"Pitch in, man," urged Ellis, looking back over his shoulder. "I'll be with you in a second." But when his tower of browned and smoking flapjacks was ready, and he came over to the log, he found that his host, being his host, had waited. That settled his convictions concerning Jones; and that was doubtless why, inside of half an hour, he found himself calling him Jones and not Mr. Jones, and Jones calling him Ellis. They were a pair of well knit, clean-limbed young men, throat and face burnt deeply by wind and sun. Jones did not have much hair; Ellis's was thick and short, and wavy at the temples. They were agreeable to look at.
"Have another batch of flapjacks?" inquired Ellis, persuasively.
Jones groaned with satisfaction at the prospect, and applied himself to a crisp trout garnished with bacon.
"I've tried and tried," he said, "but I cannot catch any trout. When I found that I could not I was horrified, Ellis, because, you see, I had supposed that the forest and stream were going to furnish me with subsistence. Nature hasn't done a thing to me since I've tried to shake hands with her."
"I wonder," said Ellis, "why you came into the woods alone?"
Jones coyly pounced upon another flapjack, folded it neatly and inserted one end of it into his mouth. This he chewed reflectively; and when it had vanished according to Fletcher, he said:
"If I tell you why I came here I'll begin to get angry. This breakfast is too heavenly to spoil. Pass the bacon and help yourself."
Ellis, however, had already satisfied his hunger. He set the kettle on the coals again, dumped into it cup and plate and fork, wiped his sheath-knife carefully, and, curling up at the foot of a hemlock, lighted his pipe, returning the flaming branch to the back-log.
Jones munched on; smile after smile spread placidly over his youthful face, dislodging his eyeglasses every time. He resumed them, and ate flapjacks.