"What on earth are you doing here, Barbara?" he asked, and before he could add anything to the question, she playfully answered: "Just now, I'm waiting for you to tell the teamsters where to drive the wagons." "But Barbara----" "Never mind the rest of your scolding. I've already rehearsed it in my imagination till I know it all by heart--forwards and backwards. Tell the men where the cooking place is." "But what are we to do with you, in all this flood and mud, and in the incessant rain?" "Just let me alone while I 'help in earnest,' as you said in your dispatch that you wanted me to do. You telegraphed me that you wanted two good cooks, so here we are, Bob and I. For, really, Bob has learned to cook as well as I can. I only wonder you didn't send for us sooner. Now, we mustn't waste any more time talking. I've got to set to work if the men are to have their breakfast on time, and there's a lot of unloading to do before I can get at the things." The girl's voice was strained and her manner not quite natural. The long anxiety and the cold and the weariness had begun to tell upon her. She was strong and resolute still, and ready for any physical effort or endurance that might be required of her. But she felt that she could stand no more of emotional strain. So, speaking low to Duncan, in order that his friend might not hear, she said: "Please, Guilford, don't say anything more that your tenderness suggests. I can't stand it. Be just commonplace and practical. Show the teamsters the way and let me get to work. I'll be happier then and better." Duncan understood and was wise enough to obey. Half an hour later he and Temple had gone back to the crib, leaving Barbara to direct the unloading of the wagons. A little later still, Bob and the two negro women who had hitherto done the cooking went out among the men at work, bearing great kettles of steaming coffee for the refreshment of the well-nigh exhausted toilers. Bob accompanied his share of the coffee distribution by a little speech of his own devising: "Dar, now! Dat's coffee as is, an' it's hot an' strong, too. Little Missie done mek it wif her own han's and she's de lady wot sen's it to you. She's done come out inter de wilderness, jes to cook victuals fer you men, and you jes bet yer bottom dollar you'll git a breakfas' in the mawnin'." Realizing the situation, and stimulated by their deep draughts of coffee, the men set up a cheer for "Little Missie," though they knew not who she was, and thought of her chiefly as a source of food supply. But they worked the better for the coffee, and for the promise it held out of good things to come. XXXV THE END OF A STRUGGLE