François soon finished dressing his pigeons, and plunged them into the boiling-water. A piece of dried meat was added, and then some salt and pepper, drawn from the store-bag, for it was the intention of François to make pigeon-soup. He next proceeded to beat up a little flour with water, in order to give consistency to the soup.
“What a pity,” said he, “we have no vegetables!”
“Hold!” cried Lucien, who overheard him. “There appears to be a variety of green stuff in this neighbourhood. Let me see what can be done.”
So saying, Lucien walked about the glade with his eyes bent upon the ground. He seemed to find nothing among the grass and herbs that would do; and presently he strayed off among trees, towards the banks of a little stream that ran close by. In a few minutes he was seen returning with both his hands full of vegetables. He made no remark, but flung them down before François. There were two species—one that resembled a small turnip, and, in fact, was the Indian turnip (psoralea esculenta), while the other was the wild onion found in many parts of America.
“Ha!” cried François, who at once recognised them, “what luck! pomme-blanche, and wild onions too, as I live! Now I shall make a soup worth tasting.”
And he proceeded with great glee to cut up the vegetables, and fling them into the steaming kettle.
In a short while the meat and pigeons were boiled, and the soup was ready. The kettle was taken from the crane; and the three brothers, seating themselves on the grass, filled their tin cups, and set to eating. They had brought a supply of hard bread to last for a few days. When that should give out, they would draw upon their bag of flour; and when this, too, should be exhausted, it was their intention to go without bread altogether, as they had often done on like excursions before.
While thus enjoying their pigeon-soup and picking the bones of the plump birds, the attention of all three was suddenly arrested by a movement near one side of the glade. They had just caught a glimpse of something that looked like a flash of yellow light shooting up in a straight direction from the ground.
All three guessed what it was—the lightning passage of a squirrel up the trunk of a tree; and there was the animal itself, clinging flat against the bark, having paused a moment—as is usual with squirrels—before making another rush upward.
“Oh!” cried Lucien, in a suppressed voice, “it is a fox-squirrel, and such a beauty! See! it is marked like a tortoise-shell cat! Papa would give twenty dollars for such a skin.”