“I-oh-I had no idea I was so very nearly bare!” Marion managed to gasp. “Please let me move, Stanley-let me get at that beach robe-!” “Lie quite still,” he directed sternly. “Item: I can see the very snow of your belly rising and falling with your breathing. I can even see the tiny pit at the center and I can see that I was not mistaken when I spoke of concealed dimples.”

“I-oh, heavens-I’ll never wear this suit or one like it again!” half-wailed the appalled girl. “I didn’t realize-yet all the girls seem to wear such bathing apparel here. I’ve seen them from a distance. And I got into this position without knowing how it displayed me. I simply won’t lie here any longer like this. Take your great hands off my shoulders… and knees…!”

“You’re in no state to argue with a shocked and offended man,” he assured her. “A man intent on reformation, a man who knows how easy it would be for him to turn you over and pull that silk completely off from a dimpled bottom which is already half-bare, a man who would have no compunctions in turning that white backside rosy. Just the least move and I swear you shall catch it, Maro, my dear-!”

“Item: although I’ve seen fair ladies and maidens of our summer colony in contraptions like this-and not without concern on my part-I’ve never before seen one of them in this very suggestive position while thus scantily clad. It’s a position, my dear little sister-in-law, commonly reserved for the nuptial chamber and the nuptial couch. Ah, you would, would you!”

In a frenzy of shame as she caught the purport of his words, poor Marion had suddenly writhed from his detaining hands and was trying to scramble to her feet. With a stretch of his powerful and sinewy frame, her bother-in-law caught her by an ankle. She tumbled upon the soft sand, unharmed but squealing.