A/N This is set the summer after Great Northern? and follows more or less directly after "A short adventure"
Chapter 1 – Three cheers for the GA.
Peggy returned to Wildcat Island without her captain and came perilously close to sailing in the dark. So close, in fact, that Susan had told Roger to hoist the lantern up the pine tree, and Titty to ready the lanterns to put on the marks for the harbour.
"Thanks for the lanterns." said Peggy as willing hands helped her haul Amazon up next to Scarab and the others enquired after the patient.
"Mother is alright. Just feeling a bit sore and worn out." she assured Titty and Dorothea. "Only Nancy thought maybe she had better stay at home overnight just in case. She says the dentist said to congratulate Susan on spotting what was wrong so quickly, by the way. Anyway, you'll see for yourself tomorrow, because Uncle Jim is back and he's brought his friend Mac – the one who owns Seabear - with him. That's why I'm so late, because they 'phoned from Rio just as I was leaving. Anyway, we're all invited to dinner tomorrow. Uncle Jim wanted to go over to the houseboat tonight and have a feast tomorrow there, but Cook and Nancy and I rushed round with sheets and things so the beds were all made up before they knew it and they didn't really have any excuse. It would be rather rotten to leave Mother out of everything. We'll collect Nancy then and bring her back with us. She'll be fairly champing at the bit by tomorrow."
Titty wondered afterwards if Mac, whom they had started by addressing very properly as Mr Smith and were all, even Dorothea, cheerfully calling Mac by the time they reached pudding (raspberry fool) made his suggestion while they were all together because he was secretly on their side.
"Why not borrow Seabear again? It's a shame to have her sitting there idly. English schools don't go back until September do they?"
"We don't at least, and nor do the D's and the Swallows." Peggy agreed cheerfully.
"After last time…." Her uncle said doubtfully.
"Oh, but look here, no-one would have foreseen that." Nancy said. "And there really wasn't anything else to do."
"Dick's hardly going to go round seeing rare birds all the time." Roger chipped in hopefully.
"And if I do, I've learned my lesson about keeping it to myself." Dick said a trifle grimly.
"It wasn't really to do with the Seabear." Titty said. "I mean it could have happened anywhere. Well, different birds."
"It was the egg-collector's fault." Susan said. "A rotter like that could turn up anywhere."
"But you can't seem to go five minutes without falling into adventures of some kind." Captain Flint protested. "The business with the North Pole."
"That was a misunderstanding, and it was my fault really." Nancy said firmly. "I won't make that mistake again. And if we were all together it couldn't happen like that."
"That business of the Walkers getting swept out to the North Sea." Captain Flint continued.
"Not their fault." Nancy said firmly. "You just need to avoid headbutting any omnibuses just before bad storms and let me go and buy any petrol that needs buying. And anyway, they coped splendidly."
No-one really could have been sure afterwards how the argument would have ended, but the telephone rang in the hall.
"I'll get it." Peggy said.
"Well, at least I know you're all here." Mrs Blackett said. "Perhaps it's Aunt Maria, wanting to know whether I've called on Countess Severn and the Thames yet."
"She'll surely understand about having a tooth out." Susan said.
"Maybe Mother and Father are coming back from Egypt sooner than they thought." Dorothea said.
"Maybe Bridget's got over her measles and Mother's coming to Holly Howe and bringing her." Titty said.
"Hello Aunt Maria," Peggy's voice came through the open door. Everyone face, except Mac's dropped. "How are you? Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."
"N… errr Ruth and I are well, thank you, but poor Mother has had to have a tooth extracted."
"Yes, in Keswick."
"Nancy drove her. Yesterday."
"No, she didn't have time to visit her before the abscess happened."
"Well, I did sail across to the village yesterday and I met her."
"Good old Peg. She's got you off the hook, Mother."Nancy said quietly.
"It was a very short visit, because I'm afraid she had just had her jewellery box stolen. I expect she would have sent her regards otherwise."
"No, I'm quite sure John Walker is absolute nowhere near the lake."
"Oh, I say …" Roger began.
"The beastly rudeness!" and Nancy half rose, face suddenly pale despite her sunburn before her uncle's hand on her shoulder forced her down into her chair again.
"We shouldn't be listening." Susan said, wretchedly.
"Not much choice." Dick said. "It would be even harder for Peggy to hear and say the right thing with us yakking on in the background."
"I'm sorry." said Mrs Blackett spring to her feet and going to the door which she shut after her.
"It's rotten for her." Titty said.
"Maybe the Great Aunt was just asking to be sure you weren't all around to be a bad influence." Dorothea suggested.
Peggy came back in the room grinning.
"The thing is, Uncle Jim, do you feel you can keep an eye on us all better here, sailing about on the lake and wandering about on the fells, or all together on the Sea Bear?"
"Your great aunt's not coming here?" Titty said.
"No, she wants Mother to go and stay with her. She's feeling most unwell." Peggy said.
"I thought she had her friend staying with her. Miss Hutchinson or whoever." Captain Flint said.
"Huskinson?"Nancy suggested.
"Huskisson." Peggy said, "Yes but she's had to go home sooner than expected. Maybe they've fallen out."
"Oh, that sort of illness." Her uncle said.
"Beastly for mother though." Nancy said.
"Not quite as rotten as the GA coming here and upsetting Cook and having goes at Mother about the garden and the house and everything." Peggy pointed out.
"I'll see what your Mother has to say."
"She'll say yes." Nancy said confidently.
"And Mrs Walker too."
"She won't want them to catch measles."
"I'm promising nothing until we've discussed it."
"We'll be absolute angels." Nancy promised. "No adventures at all. A flock of flamingos could settle on the cross-trees and we wouldn't even mention them."
It didn't take very long for phone calls to be made and things to be discussed. Nancy had been right.
"Send me lots of postcards to let me know you're alright." Mrs Blackett said, "but remember, Aunt Maria doesn't know about the Sea Bear, or that you're with the Walkers and the Callums."
"Three cheers for the great aunt" said Nancy.