"I think I can;" and the cook at once rolled up the sleeves of her riding-dress, and Jimmy brought out the eggs and some bits of salt meat—evidently bear-meat—that was hung from the ceiling of the cupboard; at once there began a great beating of eggs and stirring up of a corn pone; some berries were set on the coals to stew in a tin-cup, the water put to boil for the coffee, and an iron skillet with a lid utilized as an oven; and the fragrance of the preparing eatables filled the little room and prompted the hungry lifting of lids many times ere the fire had time to do its work.
"That pone's a 'dandy!'" said Jim, taking a peep at it; "it's gettin' as brown as—as your hair; an' them berries is done, an' ain't it time to put in the coffee?"
Acting on this hint, the coffee, beaten into a froth with an egg, had the boiling water poured over it, and set bubbling and aromatic on the red coals.
"You mayn't be much use to find strayed-off stock," said Jim deliberately, with his head on one side, as he watched the apparent ease with which the girl managed her primitive cooking apparatus; "but I tell you—you ain't no slouch when it comes to gettin' grub ready, and gettin' it quick."
"Better keep your compliments until you have tried to eat some of the cooking," suggested Miss Hardy, on her knees before the fire. "I believe the pone is done."
"Then we'll dish-up in double-quick," said Jim, handing her two tin pans for the pone and potatoes. "We'll have to set the berries on in the tin—by George! what's that?"
"That" was the neigh of Betty in the shed by the chimney, and an answering one from somewhere out in the darkness. Through the thunder and the rain they had heard no steps, but Jim's eyes were big with suspense as he listened.
"My horse has broke loose from the shed," he said angrily, reaching for his hat; "and how the dickens I'm to find him in this storm I don't know."
"Don't be so quick to give yourself a shower-bath," suggested the girl on the floor; "he won't stray far off, and may be glad to come back to the shed; and then again," she added, laughing, "it may be MacDougall."
Jim looked rather blankly at the supper on the hearth and the girl who seemed so much at home on the buffalo-robe.