IN THE BOAT
Every one out on the porch of the bungalow jumped up on hearing Russ's
cries.
"What's the matter?" asked Mother Bunker.
"What happened?" Daddy Bunker wanted to know.
"Oh, they're all loose, and one of 'em bit me," wailed Russ, and now
came sounds which seemed to indicate that he was hopping about on one
foot, and holding the other in his hands. And he really was doing this,
as they found out afterward.
"Loose? They're all loose? What does he mean?" asked Rose.
"It's the crabs!" exclaimed Cousin Tom, as he made a run for the
kitchen. "I guess some of them got out of the basket. They will do that
once in a while."
Daddy and Mother Bunker, with Cousin Ruth, followed Cousin Tom to the
kitchen, where Russ was still hopping about and yelling:
"Oh, they're all loose! They're all loose, and one of 'em pinched me!
Oh, dear!"
"Don't cry, silly little boy!" called his mother. "A pinch by a crab
can't hurt as much as that."
"Oh, but it hurts like anything!" yelled Russ. "He 'most bit off my big
toe!"
By this time they were all in the kitchen. The rest of the six little
Bunkers had followed their father and mother. They saw a queer sight.
Crabs were crawling all over the floor. They had managed to wiggle out
of the peach basket in which they had been put as they were caught from
the boat. Cousin Tom had spread wet seaweed over the top of the basket,
but this had not been enough to keep the crabs in.
"Look, they're chasing us!" cried Rose, as a crab came sliding sideways
over the oil-cloth, clashing its big claws.
"They are only trying to get into the dark corners to hide," said
Cousin Tom. "I'll pick them up."
"Will they pinch you?" asked Laddie.
"No, not if I pick them up by one of their back flippers," said his
cousin. "There is a certain way to pick up a crab so he can't reach you
with his claws."
Just then a crab came toward Cousin Tom. He put out his foot, and held
it tightly on the hard shell of the crab's back. Then, reaching behind
the crab, and taking hold of one of the broad, flat swimming flippers,
he lifted the crab up that way. The crab wiggled and tried to reach
Cousin Tom with the pinching claws, but could not.
"That's the way to do it," called out Cousin Tom, as he tossed the crab
into the basket.
"I can do it!" said Laddie, who liked to try new things.
"You'd better not," advised his mother. "Look how the crab pinched
Russ."
"My toe's bleeding," said the little fellow, and so it was. A big crab
can easily pinch hard enough to draw blood.
"I'll tie it up for you," said his mother. "Perhaps you children had
better not try to pick up Crabs the way Cousin Tom did," she went on.
"You might make a mistake and get badly pinched."
"Yes, let the children keep out of the way," agreed Daddy Bunker.
"Cousin Tom and I will catch the crabs."
Russ was led away, hopping on one foot, though if he had tried, he could
easily have stepped on his sore foot. He was more frightened than hurt,
I think. And then the other children followed him, though the twins
would rather have staid.
It was not easy to catch the crabs, for there were so many of them, and
they scurried around so fast. But Cousin Tom picked them up in his
fingers, and Daddy Bunker soon learned the trick of this. As for Cousin
Ruth, she took the crab tongs, which were two pieces of wood fastened
together on one end, like a pair of fire tongs. In these the crabs could
be picked up either front or back, or even by one claw, and they could
only pinch the wood, which they often did.
"There, I think we have them all," said Cousin Tom at last. "And now,
as the water is boiling, we can cook them."
So the crabs were cooked, and set aside to cool until morning, when the
white meat would be picked out of the red shells, and made into salad.
"What makes the crabs red?" asked Violet the next morning as she saw the
pile of cold, boiled creatures. "They were a sort of brown and green
color when we caught them yesterday."
"Yes," said her father, "crabs, lobsters and shrimps, when they are
boiled, turn red. Just why this is I don't know. I suppose there is
something in their shells that the hot water changes."
"Can they pinch my toe now?" asked Mun Bun, as he stood near his mother,
looking at the basket full of cooked crabs.
"Nope! They can't hurt you now; they're cooked," Laddie replied. "I'm
not 'fraid!" and he picked up a big crab, holding it by one of the
claws.
Vi then did the same thing.
"Go ahead and take one, Mun Bun," urged Laddie.
"No! I don't guess I want to," said the little fellow.
"I know a riddle you could make up about a crab," said Rose, who had
come to the kitchen to watch Cousin Ruth clean the shellfish.
"What is it?" Laddie demanded instantly.
"What color is a crab when it can't pinch?" sing-songed Rose. "And the
answer is it's red when it can't pinch."
"Yes, that is a pretty good riddle," said Laddie, as, with his head on
one side, he thought it over. "But I know how to make it better," he
went on.
"How?" asked his mother.
"Let me think a minute," he begged. "Oh, I have it! Why is a crab like a
newspaper?"
"'Tisn't!" exclaimed Russ who came along just then. He was limping a
bit, for his toe was sore where the crab had pinched him.
"Yes, 'tis!" declared Laddie. "That's the riddle. It's something like
the one Rose told. Why is a crab like a newspaper?"
"'Cause it folds its claws when it doesn't want to bite you?" asked
Violet.
"Nope!"
"Tell us," suggested Russ.
"Well, a crab is like a newspaper, 'cause when it's red it can't bite or
pinch," Laddie said. "See?"
"Huh! Yes, I see," murmured Russ. "A crab is like a newspaper because
when it's red. Oh, I know! You mean when a newspaper is r-e-a-d. That's
a different red from reading. But it's a good riddle all right, Laddie."
"I didn't think of it all," said the little boy. "Rose helped."
"Oh, well, you made a riddle out of it," his sister told him. "Here
comes Cousin Ruth. I'm going to watch her clean the crabs."
It was quite a lot of work to take the sweet, white meat out of the
crab-shells, but Cousin Ruth knew the best way to do it.
In about an hour she had a large bowl full of the picked-out meat, and
the children--all except Mun Bun and Margy, who were too little to be
allowed to eat any--said the crabs were better than fish. Daddy and
Mother Bunker liked them, too.
"Some of the crabs have awful big claws," remarked Russ after dinner,
as he looked at a pile of the legs and claws. "I guess they could dig in
the sand with 'em, the crabs could. They could dig deep holes."
"I wish one would dig down and find my lost locket," said Rose with a
sorrowful sigh.
For, though they had all searched the sand near the bungalow beach over
and over, there was no sign of the missing gold locket.
"I guess we'll never find it," Rose went on with another sigh. "Not even
if a crab could dig down deep."
"Well, I'll dig some more," promised Laddie. "Vi and I are going to make
some holes in the sand to play a new game, and maybe we'll find your
locket that way."
But they did not, and Rose, though she herself searched and dug in many
places, could not find the ornament.
There were many happy August days for the six little Bunkers at Cousin
Tom's. They played in the sand, went crabbing and fishing, wading and
swimming.
One hot afternoon, when it was too warm to do more than sit in the
shade, Mrs. Bunker, who had been lying on the porch in a hammock
reading, laid aside her book and looked up.
"Where has Mun Bun gone?" she asked Rose, who was playing jackstones
near by. "And did Margy go with him?"
"I don't know, Mother," Rose answered. "They were here a minute ago.
I'll go and look for them."
Just as Rose got up and as Mrs. Bunker arose from the hammock, a voice
down near the shore of the inlet called:
"Come back. Get out of that boat! Mother, Margy and Mun Bun are in the
boat, and it's loose, and they're riding down the inlet and the tide's
going out! Oh, Mother, hurry!"