"May I come down there, Mr. Van Brunt?" said Ellen, softly.
"Come down here? to be sure you may! You may always come straight where I am, without asking any questions."
Ellen went down. But before she reached the lowest step she stopped with almost a start, and stood fixed with such a horrified face, that neither Mr. Van Brunt nor Sam Larkens, who was there, could help laughing.
"What's the matter?" said the former "they're all dead enough, Miss Ellen; you needn't be scared."
Three enormous hogs, which had been killed the day before, greeted Ellen's eyes. They lay in different parts of the room, with each a cob in his mouth. A fourth lay stretched upon his back on the kitchen table, which was drawn out into the middle of the floor. Ellen stood fast on the stair.
"Have they been killed!" was her first astonished exclamation, to which Sam responded with another burst.
"Be quiet, Sam Larkens!" said Mr. Van Brunt. "Yes, Miss Ellen, they've been killed, sure enough."
"Are these the same pigs I used to see you feeding with corn, Mr. Van Brunt?"
"The identical same ones," replied that gentleman, as, laying hold of the head of the one on the table, and applying his long sharp knife with the other hand, he, while he was speaking, severed it neatly and quickly from the trunk. "And very fine porkers they are; I ain't ashamed of 'em."
"And what's going to be done with them now?" said Ellen.
"I am just going to cut them up and lay them down. You never see nothing of the kind before, did you?"
"No," said Ellen. "What do you mean by 'laying them down,' Mr. Van Brunt?"
"Why, laying 'em down in salt for pork and hams. You want to see the whole operation, don't you? Well, here's a seat for you. You'd better fetch that painted coat o' yourn and wrap round you, for it ain't quite so warm here as up-stairs; but it's getting warmer. Sam, just you shut that door to, and throw on another log."
Sam built up as large a fire as could be made under a very large kettle that hung in the chimney. When Ellen came down in her wrapper, she was established close in the chimney corner; and when Mr. Van Brunt, not thinking her quite safe from the keen currents of air that would find their way into the room, despatched Sam for an old buffalo robe that lay in the shed. This he himself with great care wrapped round her, feet and chair and all, and secured it in various places with old forks. He declared then she looked for all the world like an Indian, except her face; and, in high good-humour both, he went to cutting up the pork, and Ellen from out of her buffalo robe watched him.
