CHAPTER VIII
The Pangs of Hunger
BY this time, the castaways were on the brink of starvation. They had feasted all the first day, and, with the prospect of more provisions coming, had eaten all they could hold on the second; that was no small amount, for the fresh air had quickened all their appetites. On the third they ate about all there was left for breakfast.
"We might as well," said Mrs. Crane, "for the boat or the wagon will surely be here by noon, or, at worst, by night."
But, thanks to unreliable Dave, the castaways' calculations were all wrong. Not a crumb arrived that day. For their noon meal, they drank some very weak cocoa, some broken crackers, and some crusts that Mabel had left at breakfast time. Mabel always left her crusts; though now that she had nothing else to eat, they tasted, as Mabel said, almost as good as cake.
"This won't do," said Mr. Black, putting his share of the fragments on Bettie's wooden plate. "I'm going to rob that Indian's wigwam and we'll have a real meal just as soon as we can cook it."
"If we were toads," offered Mabel, disconsolately eying her empty plate, "we could eat toadstools. I saw a lot of awfully queer ones along the road that leads to Barclay's Point."
"Toadstools?" questioned Mr. Black, pausing in his flight. "What were they like?"