"After all," said Eleanor, "we can get such an early start afterward that it won"t take very much time. And to-morrow we"ll finish our tramp through the gap, and stop at Windsor for the night. Then the next day we"ll take the train straight through to the seash.o.r.e. I think really we"ll have more fun, and get more good out of it if we spend the time there than if we go through with our original plan of doing more walking before getting on the train."
"Yes. We"ve lost quite a little time already, haven"t we?" said Margery.
"Two whole days at Lake Dean, and two days more staying with the Pratts," said Eleanor. "That"s four days, and one can walk quite a long distance in four days if one sets one"s mind and one"s feet to it."
"Well, we certainly couldn"t help the delay," said Margery. "At Lake Dean the fire held us--and I wouldn"t think very much of any crowd that could see the trouble those poor people were in and not stay to help them."
They slept well in the early part of that night in the rough quarters at the Gap House, and, while it was still dark, they were routed out to catch the funicular railway on its first trip of the day up Mount Sherman.
At first, when they were at the top of the mountain, there was nothing to be seen. But soon the sky in the east began to lighten and grow pink, then the fog that lay below them began to melt away, and, as the sun rose, they saw the full wonder of the spectacle.
"I never saw anything so beautiful in all my life!" exclaimed Bessie with a sigh of delight. "See how it seems to gild everything as the light rises, Dolly!"
"Yes, and you can see the sea, way off in the distance! How tiny all the towns and villages look from here! It"s just like looking at a map, isn"t it?"
"Well, it was certainly worth getting up in the middle of the night to see it, Bessie. And I do love to sleep, too!"
"I"d stay up all night to see this, any time. I never even dreamed of anything so lovely."
"We were very fortunate," said Eleanor, with a smile. "I"ve been up here when the fog was so thick that you couldn"t see a thing, and only knew the sun had risen because it got a little lighter. I"ve known it to be that way for a week at a time, and some people would stay, and come up here morning after morning, and be disappointed each time!"
"That"s awfully mean," said Dolly. "I suppose, though, if they had never seen it, they wouldn"t mind so much, because they wouldn"t know what they were missing."
"They never seemed very happy about it, though," laughed Eleanor. "Well, it"s time to go down again, and be off for Windsor. And then to-morrow morning we"ll be off for the seash.o.r.e. We"re to camp there, right on the beach, instead of living in a house. That will be much better, I think."
CHAPTER IX
A STARTLING DISCOVERY
"Bessie, why are you looking so glum?" asked Dolly, as they started on the last part of their walk, taking the Windsor road.
"Am I? I didn"t realize I was, Dolly. But--well, I suppose it"s because I"m rather sorry we"re leaving the mountains."
"I think the seash.o.r.e is every bit as nice as the mountains. There are ever so many things to do, and I know you"ll like Plum Beach, where we"re going. It"s the dandiest place--"
"It couldn"t be as nice as this, Dolly."
"Oh, that seems funny to me, Bessie. I"ve always loved the seash.o.r.e, ever since I can remember. And, of course, since I"ve learned to swim, I"ve enjoyed it even more than I used to."
"You can"t swim much in the sea, can you? Isn"t the surf too heavy?"
"The surf"s good fun, even if you don"t do any swimming in it, Bessie.
It picks you up and throws you around, and it"s splendid sport. But down at Plum Beach you can have either still water or surf. You see, there"s a beach and a big cove--and on that beach the water is perfectly calm, unless there"s a tremendous storm, and we"re not likely to run into one of those."
"How is that, Dolly? I thought there was always surf at the seash.o.r.e."
"There"s a sand bar outside the cove, and it"s grown so that it really makes another beach, outside. And on that there is real surf. So we can have whichever sort of bathing we like best, or both kinds on the same day, if we want."
"Maybe I"ll like it better when I see it, then. Because I do love to swim, and I don"t believe I"d enjoy just letting the surf bang me around."
"Why, Bessie, you say you may like it better when you see it? Haven"t you ever been to the seash.o.r.e?"
"I certainly never have, Dolly! You seem to forget that I"ve spent all the time I can remember in Hedgeville."
"I do forget it, all the time. And do you know why? It"s because you seem to know such an awful lot about other places and things you never saw there. I suppose they made you read books."
"Made me! That was one of the things Maw Hoover used to get mad at me for doing. Whenever she saw me reading a book it seemed to make her mad, and she"d say I was loafing, and find something for me to do, even if I"d hurried through all the ch.o.r.es I had so that I could get at the book sooner."
"Then you used to like to read?"
"Oh, yes, I always did. The Sunday School had a sort of library, and I used to be able to get books from there. I love to read, and you would, too, Dolly, if you only knew how much fun you have out of books."
Dolly made a face.
"Not the sort of books my Aunt Mabel wants me to read," she said decidedly. "Stupid old things they are! It"s just like going to school all over again. I get enough studying at school, thanks!"
"But you like to know about people and places you"ve never seen, don"t you?"
"Yes, but all the books I"ve ever seen that tell you about things like that are just like geographies. They give you a lot of things you have to remember, and there"s no fun to that."
"You haven"t read the right sort of books, that"s all that"s the matter with you, Dolly. I tell you what--when we get back to the city, we"ll get hold of some good books, and take turns reading them aloud to one another. I think that would be good fun."
"Well, maybe if they taught me as much as you seem to know about places you"ve never seen I wouldn"t mind reading them. Anyhow, books or no books, you"re going to love the seash.o.r.e. Oh, it is such a delightful place--Plum Beach."
"Tell me about it, Dolly."
"Well, in the first place, it isn"t a regular seaside place at all. I mean there aren"t any hotels and boardwalks and things like that. It"s about ten miles from Bay City, and there they do have everything like that. But Plum Beach is just wild, the way it always has been. And I don"t see why, because it"s the best beach I ever saw--ever so much finer than at Bay City."
"I"ll like the beach."
"Yes, I know you will. And because it"s sort of wild and desolate, and off by itself that way, you can have the best time there you ever dreamed of. Last year we put on our bathing suits when we got up, and kept them on all day. You go in the water, you see, and then, if you lie down on the beach for half an hour, you"re dry. The sun shines right down on the sand, and it"s as warm as it can be."
"I suppose that"s why you like it so much--because you don"t have the trouble of dressing and undressing."
"It"s one reason," said Dolly, who never pretended about anything, and was perfectly willing to admit that she was lazy. "But it"s nice to have the beach to yourselves, too, the way we do. You see, when we get there we"ll find tents all set up and ready for us."
"Is there any fishing?"
Dolly smacked her lips.
"You bet there is!" she said. "Best sea ba.s.s you ever tasted, and about all you can catch, too! And it tastes delicious, because the fish down there get cooked almost as soon as they"re caught. And there are lobsters and crabs--and it"s good fun to go crabbing. Then at low tide we dig for clams, and they"re good, too--I"ll bet you never dreamed how good a clam could be!"
"How about the other things--milk, and eggs, and all those?"