"It won't explode, I hope," remarked Miss Campbell, noticing that the roll of meat seemed to be bursting its bonds in the process of roasting. "Poor thing, it does seem to be suffering," said Dr. Hume gravely. "There is some enlargement taking place in its internal organs, due to heat expansion, I judge." "I guess that animal, whatever it is, feels something like an early Christian martyr," put in Percy. "What is the creature?" inquired Miss Campbell, raising her tortoise shell lorgnette in order the better to see the writhing form over the flames. "It's a duck," answered Billie, desperately stirring the kettle of vegetables. "Duck?" they shouted in a loud chorus. "There never was a duck on land or sea that looked like that." "Where are its legs?" "Was it a winged duck?" "Perhaps it's a species of wingless, legless mountain duck, unknown to low countries?" "Well, if you must know," cried Billie, now very hot and red over the fire, and wishing devoutly that that brutally truthful speech about watched pots had never been made, "if you demand the truth, it's mock duck----" "It sounds like the name of a Chinese laundry-man," put in Percy. "Made by a famous Southern recipe. We didn't know it would take so long to cook." She was ashamed to mention the potatoes and onions. "If you are all so famished, you might start on the bread and butter." Instantly they gathered around the table and Percy passed around the bread tray. From bread they turned to the salad of tomatoes and cucumbers. Lettuce did not seem to flourish in that country. They drank the ginger ale and ate all the olives, and still the spurious fowl remained a mockery to cooks. It sent forth rivulets of juices and made a great to do over the fire, like people who are all promises and talk and no action, but it would not get done. Then the doctor slipped away and presently returned with his contribution to the supper. He had made it in the morning and it had been standing in the ice chest all day. "I thought we might help this so as there would be no delays after we had dispatched that talkative fat person in the blanket," he said. "I hope you will like it. My mother used to call it 'piddling.' It was a wash-day dessert and we always had it Mondays, made from Sunday's cake." Elinor busied herself serving the wash-day dessert into china saucers. It was made of slices of cake soaked in fruit juice and spread with jam. "When there is cream in the house, it adds of course," observed the doctor with some pride over his success as a cook. "The flavor's delicious," observed Miss Campbell, testing a small piece daintily on the edge of her spoon. "It's bully," exclaimed Ben. The doctor was really vain over his efforts. "And I made it from memory," he informed them, "without any recipe. I call that pretty good for a first attempt." They wondered if he had ever done anything in his profession that gave him as much childish delight as making this simple dessert of his boyhood.