Whereupon the frightened animals, flying in the face of that tradition of the wild creatures which teaches them to dread anything like a cul-de-sac, took him at his word. Stamping their delicate hoofs in a sort of timorous defiance to the bears, and ignoring both Jackson and Brannigan completely, they backed into the rear of the cabin, stared about the place curiously, and at length fell to nibbling the hay which formed the bedding of the bunks.
"Did ever ye see the likes o' that for nerve?" demanded Jackson.
"This ain't no menagerie we've got here, Tom. It's a Noah's Ark, that's what it be!"
"They've got sense, them two," said Brannigan. "They know who'll stand up fer 'em if them bears begin to git ugly."
"But we don't want the whole kit an' calabash pilin' in on us," said Jackson with decision. "An' we don't want to shet the door and not be able to see what's goin' on, neether. Guess I'd better fix up a kind o' barricade, so's I kin hold the pass in case of them there fee-rocious rabbits undertakin' to rush us."
With a bench and some boxes, he built a waist-high barrier across the doorway, and then he arranged for Brannigan a couch on the table, so that the invalid could look out comfortably over the barrier.
"Reserved seat in Noah's Ark for ye, Tom," said he.
"Hadn't ye better be fetchin' the canoe round to the front, where ye kin keep an eye onto it?" suggested Brannigan.