“We’ve worked like Trojans,” Reed told them, “but it has been great sport. There is a lot more we can do, but we shall not attempt it this year. We sleep in the loft, have two bunks there, and here is our kitchenette.” He opened a door into a small compartment where stood a blue-flame stove, a few dishes, and some cooking utensils; a wooden tray held the clams. In a few minutes all fell to work and the chowder was made ready, proving as satisfactory as expected. Bread and butter, fruit, coffee, and a large chocolate cake completed the meal. “And where did you get the cake?” asked Ellen. “I know you didn’t make it.” “I should say not. We bribed Mrs. Dan Ferry to make it. Most of her boarders have gone and she could take time to ‘accommodate’ us. She’s hot stuff when it comes to cooking, you know.” A merry meal it was, and was ended as the sun went down, leaving rosy clouds reflected in the water. “It’s as if a heavenly rosebush had been shaken down,” declared Ellen. “And, oh, those opal and jade waves, and that exquisite violet and turquoise in the eastern sky! Aren’t you dying to paint it, Mr. Marshall?” “Mr. Marshall, indeed,” he replied disgustedly. “To you I am Cronine, please remember. Yes, Cronette, I am aching to paint so much that I see that I could keep busy every hour of the day. But, I tell you, I mean to come back here, if I am alive next year. Shall you come?” “Don’t ask me. How can I tell? I only know that it is the most wonderful summer I ever spent, and that it would be too much to expect to repeat it.” Here Miss Rindy’s voice broke in: “Aren’t you boys going to wash all those dishes? If you’re not, we will.” “You will not,” announced Tom, who had just emerged from the little kitchen. “I have put them in a pan, poured water over them, and there they shall stay till morning when we can tackle them. There isn’t any hot water now.” “So that’s what you have been doing while we outside have been rhapsodizing,” said Mabel softly. “That’s old Tom all over,” said Reed. “He is the most practical chap, hauls me down from the clouds a dozen times a day.” “But, once down, you do your share,” declared Tom. “He goes at it like a whirlwind and gets things done while I’m thinking about them.” They chugged back to Beatty’s in the small motor-boat, arriving at home in time to catch the last of the afterglow and to watch the moon emerge from smoky clouds. “Those are nice boys,” remarked Miss Rindy with satisfaction. “It’s good to get among that kind again. I knew some of the same sort in France, like that Tom Clayton, always thinking of some one besides himself. I believe of the two I like him the best.” At which remark Ellen had a small feeling of resentment, although she couldn’t have told why.