CHAPTER XXX 

FERN Mullins rushed into the house on a Saturday morning early in September and shrieked at Carol, "School starts next Tuesday. I've got to have one more spree before I'm arrested. Let's get up a picnic down the lake for this afternoon. Won't you come, Mrs. Kennicott, and the doctor? Cy Bogart wants to go--he's a brat but he's lively." 

"I don't think the doctor can go," sedately. "He said something about having to make a country call this afternoon. But I'd love to." 

"That's dandy! Who can we get?" 

"Mrs. Dyer might be chaperon. She's been so nice. And maybe Dave, if he could get away from the store." 

"How about Erik Valborg? I think he's got lots more style than these town boys. You like him all right, don't you?" 

So the picnic of Carol, Fern, Erik, Cy Bogart, and the Dyers was not only moral but inevitable. 

They drove to the birch grove on the south shore of Lake Minniemashie. Dave Dyer was his most clownish self. He yelped, jigged, wore Carol's hat, dropped an ant down Fern's back, and when they went swimming (the women modestly changing in the car with the side curtains up, the men undressing behind the bushes, constantly repeating, "Gee, hope we don't run into poison ivy"), Dave splashed water on them and dived to clutch his wife's ankle. He infected the others. Erik gave an imitation of the Greek dancers he had seen in vaudeville, and when they sat down to picnic supper spread on a lap-robe on the grass, Cy climbed a tree to throw acorns at them. 
what was being planned? who all was invited? what did Cy climb? what did he throw from it? whose idea was the picnic? who was invited first? what day was it? who chaperoned? what time of day did they have the picnic? when was school scheduled to start? in what month? was Erik a slob? how did Dave act? were they on the north shore or the south shore? of what? where did they drive to specifically? where did the men dress? and the women? what did Dave put down Fern's back? who did Erik imitate?
a picnic Carol, Fern, Erik, Cy Bogart, and the Dyers a tree acorns Fern Mullins Mrs. Kennicott Saturday Mrs. Dyer the afternoon the following Tuesday September no like a clown the south shore Lake Minniemashie the birch grove on the south shore of Lake Minniemashie behind the bushes in the car an ant the Greek dancers he had seen in vaudeville