“Might build a snow hut,” suggested Dutchy.
“Now, be sensible,” answered Reddy. “We can’t build a snow hut in five minutes.”
“The best plan,” I volunteered, “would be to go over to Jim Halliday’s and ask him to let us sleep in his barn.”
Immediately the suggestion was acted upon.
A Friend in Time of Trouble.
Old Jim Halliday greeted us very gruffly. He said he wouldn’t have us in his barn. “You’ll be amussin’ up the hay so’t wouldn’t be fit fer the horses to eat. Any boy that is fool enough to build a fire on a straw bed ought to go right home to his mother, and he hadn’t oughter be trusted with matches, nuther. He might get his fingers burned.”
But I caught a twinkle in the old man’s eyes and wasn’t surprised to have him end his lecture by taking us into the kitchen and seating us around an old-fashioned log fire while “Marthy,” his daughter, made us some hot coffee to take the chill out of our bones. We didn’t sleep in the barn that night. The Hallidays had only one spare bed, hardly enough for six boys, and the old man didn’t want to be partial to any two of us, but his daughter solved the difficulty by dragging down two large feather mattresses and laying them on the kitchen floor in front of the hearth.
Before bidding us “good night,” Mr. Halliday put on his sternest expression and bade Marthy clear out all the matches from the room.
“Jest as like as not they’ll set fire to the house,” he growled. “I expect this is my last night on airth.” And then, with a solemn warning not to hang our clothes on the flames, and to “keep them feather beds offen the embers,” he left us to a comfortable night’s rest.
In the morning, after we had disposed of all the hot griddle cakes we could eat, and had sincerely thanked our host and hostess for their hospitality, we wended our way back to the island, silently packed up our goods and started home for Lamington.