It was really too bad, but one of the wagons drove up and the men on it began to unload bear carcasses. All this bear meat was dumped before B Company's line. C Company men tried not to look in that direction at all, for C Company's share in the bear meat was to be—none.
Early that morning Captain Cortland had sent the wagon and men to recover the bear carcasses from the cave. The bears had been promptly "skinned" and dressed before loading them into the wagon.
From still another wagon sounded the whines of the five cubs. These were to be taken back to Fort Clowdry, there to be fattened and served at the coming Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner of B Company's men. A few months later these cubs would be "a good size for killing."
"To the victors belong the spoils." The two older bears had been killed as already related, and the cubs found by B Company scouts within C Company's "territory."
Out were tumbled the Army cookstoves. Men of B Company cut up the meat. Soon the odor of baking and roasting meats was on the air. Other willing helpers to the cook were trimming off pieces of meat for broiling.
It was torment to hungry C Company men to smell the appetizing odors and to meet the grins with which B Company men favored them.
B Company must wait a while for its dinner, but was willing. The men of C Company, to stop, as far as possible, the pangs of longing and the watering of mouths, fell to at once to cook their own monotonous bacon.
"See here, Freeman, there's going to be an abundance of bear meat," remarked Captain Cortland, going over to his fellow company commander. "Your men may as well have some of it."
"Not under the circumstances under which the meat was obtained," replied Captain Freeman firmly. "Let the men of my company realize that they were disgracefully worsted, and that they have no cause for complaint."
So the men of one company sat down to a meal of hard tack, bacon and coffee, while B Company men waited for a better feast.