At last I carried some of my pots and kettles to my hidden field in the woods. I could do my cooking there much more safely than at my castle.
Hardly had I put things in order there when I found something that made me very glad. What do you suppose it was?
It was a cave — a real cave. The door into it was through a little hollow place at the bottom of a great rock. It was so well hidden that no one could have found it even by looking for it.
Shall I tell you how I came upon it?
I was afraid to make a smoke near my house, and yet I could not live without cooking meat. I tried all kinds of dry wood, and yet there was always some smoke. Then I thought I would try charcoal. But I must first make the charcoal.
I found a place in the darkest part of the woods where the smoke would hardly rise to the tops of the trees. There I built my charcoal pit.
This was done in the following way:
First, I cleared off a round space about ten feet in diameter. Here I dug out the earth till I made a pit about a foot deep. Then I cut a cord or more of wood and piled it up in this space. I piled it up until it was almost as high as my shoulders. I covered it a foot deep with earth and turf, leaving a small open place at the bottom.
When this was done, I set fire to the wood through the hole in the bottom. It burned slowly. The wood became charcoal.
One day, while cutting wood for my charcoal pit, I happened to see a hollow place in the rock close by a tree I was chopping.
It was half covered with brush. I pushed this aside and looked in. I saw a little cave just large enough for me to creep into on my hands and knees.
But, a little farther in, it was larger. It was so high that I could stand upright, and it was so wide that two men could have walked in it side by side.
It was a very dark place, and I stood still a moment till my eyes should become a little used to it.
All at once I saw something in the darkness that made me scramble out of that place much faster than I had come into it.
What do you think it was? Two big shining eyes that glowed like coals in the darkness. Whether they were the eyes of a man or of some fierce beast, I did not stop to see.
I stood a little while by the mouth of the cave and then I began to get over my fright.
What could there be in this cave that would do me harm? No man could live there in the darkness. As for any animal, I knew there was nothing fiercer on the island than one of my cats.
So, with a blazing stick for a torch, I crept back into the cave. But I had not gone three steps before I was frightened almost as much as before.
I heard a loud sigh, like that of a man in trouble. Then there were low moans, and sounds as of some one trying to speak.
I stopped short. Cold chills ran down my back. My hair seemed to stand on end. But I would not allow myself to run out again.
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