Chapter XI.
ONE COOK SPOILS THE BROTH.
The question of what was to make up the dinner bill of fare appeared to be an important one to all, and many were the suggestions made to the cooks. Some proposed that the work of raising the tent be intrusted to other hands, so that Bill and Tip could go out and bring in a deer or a bear; others thought the old hen should be killed at once, and served up as a roast; while one portion of the party seemed to think it Captain Jimmy’s duty to get his ship under way and go after some fish for a chowder.
But Tim and Bobby did not allow any of these remarks to trouble them; they were the legally elected cooks, and they proposed to do the work in their own way.
“We’ll get the dinner,” said Tim, with some dignity; “an’ after it’s done, if you fellers don’t like it, you can cook one to suit yourselves.”
But the cooks did listen to what Bill had to say, since he was one of the high officials, and he was strongly in favor of making the first dinner in camp a “big” one, even going so far as to propose in all earnestness that the hen be killed.
“We might jest as well eat her,” he said, as he looked murderously toward the unhappy fowl, which was struggling to free herself from her bonds at the risk of breaking her leg. “’Cause jest as likely as not she’ll get away, an’ then we sha’n’t so much as have a smell of her.”
“It will take us too long to fix her up for dinner,” said Tim, who was just the least bit afraid that he was not cook enough to serve the hen properly, “We can get enough to eat to-day without havin’ so much fuss.”
“I don’t care how long it takes; what we want is a bang-up dinner, an’ I go in for havin’ it now,” said Bill, decidedly.
Bobby was on the point of throwing the weight of his opinion against the proposed feast when a bark of triumph was heard from Tip, and the question was settled without farther discussion. The dog, which had been struggling to get free from the time he had been tied so near the hen, to which he seemed to think he had a perfect right, finally succeeded in releasing himself. There was a sudden rush on his part, a loud, cackling protest from poor Biddy, who seemed to anticipate her fate, and then she was tossed in the air a dead chicken.