All this time with no observer save the unsuspected Pant, Mose was operating skillfully on that pork loin. With a slab of drift wood as chopping block, he sliced away with the skill of a hotel butcher. In a twinkle, the chops lay neatly piled in heaps on the slab. Then, while no one was looking, he caused a liberal handful of the chops to disappear into the huge pocket at the back of his coat.

Pant’s lips curved in a smile. “Holding out,” he whispered.

“Dere dey is,” exulted Mose, like a rooster calling his brood to a meal. “Dere dem po’k chops is, all carved an’ cleaned an’ ready fo’ de roastin’.”

“Um, um, um,” chanted his companions in gurgling approval.

Whence had come these pork chops? This question did not trouble Pant. They might have been bought at a butcher shop; then again, they might have been stolen. It was enough for Pant that they were there. He was glad. Not that he hoped to “horn in” on the feast; he had eaten bountifully but an hour before. Nevertheless, he was glad to be here. This little festal occasion suited his purpose beautifully. He had hoped something like this might be going on down here. The pork chops stowed away in Mose’s pocket amused him. As he thought of them his former plan changed slightly, his lips twisted in a smile.

“It’s all plain enough,” he thought to himself. “Moses and old Lankyshanks, his buddie, have a half hour longer to loaf than the rest of them; that gives them time for a little extra feast. The supplies belong to them all alike, but Mose and Lankyshanks get double portions if—” Here he smiled again.

The preparation for the feast went on. Each man twisted out of tangled wire a rude but serviceable broiler. They joked and laughed as they worked, their dark faces shining like ebony.

“Po’k chops, po’k chops, po’k chops! Um! Um! Um!” they chanted now and then.

In time word was passed around the circle, and then eight right hands shot out and eight broilers hung out over the coals.

Snapping and sputtering, flaring up with a sudden burning of grease, whirled now this way, now that, the pork chops rapidly turned a delicious brown. The odor which rose in air would have made a chronic dyspeptic’s mouth water.

“Po’k chops, po’k chops, po’k chops! Um! Um! Um!”

Twice Pant lifted his eyes 

 Prev. P 18/98 next