"Oh," says I. "I won't starve. I'm goin' to get dinner."
Dinner! The very name of it was like a life-preserver to a feller who'd gone under for the second time.
"Can you get us dinner?" roars the Major. "By George, if you can I'll—"
"Not for you I can't," I says. "You live accordin' to the Payne schedule, on prunes and pecans and such. The prune crop 'round here is a failure and I don't see a pecan tree in Jonathan's back yard. No, any dinner I'd get would give you compound, gallopin' dyspepsy, and I can't be responsible for your death—I love you too much. But I cal'late I can scratch up a meal that'll keep folks with common insides from perishin' of hunger. Anyhow, I'm goin' to try."
[CHAPTER IV—HOW I MADE A CLAM CHOWDER; AND WHAT A CLAM CHOWDER MADE OF ME]
Well, sir, even the Major's guns was spiked for a minute. I cal'late that, for once, he'd forgot all about his dietizin' and only remembered his appetite. He gurgled and choked and glared. Afore he could get his artillery ready for a broadside I walked off and left him. He'd riled me up a little and I saw a chance to rile him back.
I went around to the back part of the Crowell house and tried the kitchen door. 'Twas locked, for a wonder, but the window side of it wasn't. I pushed up the sash and reached in fur enough to unhook the door. Then I went into the house and begun to overhaul the supplies in the galley. I found flour and sugar and salt and pepper and coffee and butter and canned milk and salt pork—about everything I wanted. Jonathan and I was friendly enough so's I knew he wouldn't care what I used so long as I paid for it. If he had I'd have taken the risk, just then.
The wood-box was full and I got a fire goin' in the cookstove, and put on a couple of kettles of water to heat. Then I went out to the shed and located a clam hoe and a bucket. There's clams a-plenty 'most anywheres along that beach and the tide was out fur enough for me to get a bucket-full of small ones in no time. I fetched 'em up to the house and set down on the back step to open 'em.
The Major and Shelton was watchin' me all this time and they looked interested—that is, the Congressman did, and Clark was doin' his best not to. Pretty soon Shelton walks over and asks a question. "What are you doin' with those things, Cap'n Snow?" says he, referrin' to the clams.
"Oh," says I, cheerful, "I'm figgerin' on makin' a chowder, if nothin' busts."