Jim said, with a slow red coming into his cheeks, "Let's get out of here, Sara."
"Why, we just got here," replied Sara. "Let's get into our suits and have some fun."
"Pen'll not get into a bathing suit with these muckers," answered Jim, slowly.
Pen, who had been thinking the same thing, immediately resented Jim's tone. "Of course I shall," she replied airily. "You can't boss me, Jim."
"That's right, Pen," agreed Sara. "Let old Prunes sit here and swelter. You and I will have a dip."
Pen rose and she and Sara started toward the bath house. Jim took a long stride round in front of the two.
"Sara, do as you please," he drawled. "Penelope will stay here with me."
"The river forever flows yet she sees no farther than I who am forever silent, forever still."
"Jim Manning, you've no right to speak to me that way," said Penelope.
Jim returned her look clearly. "You are to stay here, Pen," he repeated slowly.
"You've got your nerve, Still!" exclaimed Sara. "Pen's as much my company as she is yours. Quit trying to start something. Pen, come along."
Jim did not stir for a moment, then he jerked his head toward the bath house. "Go ahead and get into your suit, Sara. Penelope and I will wait here for you."
Sara had seen Jim in this guise before, on the football field. For a moment he scowled, then he shrugged his shoulders. "You old mule!" he grunted. "All right, Pen. You pacify the brute and I'll be back in a few minutes."
Pen did not yield so gracefully. She sat down in the sand with her back half turned to Jim and he, with his boyish jaw set, eyed her uncomfortably. She did not speak to him until Sara appeared and, with an airy wave of the hand, waded into the water.
"I think Sara looks like a Greek god in a bathing suit," she said. "You'd know he was going to be a duke, just to look at him."
Jim gave a good imitation of one of Uncle Denny's grunts and said: "He isn't a duke--yet--and he's gone in too soon after eating."
"And he's got beautiful manners," Pen continued. "You treat me as if I were a child. He never forgets that I am a lady."
Pen turned her back, squarely. Sara did not remain long in the water but came up dripping and shivering to burrow in the hot sand. Pen deliberately sifted sand over him, patting it down as she saw the others do, while she told Sara how wonderfully he swam.