“Feel sleepy now?” cried Chris, with a laugh, and in quite a different tone of voice.
“Sleepy? Who could?” was the reply, punctuated with gasps. “My! Isn’t it icy this morning!”
“Yes. Washed all the snarl out of you, old chap,” cried Chris merrily. “I say, you did sound disagreeable.”
“Oh, I like that!” said Ned. “Why, a bear with a sore head was nothing to you.”
“Humph!” grunted Chris, feeling too guilty to defend himself. “I say, feel cold now?”
“No; burning hot,” was the reply. “I say, what a pity there are not falls like this all over the salt desert.”
“There’d be no salt desert if there were,” said Chris, who was now dressing rapidly in the increasing light. “They’d soon wash all the salt away. Look sharp: old Griggs will be shouting directly.”
The word “Breakfast!” came almost as he spoke, and as the boys hurried towards the fire, fully alert now and ready for anything, they saw that the mules were all laden but the one which carried the kitchen, as they called it, and this beast was feasting in company with the ponies.
“Oh, I say, father, it isn’t fair,” cried Chris, in response to the morning greeting. “You know I like to help load.”
“Yes, my boy, but we woke earlier than usual, and I wanted you two to have a good rest, for we shall have a long day.”