CHAPTER IV.
THE SEA URCHINS' CLUB.
"'Twas here where the urchins would gather to play, In the shadows of twilight or sunny midday."
Isobel found her namesake waiting for her on the beach next morning.
"I thought you'd be coming out soon," announced Belle, "so I juststopped about till I saw you. We're all starting off to play cricketagain on the common down under the cliffs, and I want you to go with us.I've taken _such_ a fancy to you! I told mother I had, and she laughedand said it wouldn't last long; but I _know_ it will. I feel as if youwere going to be my bosom friend. You'll come, won't you?"
"Of course I will," replied Isobel, accepting the offered friendshipwith rapture. "Mother told me to do what I liked this morning."
"Let us be quick, then. The others have run on in front, but we'll sooncatch them up."
"Are you going to the same place where you were playing yesterday?"asked Isobel.
"Yes; we call it our club ground. We mean to have matches there almostevery day. It'll be ever such fun. You see there are several families ofus staying at Silversands that all know one another, so we've joinedourselves together in a club. We call it 'The United Sea Urchins'Recreation Society,' and it's not to be only for cricket, because wemean to play rounders and hockey as well, and to go out boating, andhave shrimping parties on the sands. We arranged it last night aftertea. There are just twenty of us, if you count the Wrights' baby, sothat makes quite enough to get up all sorts of games. Hugh Rokeby's thepresident, and Charlie Chester's secretary, and Charlotte Wright'streasurer. We each pay twopence a week subscription, and at the end ofthe holiday we're going to have what the boys call a 'regular blow-out'with the funds--ginger beer, you know, and cakes, and ices if we canafford it. I wanted to make the subscription sixpence, but Letty Rokebysaid the little ones couldn't give so much. I'll ask them to elect you amember. You'd like to join, wouldn't you?"
"Immensely. But I haven't any money with me now."
"Oh, never mind! You can give it to Charlotte afterwards. Here we are. Iexpect they're all waiting. I see they've put the stumps up. You don'tknow anybody except me, do you? I'll soon tell you their names."
The party of children who were assembled upon the green patch of commoncertainly appeared to be a very jolly one. First there were the Rokebys,a large and tempestuous family of seven, who were staying at a farm onthe cliffs by the wood.
"A thoroughly healthy place," as Mrs. Rokeby often remarked, "with agood water supply, and no danger of catching anything infectious. We'vereally been so unfortunate. Hugh and Letty took scarlet fever at thelodgings in Llandudno last year, and I had the most dreadful timenursing them; Winnie and Arnold had mumps at Scarborough the yearbefore; and the three youngest were laid up with German measles atEaster in the Isle of Man; so it has made me quite nervous."
Just at present the Rokebys did not seem in danger of contractinganything more serious than colds or sprained ankles, for a more recklesscrew in the way of falling into wet pools, climbing slippery rocks, orgenerally endangering their lives and limbs could not be imagined. Itwas in vain that poor Mrs. Rokeby dried their boots and brushed theirclothes, and implored them to keep away from perilous spots; they werefull of repentance, and would vow amendment with the most warm-heartedof hugs, but in half an hour they had forgotten all their promises, andwould be racing over the rocks again as wet and jolly as ever.
"I really do my best to keep them tidy," sighed Mrs. Rokeby patheticallyto Mrs. Barrington. "Their father grumbles horribly at the bills, butthey seem to wear their clothes out as fast as I buy them. Bertie's newNorfolk suit is shabby already, and Winnie's Sunday frock isn't fit tobe seen. As to their boots, I sometimes think I shall have to let themgo bare-foot. Other people's children don't seem to give half thetrouble that mine do. Look at them now--dragging Lulu down the sands,when I told them she mustn't get overheated on any account! The doctorsaid we were to be so careful of her, and keep her quiet; but it seemsno use--she _will_ run after the others. Oh dear! I can't allow them toturn her head over heels like that!"
And Mrs. Rokeby flew to the rescue of her delicate youngest,administering a vigorous scolding to the elder ones, which apparentlymade as little impression upon them as water on a duck's back. Theuntidy appearance and unruly behaviour of her undisciplined flock werereally a trial to Mrs. Rokeby, since they generally managed to compareunfavourably with the Wrights, a stolid and matter-of-fact family whowere staying in rooms near the station.
"You never see Charlotte Wright with her dress torn to ribbons, or herhair in her eyes," she would remonstrate with Letty and Winnie. "Bothshe and Aggie can wear their sailor blouses for three days, while yoursaren't fit to be seen at the end of a morning."
"The Wrights are so stupid," replied Winnie, "you can hardly get them tohave any fun at all. They spend nearly the whole time with thatmademoiselle they've brought with them. They're so proud of her, they donothing but let off French remarks just to try to impress us. She's onlya holiday governess too--they don't have her when they're at home--sothere's no need for them to give themselves such airs about it. Ibelieve their French isn't anything much either, they put in so manyEnglish words."
"Arthur Wright actually brings his books down on to the shore," saidLetty, "and does Greek and Euclid half the morning. He says he's workingfor a scholarship. You wouldn't catch Hugh or Cecil at that."
"I'm afraid I shouldn't," sighed Mrs. Rokeby. "To judge from their badreports at school, it seems difficult enough to get them to learnanything in term time. As for mademoiselle, you might take theopportunity to talk to her a little, and improve your own French."
"No, thank you!" said Winnie, pulling a wry face. "No holiday lessonsfor me. I loathe French, and I never can understand a single word thatmademoiselle says, so it's no use. If the Wrights like to sit on thesand and 'parlez-vous,' they may. They're so fat, they can't rush aboutlike we do. That's why they keep so tidy. Charlotte's waist is exactlytwice as big as mine--we measured them yesterday with a piece ofstring--and Aggie's cheeks are as round as puddings. You should see howthey all pant when they play cricket. They scarcely get any runs."
"And they really eat far more even than we do, mother," said Letty."Aggie had five buns on the shore yesterday, and Eric took sixteenbiscuits. I know he did, for we counted them, and he nearly emptied thebox."
"The Chesters are five times as jolly," declared Winnie. "Both Charlieand Hilda went out shrimping with us this morning, and got sopping wet,but they didn't mind in the least, and Mrs. Chester only laughed whenthey went back. She said sea water didn't hurt. She's far nicer thanMrs. Barrington. I wouldn't be Ruth Barrington for all the world. Sheand Edna never have any breakfast, and they're made to do the queerestthings."
The unlucky little Barringtons were possessed of parents who clung totheories which they themselves described as "wholesome ideas," and theirfriends denounced as "absurd cranks." Many and various were theexperiments which they tried upon their children's health and education,sometimes with rather disastrous results. Being at present enthusiasticmembers of a "No Breakfast League," which held that two meals a day wereamply sufficient for the requirements of any rational human being, theyhad limited their family repasts to luncheon and supper, at which onlyvegetarian dishes were permitted to appear; and the poor children,hungry with sea air and with running about on the sands, who would haveenjoyed an unstinted supply of butcher's meat and bread and butter, werecarefully dieted on plasmon, prepared nuts, and many patent foods, whichtheir mother measured out in exact portions, keeping a careful record inher diary of the amount they were allowed to consume, and taking thepair to be weighed every week upon the automatic machine at the railwaystation. Their costumes consisted of plain blue over-all pinafores andsandals, and they wore neither hats nor stockings.
"It's all right for the seaside," grumbled Ruth to her intimate friends,"because we can go into the water without minding getting into a mess;but we have to wear exactly the same in town, and it's
horrible. Youcan't think how every one stares at as, just as if we were a show.Sometimes ladies stop us, and ask our governess if we've lost our hats,and hadn't she better tie our handkerchiefs over our heads? We shouldn'tdare to go out alone even if we were allowed, we look so queer. We wentonce to the post by ourselves, and some rude boys chased us all the way,calling out 'Bare-legs!' It's dreadfully cold in winter, too, withoutstockings, and when it rains our heads get wet through, and we have tobe dried with towels when we come in again. I wonder why we can't bedressed like other people. I wish I had Belle Stuart's clothes; they'reperfectly lovely!"
Ruth's rather pathetic little face always bore the injured expression ofone who cherishes a grievance. She was a thin, pale child, who did notlook as though she flourished upon her peculiar system of bringing up,which seemed to have the unfortunate effect of completely spoiling hertemper, and making her see life through an extremely blue pair ofspectacles. This summer she certainly thought she had a just cause ofcomplaint, since her two schoolboy brothers, instead of spending theirholidays as usual at the seaside, had been dispatched on a walking-tourto Switzerland with a certain German professor, who, in accordance withthe latest educational fad, was conducting a select little party of boyson an open-air pilgrimage, the main features of which seemed to be towalk bare-foot by day and to sleep in a kind of wigwam at night, whichthey erected out of alpenstocks and mackintoshes.
"It's too disgusting!" said Ruth dolefully. "Just when Edna and I hadbeen looking forward all the term to the boys coming home, and making somany plans of what we would do and the fun we would have, some wretchedperson sent father a copy of _The Educational Times_, with a longaccount of this horrid walking-tour, and he said it was the exact thingfor Clifford and Keith, and insisted upon arranging it at once. I thinkmother was really dreadfully disappointed. I believe she wanted to havethem home as much as we did, because she said they ought to go to thedentist's, and she must look over their clothes, and she should like togive them some phosphates tonic; but father said they could have theirteeth attended to at Geneva, and she could send the tonic to theprofessor, and ask him to see that they took it. I know the boys will befurious; they hate taking medicine: they generally keep it in theirmouths, and spit it out afterwards. They'll have to talk German all daylong too, and they can't bear that. You've no idea how they detestlanguages. I had a picture post-card from Clifford yesterday, and hesaid his feet were horribly sore with walking bare-foot, and his tentblew away one night, and he was obliged to sleep in the open air."
No greater contrast could be found to the Barringtons than the Chesterchildren. Charlie, the elder, a lively young pickle of twelve, was onterms of great intimacy with all the fishermen and sailor boys whoseacquaintance he could cultivate, talking in a learned manner ofmain-sheets, fore-stays, jibs, gaffs, booms and bowsprits, and usingevery nautical term he could manage to pick up. He had a very good ideaof rowing, and would often persuade the men to let him go out with themin their boats, taking his turn at an oar, much to their amusement, andsetting log lines with the serious air of a practised hand. His jolly,friendly ways won him general favour, and he was allowed to make himselfat home on many of the little fishing smacks, learning to hoist sails,to steer, and to cast nets, though sometimes a too inquiring mind ledhim to interfere on his own account in the navigation, with the resultthat he would be unceremoniously bundled back to shore again, with awarning to "keep out of this" in the future.
He was the envy of his eight-year-old sister Hilda, who would have likedto follow him through thick and thin, but the sailors drew the line atlittle girls, and would politely request "missy" to "return home to herma," as there was no place for her "on this 'ere craft," much to herindignation. She consoled herself, however, by organizing the games ofthe younger Wrights and Rokebys, making wonderful sand harbours withtheir aid, and sailing a fleet of toy boats with as keen an enthusiasmas if they were real ones.
At the end of a morning on the common Isobel found herself on quite anintimate footing with the Wrights, the Rokebys, the Barringtons, and theChesters, besides being a duly elected member of "The United SeaUrchins' Recreation Society."
"I've never had such fun in my life," she confided to her mother atdinner-time. "We played cricket, and then we went along the shore,because the tide was so low. I picked up the most beautiful screwshells, and razor shells, and fan shells you ever saw. I had to put themin my pocket handkerchief because I hadn't a basket with me. BertieRokeby got into a quicksand up to his knees, and Lulu sat down in thewater in her clothes. You must come and see our club ground, mother,when you can walk so far. We have it quite to ourselves, for it's rightbehind the cliff, and none of the other visitors seem to have found itout yet; and if anybody else tries to take it, the boys say they mean toturn them off, because we got it first. They're all going to carry theirtea there this afternoon, and light a fire of drift-wood to boil thekettle. So may I go too, and then we shall play cricket again in theevening?"