Shortly after, the cobbler rose to go, saying, as the butcher offered to give him a lift in his cart, that he was going another way; and as he went out, he made a sign to the landlord to follow him. When they were outside together he whispered, “I should like to play our boasting friend a good trick.” “I wish, with all my heart, you could,” the Landlord answered; “but he is a cunning fellow.” “Cunning as he is, I’ve a great mind to steal the calf he’s so proud of having cheated old Hagan out of, and then sell it him again, but at double the price,” the Cobbler said. “He’s too deep for you,” said the Landlord; “you can’t do it.” “What will you bet?” the Cobbler asked. “Anything you like!” was the answer. “Well, then,” the Cobbler again said, “let it be a gallon of your very best ale. Now you go back, and manage—as if without any particular motive—to tell our friend that you have a calf (that can be easily done as he is getting into his cart), when you may as well say that it is just like the one he has. You do this, and leave the rest to me.”
“I hope, with all my heart, that you’ll succeed,” the Landlord said, as he went back into the house; and the cobbler hastened along the road which he knew was the butcher’s way. When he had got some distance from the house, he dropped one of the shoes he was carrying home by the side of the road, where it would be sure to be seen, and then ran on some distance further, where he dropped the other shoe, choosing the spot close by an opening in the hedge by the road-side.
Shortly after, the butcher came the same way, still chuckling over his morning’s bargain, and when he saw the shoe, drew in his horse. He was about to get out, when he thought better of it, saying, “There’s some of that careless cobbler’s work. He evidently has come this way, and dropped one of the shoes I saw him carrying—but I’m not going to take the trouble to carry it after him. Let him come back, and that will teach him not to refuse a civil offer again. If he had but dropped the pair, I should not mind getting out to pick them up—though certainly it would not be to give them to him, but to keep them myself.”
With these friendly thoughts he drove on, and, before long, saw the other shoe. “Hallo!” he said; “why, that lazy rascal of a cobbler, rather than go back when he discovered the loss of the one shoe, has thrown the other away as useless; but I’ll not be such a fool, and won’t begrudge a little trouble for the sake of a good pair of shoes.” So saying, he jumped out of his cart and picked up the shoe, and, finding it was a good one, ran back for the other, leaving his cart standing in the road.
No sooner had he turned a corner in the road, than the cobbler jumped out from behind the hedge where he had hidden himself, and having lifted the calf out of the cart, took it on his shoulders, and hurried back with his load, as fast as possible, a short cut to Tom Turner’s house.
Tom received him with an acclamation of joy; and as soon as they had stowed the calf away in a shed, he produced some of his very best ale, over which they discussed what was further to be done. The Cobbler said, “As soon as the butcher finds that his calf has disappeared, and that there are no signs of it, he will be sure to come back to you, having heard you had one; but be sure you do not let him have it a farthing under three pounds, for you know that was the price named by himself, and that he said he must have one to-day at any price. When we have had our joke out, we will give him back his money, making him pay the amount of our wager, and another gallon to boot. But he is a slippery rogue, so mind you do not part with the calf without receiving the money down. And now, what will you bet that I do not steal this very calf again?”
The landlord, enjoying the joke, betted another gallon, and his companion continued, “To prepare for another sale, tell him, as he is driving off—tell him you have another calf, the twin brother to this one, and so like it that no one can tell one from the other.”
After all that had been arranged, the cobbler related every circumstance of the past adventure—not forgetting the butcher’s soliloquy—to Tom’s infinite amusement, and added, “Take particular notice whether he says anything about finding the shoes; for if he intends to act dishonestly we may alter our determination about giving him back his money.” He had scarcely finished when they saw the butcher’s cart at the door, so he hastened away to his former hiding-place.
