"Oh, it's early yet," replied Ernest, "and we haven't got half a sackful."
"We have twelve quarts at home," said Jack. "We don't need any more. Besides, we haven't been to the Cave for two weeks. It rained so hard last Saturday that it may need cleaning out."
"All right," said Ernest. "Come along."
Jack scrambled to his feet and together they set off into the woods again. A walk of half a mile or so brought them to a brook which they followed upstream until they came to a leaky dam of stones and logs which they had built the previous spring and which held back enough water to make a small pond above. This they called their Beaver Dam and Beaver Pond, and in the sandy bank at one side was Trapper's Cave.
Beaver Pond lay just within the edge of the wood, and from the Cave one's eyes commanded a view of an old, disused pasture, now grown up to sumacs and blueberry bushes, which stretched up and over a long hill that seemed to bear the rim of the blue sky on its shoulder. One could sit unobserved in the mouth of the Cave, quite hidden by the saplings and undergrowth of the wood's edge, and watch all that went on outside, with the depths of the dark, mysterious, whispering forest at one's back.
The Cave itself would hardly have housed a family of real Cave-Dwellers. It was neither very large nor very skilfully built, but it amply served the purpose for which it was intended. It was dug out of the soft sand of the bank. Two boards in the ceiling supported by two birch props did not entirely prevent the sand from falling in, and every visit to the Cave was attended by housecleaning. Nevertheless, it was a delectable rendezvous for adventurers.
At one side was a low bench built of fence boards and at the other a soap box with a hinged cover, hasp, and padlock, which served as a treasure chest and which contained, among other things, a hatchet, an old and not very sharp hunting knife, a dozen potatoes, and a supply of salt and pepper. At first the boys had attempted to build a fireplace at the back of the Cave, with a hole cut through the roof to the surface of the ground above to serve as a chimney, but it proved unsuccessful, and a circular pile of stones in front, with a rusty kettle supported on two forked sticks, now served as campfire and cook stove.
The boys filled the kettle at the little pond, not because they wished to boil anything, but because it made a fire seem more worth while. Then they kindled a blaze beneath it, and when there were enough red coals, they thrust four of the potatoes among them.
"Now for a good feed," said Ernest.