Posted by Jenny Berki on September 27, 2006 at 17:08:21 from 82.36.97.120 user JennyB.
Recently I started wondering whether the various children in the books would have kept in contact when they weren't having adventures together. I decided they would - letter-writing was a great art, and I'm sure they would have wanted to keep in touch and hear everyone's latest news.
Then I noticed in the first couple of pages of Big Six, Bill refers to "the D's" and the secret password "Coots for ever" "And ever" is used. I don't think the D's are known as the D's in CC, or that the "Coots for ever" password is used. But I might be wrong!
Anyway, my current thinking is that this is direct evidence that the D's and the Coots communicated during the time between CC and BS, the D's telling the Coots their collective name, and also telling them about the "...for ever. And ever" term which is originally used with "Swallows and Amazons for ever! And ever!" Or was it the other way round? Did the Coots invent the "for ever" saying and the D's took it back to the S&A's? When is the earliest instance of this in a S&A book?
Sorry, this has turned into a bit of a rambling post!