"We're all right," returned Reddy. "My compass tells me. We go due north till we want to start home and then we can either turn around and go back due south or turn west and go home by the road." "I have neither compass nor watch," said Hippy, "but nature's timepiece tells me that it's lunch time. This cold air gives me an appetite." "Gives you one?" cried David. "You old anaconda, you were born with an appetite. You started eating boiled dumplings when you were two years old." "Who told you so?" demanded Hippy. "Never mind," said David. "It's an old story in Oakdale." "Let's feed the poor soul," interposed Grace. "It would be wanton cruelty to keep him waiting any longer." "He'll have to make the fire, then," said Reddy. "Make him pay for his dumplings if he wants 'em so early." "All right, Carrots," cried Hippy. "I'll gather fagots and make a fire, just to keep you from talking so much." "I'll help you, Hippy," said Nora. "I'm not ashamed to admit that I am very hungry too. It's the people who are never able to eat at the table, and then go off and feed up in the pantry, who always manage to shirk their work." The others all laughed. "Let's make a fair division of labor," put in Grace, "so as to prevent future talk." While some of them gathered sticks and dried branches, the others began clearing away the snow in an open space, where the fire could be built. Anne and Jessica unpacked the luncheon and poured some coffee from a glass jar into a tin pot to be heated, while Tom peeled several long switches and impaled pieces of bacon on the ends to be cooked over the fire, which was soon blazing comfortably. "How do you like this, girls?" he asked presently, when the broiling bacon began to give out an appetizing smell and the hot coffee added its fragrance to the air. "How's this for a winter picnic?" "I like it better than a summer picnic," interposed Hippy. "The food is better and there are no gnats." "Gnats are very fond of fat people," said Reddy. "They drink down their blood like--circus lemonade." "Get busy and give me some coffee, Red-head," said Hippy, who sat on a stump and ate energetically, while the others were broiling their slices of bacon. "Here, Hippy," said Nora, pouring out a steaming cupful, "if it wasn't interesting to watch you store it away, perhaps I wouldn't wait on you hand and foot like this." "This is the best way in the world to cook bacon," said Tom, holding his wand over the fire with several pieces of bacon stuck on the forked ends. "A very good method, if your stick doesn't burn up," replied Anne. "There! Mine fell into the fire. I knew it would." Meantime, Jessica and Grace were frying the rest of the slices in a pan. "That's good enough, but this is better and quicker," said Grace. "There's no reason for dispensing with all the comforts of a home just because you choose to be a woodsman, Tom."