“Mary Temple, are you trying to kid me?” asked Andy warily.
“To this day we don’t know her name,” Mary went on, still searching. “But we know Ed killed her.”
“Spring it—I’ll bite. How’d he kill her?”
“He put two bites of pork in a can of pork and beans instead of one,” said Mary. “And I know the woman that opened that can dropped dead. Anyway, they fired Ed for wasting the company’s profits.”
She stood erect with a can-opener in one hand and a large can labelled Pork and Beans in the other, and without a smile began the conflict between them. “Better wake the doctor,” she advised. “The wonderful cook will have breakfast ready in no time this morning. She and you and the doctor can draw straws for the pork—I don’t care for it. Here comes the good ship Marblehead.”
Andy chuckled. He liked this droll, gaunt Mary Temple who was so devoted to the girl he loved. “And do you never expect to find more than one bite of pork in a can of pork and beans?” he asked.
“I’d as soon think of finding the Valley of Arcana,” Mary replied.
With a brief “Good mornin’, ma’am” Shirttail Henry passed Mary Temple at the campfire and went to his tumble-down stable. When Andy had awakened Dr. Shonto and had received a feeble response to his call from Charmian, he returned to Mary, to find Henry there with a slim sledge that he had found among his belongings.
“Thought she might come in handy,” he grinned. “If we c’n pack her on one o’ th’ burros, she’ll carry all our truck when we leave the critters and keep on afoot. Can’t use her, though, lessen it snows. But I thought we’d better take her along.”
“Good idea,” said Andy lightly, and turned to Mary, who was pointing to a small die of fat pork, a tiny monument in the pan of sizzling beans.