and tough. It burned merrily enough in the living-room fireplace, and
the chimney responded with a hollow rushing as the hot air poured into
it.

"It makes it seem as if there were something alive here besides us,
anyway," Felicia said.

They were all sitting on the hearth, warming their fingers, and when the
apple-wood fire burned down to coals that now and again spurted
short-lived flame, they set the can of peas and the can of baked beans
among the embers. They turned them gingerly from time to time with two
sticks, and laughed a great deal. The laughter echoed about in the empty
stillness of the house.

Ken's knife was of the massive and useful sort that contains a whole
array of formidable tools. These included a can-opener, which now did
duty on the smoked tins. It had been previously used to punch holes in
the tops of the cans before they went among the coals--"for we don't
want the blessed things blowing up," Ken had said. Nothing at all was
the matter with the contents of the cans, however, in spite of the
strange process of cookery. The Sturgises ate peas and baked beans on
chunks of unbuttered bread (cut with another part of Ken's knife) and
decided that nothing had ever tasted quite so good.

"No dish-washing, at any rate," said Ken; "we've eaten our dishes."

Kirk chose to find this very entertaining, and consumed another
"bread-plate," as he termed it, on the spot.

The cooking being finished, more gnarly apple-wood was put on the fire,