"There now!" said Jack, "sleep till you wake of your own accord. We'll all keep as still as mice."
"No, don't," said Tom. "I shall sleep better if you go on talking as usual. Then I'll know when I half wake that I'm here in camp and I'll go to sleep again easily." Then, after the boys thought him asleep Tom turned over and said, with much solicitude in his voice:
"Boys, I'm sorry I broke up your sleep so early this morning, but I couldn't very well help myself."
"Never you mind about that," said Jim Chenowith. "You're on duty now,—sleep duty,—and if you don't shut up and go to sleep I'll pour buckets of cold water over you. We're not suffering for sleep just because we were waked up an hour or so earlier than usual."
Tom was too tired to argue or to resist. He turned over on his side and a minute later he was asleep.
Meantime the boys busied themselves with breakfast. Ed was still the head cook, partly because he knew more about cooking than any body else did, and partly because the Doctor still refused to let him work with an axe. But all the boys helped him with this meal, as they always did when they were in the house at the time of the preparation of meals.
"How long will it be, Doctor, before Tom will wake up hungry?" asked Ed solicitously.
"Not more than two hours at farthest," answered the Doctor. "But why?"
"Well, I want to have something ready for him when he wakes—something hot and appetizing."
And Ed accomplished his purpose. He gave the other boys their breakfast of broiled bear's meat and ash cakes and then he set to work on Tom's breakfast. He dressed two of the quails and laid them aside. Then he mixed some of the meal and made pones of it, baking them in a skillet. When Tom began to stir restlessly Ed raked out a fine bed of clean coals and placed the two quails upon them to broil. They required very close and constant attention, of course, to prevent burning, and just as Ed was finally taking them off the fire Tom sat up in his bunk and asked: