“Two got off; got the pelts of the others,” answered Dave.
“Not too bad, that,” commented Kirstie, with approval; “now come and have some supper.”
“Not jest yet, Kirstie,” he replied, undoing his package. “I’ve noticed lately ye was looking mighty peaked, an’ hadn’t much appetite, like. Now when folks has anything the matter with ’em I know as much about it as lots of the doctors, and I know what’s goin’ to set ye right up. If ye’ll lend me the loan of yer fire, an’ a frying-pan, I’ll have something for yer supper that’ll do ye more good than a bucketful of doctor’s medicine.”
Miranda knew what was coming. She knew Dave had been all the way back to the camp, beyond the Quah-Davic, for meat, that he might run no risk of killing any of the beasts that were under her protection. She knew, too, that to make such a journey in the twenty-four hours he could scarce have had one hour’s sleep. None the less, she hardened her heart against him. She kept her eyes on her plate and listened with strained intensity for her mother’s word upon this vital subject.
Kirstie’s interest was now very much awake. “There’s the fire, Dave,” she said, “and there’s the frying-pan hanging on the side of the dresser. But what have you got? I’ve felt this long while I’d like a bit of a change—not but what the food we’re used to, Miranda and me, is real good food and wholesome.”
“Well, Kirstie,” he answered, taking a deep breath before the plunge, and at the same time throwing back the wrapping from a rosy cut of venison steak, “it’s jest nothin’ more nor less than fresh meat. It’s venison, clean an’ wholesome; and I’ll fry ye right now this tender slice I’m cuttin’ for ye.”
Kirstie was startled quite out of her self-possession. The rule of the cabin against flesh meat was so long established, so well known at the Settlement, so fenced about with every sanction of principle and prejudice, that Dave’s words were of the nature of a challenge. She felt that she ought to be angry; but, as a matter of fact, she was only uneasy as to how Miranda would take so daring a proposal. At the same time she was suddenly conscious of an unholy craving for the forbidden thing. She glanced anxiously at Miranda, but the girl appeared to be wrapped up in her own thoughts.
“But you know, Dave,” she protested rebukingly, “we neither of us ever touch meat of any kind. You know our opinions on this point.”
The words themselves would have satisfied Miranda had she not detected a certain irresolution in the tone. They did not affect Dave in the least. For a moment he made no reply, for he was busy cutting thin slices off the steak. He spread them carefully in the hot butter, now spluttering in the pan over the coals; and then, straightening himself up from the task, knife in hand, he answered cheerfully: “That’s all right. But, ye see, Kirstie, all the folks reckon me somethin’ of a doctor, an’ this here meat I’m cookin’ for ye ain’t rightly food at all. It’s medicine; ’tain’t right ye should hold off now, when ye need it as medicine. ’Tain’t fair to Mirandy. I can see ye’ve jest been pinin’ away like, all winter. It’s new blood, with iron in it, ye need. It’s flesh meat, an’ flesh meat only, that’ll give ye iron an’ new blood. When ye’re well, an’ yer old strong self agin, ye can quit meat if ye like,—an’ kick me out o’ the cabin for interferin’; but now—”
He paused dramatically. He had talked right on, contrary to his silent habit, for a purpose. He knew the power of natural cravings. He was waiting for Kirstie’s elemental bodily needs to speak out in support of his argument. He waited just time for the savoury smell of the steak to fill the cabin and work its miracle. Now the spell was abroad. He looked to Kirstie for an answer.