Hildegarde's Neighbors Part 12

"I suppose," said Bell, slowly, "life is always good, when we want to make it so. There are so many different kinds of life,--I have known so many in the short time I have been alive, and it didn't seem to make much difference about the outside of them. Some of the poorest and most suffering lives have been the happiest and blessedest, and again some that have money and health and everything that so many people sigh for, are miserable, for one reason or another. I can't bear to hear girls say, 'Oh, if I only had money! I would do so much, and be so good, and all that sort of thing.' I always want to say, 'Why don't you begin with what you have?' I did say it once to a girl, and she has hardly spoken to me since. She had been wishing that she had a hundred dollars to give to the Mission Society, and when I asked her for ten cents (I was the collector) she said she had only one dime, and she must get some soda water, or she should die."

"The creature! what did you say to her?"

"I said, 'Possibly the world would continue to revolve if you did!' and stalked away. Oh, I cannot stand that sort of thing, you know! And if you are a girl, you can't knock people down when they are cads."

Bell spoke regretfully, and Hildegarde could not help laughing at her friend's angry eyes and kindling cheek. The strong white bare arms, the deep chest and square shoulders, looked as if Bell would be no mean antagonist.

"I should not like to have you knock me down, my dear!" said Hilda.

"You never would need it," said Bell. "But I can tell you, Hilda, there are times when I feel as if a blow from the shoulder would be the best argument in the world. I love fighting! and I think I am rather a bonny fighter, as Alan Breck says. Roger taught me to box."

Hildegarde opened her eyes a little at this, boxing never having come within her horizon of feminine accomplishments.

"Does Professor Merryweather know how to do everything?" she asked. "He seems to be the Admirable Crichton come to life again."

"Nearly everything," said Bell, with judicious candour. "He cannot write verses, and he does not like dancing; those are the only things I can think of just now."

A birch canoe glided silently round the point; Roger was kneeling in the stern, paddling, Indian fashion, while Will and Kitty were curled up like two kittens in the bow. Hildegarde thought to herself that he was the handsomest man she had ever seen, so strong, so gentle, so perfectly graceful; but she did not say so.

"What luck?" cried Bell, as the Cheemaun came alongside the wharf.

Roger held up a string of gleaming fish, two of them long, deep-bodied fellows, striped with pink and silver. w.i.l.l.y was happy with three hideous horned pouts, which he declared were the best fish that swam.

"Oh, pickerel! how delightful!" cried Bell, as she took the beauties from her brother's hands. "We will bake them for supper, Hilda; it is our turn, isn't it?"

"Oh!" said w.i.l.l.y, "I thought it was Toots' and Roger's turn. Toots makes the best griddle-cakes, and she ought always to get supper."

"w.i.l.l.y, you ungrateful little monster!" cried Bell. "And you said only last night that my biscuits were a dream of joy. You won't find me baking an extra pan for you, if you are going to turn upon me in this way."

"Oh yes! so you did, sister," said w.i.l.l.y, penitently. "But you see, I am griddle-cake hungry to-day, and yesterday I wasn't."

"Come, Hilda! we'll make our little gentleman pickerel-hungry before he is an hour older!" and the two girls hurried into the house.

Inside the camp was a large, low room, with a huge open fireplace filling nearly one side. A plain table stood in the middle; two hammocks were slung against the walls, which were hung with guns and fishing-rods. A bookcase in one corner, and Mrs.

Merryweather's workstand in another, completed the furniture of the primitive parlour. On one side a door opened into the tiny kitchen, and hither the girls now betook themselves, after reminding Will and Kitty that it was their turn to set the supper table. The fire was soon burning brightly in the stove, the kettle put on to boil, and Hildegarde, rolling up her sleeves, set to work mixing and moulding biscuits, while Bell devoted herself to the stuffing and dressing of the big fish.

"I wish I had Izaak Walton here!" she said, as she mixed the bread stuffing.

"Father Izaak pleasant company would be at any moment," Hilda a.s.sented; "but what do you want him for just now? To cook the fish for you?"

"Not exactly; I doubt if he was as good in the kitchen as by the brookside; but to give me his famous receipt for cooking pickerel.

I should like to astonish the family with it. I remember that it has thyme in it, and sweet marjoram and summer savory, not to mention oysters and anchovies, a pound of b.u.t.ter, a bottle of claret and three or four oranges; he gives you your choice about two cloves of garlic, and says you need not have them unless you like. Perhaps on the whole it is just as well not to try the dish at present; the anchovies were left behind, and the orange trees are not bearing very well this year."

"Dear me!" said Hildegarde. "That is as bad as my Southern receipt for wedding cake. Two hundred and one pounds of flour and fruit, and ten eggs to the pound; and if it isn't rich enough then, you can add two pounds of currants and one of raisins for each pound of flour. That would make,--let me see! I worked it all out once: two hundred and seventy pounds of things, and two thousand seven hundred eggs. What do you suppose they baked it in?"

"In the well!" said Bell. "That would hold it. Or else they built a pavilion round it, and had the bride and groom dance a minuet on the top after the ceremony. What fun cook-books are! Any more pleasantnesses in your Southern friend?"

"Oh, all kinds of good things! I remember the receipt for Seminole soup; we ought to try that out here, if we could find the ingredients. 'Take a squirrel, cut it up and put it on to boil.

When the soup is nearly done add to it one pint of picked hickory-nuts and a spoonful of parched and powdered sa.s.safras leaves, or the tender top of a young pine tree, which gives a very aromatic flavour to the soup.'"

"Oh, do somebody get us a pine tree!" cried Bell. "That is truly delightful! We must try it some day. Now it is my turn. I quote from Mrs. Rundell the glorious. This is what she gives to the poor; I don't want to be poor in Mrs. Rundell's parish.

"'Cut a very thick upper crust of bread, and put it into the pot where salt beef is boiling and near ready; it will attract some of the fat, and, when swelled out, will be no unpalatable dish to those who rarely taste meat.' That is called a brewis, my dear; suppose we give it to our pampered family here some day, and see what they say. How nearly are your biscuits done? I hear the people growling inside, like hungry bears. Uncle Pickerel is beginning to smell very good."

"Another five minutes will give them the requisite 'beautiful light brown'" said Hildegarde, peeping into the oven. "And the tea is made, and the potatoes are tearing off their jackets in impatience to be eaten."

"Are we going to have any supper?" asked Phil, looking in from the dining-room. "Roger has fainted with hunger, and lies a pallid heap on the floor, and Obadiah is gnawing his boots in his agony."

"As long as he does not swallow the nails," said Bell, calmly, "it will do him no harm. Have the babes got the table ready?"

"All ready, sister!" cried Kitty. "Cups and saucers and plates, and--oh, w.i.l.l.y, we have forgotten the b.u.t.ter! Why do we always forget the b.u.t.ter?"

In five minutes the whole family were seated round the table, with the lamp burning brightly above their heads. Bell came in triumphantly, bearing the mighty pickerel in their glory, on a huge platter decorated with green leaves and golden-rod.

Hildegarde followed, flushed and sparkling, with her biscuits and coffee; and every one fell to with right good will.

"Why is it that everything tastes so good here?" demanded Will.

"At home I can't always eat as much as I want to, and here I can always eat more than there is; and yet there is lots!" he added, surveying the broad table, heaped with substantial victuals of every sort.

"Ah! that's the beauty of it!" cried Gerald, spearing a potato.

"The human capacity enlarges, my son, with every mile one retires from civilisation. When I was a Kickapoo Indian, w.i.l.l.y, I ate for three weeks without stopping, and I had three buffaloes at a--"

"Gerald, my dear!" said Mrs. Merryweather.

"Yes, Mater, my dear!" said the unblushing Gerald. "I was only trying to expand his mind, like the Nink.u.m. Excellent biscuits, Miss Hilda! three more, if you please."

CHAPTER XI.

A NIGHT-PIECE.

It was clear moonlight when the girls went to bed; clear, that is, to Hildegarde's unpractised eyes. She saw only the brilliant stars overhead, and took no note of the low bank of cloud in the south.

Captain Roger (for Roger was in command at camp, Mr. Merryweather only coming out at night on his bicycle, and going in again to his business in the morning), after a critical survey of the sky, went the rounds in his quiet way before bedtime, making all secure, but said nothing to anybody. Going to bed was a matter of some labour at the camp. During the day the beds were piled one on top of another in the one bedroom, the blankets, after hanging in the air for two or three hours, being folded and laid over them. Only in the tent where Mr. and Mrs. Merryweather slept the beds remained stationary all day, the sides of the tent being rolled high, to let the air circulate in every direction.

When nine o'clock came, or ten, as the case might be, the order was given, "Bring out the beds!" Straightway the boys made broad their backs, and walked about like long-legged tortoises, distributing mattresses here and there. The three girls slept in the bedroom which opened off the living-room; the boys and Roger carried their beds into the second tent, or under the trees, or into the boat-house, as fancy suggested, and the wind favoured.

Then blankets were unrolled, and the business of bed-making went on merrily.

As I said, it was clear moonlight when the girls went to bed; but somewhere in the middle of the night Hildegarde was waked by a rustle and a roar. Visions of lions ramped before her still-dreaming eyes; she shuddered awake, to find a gale raging round the camp. Outside was one continuous roar of waves on the sh.o.r.e, while overhead the wind clutched and tore at the branches, and shook the frail hut to its foundations. Hildegarde lay still and listened, with a luxurious sense of safety amid the wild tumult.

"But I am safe, and live at home!" she said softly. Then suddenly a thought came, like a cold hand laid on her heart, and she sat up in bed, her breath coming quickly.

"Bell!" she said, under breath, that she might not wake little Kitty, "Bell, wake up!"

"What is it?" asked Bell, turning drowsily on her side. "Not our turn to get breakfast, you know."

"There is a storm! Hear it raging outside. Oh, Bell! the birch canoe! Can you remember whether we put her in the boat-house when we came in from paddling?"