“Last night!” Silva repeated in a bland tone of mere curiousness. “What do you mean by _last night_?” “You know very well what I mean,” Arthur persisted. “Last night in the Moraine--in the woods.” “In the Moraine--in the woods,” Silva repeated. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t sleep in the woods last night. I slept in my tent as usual.” Arthur looked at her hard. “Well,” he said after a moment, “either you’re telling the biggest whopper I ever listened to or you were walking in your sleep.” “Walking in my sleep,” Silva said scornfully, “you’re crazy.” And she passed on. CHAPTER XVII CRESCENT MOON BEACH It was drawing near the middle of August. And now with each sunrise, the fun at the Little House seemed to double itself. “I never saw such a place as this,” Rosie wailed once. “There aren’t hours enough to do all the things you want to do every day; and not days enough to do all you want to do every week.” There was some justice in Rosie’s complaint. The day’s program of swimming, tennis, croquet, bicycling, reading and games had been broken into by the coming of the berry season. Blueberries and blackberries were thick in the vicinity and the children enjoyed enormously eating the fruit they had gathered. Floribel taught the little girls how to make blueberry cake and blackberry grunt and on their teacher’s day out, the Little House was sure to have one of these delicacies for luncheon and another for dinner. The Big Six tried to do everything of course; and as Laura complained, they succeeded in doing everything badly and no one thing very well. One day Maida appeared at the table with a radiant look of one who has spawned an idea. “Granny,” she said, “we haven’t had a picnic on the beach yet. Every summer we go to the beach once at least. Can’t we go this week on Floribel’s day out? We girls will cook the luncheon and pack it all up nicely.” “But the beach is pretty far away,” Mrs. Dore said warily. “How far is it? Could you walk to it?” “It’s between four and five miles,” Maida answered hazily. “You see the little children could go in the motor and the rest of us--the Big Six--could go on our bicycles.” “But I don’t think,” Mrs. Dore said, “that I’d like you children to go so far away without a grown person with you.” “Yes, of course,” Maida said, “you and Granny come too.” “But with Zeke and Floribel away,” Mrs. Dore protested, “who would drive the automobile?” Maida’s face fell. “Oh,” she exclaimed, “I never thought of that.” All the faces about the table--they had grown bright in anticipation of this new excursion--grew dark. Zeke had already taught Arthur and Harold to run the machine, but Mr. Westabrook’s orders against unlicensed persons driving it, were strict. For a moment it looked as though the ocean-picnic must be given up. “I think,” Maida faltered, “if I ask my father to lend us Botkins and the big car, he’d do it.”