“Yes, but if you can’t do that, I think the feeders should at least have the grace to lick their plates. What on earth do you do with all the scraps?” asked Dum as she vigorously scraped plates, a part of the work that everyone hates.
“Fatten chickens for killin’,” answered Oscar, sharpening a great knife fit for the deed he had to do. “For land’s sake, Miss Dum, don’t arsk none of the week-enders ter lick they plates. They don’t leave nothin’ now for my chickens. The gals even eat the tater peelin’s. They say it gwine make they har curl, but they eat so much they don’t leave no room for they har ter curl.”
Dum and Nan had become fast friends during that week at camp. The several years’ difference in their ages was as nothing. The feeling for beauty which both of them had to a great degree was what drew them together. Nan was so quiet and unostentatious in her unselfishness, few at the camp realized how much she did. For instance: the person who cooks a meal is usually praised by the hungry ones, but the person who patiently scrapes and washes dishes is hardly thought of at all by the satiated. On that Friday morning, Helen had, with the help of Page, produced a wonderful breakfast; and when these two girls came to that meal flushed but triumphant in the knowledge that their popovers popped over and that their omelettes had risen to the occasion, the breakfasters had given them three rousing cheers. No one thought of who was going to wash up.
While Dum was sloshing in the suds and Nan was busily drying the dishes that piled up to such great heights they looked like ramparts, Page and Helen came in to try their hands at pies for Saturday’s picnic. Page had on one of Helen’s bungalow aprons and seemed as much at home as though she had been born and bred in camp. Page always had that quality of making herself at home wherever she happened to drop. Dee used to say she was just like a kitten and wasn’t particular where she was, just so it was pleasant and people were kind.
“What kind of pies shall it be?” asked Helen.
“Something not too squashy!” pleaded Dum. “Nan and I have found the most adorable spot for a picnic: a fallen tree about half a mile around the mountain—not a freshly fallen one but one that must have fallen ages and ages ago as it has decided just to grow horizontally. Any old person could climb up it, just walk up it in fact—such seats were never imagined—the limbs all twisted into armchairs.”
“Of course if we are going to eat up a tree we had better have mighty solid pies,” laughed Page. “How about fried turnovers like Mammy Susan makes?”
“Grand!” from Dum. “Apple?”
“Yes, apple,” laughed Helen, amused at Dum’s enthusiasm, “also some lemon pies, don’t you think? I mean cheese cakes.”