Esther came suddenly forward and bent over it. “It is good, too,” she declared. “That is the stuff they had down at Julianita’s one day. They were eating it, and said for Jennie and me to eat some too, but Jennie wouldn’t touch it ’cause she was ’fraid it would make us drunk.”
“You didn’t eat any either,” remonstrated Jennie.
“I didn’t ’cause you didn’t.”
Marian was cutting the stump in pieces. They all tried it. It was sweet and good, though there was a great deal of string and fiber to be discarded after the sweetness and goodness had been chewed out and swallowed.
“But it is what they make mescal of; isn’t it?” asked Delbert.
“I presume it is; in fact, it must be, only this wild plant doesn’t grow just the same as the tame ones, maybe; but it must be that they cook the centers something like this and mash them and let them ferment and distill it some way. It seems to me I have heard how it was done, but I was like you about the ropes; I didn’t pay enough attention to remember. It certainly never occurred to me that there was anything about it that was any good to us. I think we owe Davie a vote of thanks.”
“Clarence ought to have told us,” said Esther reproachfully.
So another food was added to their list, and after a little practice they could turn out mescal fiber ropes that were so smooth and well twisted that they could be used to lasso with.
The two little girls had learned to lasso burros, but Marian’s aim was not much better than Davie’s. She did not practice the art as her little sisters did. She whittled out a big crochet-hook, though, and then twisted a very fine strand of fiber and crocheted a bag of it that was very useful to put things into on their travels. Whenever there was a storm, they would always go to Bonanza Cove afterwards to collect the riches found there.
These consisted mostly of driftwood, and the small pieces could go into the bag, while the big ones were tied together and carried or dragged home. But sometimes other things came, bottles empty but corked,—so many of them that Marian concluded all sailors must be sad drinkers,—bits of board, an old leaky bucket, and, best of all, this second year, a broken oar.