Part 16 (1/2)
”Well, now, look here, Miss Jenny; it's going to be a mess, and I wouldn't mind hauling the carca.s.ses clear down the gully, out of sight, if it was to be the only time. But it's not, and you've got to get used to it, sooner or later. So we'll start now.”
”I suppose, if I must, Mr. Blake-- Really, I wish to help.”
”Good. That's something like! Think you can learn to cook?”
”See what I did this morning.”
Blake took the cord of cocoanut fibre which she held out to him, and tested its strength.
”Well, I'll be--blessed!” he said. ”This _is_ something like. If you don't look out, you'll make quite a camp-mate, Miss Jenny. But now, trot along. This is hardly arctic weather, and our abattoir don't include a cold-storage plant. The sooner these lambs are dressed, the better.”
CHAPTER X
PROBLEMS IN WOODCRAFT
It was no pleasant sight that met Miss Leslie's gaze upon her return.
The neatest of butchering can hardly be termed aesthetic; and Blake and Winthrope lacked both skill and tools. Between the penknife and an improvised blade of bamboo, they had flayed the two cubs and haggled off the flesh. The ragged strips, spitted on bamboo rods, were already searing in the fierce sun-rays.
Miss Leslie would have slipped into the hollow of the baobab with her armful of f.a.gots and brush; but Blake waved a b.l.o.o.d.y knife above the body of the mother leopard, and beckoned the girl to come nearer.
”Hold on a minute, please,” he said. ”What did you find out?”
Miss Leslie drew a few steps nearer, and forced herself to look at the revolting sight. She found it still more difficult to withstand the odor of the fresh blood. Winthrope was pale and nauseated. The sight of his distress caused the girl to forget her own loathing. She drew a deep breath, and succeeded in countering Blake's expectant look with a half-smile.
”How well you are getting along!” she exclaimed.
”Didn't think you could stand it. But you've got grit all right, if you _are_ a lady,” Blake said admiringly. ”Say, you'll make it yet!
Now, how about the gully?”
”There is no place to climb up. It runs along like this, and then slopes down. But there is a cliff at the end, as high as these walls.”
”Twenty feet,” muttered Blake. ”Confound the luck! It isn't that jump-off; but how in--how are we going to get up on the cliff? There's an everlasting lot of omelettes in those birds' nests. If only that bloomin'--how's that, Win, me b'y?--that bloomin', blawsted baobab was on t' other side. The wood's almost soft as punk. We could drive in pegs, and climb up the trunk.”
”There are other trees beyond it,” remarked Miss Leslie.
”Then maybe we can s.h.i.+n up--”
”I fear the branches that overhang the cliff are too slender to bear any weight.”
”And it's too infernally high to climb up to this overhanging baobab limb.”
”I say,” ventured Winthrope, ”if we had a axe, now, we might cut up one of the trees, and make a ladder.”
”Oh, yes; and if we had a ladder, we might climb up the cliff!”
”But, Mr. Blake, is there not some way to cut down one of the trees? The tree itself would be a ladder if it fell in such a way as to lean against the cliff.”
”There's only the penknife,” answered Blake. ”So I guess we'll have to scratch eggs off our menu card. Spring leopard for ours! Now, if you really want to help, you might sc.r.a.pe the soup bones out of your boudoir, and fetch a lot more brush. It'll take a big fire to rid the hole of that cat smell.”
”Will not the tree burn?”