with her big bucket and the milk-can. She had a tray over the top of the bucket for a lid, and steam was coming from under it.
“No. It isn’t pigwash,” she said, “though you might think it. It’s porridge for drowned rats, which is what I reckoned you’d be. You’ve done well to get your fire lit at all. I could hardly rest for thinking of you in that storm. My word, how it did come down. And so you found Mr. Turner’s box that was stolen. And I thought it was you that took it. Dixon told me the news when he came from the village last night.”
The Swallows and Amazons looked at each other. Did everybody know everything?
“Porridge,” said Roger.
“Aye, porridge,” said Mrs. Dixon. “There’s no room in anybody for a cold if they’re full up with hot porridge, so I always say. Have you any spoons?”
“Lots.”
“I’ll just slop the milk into the bucket and give it a stir round. I put the sugar in up at the farm.”
In another minute the four Swallows and the two Amazons were spooning hot porridge and milk out of the bucket and feeling each mouthful go scalding down their throats.
“This really is eating out of the common dish,” said Titty.
Then came Captain Flint.
“Good for you, Mrs. Dixon,” were his first words. “I ought to have thought of that. Porridge was the very thing. One, two, three, four, five, six. That’s all right. Nobody washed away in the night.”