet flowers!”
“They smell nice!” said Nora, sniffing them.
“The beans will taste nicer!” said Jack.
The weather was hot and fine, for it was a wonderful summer. The children all slept out of doors in their “green bedroom,” as they called it, tucked in the shelter of the big gorse bushes. They had to renew their beds of heather and bracken every week, for they became flattened with the weight of their bodies and were uncomfortable. But these jobs were very pleasant, and the children loved them.
“How brown we are!” said Mike one day, as they sat round the fire on the beach, eating radishes, and potatoes cooked in their jackets. They all looked at one another.
“We’re as brown as berries,” said Nora.
“What berries?” said Mike. “I don’t know any brown berries. Most of them are red!”
“Well, we’re as brown as oak-apples!” said Nora. They certainly were. Legs, arms, faces, necks, knees - just as dark as gypsies! The children were fat, too, for although their food was a queer mixture, they had a great deal of creamy milk.
Although life was peaceful on the island, it had its excitements. Each week Jack solemnly led poor Daisy to the cave and made her squeeze through the narrow passage into the cave beyond. The first time she made a terrible fuss. She mooed and bellowed, she struggled and even kicked - but Jack was firm and kind and led her inside. There, in the inner cave, he gave her a juicy turnip, fresh-pulled from his grandfather’s farm the night before. Daisy was pleased. She chewed it all up, and was quite good when she was led back through the passage once more.
The second time she made a fuss again, but did not kick, nor did she bellow quite so loudly. The third time she seemed quite pleased to go, because she knew by now that a fine turnip awaited her in the cave. The fourth time she even went into the cave by herself and made her way solemnly to the passage at the far end.
“It’s an awfully tight squeeze,” said Mike, from the back. “If Daisy grows any fatter she won’t be able to get through, Jack.”
“We won’t meet our troubles half-way,” said Jack cheerfully. “The main thing is,
Daisy likes going into the cave now, and won’t make a fuss if ever the time comes when she has to be put there in a hurry.”
July passed into August. The weather was thundery and hot. Two or three thunderstorms came along, and the children slept in Willow House for a few nights.
Jack suggested sleeping in the cave, but they all voted it would be too hot and stuffy. So they settled down in Willow House, and felt glad of the thick green roof above them, and the stout, heather-steed walls.
The wild raspberries ripened by the hundred. Wild strawberries began to appear in the shady parts of the island - not tiny ones, such as the children had often found round about the farm, but big, sweet, juicy ones, even nicer than garden ones. They tasted most delicious with cream. The blackberries grew ripe on the bushes that rambled all over the place, and the children’s mouths were always stained with them, for they picked them as they went about their various jobs.
Jack picked them on his way to milk Daisy, and so did Mike. Peggy picked them as she went to get water from the spring. Nora picked them as she went to feed the hens.
Nuts were ripening, too, but were not yet ready. Jack looked at the heavy clusters on the hazel-trees and longed for them to be ripe. He went to have a look at the beans. They were ready to be picked! The runners grew up the brambles, and the long green pods were mixed up with the blackberry flowers and berries.
“Beans for dinner to-day!” shouted Jack. He went to fetch one of the many baskets that Peggy knew how to weave from willow twigs, and soon had it full of the juicy green beans.
Another time Jack remembered the mushrooms that used to grow in the field at the end of his grandfather’s farm. He and Mike set off in the boat one early morning at the end of August to see if they could find some.
It was a heavenly morning. Mike wished they had brought the girls, too, but it would not do to take a crowd. Someone might see them. It was just sunrise. The sun rose up in the east and the whole sky was golden. A little yellow-hammer sang loudly on a nearby hedge, “Little bit of bread and no cheese!” A crowd of young sparrows chirruped madly in the trees. Dew was heavy on the grass, and the boys’ bare feet were dripping wet. They were soaked to the knees, but they didn’t mind. The early sun was warm, and all the world was blue and gold and green.
“Mushrooms!” said Jack, in delight, pointing to where two or three grew. “Look - fresh new ones, only grown up last night. Come on! Fill the sack!”
There were scores in the field. Jack picked the smaller ones, for he knew the bigger ones did not taste so nice and might have maggots in them. In half an hour their sack was full and they slipped away through the sunny fields to where they had moored their boat.
“What a breakfast we’ll have!” grinned Jack. And they did! Fried mushrooms and fried eggs, wild strawberries and cream! The girls had gone out strawberry hunting whilst the boys had gone to look for mushrooms.
Nora learnt to swim well. She and Peggy had to practise every day in the lake till Jack said they were as good as he and Mike were. They were soon like fish in the water, and tumbled and splashed about each day with yells and shrieks. Jack was clever at swimming under water and would disappear suddenly and come up just beside one of the others, clutching hard at their legs! What fun they had!
Then there came a spell of bad weather - just a few days. The island seemed very different then, with the sun gone, a soft rain-mist driving over it, soaking everything, and the lake-water as cold as ice.
Nora didn’t like it. She didn’t like feeding the hens in the rain. She asked Peggy to do it for her. But Jack heard her and was cross.
“You’re not to be a fair-weather person,” he told her. “It’s all very well to go about happily when the sun is shining and do your jobs with a smile - but just you be the same when we get bad weather!”
“Ay, ay, Captain!” said Nora, who was learning not to be such a baby as she had been. And after that she went cheerfully out to feed the hens, even though the rain trickled down her neck and ran in a cold stream down her brown back.
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