"Gillies! Did you see him?"
"No, me an' Pa an' Anse was down at the back end of the place. Ma saw him, though, an' she told me all about it. Say, maybe I wasn't mad, but I got even, all right."
"Did you? How?"
Billy looked searchingly at his new friend. "I never told a soul how I did it, 'cept my chum, Maurice Keeler," he said. "But I'll tell you. That same evenin' I was prowlin' through the slashin' lookin' fer white grubs fer bass-bait. I found a big rotten stump, so I pushed it over, an' right down under the roots I found an old weasel an' six half-grown kittens. Afore she could get over her surprise, I had her an' her family in the tin pail I had with me, an' the cover on. By rights I should'a killed the whole caboodle of 'em, I s'pose, 'cause they're mighty hard on the birds; but I had work fer 'em to do.
"That night I took them weasels over to Scraff's an' turned 'em loose under his barn. I knowed mighty well ma weasel would stay where it was dark an' safe and the chicken smell was so strong. Couple of days after that Scraff come over to our place to borrow some rat traps. His face was so long he was fair steppin' on his lower lip. He said weasels had been slaughterin' his Leghorns, right an' left; six first night an' nine the next.
"'I hope they won't get among my quail,' I says, an' Scraff he turned round an' looked at me mighty hard, but he didn't say nuthin'. He went away, grumblin', an' carryin' six of Dad's traps. Course I knowed he couldn't catch a weasel in a trap in twenty years an' he didn't catch any either. Ma weasel killed some more of his Leghorns, an' then Scraff he comes to me. 'Billy,' he says, 'is there any way to get rid of weasels?' 'Sure there's a way,' I says, 'but not everybody knows it.'
"'I'll give you five dollars if you'll catch them weasels that are killin' my chickens,' he says.
"'If you'll promise me you'll stay away from my quail an' partridge I'll catch 'em fer nuthin,' I told him. 'Only,' I says, 'remember, I do what I please with 'em, after I get 'em.' He looked at me as though he'd like to choke me, but he said all right, he'd leave my birds alone.
"That night Maurice Keeler an' me went over to Gamble's an' borrowed his old ferret. He's a big ferret an' he'll tackle anythin', even a skunk. With some keg-hoops an' a canvas sack we had made what we needed to catch the weasels in. Then we put a muzzle on the ferret, so he couldn't fang-cut the weasels, an' we went over to Scraff's. As soon as Joe Scraff saw the ferret he began to see light an' turned into the house to get his shotgun. I told him to remember his promise to let me get the weasels alive, so he set on the fence an' watched while we got busy.
"First off we plugged every hole under that barn but two, an' at each of these two we set a hoop-net. Then we turned ol' Lucifer, the ferret, loose under the barn. Holy Smoke! afore we knowed it there was high jinks goin' on tinder there. Maurice had hold of one hoop an' me the other. It took ma weasel an' her boys an' girls 'bout half a minute to make up their minds that ol' Lucifer wasn't payin' 'em a friendly visit. When the big scramble was over, I had a bagful of weasels an' so did Maurice. We let Lucifer prowl round a little longer to make sure we had all of 'em, then I called him out. I made Scraff give us one of his hens to feed the ferret on. Then Maurice an' me started off.