"Oh well!" he said, solemn-looking as an owl, as he tucked it under one
arm, "if it can't keep a chap warm after ten years' experience it'll
never do it," and turned in at once, with his usual lack of ceremony.
We had boiled eggs for breakfast, and once more the traveller joined us.
Cheon had sent the eggs out with the cabbage, and I had hidden them away,
intending to spring a surprise on the men-folk at breakfast.
"How many eggs shall I boil for you, Dan?" I said airily, springing my
surprise in this way on all the camp. But Dan, wheeling with an
exclamation of pleasure, sprung a surprise of his own on the missus.
"Eggs!" he said. "Good enough! How many? Oh, a dozen'll do, seeing
we've got steak "; and I limply showed all I had - fifteen.
Dan scratched his head trying to solve the problem. "Never reckon it's
worth beginning under a dozen," he said; but finally suggested tossing
for 'em after they were cooked.
"Not the first time I've tossed for eggs either," he said, busy grilling
steak on a gridiron made from bent-up fencing wire. "Out on the Victoria
once they got scarce, and the cook used to boil all he had and serve the
dice-box with 'em, the chap who threw the highest taking the lot."
"Ever try to boil an emu's egg in a quart-pot?" the man from Beyanst
asked, "lending a hand" with another piece of fencing wire, using it as a
fork to turn the steak on the impromptu gridiron.
