in her, of course. The last lot were quite decent.”
“We saw them this afternoon, too,” said Port. “Real Hullabaloos. They crashed right through the middle of the race, calmly hooting to clear us all out of the way.”
“Narrow bit of river, too. Lucky nobody got run down.”
“Real beasts,” said Tom. “Look here, it’s no good putting the awning up till we’ve got the grease off those boards. We’ll have tea first while the kettle boils.”
In a few minutes the three elders of the Coot Club were busy in the shed, with the jug of tea and the loaf. Tom sat on an old empty paint-drum. The other two swung their legs, sitting on the edge of the high carpenter’s bench, talking about the afternoon’s racing.
“What about these plans?” said Starboard at last.
“Wait till you’ve been inside the Titmouse with her awning up,” said Tom.
“Was it jolly cold last night?” asked Port.
“Just right,” said Tom. “As good as any cabin.”
“Oh,” said Starboard. “I wish it was the summer holidays and the A.P. was taking us cruising again, like all these lucky beasts of visitors.”
“Just you wait till we’ve cleaned those bottom-boards,” said Tom, gulping down his tea in a hurry to get those boards clean, set up the awning, and let Port and Starboard see what they thought of it. Sitting in there, afloat, in a tent as good as a cabin, he was sure that they, too, would be stirred to action. After all there were two weeks of the holidays left. And you can do a lot in two weeks.
But Port and Starboard were not hurrying. The Coot Club had met to discuss plans often enough. No doubt Tom had something in his head. There had been the building of the drawbridge last summer. That had been pretty good fun while it lasted and the drawbridge was still useful. Then there had been bird protection, which was still going very strong. Piracy had been a good plan once, but it had had its day except among the younger Coots, who refused to be weaned from it. Whatever the plan was, Tom would spit it out sooner or later, and the twins, tired and hungry after their race, drank their tea and ate bread and marmalade until Tom could hardly bear it, and was glad when the kettle boiled over and made them think of something else.
There was a rush for it, and Starboard, using an old towel for a kettle-holder, picked it up and carried it outside, spluttering under its lid. All three of them set to work on those bottom-boards, and with hot water, soap, and hard scrubbing they soon had them free from grease, clean and dry enough to sit upon, if one didn’t sit too long.
Tom fitted the boards in the Titmouse, and then, with the others watching, went carefully about the rigging of the awning. First there was the crutch, a thin bar of iron with a fork at the top of it, fitting into two rings in the transom. Then boom and sail, neatly rolled up, rested in the fork at one end and were hoisted a foot or two up the mast at the other. The folded awning was laid across the boom close by the mast and partly unrolled. The front part was neatly laced round the bows. Then, fold by fold, the awning was unrolled from the mast towards the stern, each fold being laced down at the edges to very small rings just outside the boat. The last two folds were left unlaced, to make it easy for getting in and out, and the twins were asked to step aboard.
“Jolly good,” said Starboard.
They wriggled down under the middle thwart, one each side of the centre-board case that cut the boat in half down the middle. Tom rocked the Titmouse, just a little, to make them realise what it would be like to be asleep in her and afloat.
“Now do you see the idea?” he said. “It works with the Titmouse. It would work just as well with your rowing boat. The Death and Glories could manage it, too. Let’s make more awnings at once and really go somewhere…. What about that for a plan?”
“Let’s,” said Starboard, and then stopped. Of course they couldn’t. Why that very afternoon…. “We can’t though. Anyway not the last week of the hols. They’ve fixed up a private championship. The usual five boats…. They’re going to have five races, counting points for Firsts, Seconds, and Thirds. That last week the A.P.’ll be racing Flash practically every day.”
“Oh bother racing!” said Tom.
“And he’s racing the day after tomorrow. Ordinary practice race, and again another day, I forget which,” said Port. “It’s a jolly good plan, but it’s no good just now. We must think of a plan that we can manage without having to go off anywhere….”
Tom’s face fell. That plan had been glowing brighter and brighter ever since first his awning had been ordered from old Jonas. But it was no use struggling. The twins, because they had no mother, felt that they had to look after their A.P. It had always been like that, ever since they had been babies. Tom had long ago given up trying to persuade them. There it was. Nothing would stir them. If their A.P. had fixed up a lot of races for his little Flash, never for a single moment would they think of letting him get some other crew.
“We’ll do it next hols,” said Starboard. “There’ll be masses of time then. We’ll only have a fortnight properly cruising. The A.P. can’t get away for more. That’s the worst of his being a solicitor. Think of some other plan for now. Quick, before the Death and Glories come along.”
But Tom had no other plans.
“Perhaps the Death and Glories’ll have something in their heads,” he said.
“Not they,” said Port. “We must think of something and think of it quick.”
“Where are the little brutes?” said Starboard. “They ought to have been here ages ago.”
They went ashore from the Titmouse, and back to the shed.
“There isn’t going to be much tea left for the Death and Glories if they don’t buck up,” said Port, looking deep into the jug as she filled the mugs again.
“It’s not much good having a meeting,” said Tom, “with no plans to propose.”
“Here they are,” said Port.
There was a splash of oars, a rustling of reeds, and the old black ship’s boat came pushing her way into the dyke. Under their gaudy handkerchiefs the faces of her crew looked much more worried than ever pirates’ faces ought to be.
“You’re jolly late,” said Starboard.
“Look here,” said Tom, “what’s the use of fixing up a Coot Club meeting if you three go off pirating and don’t come back till nearly dark?”
“No, but listen,” said Joe, at the tiller. “It ain’t pirating.”
“It’s B.P.S. business,” said one of the rowers, Bill. “It’s No. 7 …. Something got to be done.”
“What?”
“No. 7?”
“What’s happened?”
All thoughts of plans proposed or rejected were gone for the moment. No. 7 nest. The club’s own coot. The coot with the white feather.
“Everything was all right when
