As for the Kinzers, that was by no means their first experience in such
matters, but their friends had never before been so near to a genuine,
out and out shipwreck. Perhaps, too, they had rarely if ever felt so
very nearly starved. At least Joe and Fuz Hart remarked as much a score
of times before the "Swallow" slipped through the inlet and made her way
toward the landing.
"Ham," said Dab Kinzer, "are you going right back again?"
"Course I am, soon as I can get a load of eatables from the house and
the village. You 'll have to stay here."
"Why can't I go with you?"
"Plenty for you to do at the house and around while I'm gone. No, you
can't go."
Dab seemed to have expected as much, for he turned to Ford with,
"Then I'll tell you what we must do."
"What's that?"
"See about the famine. Can you cook?"
"No."
"I can, then. Ham'll have one half of our house at work getting his
cargo ready, and that baby'll fill up the other half."
"Mother wont be expecting us so soon, and our cook's gone out for the
day. Annie knows something."
"She can help me, then. Those Hart boys'll die if they're not fed. Look
at Fuz. Why, he can't keep his mouth shut."
Joe and his brother seemed to know, as if by instinct, that the dinner
question was under discussion; and they were soon taking their share of
talk. Oh, how they wished it had been a share of something to eat! The
"Swallow" was moored, now, after discharging her passengers, but Dab did
not start for the house with his mother and the rest. He even managed to
detain some of the empty lunch-baskets, large ones, too.
"Come on, Mr. Kinzer," shouted Joe Hart, "let's put for the village.
We'll starve here."
"A fellow that'd starve here just deserves to, that's all," said Dab.
"Ford, there's Bill Lee's boat and three others coming in. We're all
right. One of 'em's a dredger."
Ford and Frank could only guess what their friend was up to, but Dab was
not doing any guessing.
"Bill," he exclaimed, as Dick's father pulled within hearing,--"Bill,
put a lot of your best pan-fish in this basket and then go and fetch us
some lobsters. There's half a dozen in your pot. Did those others get
any luck?"
"More clams 'n 'ysters," responded Bill.
"Then we'll take both lots."
The respect of the city boys for the resources of the Long Island shore
began to rise rapidly a few minutes later, for not only was one of Dab's
baskets promptly provided with "pan-fish," such as porgies, black fish
and perch, but two others received all the clams and oysters they were
at all anxious to carry to the house. At the same time, Bill Lee
offered, as an amendment to the lobster question,
"Ye 'r' wrong about the pot, Dab."
"Wrong? Why--"
"Yes, you's wrong. Glorianny's been an' b'iled every one on 'em an' they
're all nice an' cold by this time."
"All right. I never eat my lobsters raw. Just you go and get them, Dick.
Bring 'em right over to Ford's house."
Bill Lee would have sent his house and all on a suggestion that the
Kinzers or Fosters were in need of it, and Dick would have carried it
over for him.
As for "Gloriana," when her son came running in with his errand, she
exclaimed:
"Dem lobsters? Sho! Dem aint good nuff. Dey sha'n't hab 'em. I'll jist
send de ole man all 'round de bay to git some good ones. On'y dey isn't
no kin' o' lobsters good nuff for some folks, dey isn't."
Dick insisted, however, and by the time he reached the back door of the
old Kinzer homestead with his load, that kitchen had become very nearly
as busy a place as Mrs. Miranda Morris's own, a few rods away.
"Ford," suddenly exclaimed Dab, as he finished scaling a large porgy,
"what if mother should make a mistake?"
"Make a mistake? How?"
"Cook that baby! It's awful!"
"Why, its mother's there."
"Yes, but they've put her to bed, and its father too. Hey, here come the
lobsters. Now, Ford--"
The rest of what he had to say was given in a whisper, and was not heard
by even Annie Foster, who was just then looking prettier than ever as
she busied herself around the kitchen fire. As for the Hart boys, Mrs.
Foster had invited them to come into the parlor and talk with her till
dinner should be ready.
Such a frying and broiling!
Before Ham Morris was ready for his second start, and right in the midst
of his greatest hurry, word came over from Mrs. Foster that "the table
was waiting for them all."
Even Mrs. Kinzer drew a long breath of relief and satisfaction, for
there was nothing more in the wide world that she could do, just then,
for either "that baby" or its unfortunate parents, and she was beginning
to worry about her son-in-law, and how she should get him to eat
something. For Ham Morris had worked himself up into a high state of
excitement in his benevolent haste, and did not seem to know that he was
hungry. Miranda had entirely sympathized with her husband until that
message came from Mrs. Foster.
"Oh, Hamilton, and good Mrs. Foster must have cooked it herself!"
"No," said Ham, thoughtfully; "our Dabney went home with Ford and Annie.
I can't stay but a minute, but I think we'd better go right over."
Go they did, while the charitable neighbors whom Ham had stirred up
concerning the wreck attended to the completion of the cargo of the
"Swallow." There would be more than one good boat ready to accompany her
back across the bay, laden with comforts of all sorts.
Even old Jock, the village tavern-keeper, not by any means the best man
in the world, had come waddling down to the landing with a demijohn of
"old apple brandy," and his gift had been kindly accepted by the special
advice of the village physician.
"That sort of thing has made plenty of ship-wrecks around here,"
remarked the man of medicine; "and the people on the bar have swallowed
so much salt-water, the apple-jack can't hurt 'em."
May be, the doctor was wrong about it, but the demijohn went over to the
wreck in the "Swallow."
Mrs. Foster's dining-room was not a large one. There were no large rooms
in that house. Nevertheless, the entire party managed to gather around
the table,--all except Dab and Ford.
"Dab is head cook and I'm head waiter," had been Ford's explanation,
"and we can't have any women folk a-bothering about our kitchen. Frank
and the boys are company."
Certainly the cook had no cause to be ashamed of his work. The coffee
was excellent. The fish were done to a turn. The oysters, roasted,
broiled or stewed, and likewise the clams, were all that could have been
asked for. Bread there was in abundance, and everything was going finely
till Mrs. Kinzer asked her son, as his fire-red face showed itself at
the kitchen door:
"Dabney, you've not sent in your vegetables; we're waiting for them."
Dab's face grew still redder, and he came very near dropping a plate he
had in his hand.
"Vegetables? Oh yes. Well, Ford, we might as well send them in now. I've
got them all ready."
Annie opened her eyes and looked hard at her brother, for she knew very
well that not so much as a potato had been thought of in their
preparations. Ford himself looked a little queer, but he marched out,
white apron and all. A minute or so later, the two boys came in again,
each bearing aloft a huge platter.
One of these was solemnly deposited at each end of the table.
"Vegetables?"
"Why, they're lobsters!"
"Oh, Ford, how could you?"
The last exclamation came from Annie Foster as she clapped her hands
over her face. Bright red were those lobsters, and fine-looking fellows,
every one of them, in spite of Mrs. Lee's poor opinion; but they were a
little too well dressed, even for a dinner-party. Their thick shoulders
were adorned with collars of the daintiest material and finish, while
every ungainly "flipper" wore a "cuff" which had been manufactured for
very different uses. Plenty of cuffs and collars, and queer enough the
lobsters looked in them. All the queerer because every item of lace and
linen was variegated with huge black spots and blotches, as if some one
had begun to wash it in ink.
Joe and Fuz were almost as red as the lobsters, and Mrs. Foster's face
looked as severe as it could, but that is not saying a great deal. The
Kinzer family knew all about those cuffs and collars, and Ham Morris and
the younger ladies were trying hard not to laugh.
"Joe," said Fuz, half snappishly, "can't you take a joke? Annie's got
the laugh on us this time."
"I?" exclaimed Annie, indignantly. "No, indeed. That's some of Ford's
work and Dabney's. Mr. Kinzer, I'm ashamed of you."
Poor Dab!
He muttered something about "those being all the vegetables he had," and
retreated to the kitchen. Joe and Fuz were not the sort to take offense
easily, however, and promptly helped themselves liberally to lobster.
That was all that was necessary to restore harmony at the table; but
Dab's plan for "punishing the Hart boys" was a complete failure. As Ford
told him afterward,
[Illustration: "VEGETABLES?" "WHY, THEY'RE LOBSTERS!"]
"Feel it? Not they. You might as well try to hurt a clam with a pin."
"And I hurt your sister's feelings instead of theirs," replied Dab.
"Well, I'll never try anything like it again. Anyhow, Joe and Fuz aint
comfortable. They ate too many roasted clams and too much lobster."