A savory odor was soon wafted in from the kitchen. Pee Wee sat bolt upright and sniffed.
“Say, fellows! do you smell that?” he asked. “If I’m dreaming, don’t wake me up.”
“It’s no dream,” Mouser assured him. “It’s something a good sight more real than that.”
Before long the door opened to reveal the smiling face of Mrs. Wilson.
“All ready, boys,” she announced cheerily. “Come right along.”
CHAPTER V
THE TRAMPS’ RETREAT
The boys needed no second invitation. Even Pee Wee shook off his usual laziness. With a single impulse they sprang from their chairs and trooped out into the dining room.
It seemed to the hungry boys as though nothing had ever looked so good as the meal that their hostess had provided for them. There was a huge dish of bacon and eggs, plates piled high with snowy, puffy biscuit, which, as Mrs. Wilson told them, she had “knocked together” in a hurry, smoking hot from the oven, a great platter of fried potatoes, and, to crown the feast, mince and apple and pumpkin pies whose flaky crusts seemed to fairly beg to be eaten.
A simultaneous “ah-h” came from the boys, as they looked at the store of good things set before them, and the way they plunged into the meal was the sincerest tribute that could be paid to the cookery of their hostess. It brought a glow of pleasure into her kindly eyes and a happy flush to her cheeks. She fluttered about them like a hen over her chicks, renewing the dishes, pressing them to take more—a thing which was wholly unnecessary—and joining in their jokes and laughter. It is safe to say that a merrier meal had not been enjoyed in that old farmhouse for many a day.
But even a meal like that had to come to an end at last, and it was with a sigh of perfect satisfaction that the boys finally sat back in their chairs and looked about at the complete wreck they had made of the viands.