"Why not?"
"Because there's no coal."
"No coal?"
"There's about half a scuttle full of dust. If you can make it burn you'll be clever."
What Rupert said was correct. Madge confessed, with crimson cheeks, that she had meant, over and over again, to order some coal, but had continually forgotten it, until finally Christmas Day had found them with an empty cellar. There was plenty of wood, but it was not so dry as it might have been, and anyhow, the grate was not constructed to burn wood.
"You might try smoked beef," suggested Rupert. "When that wood goes at all it smokes like one o'clock. If you hung the beef up over it, it would be smoked enough for anyone by the time that it was done."
I began to rub my chin. Considering the breakfast we had had, from my point of view the situation commenced, for the first time, to look really grave, I wondered if it would not be possible to take the whole eight somewhere where something really eatable could be got. But, when I broached the subject, I learned that the thing could not be done. The nearest hostelry was the "Boy and Blunderbuss," and it was certain that nothing eatable could be had there, even if accommodation could be found for us at all. Nothing in the shape of a possible house of public entertainment was to be found closer than the market town, eight miles off; it was unlikely that even there a Christmas dinner for nine could be provided at a moment's notice. Evidently the only thing to do was to make the best of things.
When the meeting broke up Madge came and said a few words to me alone.
"I really think you had better not stay."
"Does that mean that you had rather I went?"