What easily might have been an embarrassing situation was dealt with capably by the Safety First Club. Hardly had the jovial Mr. Kane welcomed the belated Sam and demanded how in the world he had happened to stray from the rest of the party and what he had been doing to amuse himself out in the cold; and hardly had Sam explained as nonchalantly as might be that he had chanced to meet a schoolmate, who was serving as cookee to the camp, and had paused for a chat with him, when the door in the partition shutting off the cook’s domain opened, and Orkney appeared.
There was brief, but tense, silence as Tom advanced toward the group. Then Step, who chanced to be nearest, spoke.
“H’lo, Orkney!” said he brusquely but not harshly.
“Howdy, Step!” responded Tom, quite in the same manner.
“Oh, up here for a while, eh?”
This was Poke’s contribution. The others nodded, a bit stiffly, maybe; and the Shark regarded the newcomer solemnly through his glasses. Nowhere was there sign of hostility, even if warmer welcome were lacking. There was not a boy there but guessed shrewdly at what had taken place; but not for love or money would one of them have betrayed his knowledge by speech or look. At times the methods of youngsters in their teens curiously resemble those of Indians—at least, to the extent of jealous hiding of emotion. Both Tom and Sam bore a mark or two of their encounter, but for the present these were things to be carefully ignored.
Mr. Kane, as he himself would have said, “sensed” something queer; but though he glanced quickly and inquiringly from face to face, he could make nothing of the manner of his guests. And then Orkney going about his duties and the boys resuming their talk, he gave up the problem, and turned to Lon, from whom he demanded the latest news of the outside world.
It was Sam’s first opportunity to inspect a lumber camp, and he studied with keen interest the long, low room, with its walls of logs, its big stove, its line of bunks against each wall, and its “deacon’s seat,” or bench built beside the bunks. The windows were few and small. Roughly as the house was built, it was very solidly put together, while drafts were lessened by moss packed between the logs. Here and there hung spare clothing and extra boots. There was no attempt anywhere at adornment or decoration, but order of a sort seemed to be maintained, the order which places everything where it can be most handily come at.
Dusk was falling, and the choppers began to straggle into the camp. With them came the “yard men,” whose business it is to handle and pile the logs, and the teamsters. Strapping big fellows were most of Kane’s crew, roughly clad for rough work, hard as nails, and hungry as bears. Among the last to arrive was Peter Groche, who slouched into the big room, grunted when his eyes fell upon Lon and the boys, halted for an instant, regarding them evilly, and finally made his way to what appeared to be his especial corner. There he remained until the whole company trooped through the doorway in the partition to the combined kitchen and dining-room.
This filled the ell of the camp. There was a range in one corner, and a table of boards ran the length of the room, benches serving as seats. Behind these were two bunks for the cook and the cookee. The supper, everything being eaten from tin plates, made up in quantity what it lacked in variety. Beans, baked with pork, formed the principal dish, most excellent beans and in seemingly inexhaustible supply. Then there were enormous camp doughnuts, which would have appalled a dyspeptic, but which proved to be singularly toothsome and comforting after a day in the open. Tea, sweetened with molasses, was drunk from tin cups. The boys may not have been able to match the huge appetites of the woodsmen, but they ate and ate until, as Poke whispered to Step, he’d have to stop or hitch two belts together; for the food, simple as it was, was well cooked and tempting enough to hungry folk, young or old.