dinner get ice-cold,” said his wife. “Hear a thing,” said she.
She sprinkled some salt all thick on the table and took the stick on which the flesh had been roasted, and in the salt she drew a circle.
“This,” she said, “is the sky. And this place, at the top, is the top of the sky. And when the sun is at the top of the sky and there is no shadow, I will have ready the dinner, hot and sweet in the pot, and dessert—for a surprise. And when the sun is at the top of the sky and there is no shadow, do you come to eat it, always. That will be dinner.”
“That is well,” said the Troglodyte, like a true knight—for in those first days even true knights were willing that women should cook and cave-tidy for them all day long and do little else. But that was long ago and we must forgive it.
Then she made a mark in the salt at the edge of the circle a little way around from the first mark.
“When the sun is at the edge of the sky and all red, and the shadows are long, and the dark is coming, I will have ready berries and nuts and green stuffs and sweet syrups and other things that I shall think of—for you. And when the
