OLD HARRY MAKES A FIND
Through the dusky twilight, soft with woodland dews and sweet with odor of ferns and wild flowers, Billy walked slowly. For the first time in long days his heart felt at peace. The canker of loneliness that had gnawed at his spirit was there no longer. It was a pretty good old world after all.
A whip-poor-will lilted its low call from a hazel copse and Billy answered it. A feeling that he wanted to visit his wild things in the upland shanty and explain to them his seeming neglect of them during his time of stress took possession of him. So, although he knew supper would be ready and waiting at home, he branched off where the path forked and hurried forward toward the oak ridge.
It was almost dark when he reached the little log sugar-shanty which housed his pets. He had hidden a lantern in a hollow log against such night visits as this and he paused to draw it out and light it before proceeding to the menagerie. As he rounded the shanty, whistling softly, and anticipating how glad Spotba, Moper, the owl, and all the other wild inmates would be to see him, he paused suddenly, and the whistle died on his lips. Somebody had been snooping about his menagerie! The prop had been taken from the door.
His mind traveled at once to Anse. So that meddler had been here and tried to let his pets free, had he? Apparently the chump didn't know they each had a separate cage, or if he did he hadn't the nerve to open it. Well, it meant that Anse had that much more to settle for with him, that was all!
Billy put his hand on the latch of the door, then stood, frozen into inaction. From the interior of the shanty had come a groan—a human groan! Billy almost dropped the lantern. A cold shiver ran down his spine. His mind flashed to Old Scroggie's ghost. The hand that groped into his pocket in search of the rabbit-foot charm trembled so it could scarcely clasp that cherished object.
What would Trigger Finger do if placed in his position? Billy asked himself. There was only one answer to that. He took a long breath and, picking up a heavy club, swung the door open. The feeble rays of the lantern probed the gloom and something animate, between the cages, stirred and sat up.
"Harry!" gasped Billy, "Harry O'Dule!"
"Ha," cried a quavering voice, "and is ut the Prince av Darkness, himself, as spakes t' me? Thin it's no fit av the delirium tremens I've had at all, at all, but dead I am and in purgatory! Oh weary me, oh weary me! Such shnakes and evil eyed burruds have I never seen before. Och! could I be given wan taste av God's blissid air and sunshine ag'in, and never more would whiskey pass me lips."
Spotba, the big mottled marsh snake, sensing Billy's presence, uncoiled himself and raised his head along the screen of his cage; the brown owl hooted a low welcome that died in a hiss as Harry groaned again.