Shades of old chemists gathered in the kitchen to watch the experiment. They never come when hands are ungratefully washed, but here were Geoffrey and Scheele, Chevreul and Leblanc, to watch their discoveries comfort a hand in which they were interested. They were for him. But the soft electricity of the emulsification was less comforting to Marvin than the soft electricity of her touch.
At last he was triumphantly dried and ready for supper, and curious to know what she had managed to assemble out of her empty storeroom.
He soon found out. There were fresh eggs, each a marvel of organization. There was baked macaroni with a crust of cheese. There were beautiful biscuits with never an atom of sodium left in them. There was strawberry jam transformed by its Indian name of bashkeeminsigun, which sounds more delicious. And there was fragrant oolong, concealing rubidium in its leaves. She had made a feast out of nothing, but he knew she could hardly do it again.
“Do you mind telling me what we shall have for breakfast?”
“Buckwheat cakes.”
“With maple syrup?”
“Why, I guess so. And for dinner tomorrow we’ll have bass chowder.”
“I beg leave to doubt that. Bass don’t run till September.”
“Mr. Mahan, there are bass within a foot of your island. Tomorrow I shall come and catch one under your very nose.”
“I’ll bet you don’t. I’ll have him all caught before you get there, and make you pay me eighty cents a pound for him.”