Having finished drinking the weak tea which Mrs. Bimby brewed for them,
eating with it some of the lunch they had brought along, Bert and Nan
sat in the lonely cabin in the woods wondering what would happen next.
There was no other cabin or house near them, and as they heard the wind
howl down the chimney and moan around the corners, and heard the rattle
of hard snow against the window, the older Bobbsey twins were glad they
had found this shelter.
"Do you think we'll be able to start back soon, Mrs. Bimby?" asked Nan,
as she helped the old woman clear the tea things off the table.
"Back where, dearie?"
"Back to our camp."
"Oh, not to-night, surely," said Mrs. Bimby. "You won't dare venture out
in this storm. It's getting worse, and black night is coming on. You
just stay here with me. I can make up beds for you, and I'll be glad to
have you, since my Jim isn't coming back, I reckon."
"What do you think has become of him?" asked Bert, who was interested in
looking at a gun that hung over the mantel.
"Well, I reckon he got to the village, but found the storm so bad he
didn't dare to start back," answered Mrs. Bimby.
Of course she did not know what had happened to Old Jim any more than
Jim knew that the older Bobbsey twins were in his own cabin.
"But Jim'll be here in the morning," said his wife. "And I do hope he'll
bring in something to eat. If he doesn't----"
She did not finish what she started to say, and Nan asked:
"Will you starve, Mrs. Bimby?"
"Well, not exactly _starve_, for I s'pose a body could keep alive on tea
and condensed milk for a while. But we'll be pretty hungry. There'll be
three to feed instead of just one," the old woman went on.
"We've some food left," said Bert. "And we can cook our chestnuts. We
got quite a few before the storm came."
"Bless your hearts, dearies!" exclaimed Mrs. Bimby. "You may be able to
eat chestnuts, but _my_ old teeth are too poor for that. But I dare say
we'll get along somehow, even if the cupboard is almost bare. Don't you
want to go to bed?"
"Oh, it's too early," objected Bert.
"Have you any games we could play?" asked Nan.
She and her brother were in the habit of playing simple games at home
before going to bed, and it seemed natural to do it now. After the first
shock of feeling that they were lost in the snow storm had passed, the
Bobbsey twins were quite content. They felt that their father and mother
must realize that they were safe.
"Games, dearie?" asked Mrs. Bimby. "Well, seems to me there's some
dominoes around somewhere, and I did see a checker board the other day.
Jim used to play 'em when the loggers came in. I'll see if I can dig 'em
out."
She rummaged through an old chest and brought to light a box of battered
dominoes. But as several were missing it was hard to play a good game
with them. As for the checkers, the board was there but the pieces, or
men, were not to be found.
"But you can take kernels of corn," said Mrs. Bimby. "I've often seen my
Jim do that."
"Checker men have to be of different color," said Nan, "and corn is all
one color, isn't it?"
"There are red ears," suggested Bert. "Don't you remember we saw some
when we were in the country?"
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed Nan.
"That's what I was going to say," remarked Mrs. Bimby. "I can give you
some yellow kernels and some red ones, and you can play checkers if you
like."
This suited Nan and Bert, and though it was hard to make "kings" by
placing one grain of corn on top of another, they managed to go on with
the game, using pins to fasten two red or two yellow kernels one on top
of the other when the king row was reached.
Grains of corn or some other cereal, or perhaps colored stones, were,
very likely, the first sort of "men" used in the ancient game of
checkers, and Bert and Nan got along very well in this way. Mrs. Bimby
kept stoking the fire, putting on stick after stick of wood as it burned
away, and the cabin was kept warm and cozy.
Outside the storm raged, the wind blew, and the snow came pelting down.
But at times the older Bobbsey twins were so interested in their checker
game that they hardly heard the sounds outside the log cabin.
At last Mrs. Bimby, with a look at the clock, said:
"It's after nine, dearies; hadn't you better go to bed? My Jim won't
come to-night, that's sure, and I don't believe any of your folks will
come for you."
"They don't know where we are," said Nan.
"No more they do, dearie. Well, I'll show you where you're to sleep. I'm
glad I've got covers enough for two extra beds."
There were three rooms in the second story of the log cabin. Two of the
rooms were small, each one containing a little single cot. The other
room was larger, and had a bed in it. Mrs. Bimby slept there, and she
gave Bert and Nan each one of the smaller rooms. There was a window in
each of the bedrooms, and being above the warm downstairs room, where a
hot fire had been blazing all evening, the sleeping chambers were more
comfortable than one would have supposed.
Bert and Nan were so sleepy that they did not lie awake long after
getting to bed. As there were no pajamas for Bert and no night-gown for
Nan, the children slept in their underclothes, taking off only their
shoes and outer garments.
In spite of the fact that he fell asleep soon after going to bed,
because he was tired from the day's tramp after chestnuts, Bert was
awakened in the middle of the night by hearing Nan call:
"Mother, please give me a drink!"
It was a request Bert had often heard his sister make before, and now he
realized that she was either half awake, and did not remember where she
was, or else she was talking in her sleep. He raised up on his elbow and
listened. Again Nan said:
"I want a drink!"
Bert knew how hard it was to try to go to sleep when thirsty, so he got
up and, having noticed on coming to bed the evening before a pail of
water on a chair in the upper hall, he brought Nan a dipper full. Mrs.
Bimby had left a lantern burning, so it was not dark in the cabin.
"Oh, Bert! I dreamed I was back home," said Nan, as she took the drink
her brother handed her. "Thank you!"
"Welcome," he said, struggling to keep his sleepy eyes open.
"Is it still snowing?" asked Nan.
"Hard," answered Bert, looking out of the window, though, truth to tell,
he could see nothing, it was so pitch dark outside. But he could hear
the rattle of snow against the glass.
"I hope it stops by morning," sighed Nan.
"So do I--long enough for us to get back to camp, anyhow," added Bert.
He got himself a drink and went back to bed, there to sleep soundly
until morning, when Mrs. Bimby called him and Nan to get up.
"Come, dearies," said the kind old woman. "We'll have breakfast, such as
it is."
For a few moments after awakening Bert and Nan could not quite remember
where they were. Bert afterward said that he hoped there would be hot
buckwheat cakes for breakfast, with maple syrup, such as they had had in
the cabin where Mrs. Baxter acted as cook. But there was no such
appetizing smell as that of pancakes coming up from Mrs. Bimby's
kitchen.
"I'm sorry I haven't any more to offer you," she said to the children,
as she set before them some more weak tea and a few pieces of bread and
butter. "If my Jim had come back we'd have had enough to eat. But as it
is, I'm afraid you'll go hungry soon."
"We'll eat what's left of our lunch," said Bert.
"And cook some chestnuts," added Nan. "We'll pretend we've been
shipwrecked. Were you ever shipwrecked, Mrs. Bimby?" Nan asked, as
cheerfully as she could.
"No, dearie, but I've had the rheumatiz, and I reckon that's 'most as
bad. But let's eat what we've got and we'll hope for more before the day
is over."
"It's still snowing, isn't it?" remarked Nan, as she hungrily ate some
of the dry food and swallowed some of the weak, but warm, tea.
"Yes, and it's likely to keep up all day," said Mrs. Bimby. "It'll be
hip-deep by night, and we'll be completely snowed in. I declare, I don't
know what we'll do!"
"Maybe it'll stop," suggested Bert, trying to look on the bright side.
"Or maybe it won't be so bad but what we can go out," added Nan. "And if
we get back to camp we can send you something to eat by one of the men
in a sleigh, Mrs. Bimby."
"I wouldn't let you go out in this storm--not for anything!" declared
the kind old woman. "The only safe place is this cabin when it snows
this way. You can't starve to death as quickly as you can freeze to
death, that's a comfort. And we've got enough for one more meal,
anyhow."
But when noon came, after a long morning, during which the Bobbsey twins
played more checker games with grains of corn, and when almost all there
was in the cupboard had been eaten, Mrs. Bimby opened the doors, looked
at the bare shelves and said:
"I declare, I don't know what we're going to do! Almost everything is
gone!"
The cupboard, indeed, was nearly bare.
For some reason or other, Bert's eyes rested on the gun on the wall over
the mantel.
"Is that gun loaded, Mrs. Bimby?" he asked.
"Yes, I reckon 'tis," she answered. "Jim always keeps it loaded, for he
goes hunting sometimes."
"What after?" asked Bert.
"Oh, squirrels and rabbits."
"That's what I'm going to do, then!" cried Bert. "If I could shoot some
squirrels or rabbits we'd have a potpie and we wouldn't be hungry. Will
you please get that gun down for me, Mrs. Bimby?"
She looked at Bert and smiled.
"You're pretty small to handle a gun," she said. "But maybe you could
fire it if I showed you how. I've shot it more 'n once, and I brought
down a cawing crow last winter. Sometimes the rabbits come close up to
our cabin here. Wait till I take a look."
She went to the window to peer out into the storm, and Nan did likewise,
while Bert continued to gaze at the gun on the wall. It was a shotgun,
not very heavy, and he felt certain he could aim it at a rabbit and pull
the trigger.
Mrs. Bimby shook her head as she turned away from her window.
"There's no game here," she said. "Guess we'll have to go without a
potpie."
But Nan suddenly uttered an exclamation.
"Oh, I see one!" she cried. "I see a big rabbit! Two of 'em! Oh, Bert,
it's a shame to shoot the bunnies, but we can't starve! Get the gun!"