“I saw two in line,” he said proudly. “I squatted down and shot right through the first one and hit the second. Then I got number three with the other shot.”

“Good boy,” said my father. “Lizzy, you get the potatoes started. Tim and I will clean these babies.”

I got some water from the creek and began peeling potatoes, which I didn’t mind today. Anything was better than skinning rabbits.

“Let me show you an easy way to clean a rabbit out,” my father said. “You don’t even need a knife.”

I watched as he dug his fingers under the rib cage of one of the rabbits and tore open the hide to reveal the entrails. Then he held the front feet in his hand and bent the carcass backward so that he had the rear feet held in the same hand too, and the rabbit was bent like a horseshoe. As if he were throwing a stick, my father snapped the rabbit forward but didn’t let go. It remained in his hand, but all the innards went flying out into the woods.

“Clean as a whistle,” my father said, showing Tim the glistening cavity. “Now here’s how you finish skinning him.” He poked a stick through a loose fold of hide on the rabbit’s back, opening up a fingergrip which he took with both hands. Then he snapped his hands apart, and the hide peeled back like two pairs of gloves and the rabbit was bare meat, with the hide attached only at the feet. He snapped the little legs and the hide came free. He had a completely dressed rabbit ready for the pot.

“All right,” said my father, “you do the other two, and I’ll get the fire going.”

He tore some curls of birch bark from a nearby tree and piled them inside a small circle of stones, heaping twigs on top. Then he broke some larger dead branches and added them to the heap, struck a match, and in no time had a cheerful fire blazing away.

I finished the potatoes and put fresh water in the pot, then propped it up on two of the stones so that the fire struck it. One of the tin plates made a satisfactory lid to keep the heat in and the ashes out.

An hour later we were stretched out, enjoying the last red glow of the sun and picking our teeth. Three small rabbits do not go far with as many hungry people in the woods, and the potatoes had vanished too. My father had rolled the rabbit meat in a little flour, heavily seasoned with salt and pepper, and then fried it to a crisp brown over the camp fire. The crowned heads of Europe had never eaten anything more delicious. To me, tender young rabbit is tastier than the finest chicken white meat.