"Do you mind lending of it to a feller?"
"Certainly not. You can keep it as long as you wish."
"That is clever, now. I'll set it in the same place, jest for luck. I say, don't you want some help about skinning the critter?"
Bertie thought he could manage it alone.
"It will be an awkward job, if you never tried it."
"I suppose it will," said Bertie.
"And you may spile the head. I don't mind showing of you how it's done."
Bertie thanked Jack, but declined to trouble him. The fact was, he was in a hurry to get home with his prize. He could not stop to talk about anything, for Charley had not seen it. Didn't he open his black eyes when he saw what Bertie had brought?
And didn't Bertie feel proud and happy? But he did not make much ado about his good fortune, as Charley would have done under similar circumstances. He allowed the game to speak for itself. At first Charley was inclined to doubt that it was caught in Bertie's trap; but Bertie asked—with some vanity, we confess—if he could mention any boy who would be likely to give up an animal like that, and Charley could not.
Everybody came out to examine Bertie's prize, and everybody said it was a beauty. Flora clapped her hands, for now she was to have all the 'fumery she wanted. It lay at full length on the piazza, until it had been duly admired by every one on the premises, and then it was carried over to Grandma's.