"One day a girl washed up on the beach. After she wiped the seaweed out of her eyes, she looked around. Everything seemed strange. She couldn't remember who she was or where she came from. Along came two walkers." So begins this fantastic story of a lost girl and an unusual family. Peg and Mumblety invite her to come home with them, right on top of a volcano. They found their oldest boy while digging in the ash garden, the second came shooting out of the volcano, and the third blew in on a northeast gale. The girl likes what she sees and hears, but asks her new friends to return the next day for her answer. They leave her alone. "We don't keep children," they say reassuringly. That night she dreams of magical adventures, swimming in the sea, floating in a hot air balloon and flying above the desert. She wakes with an answer.