Then came the task of building our fireplace. First we sawed out the opening, cutting right through the rear foundation log. Then we gathered from the river a large number of the flattest stones we could find. With these we planned to build the three outer walls of our chimney. But the question of getting mortar to bind the stones together bothered us for a while.

"If only we could find a bed of clay. Don't any of you know of one around here?" queried Bill.

But none of us remembered seeing any clay bed in the vicinity.

"If we were in south Jersey now," I said, "we could use some of that red mud they have down there. It sticks like the mischief to shoes and pant legs. I bet it would hold those stones together."

"Red mud? Why there's plenty of it over the hill, back of Lumberville," said Reddy. "All the roads over there are red shale roads, and I saw some red banks along the river when we went after the logs."

That was just what we wanted. The banks Reddy referred to turned out to be genuine red shale, and soon we had ferried several scow loads of the stuff down to Kite Island. When the shale was wet it made quite a sticky mortar. The foundations of the chimney were laid in a trench about 2 feet deep, and the side walls of the chimney were carried inside of the cabin and covered the ends of the logs at the chimney opening. The side walls extended outward a distance of 3 feet, where they were joined by the rear wall of the chimney.