The cabin was not only as cold as it looked but colder, and as Wallie hopped over the floor bare-footed and shivering he reflected that very likely his potatoes and onions were frozen and wished he had taken them to bed with him.
They were, unmistakably, for they rattled like glass balls when he picked up several onions and examined them with a pained expression.
Wallie was still wearing much of the wardrobe he had brought with him, and when dressed to go outside he was warm but unique in a green velour hat, his riding breeches, brilliant golf stockings that were all but feetless thrust in arctics, a blue flannel shirt from the Emporium in Prouty, and a long, tight-fitting tan coat which had once been very smart indeed.
The snow had stopped falling by the time he had done his chores and breakfasted. The only benefit the storm had brought him was that it did away with the necessity of carrying water for his washing. He had acquired the agility of a cliff-dweller from scaling the embankment by means of the "toe-holts"; yet, at that, it was no easy matter to transport a bucket of water without spilling it.
He wished for a well every time that he panted in from a trip to the creek, and meant to have one as soon as he could afford it.
While the snow-water was melting Wallie considered the manner in which he should prepare the prairie-dogs. He presumed that it was too much to expect that the cook book would have anything to say on the subject, but it surely would recognize rabbit, and a recipe suitable for one would do for the other.
Wallie got out his cook book and turned eagerly to the index. There was no mention of rabbit. A thought struck him--rabbit was hare and hare was rabbit, wasn't it? If so, the cook book would not admit it, for there was no such word under the H's.
He was disgusted. What good was such a cook book, he asked himself as he turned the leaves in resentment. He wished he could collect the two-fifty he had paid for it. He read aloud, sneeringly: "Caviar toast, garnished. Crab, scalloped, in shell. Aspic in jelly. Fondu of cheese. Floating Island. Meringue glacé, and Whipped Cream."
The mere mention of the dishes made his mouth water, while his anger against the dame who had compiled it mounted higher. He remotely contemplated writing to inquire of the culinary oracle why she had ignored hare and rabbit.
Continuing to scan the index, his eye caught a word which held possibilities. Game! If rabbit was not game, what was it?