Chapter TWO: The Dolls’ Bathing-Picnic

“What is a dolls’ bathing-picnic, Aunt Elsie?” inquired Wiggles curiously. “Our dolls can’t swim, you know.”

“Wait and see,” replied Aunt Elsie mysteriously.

“You do think of the nicest things,” said Jeannette, slipping her hand in her aunt’s.

Here Wiggles, who had scurried on ahead of the others, came puffing back, her hair in a wild curly mass from heat and perspiration.

“I could just see the Point,” she panted breathlessly, “and, what do you think, Auntie? I could see some horrid boys there, so we won’t be able to go there after all. Isn’t that mean?”

“Ugh! I hate boys,” cried Alice. “You can have so much nicer times when there are just girls. I do think all boys ought to live in a menagerie, they’re so fond of bugs, and toads, and horrid things.”

“Well,” confessed Aunt Elsie, “you see, I invited some boys myself, so I don’t doubt but that they are there ahead of us.”

“You did? Boys?” echoed Wiggles. “To a dolls’ party? Why, Auntie!”

Aunt Elsie laughed again. “They’ll only be with us for a little while,” she explained. “I asked Marion’s brother, Hugh, and your own cousins, Billy and Dick. They won’t be so bad, will they?”

“I hope not,” replied Jeannette, doubtfully it must be confessed. “They always have to race around and upset and break things so, and make such a noise.”

The four little girls walked on together, arms around each other’s waists, brown, black, yellow, and red hair mingling.

“I do think boys are disgustable creatures,” declared Wiggles, tossing her curls. “No good at all unless you want to go swimming or something.”

“I think so, too,” declared Marion unexpectedly. “Always pulling my hair and calling me, ‘Carrots’ and ‘Red Head’ and ‘Ginger.’”

“The idea!” said Jeannette indignantly. “Your hair is perfectly beautiful.”

“It’s what is called ‘Tissue’ hair,” announced Wiggles with an air of wisdom. “I heard one of the teachers say so, though I can’t see why it’s called that. It’s not a bit like tissue paper.”

“Oh, Wiggles!” laughed Jeannette; “you’ll certainly kill me. It’s ‘Titian’ hair, not ‘Tissue,’ and ‘Titian’ is a Latin or Greek name for ‘red,’ I think.”

“Well,” agreed Wiggles serenely, joining in the laughter, “it’s a much more ’spressive word than ‘red,’ anyway.”

Fleur-de-Lys Point was well named. There the brook gurgled along over flat stones and tiny pebbles, while masses of purple and white fleur-de-lys clustered about its bank, and even sent up daring shoots of green in the rippling water. The mossy bank was thickly carpeted with violets, and under a huge old willow-tree, that spread its drooping boughs over the crystal waters, the “disgustable” boys were waiting.

Wiggles’ cousins, Billy and Dick Gerard, were really very nice, jolly boys, full of spirits and boyishness, and, notwithstanding the little girls’ previous remarks, they were very fond of their good-natured cousins. Richard, or Dick as he was called, was ten; and William, who never answered to anything but “Bill,” or “Billy,” was past twelve. They were both strong, husky lads, with dark hair and eyes like Jeannette’s.

Hugh, Marion’s brother, was Dick’s inseparable pal and bosom crony, and had a head of heavy mahogany-colored hair several shades darker than his sister’s.

“If there isn’t Polly Wiggles,” greeted Billy. “Wiggles, every single hair on your head stands erect.”

The four little girls dropped down on the mossy bank, first carefully putting the market-basket, which they had taken turns in carrying, at the gnarled roots of the willow tree.

“Isn’t it lovely and shady here?” said Alice with a blissful sigh of content.

“Usually is shady under a tree,” teased Dick.

“Goodness,” said Marion, wiping her flushed face and trying to hold up her heavy hair away from her neck.

Aunt Elsie secured both Jeannette’s and Marion’s long locks with hairpins on top of their heads, and the two little girls felt quite grown up.

“Wiggles looks like a Fiji Islander,” said Hugh, for every strand corkscrewed out from her head in a mass of short, kinking curls.

“All you need is a ring in your nose,” gibed Billy.

“Well,” agreed Wiggles unruffled, “if I had a ring, I’d be a ‘belle’ I s’pose.” There was a general shout at this, and Billy pretended to faint away at such brain work in one so young.

Then Aunt Elsie pointed to the willow boughs above them, and, looking up, the little girls spied four small bundles, tied to the branches within easy reach of their eager hands, and each package was marked with a little girl’s name.

“More s’prises,” beamed Wiggles. “I just love s’prises. Oh!” with a shriek of joy; “just see what I have,” and she held aloft the dearest little celluloid doll, dressed in a brilliant scarlet bathing-suit.

“And mine,” echoed Jeannette, holding up a blue-clad bather. Alice and Marion had the same, but Marion’s doll wore a green suit, and Alice’s a purple.

“Now,” said Aunt Elsie briskly, “we will have a swimming contest for the four doll-ladies.”

Seeing the girls’ look of surprise, the boys shouted.

“Celluloid floats, you know,” Dick explained to the girls at large. “What’s the matter? Are you afraid they’ll spoil their bathing-suits?”

Billy acted as master of ceremonies, and at his, “One, two, three, go!” each doll fell with a splash from the stone where it had been held by its little owner.

The current carried them gently down-stream, and even the boys became excited in seeing which would pass the “tape” first, which was a piece of string from Hugh’s pocket, fastened across the brook to the bushes on each side.

“Oh, mine’s ahead!” cried Marion, her eyes intent on the green-clad swimmer.

“There goes Wiggles’ first,” said Billy, as Marion’s doll suddenly swung round in a circle, delaying its progress.

“See mine, see mine!” squealed Alice, jumping up and down on the bank, and nearly tumbling in to join the bathers.

But it would take too long to tell you all the details of the “swim,” except to say that Wiggles’ doll was side-tracked by a surprised little turtle, that snapped angrily at the red cloth, thinking it, no doubt, a new variety of food. How the children screamed with laughter, Wiggles as much as any one, although it put her out of the race, as her doll bumped and stopped against a stone.

Jeannette’s doll swam straight into a mass of fleur-de-lys and became entangled among them, but Alice’s and Marion’s dolls went gayly on down-stream, sometimes one ahead, sometimes the other, until a fluttering breeze caught the purple doll and rushed her under the line victorious.

Such cheers as then arose! Even the boys clapped and acknowledged that they would never have believed a doll’s race could be so thrilling. Then, after the swimmers had been rescued and were once more on dry land, Alice’s doll received a prize, which proved to be a cunning little clock for her doll-house, that could tick when wound, and wave its pendulum back and forth.

If care had not been taken, the boys would have had it apart, to see “what made it go.” So busy were the girls admiring the prize that they never noticed when the boys slipped away into the woods for a few moments, and they jumped with a start when the three lads crept up behind them and tumbled into each little girl’s lap,--what do you suppose? A cunning little birch-bark canoe, made with their own hands from scraps of bark. You can imagine how pleased they were.

“Where did you get them?” cried Jeannette, gazing admiringly at her tiny craft.

“We made them yesterday, and Aunt Elsie sewed the ends for us,” answered Dick.

“Then we hid them in a stump in the woods until now,” explained Hugh. “Aren’t they crackerjacks?”

“Ladies and gentlemen,” called Bill, “the next race will be a canoe race. Only members of the Fleur-de-Lys Country Club may take part in this, and all who enter must pay an admission fee of one gold-piece, and, of course, the usual war tax.”

As dandelions were accepted for gold, and violets for the taxes, the members soon paid their fees, and the Fleur-de-Lys Country Club race was ready for action.

“Man your boats!” cried Billy.

Into each canoe went a brave swimmer, still in full bathing costume. What mattered it that each doll had to lie flat on her back, owing to an inability to sit, as most celluloid dolls are made unbendable.

“It’s a clever canoeist indeed,” laughed Aunt Elsie, “that can paddle while lying down.”

Then Billy called again, “One, two, three, go!” and away the tiny crafts sailed, puffed along by the soft spring breezes. The same tape was again the goal. But, alas, Alice’s and Jeannette’s boats came to grief very soon. They rammed one another, capsized, and would have floated unmanned if they had not been rescued by Hugh.

“He deserves a life-saver’s medal,” laughed Wiggles, as the dripping purple and blue dolls were carried ashore.

“We must roll them over a barrel to bring them to life,” cried Jeannette. “That’s what they always do if you nearly drown.”

This proved very absorbing, with a large stone used as a barrel, while “Doctor” Jeannette Eaton looked professionally grave, and Alice gasped, “My child, my child! Is she dead all over?” At last the doctor declared them out of danger, and, after recommending some dandelion wine to brace them up, ordered them rolled up in handkerchiefs and put in the sun to take a “sun-cure.”

Meanwhile Wiggles’ boat with its scarlet occupant crossed the “tape” first, and again a prize mysteriously appeared from Aunt Elsie’s work-bag, in the form of a tiny doll’s piano, just big enough for a doll-house; for Wiggles was passionately fond of music, and could hardly wait until fall when she would start music-lessons.

“O, dear me suz, there’s the twelve-o’clock bell. I’ll have to go home for luncheon,” bemoaned Marion. “Did you ever see a morning go so fast in your life? Haven’t we had the loveliest time?”

“How are the patients, Dr. Eaton?” inquired Dick, nodding toward the two dolls, still taking their sun-bath.

“Very, very poorly,” said Dr. Eaton, looking grave and shaking her topknot of curls. “They have a ‘temperment’ of one hundred and forty degrees.”

They were indeed very warm from the broiling sun, and were tenderly carried up under the willow-tree and comfortably arranged on a bed of moss.

“I greatly fear,” said the doctor, looking wise, “that we shall have to call in a nurse, as they will have chills soon, and water on the brain from their nearness to drowning.”

“Do give them something fashionable,” urged Wiggles. “Any one can have chills. Let’s have something where there can be a card on the door; it looks so kind of exclusive,--yellow plague, or black peril, or something like that.”

“Why, where’s your aunt?” asked Alice, noticing, for the first time, that Aunt Elsie had disappeared. “We must thank her and hurry home.”

“She’s up in the woods,” said Billy, looking as if he wanted to laugh at something.

So, clutching their treasures, all four girls followed the whooping boys up the bank, to the curve of the stream at the edge of the woods. And there, what do you suppose they saw?