By the time the perch were all cleaned and laid out in a neat row in the bottom of the boat, Roger and Titty came back with the milk.
“It’s too bad,” said Titty, as soon as she was near enough to talk. “Captain Flint’s been at it again, worse than ever. We’d hardly said good morning to Mrs. Dixon before she said we ought never to have touched the houseboat. I told her we hadn’t. She said, ‘Well, somebody has.’ Then she shut up and didn’t say any more even when I said Captain Flint was a beast and I wished his houseboat was sunk.”
“You oughtn’t to have said that,” said Susan.
“I forgot she was a native,” said Titty.
“She didn’t give us any cake or molasses. Not even an apple,” said Roger.
“Why can’t he leave us alone?” said John.
“Which perch did I catch?” asked Roger, looking at the row of cleaned perch in the bottom of the boat. “Was it this one? It wasn’t the very little one. Susan caught that. I saw her.”
They rowed back to Wild Cat Island. Susan stoked up her fire, put butter in the frying-pan and melted it for the frying of the perch. Roger watched her. John went up to the lookout point. Titty followed him.
“May Roger and I go and look for treasure after breakfast,” she said.
“The Amazons are coming today,” said John. “We’ve got to scrub decks first and put everything shipshape before they come. But afterwards, perhaps. Hullo,” he said. “Titty, skip down to my tent and get the telescope. That’s the third boat I’ve seen go into Houseboat Bay.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said the able-seaman, and ran down to the camp. Here she was grabbed by the mate, who wanted someone to butter bread while she was looking after the perch.