"Here's something!" and Worth drew a basket out from beneath a blanket. "Guess we'll all feel better for a bite of breakfast," he added.
Crackers, cheese, bread and butter and bananas were in the "ship's stores," as Billy expressed it, and there was enough for all.
The simple matter of eating served not only to relieve hunger but gave all present a sense of better acquaintance and far greater freedom in talking with one another.
"'Tis an awful waste of wood, sure!" said Mr. O'Lear.
Obviously he referred to the fire. The flames now swept the shore line from the Point to the lake's eastern boundary. For miles upon miles the forest was a whirlwind of furiously roaring flames, or a desolate waste of blazing wreckage, smoldering stumps and blackened, leafless tree trunks.
"The clubhouse! The roof has caught!" cried Billy Worth suddenly. "And look! It's a man!–two men, on the porch roof!" he yelled.
"Great heavens! it's Lew Grandall!" cried the stranger on the raft. "And the other man! They're fighting!"
"It's Murky! The other one is Murky!" Paul's sharp voice fairly shrieked. "It's the suit-case! They have the suit-case! Murky's trying to get it away from him!"
"Oo–ho there!" shouted the golfing man with all his force. "Get to the ground! The fire's all around you! Get into the lake quick or you're dead men!"
For an instant the two who fiercely struggled on the small balcony seemed to answer to the voice. Grandall would have leaped, it was apparent, but the other seized him furiously, and drew him forcibly back. Then a thick burst of smoke concealed them both.