Country life -- Juvenile fiction; Girls -- Juvenile fiction; Grandparents as parents -- Juvenile fiction
It began to be exciting. If Tommy had not been so hungry, he really
believed that he might have appreciated the adventure. But his soul
yearned for hot cakes and maple syrup, or beefsteak and waffles--or at
least for plain bread and butter.
"Gee, but it would taste good," he said aloud.
"What?"
"I was thinking of breakfast," said poor Tommy, "hot rolls and things
like that, Judy."
"O-o-oh," said Judy, "how about some hot biscuit, with one of Perkins'
omelettes--and--creamed potatoes?"
"Oh, don't," groaned hungry Tommy, and fled.
He came back in about two minutes, swaggering with importance.
"This island isn't so barren as it looks," he said, pompously. "You
don't know everything, Judy."
"Don't I?"
"No. Now what do you think of these," and he produced the two lemons
triumphantly.
"Where did you find them?"
"Growing over there," and he pointed to the scrubby, sage-green spiky
bush.
"Who would have believed it?" Judy's eyes were round and solemn, but
the expression in them should have warned Tommy.
"You see there are some things you don't know. I'm going to look for
oysters now."
"Oysters--"
"Yes. To eat with our lemons."
"You might find some cracker fruit, and a coffee vine, and maybe there
will be a salt and pepper tree somewhere--and Tommy, _please_ discover
a Tabasco bush--I never could eat my oysters without Tabasco."
Tommy looked at her wrathfully. "Aw, Judy," he said, with a red face,
"you're foolin'--and I think it's mean."
Then a thought struck him, and he examined the lemons carefully.
"You stuck them on that bush," he accused, excitedly. "There are holes
in them. You did it to fool me, didn't you, Judy?"
She nodded.
"An' you think it's a joke--I--I--" He could think of nothing
sufficiently crushing to say. "Well, I don't," he finished sulkily,
and plumped himself down on the sand, with his face away from her.
"Tommy," she said, after a long silence, "Tommy."
"Huh?"
"Please be good-natured."
"Be good-natured yourself," said Tommy, with a half-sob.
"I'm--I'm--perfectly mis'able, Judy Jameson--"
It was then that Judy showed that she could be womanly and sympathetic.
"I'm sorry I teased you, Tommy," she said, softly. "Let's make
ourselves comfortable here on the sand, and I'll tell you about when I
used to live in Europe."
Tommy liked that, and all the morning Judy talked, although she was so
tired, that her head felt light, and her eyes blurred, but Tommy was
happy and she tried to forget about herself.
She made him suck both of the lemons.
"I don't want any," she said, although her throat was so dry that she
could hardly speak. "I don't want any."
"Whew, but they are sour," said Tommy, and made a wry face, but he did
not insist upon her having one.
That was the worst of it, the thirst, for there was no fresh water.
"Let's explore," said Tommy, as the afternoon waned and no relief came.
"Maybe we will find a house back there somewhere."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account