Cousin Tom poked aside the blazing pieces of driftwood and underneath were the hot, glowing embers.
"Now each one put a candy on a stick and hold the marshmallow over the embers," said Daddy Bunker. "Don"t hold it still, but turn it around.
This is just the same as shaking corn when you pop it, or turning bread over when you toast it. By turning the marshmallow it will not burn so quickly."
So, kneeling in a circle about the fire, the six little Bunkers, and the others, began to roast the candies. But Margy and Mun Bun did not have very good luck. They forgot to turn their marshmallows and they held them so close to the fire that they had accidents.
"Oh, Mun Bun"s candy is burning!" cried Rose.
"And Margy"s is on fire, too!" added Russ.
"Oh, that"s too bad!" cried Mother Bunker. "Never mind," she said, as she saw that the two little tots felt sorry. "I"ll toast your candies for you. It"s rather hard for you to do it."
Mrs. Bunker"s own candy was toasted a nice brown and all puffed up, for this is what happens when you toast marshmallows. So she gave Mun Bun and Margy some of hers, and then began to brown more.
The other children did very well, and soon they were all eating the toasted candies. Now and then one would catch fire, for sugar, you know, burns faster than wood or coal. But it was easy to blow out the flaming candies, and, if they were not too badly burned, they were good to eat.
"Oh, look at the little dog!" cried Rose, as she put a fresh marshmallow on her stick. "He smells our candy! May I give him one, Daddy?"
"Yes, but give him one that isn"t toasted. He might burn himself on a hot one. Whose dog is he?"
"He just ran over to me from down there," and Rose pointed to some boys and girls about another fire farther down the beach, who were also roasting marshmallows. The dog seemed glad to be with Rose and his new friends, and let each of the six little Bunkers pat him. He ate several candies and then ran back where he belonged.
"Oh, he was awful cute!" exclaimed Vi. "I wish we could keep him.
Couldn"t we have a dog some time?"
"Maybe, when we get back home again," promised Mother Bunker.
The marshmallow roast was fun, and even after the candies had all been eaten the party sat on the beach a little longer, looking at the waves in the moonlight.
"Now it"s time to go to bed!" called Mother Bunker. "Margy and Mun Bun are so sleepy they can"t keep their eyes open. Come on! We"ll have more fun to-morrow!"
"I"m going crabbing off the pier," declared Russ. "There"s lots of crabs now, Mr. Burnett says."
"Yes, August is a good month to catch crabs," returned Cousin Tom.
"I"m going fishing," said Laddie. "Can you catch fish off your pier, Cousin Tom?"
"Oh, yes, sometimes. But don"t catch any Sallie Growlers."
"What"s a Sallie Growler?" asked Vi, before any one else could speak.
"Oh, you"ll know as soon as you catch one," laughed her cousin. Then he picked up Mun Bun, who was really asleep by this time, and carried him up to the house, while Daddy Bunker took Margy, whose eyes were also closed.
True to their promises Russ and Laddie went down to the little boat wharf the next morning after breakfast. Russ had the crab net and a chunk of meat tied to a string. Laddie had a short pole and line and a hook baited with a piece of clam, for that was what fishermen often used, Cousin Tom said.
"Now we"ll see who catches the first fish!" exclaimed Laddie, as he sat down on the pier.
"I"m not fishing for fish, I"m fishing for crabs," said Russ.
"Well, in this race we"ll count a crab and a fish as the same thing,"
returned Laddie. "We"ll see who gets the first one."
The boys waited some time. Now and then Russ would feel a little tug at his line, as if the crabs were tasting his bait, but had not quite made up their minds to take a good hold so he could pull them up and catch them in the net. And the cork float on Laddie"s line would bob up and down a little as though he, too, had nibbles. But neither of them had caught anything yet.
Suddenly Laddie felt a hard tug, and he yelled:
"Oh, I got one! I got one! I got the first bite!"
He yanked on his pole. Something brown and wiggling came up out of the water and flopped down on the wharf. At the same time a little dog that had run up behind the two boys and was sniffing around, gave a sudden yelp.
"What"s the matter?" cried Russ.
"He"s bit by a Sallie Growler! The Sallie Growler you caught bit my dog on the nose!" exclaimed another boy and he began striking at the brown thing Laddie had caught, which was now fast to the nose of the dog that had been eating marshmallows the night before.
CHAPTER XX
THE WALKING FISH
Laddie dropped his fishing-pole. Russ let go of his crab-line, and they both stood looking at the dog and at the strange boy. The dog was howling, and trying to paw off from his nose a queer and ugly-looking fish that had hold of it. It was the fish Laddie had caught and which the boy had called a "Sallie Growler."
"Cousin Tom told us about them last night," thought Russ. "I wonder why they have such a funny name, and what makes "em bite so."
But he did not ask the questions aloud just then. There was too much going on to let him do this.
The dog was howling, and the new boy was yelling, at the same time striking at the fish on the end of his dog"s nose.
"Take him off! Take off that Sallie Growler!" yelled the boy.
But the brown fish Laddie had caught looked too ugly and savage. Neither of the little Bunkers was going to touch it and the new boy did not seem to want to any more than did Russ or Laddie.
As for the dog, he could not help himself. The fish had hold of him; he didn"t have hold of the fish.
Finally, after much howling and pawing, the dog either knocked the fish off his nose, or the Sallie Growler let go of its own accord and lay on the pier.
"Poor Teddy!" said the boy as he bent over his pet to pat him. "Did he hurt you a lot?" The dog whimpered and wagged his tail. He did not seem to be badly hurt, though there were some spots of blood on his nose.
"I guess he"ll be all right if the Sallie Growler doesn"t poison him,"
said the boy. "How"d you come to catch it?" he asked, looking from Laddie to Russ.
"I didn"t want to catch it," said Laddie. "I was fishing for good fish and I got a bite and pulled _that_ up!" and he pointed to the ugly brown fish that lay gasping on the boards.
"Is it a Sallie Growler?" asked Russ.
"It is," said the new boy. "And they can bite like anything. Look how that one held on to my dog"s nose."