They had forgotten the cocoanuts. Neale got a gimlet and bored the "eyes" of a big one and the milk foamed out into the children's cups.

They rather liked its sweetish flavor too.

"Although," said Dot, "I think my milk's been skimmed. It looks sort of blue."

In the stores which they had brought ash.o.r.e from the launch there was some canned milk; but they were sparing of this. The older members of the party refused to use it at all in their drink. There was considerable coffee and tea and some canned fruits and meat. They had not expected to be gone from the St. Sergius Arms much longer than two days, and had provisioned accordingly.

But Neale's bright mind evolved makeshifts for food as well as for other things. He entered into the spirit of this Crusoe experience with all the gusto of live adventure. It would have seemed very tame indeed to him, on this uninhabited island, if his ingenuity had not to be taxed.

Mr. Howbridge warmly acclaimed Neale's statement that the capture of the sea-turtles was important. After breakfast, which was graced by the turtle eggs which Agnes had helped discover, the whole party gathered about the three sprawling turtles, which the lawyer called "testudinate reptiles."

"Don't call them by such horrid names, Guardy, or I shall not want to eat them," begged Agnes.

"And who is going to do the preparing?" Luke wanted to know. "How do you get them out of their sh.e.l.ls, Neale? That looks like a formidable task."

"You can read poetry to them, if you like," grinned Neale, "till they get disgusted and shuck their sh.e.l.ls to get away. Or you can tickle their toes with a straw until they laugh so heartily that they split their sh.e.l.ls."

"Now, Neale!" exclaimed Ruth, while the others laughed with and at him.

"Never mind. Give me the boat-ax," said the joking boy. "I don't need any help. We will have stewed turtle for dinner if you leave it to me."

Mr. Howbridge and Luke immediately went aboard the _Isobel_ and began a thorough overhauling of the engine. They had tools in plenty; and now that the motor-boat was in quiet water they thought they would be able to correct the mechanical difficulties. Luke knew considerable about an engine, and the lawyer was not unhandy himself.

Ash.o.r.e, the bigger girls proceeded to make the tent more comfortable, so that if they _should_ be obliged to stay another night it would be better for the children. There were certain pans and dishes to wash, and washing them in salt water was not an easy matter.

n.o.body had said much about the small amount of drinking water; but Ruth had thought of it and she forbade Agnes to use any of the supply that had been brought ash.o.r.e unless she was actually obliged to. If Tess and Dot said anything about being thirsty, Ruth gave them fruit, the juice of which made up for the lack of water which they would have drunk under other circ.u.mstances.

As for Tess and Dot, when they had sated their curiosity in looking at the three turtles on their backs with their flippers waving in the air, they wandered away on a tour of exploration, the smaller sister bearing her Alice-doll, which was almost as much her companion as her own head.

The two little girls wandered afar that morning. The others were so sure that Tess and Dot could not get into trouble that they did not limit the bounds of their wanderings, so long as they kept to the easterly side of the mound on which grew the great palm tree.

The island was not more than an eighth of a mile wide at this end, and the shrubbery in the middle, between the two strips of sh.o.r.e, was not properly a "jungle," for it was easily penetrated even by Tess and Dot Kenway.

Dot, however, was not as st.u.r.dy as her sister. Nor was she so much interested in the strange things they saw. In fact, Dot was a very practical little thing, and nothing, no matter what, suited her unless it was just what she was used to in and about the old Corner House.

"Aren't these sh.e.l.ls pretty?" cried Tess, gathering pearl-lipped sh.e.l.ls on the strand and loading her ap.r.o.n with them.

"We have sh.e.l.ls at home," said Dot, in her blase way. "Mrs. MacCall's got one as big as that for a sugar scoop."

"Oh! Well! So she has," admitted Tess. "But maybe she'd like a new one."

"What for?" asked the exasperating Dot. "They never wear out, I guess."

The sun began to get hot and there was no longer a breeze. Even Tess considered the shade of the dwarf palms preferable to the open beach.

Dot, nursing her Alice-doll, sat down on a stone as soon as Tess called a halt, and emitted a sigh of relief.

"Well, anyway!" she remarked. "I'm glad you want to wait a while, Tess Kenway. You know, we don't have to see everything on this island in one day."

"Maybe we have," rejoined her sister quickly. "If Mr. Howbridge and the boys get the engine fixed, we'll go right back to the hotel. Ruth says so. I need a clean pair of stockings."

"Well, my Alice-doll ought to have her clothes changed," admitted Dot.

"I guess we'll not have to stay here much longer. Or maybe a steamship will come for us. I--"

And then, with sudden animation, she began waving her arms and feet and from her lips issued the most excruciating cries. She lost hold of the doll, which sprawled in the sands. To Tess Kenway's amazement, Dot began to travel right away from the edge of the grove toward the sea!

CHAPTER XVI

MR. METHUSELAH

Dot's cries of surprise and Tess' shrieks for help brought Neale bounding through the grove with the older girls after him in wild alarm.

What they saw first was calculated to amaze them.

Cavorting down the beach was Dot Kenway, flat upon her back, her legs and arms waving wildly. She was not moving so very fast, but she evidently was headed for the sea.

Luckily Neale had picked up the first weapon to his hand when he started. This was the stick he had used early that morning to turn over the three captured turtles. He ploughed his way through the brush, leaped across the sands, and arrived beside the traveling Dot just as she rolled off the sh.e.l.l of the huge turtle which, half-buried in the sand, she had thought was a stone!

Neale immediately inserted the stick under the edge of the creature's lower sh.e.l.l and heaved it over on its back. Dot gathered herself up, crying and sputtering.

"You-you can have your old turkles, Neale O'Neil!" she cried. "I won't even eat their eggs, if that's the way they act. I-I thought I was sitting down on a stone. I-I--"

Ruth arrived to comfort her. Meanwhile Tess brought the Alice-doll and Neale and Agnes examined this huge reptile, which really was a monster.

"He must be awfully old," said Agnes, wonderingly.

"The edge of his upper sh.e.l.l is all cracked and dented. He's seen some few seasons, all right," Neale agreed.

"Do they grow very old, Neale?"

"Old as Methuselah," laughed Neale.

"No!"

"It's a fact. Tortoises-sea turtles, too-grow to be hundreds of years old. They beat elephants and whales. This fellow--"

"He'll get away if you turn him over," Agnes cried.

"I'll head him up the beach. I want to see--"

Over went the big turtle at that moment. Neale jumped on the corrugated sh.e.l.l and tried to hold the creature down. The sand slid from the sh.e.l.l and as the dull beast started to crawl up the strand, instead of into the sea, Agnes came nearer and pointed at something she saw.

"See there, Neale."

"Look out! Don't get in front of him!" Neale warned her. "His beak is as hard as iron."

"Are those letters, Neale-words?" demanded Agnes, still staring at the turtle.