It did not take very long to satisfy their appetite for grapes. The sun
got hotter, their eyes ached with the glare, and they decided to return
to the coolness of the woods and gardens lower down. The boys wanted to
go exploring; the girls were to be left to collect peaches and melons
for the new drink--which might bear the honoured name of Gordello until
the famous champagne was put on the market--which would then be ready
and cooling in the spring of the Fairy Dell by the time that the
explorers were weary of exploring. Thus planned the boys.
"Boys propose, girls dispose," paraphrased Mollie, as the three pith
helmets disappeared, after their owners had condescended to gather a
share of the Gordello-destined grapes and carry them part of the way
towards the Dell. "If Dick and Jerry want drinks they can jolly well
come and make them. _I_ am going to have a rest."
Prue looked a little shocked, but Grizzel heartily agreed with Mollie.
"I shall pull six peaches and one water-melon _exactly_," she said. "I
am tired and my legs ache, and I can't be bothered with Hugh and his
old Gordello."
A short walk down the road between the gum trees brought them to the
fruit gardens, where Mollie saw peaches that made up by their
magnificence for any hothouse elegance lacking in the grapes. Large as
apples, soft and downy as velvet, glowing with crimson and gold, they
were a perfect revelation of what peaches could be when they tried, and
Mollie could hardly bear to wait till they reached the Fairy Dell
before devouring one. But Prudence was firm.
"No, Mollie; not after all those grapes while you are hot and tired.
Come and get your water-melon, and we'll go straight to the Dell and
rest and eat peaches there. If you ate them now you might die all of a
sudden, and that would be _so_ awkward for Grizzel and me."
Mollie thought it would be more awkward for her, but did not argue. She
followed Prue obediently, finding her basket of grapes, plus six
peaches and a large water-melon, quite enough to absorb all her
energies. If only Gordello were an accomplished fact, she thought, it
would be very delightful. If someone else had made it and _she_ could
find it "cooling in the spring", as the boys expected to do, it would
be extraordinarily delicious, and the more she thought of it the more
delicious it became in her fancy. Poor boys! She was sorry for the
disappointment awaiting them. Australians seemed to be a strenuous lot
of people; no wonder the Australian soldiers were so brown and chinny.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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