MARGARET (_sobbing out loud_). _Oh_ you little fools! JOHN. Well, what’s the matter with you then? MARGARET (_after a pause_). I’m older than any of you. HARRY. Well, _that’s_ a funny reason to be frightened! MARGARET. It isn’t. HARRY. It is! MARGARET (_warming to the argument_). It isn’t, I tell you! HARRY. _It is!_ MARGARET (_smugly_). That’s simply because you’re all too young to know.... JOHN. Oh, hit her, Emily! EMILY (_sleepily_). Hit her yourself. HARRY. But, Marghie, why are we here? (_No answer._) Emily, why are we here? EMILY (_indifferently_). I don’t know. I expect they just wanted to change us. HARRY. I expect so. But they never _told_ us we were going to be changed. EMILY. Grown-ups never _do_ tell us things. _Chapter 4_ The children all slept late, and all woke at the same moment as if by clockwork. They sat up, and yawned uniformly, and stretched the stiffness out of their legs and backs (they were lying on solid wood, remember). The schooner was steady, and people tramping about the deck. The main-hold and fore-hold were all one: and from where they were they could see the main-hatch had been opened. The captain appeared through it legs first, and dropped onto the higgledy-piggledy of the _Clorinda’s_ cargo. For some time they simply stared at him. He looked uneasy, and was talking to himself as he tapped now this case with his pencil, now that; and presently shouted rather fiercely to people on deck. ‘All right, all right,’ came from above the injured voice of the mate. ‘There’s no such hurry as all that.’ On which the captain’s mutterings to himself swelled, as if ten people were conversing at once in his chest. ‘May we get up yet?’ asked Rachel. Captain Jonsen spun round--he had forgotten their existence. ‘Eh?’ ‘May we get up, please?’ ‘You can go to the debble.’ He muttered this so low the children did not hear it. But it was not lost on the mate. ‘Hey! Ey! Ey!’ he called down, reprovingly. ‘Yes! Get up! Go on deck! Here!’ The captain viciously set up a short ladder for them to climb through the hatch. They were greatly astonished to find the schooner was no longer at sea. Instead, she was snugly moored against a little wooden wharf, in a pleasant land-locked bay; with a pleasant but untidy village, of white wooden houses with palm-leaf roofs, behind it; and the tower of a small sandstone church emerging from the abundant greenery. On the quay were a few well-dressed loungers, watching the preparations for unloading. The mate was directing the labours of the crew, who were rigging the cargo-gaff and getting ready for a hot morning’s work. The mate nodded cheerfully to the children, but thereafter took no notice of them, which was rather mortifying. The truth is that the man was busy.