"Horrors!" she gasped faintly. "And you have walked all that distance?"
"No," he grinned; "I ran a good part of it. When I came in a few minutes ago I was dead from the waist down; but I am all right now. You sit down and drink broth while I skin this rabbit. It's a juicy one—as fat as butter."
Fifteen minutes later the rabbit was stewing in the larger skillet, and Prime found time to ask Lucetta how she was feeling.
"Just plain hungry," she returned. "The fever hasn't come back any more, and if I ever have a medicine-chest of my own there will be boneset in it; great, big, smelly packages of it. Aren't you going to let me make a bit of bread to eat with that delicious gravy broth?"
"If it won't tire you too much," he consented, and at that he sat back and watched her while she mixed the bread, a housewifely little figure kneeling before the fire and patting the dough into a cake with hands that not all the rough work of the adventure weeks had made misshapen.
Somewhat beyond this they made their post-midnight meal, and were once more light-hearted and care-free. In the aftermath of it, when Prime had lighted his homemade pipe, they were even buoyant enough to plan for the future.
"We'll go on again to-morrow, shan't we?" the young woman assumed. "We can't be so very far from the towns now, with the river grown so large."
"I fancy we are nearer than we thought we were," Prime replied. "Over to the west, where I went this afternoon, there is another and still larger river. On its banks the timber has all been cut off and there is nothing but second and third growth. It is a safe bet that the two rivers come together a little below here, and if we are not stopped by our inability to cross the bigger river——"
"We are not going to be stopped," she prophesied hopefully. "I have a feeling that our troubles, or the worst of them, are all over."
Prime smiled. "The joyous reaction is still with you, but that is all right and just as it should be. We'll keep on going until we come to a town or a railroad, and then——"