"That would be tough, I own up, Frank; I hope it doesn't come along. But we sure do seem to get our feet in a heap of stirring happenings. It's like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire with us these days. But say, when do we eat, I'd like to know?"
Frank chuckled as he went on to say:
"Finished the last crumb of our lunch at noon, you remember." At the words his companion in trouble emitted a groan and began to rub the pit of his stomach sympathetically. "But wait till you hear how manna seems to come down to us, as it did to the Children of Israel in the Arabian desert long years ago. Look over yonder, Lanky. What do you see, boy? Tell me!"
Lanky looked, started, and rubbed his eyes, half suspecting that he must be "seeing things" that had no actual foundation.
"Frank— Why, say, it er—looks like a deer!" he exclaimed.
"It is a deer—caught in the big jam and killed clean by that rock covering its head. A young buck in the bargain, I'd say, and just begging to be cut into slices for two hungry fellows' supper."
"Lead me to it, Frank!" ejaculated Lanky, as he drew his hunting-knife. "Talk to me about favorites of fortune, we're sure the luckiest fellows west of the old Mississippi. Venison for supper—plenty of it for a whole week—and thrown in front of us like that!" snapping his fingers. "Whoopee! what's the use worrying when things come tumbling along by themselves?"
So the two boys settled down to making camp then and there. Frank started his fire, with a vast abundance of fine fuel to be had for the picking up, while Lanky undertook to skin the deer. He then cut off steak and chops until Frank warned him they were only two in the mess, and not a whole regiment.
As evening drew near they sat down to enjoy a fine spread, cooked in genuine hunters' style, with no limit to anything save their own capacity.