When the blaze was crackling up the chimney, built of field stones, the inside of the lonely cabin was very cheerful. Mr. Bobbsey and Nan and the boys brought in armfuls of the sweet hemlock branches and piled them on the wooden bunks which contained not even a shred of a blanket.
“When are we going to eat?” asked Freddie, when this work had been done.
“Yes, I’m hungry,” added Flossie.
“We shall have supper—such as it is—right away,” answered Mrs. Bobbsey. “Luckily Dinah put us up a big basket of food.”
When a sort of bed had been arranged for Bert and his father in the auto, where they would have to lie curled up “like puppies,” as Freddie said, and when the robes had been brought in to spread under Mrs. Bobbsey and the children, who would sleep in the cabin bunks, then the basket of food was opened.
Not much had been taken out for the noon lunch, and plenty of sandwiches and other good things remained for the evening meal.
They sat on broken boxes about the blaze on the hearth and ate, becoming quite cheerful and gay in spite of having to camp out so unexpectedly.
“Do you think Mr. Watson will worry because we don’t get there to-night?” asked Nan of her mother, when the meal was over.
“No; for I didn’t say exactly when we would get to Cloverbank,” answered Mr. Bobbsey. “I told him when we would start and said we hoped to reach Cloverbank the same evening. But I did not say we would certainly do so.”
“It’s a good thing you didn’t,” remarked Mrs. Bobbsey. “We never expected to have to do this. But I rather like it,” she went on, with a laugh.