AROUND THE CAMP-FIRE
THERE was no sign of the other trampers when Blue Bonnet and Knight
reached the little grotto; and descending to the Big Spring they found
even that charming spot deserted.
Blue Bonnet looked around in surprise.
"Do you suppose we've missed them on the way down?" Raising her voice
she gave her ranch-call--"Ho, ye ho, ho!"
"--ho ho!" the hill sent back; but no feminine or masculine voice
answered the well-known notes.
Blue Bonnet, child of the open, then looked at the sun and the shadows
and gave an exclamation of astonishment. "It's past noon! They've gone
back to camp. My, I'll have to hurry--it's my turn to cook lunch."
She darted impetuously down the hillside, and Knight found himself
compelled to move briskly in order to keep up with her. They went too
fast for conversation, but once Blue Bonnet paused long enough to say
over her shoulder--"You'll come to lunch, won't you?"
"Catch me refusing now I know who the cook is!" he replied gaily.
The path opened at last on the open space before _Poco Tiempo_. There
was sound of voices and laughter, and yes--the clink of dishes! Blue
Bonnet turned a rueful face to Knight--"Do you hear that? They won't
say a thing to me!"
"I am armed,--trust me to protect you," he declaimed theatrically.
They had to pass through the "kitchen" first, and there the clutter of
empty pots and pans told their own story. From the dining-room the
others caught sight of the tardy pair and a wild hubbub at once arose.
"Tramps!"
"Set the dogs on them!"
"Why don't you work for a living?"
Knight's eyes twinkled as he looked from Blue Bonnet's amazed
countenance to the teasing faces about the table. Lunch was evidently
not only ready but largely consumed.
"What are you eating so early for?" Blue Bonnet demanded.
"Early!"
"Twenty minutes past one!"
"No--!" Blue Bonnet gasped, subsiding on the end of the bench and
fanning her hot face with her hat. "Now, isn't that the funniest
thing?"
"I'm glad you see the point of your own joke," retorted Kitty. "We
have decided to give you a week's notice to get a new place."
"I engage her on the spot," said Knight. "It's all my fault."
"We won't give her a reference," said Kitty.
"You needn't--if you'll just give me food," said Blue Bonnet. "Alec,
make room for Knight beside you, will you? We're both starved. Who
made the muffins?"
"Guess," said Kitty, relenting and passing her the nearly empty plate.
Sarah intercepted it. "I'll get you some hot ones." And she rose
hastily.
Blue Bonnet laughed. "Now I know! Grandmother, did you help Sarah?"
Mrs. Clyde nodded. "The girls came back so hungry I thought we had
better not wait for the chief cook. No one knew where you were."
"I'm going to wear a cow-bell after this," Blue Bonnet declared.
"Sarah, if I could make such muffins I'd insist upon cooking every
meal."
"I reckon you don't need any protection," Knight said in an undertone.
"Oh, there's safety in numbers. Wait till Amanda catches me alone! We
two will have to get dinner now." She buttered her third muffin and
then glanced happily around the table. "I've a lovely scheme," she
hinted.
"Did you ever see any one so bowed down with penitence?" asked Kitty;
adding promptly, "What's the scheme?"
"It's to invite Alec and Knight to get down logs, make us a huge
bonfire and--"
"That's just like Blue Bonnet," Kitty broke in, "--she'll let you do
the work and she'll do the _rest_!"
"--and then invite them to a party," Blue Bonnet went on
imperturbably.
"'She'll do the grand with a lavish hand,'" quoted Alec. "We're your
men. A Party--with a big P--is what our souls have been pining for.
Where shall we build the festive pyre?"
"In the open space between the two camps. There'll be no danger to the
trees there and plenty of room to sit around it. I'll tell Miguel to
bring up one of the wagon horses to drag logs,--I want a perfectly
mammoth fire."
"You ought to have been a man, Blue Bonnet," Debby remarked, "--you
would have made such a wonderful general. Your ability to put other
people to work amounts to positive genius."
But Blue Bonnet had already gone in search of Miguel, with Alec and
Knight in her train. For the rest of the afternoon the "General"
demonstrated that she could not only put other people to work, but
could work herself, to advantage. While the boys--whose forces had
been augmented by the addition of Sandy, Smith, Brown and Jones--got
down logs and built them into a miniature log cabin, Blue Bonnet made
great preparations for the Party. She spread all her Indian blankets
at a proper distance from the bonfire-to-be; distributed the
buck-board seats judiciously, planning to add the dining-room benches
as soon as supper was out of the way; whittled great quantities of
long willow wands to a sharp point, maintaining great secrecy as to
the use to which the latter were to be put; and stacked many boxes of
the delectable pinoche in a convenient spot.
Hardly had these preparations been completed when Amanda announced
that it was time to begin cooking dinner. Blue Bonnet looked at her
aghast.
"I think it's maddening," she declared. "We are in a continual state
of washing up after one meal and getting ready for another. And this
is what Grandmother calls 'simplicity'--! It would be a
heap--much--simpler if I could just say--'Lisa, we'll have dinner at
six.' That would end it,--and what could be simpler?"
"What shall we have?" asked Amanda, considering that subject more to
the point.
"Baked potatoes, then we won't have to peel them,--I'd as soon skin a
rabbit. And Gertrudis cooked a leg of lamb, so that we'll only have to
warm it up."
"Shall we try hot bread?" asked Amanda.
"Certainly not! Hot bread twice to-day already--we'll all have
indigestion. We've stacks of loaves, and bread and maple syrup is good
enough camp fare for any one. If we're going in for the simple life,
let's be simple."
"That reminds me of something we translated in the German class," said
Amanda. "'Man ist was er isst'--and it means 'one is what one eats.'
And another German said 'Tell me what you eat and I'll tell you what
you are.'"
"Do you mean to tell me that if I live on angel-cake I'll grow to be
angelic?" demanded Blue Bonnet.
"Hardly!" laughed Amanda. "It would take a good deal more than that!
No offence, Blue Bonnet,--I like you best when you're--the other
thing. The Germans are always arguing about something or other. We
used to take sides in class and nearly come to blows."
"You should have taken French," said Blue Bonnet, before she thought.
"You didn't think that last March!" Amanda teased; and the next moment
could have bitten her tongue out for the thoughtless speech. Blue
Bonnet did not smile; it was evident that the memory of the day when
all the members of the French class except herself had "cut" was still
a bitter one.
"I'll wash the potatoes," Amanda offered in amend for having touched a
painful chord.
"All right!" Blue Bonnet beamed acceptance of the kind intention and
handed over the pan without hesitation. "I'll make up a hot fire, and
we'll get everything started and the table set,--then you and I are
going to the Spring."
"Oh, are we?" asked Amanda blankly. One never knew what scheme lurked
in the back of Blue Bonnet's head.
"For table decorations. I saw some ferns and wild honeysuckle near the
bank, and it won't take much time to gather enough for the table."
"Decorating the table isn't 'simple,' is it?" Amanda asked rather
provokingly.
"If you know anything simpler than a wildflower, I'd like to be shown
it," retorted Blue Bonnet. "Come on, we must do some tall hustling."
The "tall hustling" got the table set in a rather sketchy fashion;
hurried the potatoes into a scorching oven; placed the already cooked
roast in the top of the same oven at the same time; and saw Blue
Bonnet and Amanda headed for the Spring, bearing a fruit-jar and the
camp's only carving-knife, just as Uncle Joe came up the bank with a
fine string of speckled trout.
"All ready to fry, Honey," he said, holding them up proudly.
"Hide them quick!" cried Blue Bonnet in alarm, "shooing" him back
towards the creek.
Used as he was to Blue Bonnet's impetuosity, this move of hers filled
him with amazement. "What's the matter,--they're perfectly good
trout!" he urged.
"They're lovely. But I wouldn't fry one for ten million dollars! Keep
them for breakfast, Uncle Joe,--Sarah will know how to do them
beautifully."
With an understanding chuckle, Uncle Joe went off to cache his string
of beauties in a cool place along the creek; and Blue Bonnet and
Amanda continued their quest for ferns.
As they were returning, crowned with success, they met the Señora just
back from a stroll with Mrs. Judson. The three other girls were
already sitting suggestively about the board.
"There," said Blue Bonnet triumphantly, as she deposited the fruit-jar
in the centre of the table with its graceful ferns and honeysuckle
trailing over the oil-cloth, "feast on that!"
"I call that a pretty slim dinner," said Kitty.
Blue Bonnet, disdaining the insinuation, departed rather hastily to
the kitchen, drawn thither by a strong odor and a still stronger
suspicion of disaster. The sheet-iron stove was red-hot. Catching up a
cloth she flung open the oven door, and then backed abruptly away from
the cloud of acrid yellow smoke that rolled thickly into her face.
"Oh, Blue Bonnet!" wailed Amanda. "Everything's burned to a cinder! We
shouldn't have gone off."
Blue Bonnet's only reply was a violent fit of coughing. The smoke
continued to pour in dense billows from the oven. "Grab the pans,
quick!" she managed to choke out.
Amanda made a valiant dive through the smoke, and had just time to
seize the pans from the top and bottom of the oven, when she, too, was
overcome, and in the paroxysm of coughing that followed threatened to
burst a blood-vessel. Finally with crimson faces and streaming eyes,
both cooks gazed ruefully down on the black marbles that had been
potatoes, and the charred drum-stick that had once been a leg of
spring lamb.
"Keep back--no trespassing!" called Blue Bonnet as the other girls,
scenting fun as well as the odor of burning things, came running from
the dining-room. "This is our funeral and we don't want any mourners!"
She waved them back peremptorily, at the same time screening the ruins
with her apron.
The discomfited We are Sevens returned to their seats, and a moment
later there came the sound of spoons being vigorously thumped on the
table.
"We want dinner!" came imperiously from the hungry girls.
Amanda looked imploringly at her partner. "What shall we do?"
Blue Bonnet thought hard for a moment. All at once her brow cleared.
"Here, take the meat, go find a gopher-hole and push that bone down
into it as far as it will go. The potatoes can't be burned all the
way through,--we'll scrape what's left into a bowl. And I'll tell
Uncle Joe I've changed my mind,--we'll have the trout for dinner. And,
Amanda, you'll hurry back, won't you, and put the fish in the pan--I
simply can't touch 'em!"
Each sped to fulfil her allotted task, and in an incredibly short
space of time a family of gophers was sniffing about a strange object
blocking their front door; and a pan of fragrant trout sputtered on
top of the little stove. As Blue Bonnet set the great platter of
perfectly browned fish in front of her grandmother, there was a
flattering "ah!" of anticipation that repaid--almost repaid, her for
the previous bad quarter of an hour. Canned pears and the cookies that
should have been saved for future emergencies, completed a dinner
which was voted "not half bad" by the other girls, who secretly
marvelled at getting any dinner at all. No one noticed that neither
Blue Bonnet nor Amanda partook of potatoes, and there proved to be
ample for the rest.
"I'll wash the dishes, Amanda," Blue Bonnet offered, when at last that
night-mare of a dinner was over. "I ought to walk over red-hot
plowshares, or wear a hair-shirt or something as a penance for my sins
of this day. Lacking both plowshares and shirt, I'll substitute
dish-washing. And you may bear me witness--I'd take the hair-shirt if
I had my choice!"
It was a very weary Blue Bonnet who turned the dishpan upside down and
hung the dish-cloth on a bush to dry. The long tramp of the morning,
the preparations for the bonfire party, and then the exhausting
experience of getting dinner, had tired even her physique, which had
seldom known fatigue.
"I wish we could dis-invite the company," she said to Amanda.
"So do I," groaned her partner. "Fancy having to sit around a bonfire
and sing 'merrily we roll along'--! It makes me ache all over."
Later, when the inmates of both camps were gathered in a great circle
about the fire, singing, jesting and story-telling, both girls forgot
their weariness and might have been heard singing the same "merrily we
roll along" with great zest and vocal strength.
The bonfire did its builders proud and without any preparatory sulking
or coaxing burst almost at once into pillars of soaring flame. There
was a backing away at first on the part of the spectators as the
intense heat began to scorch the circle of faces; then a gradual
drawing near again. It was not until the flames had died down and the
logs were a mass of glowing coals that Blue Bonnet handed around her
willow-wands. Each one was now tipped with a white ball, puffy, round
and mysterious.
To most of the boys this was an innovation, and they had to be shown
how to hold the white globules over the coals until they spluttered
and swelled to bursting.
"Now eat them!" she commanded. There was a chary tasting and then an
ecstatic cry--"Marshmallows!"
The rapidity with which the tin boxes were emptied might have appalled
a less generous provider than Blue Bonnet; but she had relied upon
Uncle Cliff to fill her order for marshmallows, and consequently felt
no fear of "going short."
When little Bayard had consumed his ninth "moth-ball" as he persisted
in calling the sweets, his mother rose to take her brood home. Mr.
Judson bent to lift Joe who had fallen asleep in Sarah's arms, and
then turned to Blue Bonnet. "Good-night," he said, holding out his
free hand and smiling down into the girl's tired face; "this is the
first time I ever partook of toasted moonshine, and I've enjoyed my
initiation."
Carita kissed her impulsively. "It's the loveliest party I've ever
been to," she whispered.
Blue Bonnet looked wistfully after the departing group. "Aren't
families the nicest things in all the world?" she asked Sarah, as she
sank on the blanket beside this member of a numerous clan.
"The very nicest." And Sarah, whose arms still felt the warmth of
little Joe, stared into the fire with eyes that saw in the coals the
picture of a family in far-off Woodford.
There were a few more songs; an eighth or ninth rendition of
"Meet me, dearest Mandy,
By the water-melion vine"--
for the benefit of Amanda, who hated it, and then the rest rose
reluctantly to depart.
"It's the swellest thing in the bonfire line I've ever attended,"
Sandy assured Mrs. Clyde; and she could excuse the phrase because of
the undoubted enthusiasm of the speaker.
Half a dozen of the boys tramped away in a bunch, and there floated
back to the group about the fire the rhythmic refrain of "Good-night,
ladies!" until it finally died away in a sleepy murmur.
Only the older boys had lingered and they, after making arrangements
for a horse-back ride on the morrow, slowly straggled away.
"Where's Blue Bonnet?" asked Alec; he was one of the last, loitering
for a final word with his hostess.
"She was sitting by me a little while ago," said Sarah, looking
towards the Navajo.
The spot was in shadow, but as they looked in that direction, a log
fell, and a slender flame sprang up. In the light they saw Blue
Bonnet, curled up on the bright blanket, with her head pillowed on her
arm.
She was fast asleep.