There was a wicked rolling of Uncle Eb’s eyes while he spoke. Evidently from the looks of the sportsmen he guessed immediately what had been the result of their excursion.
“No luck and no buck to-night!” answered Garst. “But don’t roast us, Uncle Eb. Get us something to eat quicker than lightning or we’ll go for you—at least we would if we weren’t entirely played out. It isn’t everybody who can manage a hard shot as cleverly as you do, when he can only see the eyes of an animal. And that was the one chance we got.”
No man living ever heard a further word from Cyrus as to how his English friend bore the scares of a first night’s jacking.
“Ya-as, dat’s a ticklish shot. Most folks is skeered o’ trying it,” drawled out Ebenezer Grout, a professional guide as well as “colored gen’leman,” familiarly called by visitors to this region who hired the use of his hut and his services, “Uncle Eb.”
“There’s some comfort for you,” whispered Cyrus slyly into Neal’s ear. Aloud he said, addressing the guide, “We had a spill-out, too, as a crown-all. I’m mighty glad that this is the second of October, not November, and that the weather is as warm as summer; otherwise we’d be in a pretty bad way from chill. I feel shivery. Hurry up, and get us some steaming hot coffee and flapjacks, Uncle Eb, while we fling off these wet clothes. The trouble is we haven’t got any dry ones.”
“Hain’t got no oder suits?” queried the woodsman. “Den go ’long, boys, and rig yerselves up in yer blankets. Ye can pertend to be Injuns fer to-night. Like enough dis ain’t de worst shift ye’ll have to make ’fore ye get out o’ dese parts.”
As the draggled pair were making towards the hut, which stood about six feet from the fire, to follow his advice, its bark door was suddenly pushed wide open. Forth stepped, or rather staggered, another boy, younger and shorter than Neal. His tumbled fair hair was here and there adorned with a green pine-needle, which was not remarkable, considering that he had just arisen from a bed of pine boughs. Sundry others were clinging to the surface of the warm, fleecy blankets in which he was wrapped, and his feet were thrust into a pair of moccasins. He had the appearance and voice of a person awaking from sound sleep.
“I say, you fellows, it’s about time you got back!” he said, rubbing his heavy eyes, and addressing the hunters. “I hope you’ve had some luck. I dreamt that I was smacking my lips over a venison steak.”
“Smack ’em w’en you git it, honey!” remarked Uncle Eb, while he mixed a plain batter of flour, baking-powder, and cold water, which he dropped in big spoonfuls on a frying-pan, previously greased, proceeding to fry the mixture over his camp-fire.
The thin, round cakes which presently appeared were the “flapjacks” despised by Cyrus as insufficient diet.