“Now if you’re going to ask a lot of questions you can’t play!” said Rose.  “You just help pick up the wood, Vi.”

“Can’t I ask just one more question?”

“What is it?” asked Russ, smiling.

“What makes the ocean so salty?” Vi asked this time.  “I got some water on my hands and then I put my finger in my mouth and it tasted just like I’d put too much salt on my potatoes.  What makes the ocean so salty?”

“I don’t know,” said Russ.  “We’ll ask Daddy when we go up.  But come on, and let’s build the bungalow.  I’ll be a pirate, and we’ll play shipwreck and everything.”

“I’ll be a pirate, too,” added Laddie.  “I know a good riddle about a pirate, but I can’t think of it now.  Maybe I will after I’ve been a pirate for a while.”

“We’ll be pirates, too,” said Vi.

“No, girls can’t be,” said Russ.  “You can be our prisoners.  Pirates always have prisoners.”

“Prisoners?  What’s them?” asked Vi.

“They’re what pirates have,” explained Laddie.  “I know, ’cause I saw some pictures of ’em in a book.  Pirates always keep their prisoners shut up in a cave.”

“I’m not going to be in a cave,” said Rose.  “I was in the sand house when it caved in, and I don’t like it.”

“But you get good things to eat,” explained Russ.  “Pirates always have to feed their prisoners good things to eat.”

“Then I’ll be one, ’cause I’m hungry,” said Vi.

“So’ll I,” added Laddie.  “I’ll be a prisoner.  I guess I’d rather be a prisoner than a pirate, Russ.  You can be the pirate and get us all good things to eat.”

“All right, I will.  Now come on, we’ve got to get a lot more wood to make this pirate bungalow.  Get all the wood you can.”

“Why don’t you get some?” asked Laddie, as he saw his brother sitting down on a pile of drift pieces that had already been gathered.

CHAPTER XI

GOING CRABBING

Russ Bunker looked up at his brother Laddie and smiled.  Still he made no move toward helping gather the driftwood for the bungalow they were going to make.

“Well, why don’t you help get wood?” asked Laddie again.  “Think we’re going to do all the work and have you sit there?”

“Say, I’m a pirate, ain’t I?” asked Russ, not getting his words just right, though his brother and sisters understood what he meant.  “Didn’t you say I was to be the pirate?”

“Yes, ’cause we don’t want to be,” retorted Rose.

“Well, all right then, I’m going to be the pirate,” went on Russ.

“But you’ve got to get us good things to eat,” said Vi.  “We’re the prisoners, an’ you said they had good things to eat.”

“I’ll get good things to eat if Cousin Ruth’ll give ’em to me,” promised Russ.  “But I’m the pirate, and pirates don’t ever work.  They just boss the prisoners.  Now come on, prisoners, and build me the bungalow!” and Russ leaned back on a pile of sea weed and looked very lazy and comfortable.