“Yes, yes!” barked Napoleon excitedly; words could not have said it plainer.
“Gosh!” whispered Gabriel to Amanda, “who would have believed it?”
“Clarence,” resumed the speaker, “the host of this joyful occasion”—he turned to Napoleon, who nearly wagged himself off his chair—“desires to express publicly his thanks for the great service you rendered him in that dark hour”—here the Poet frowned and shook a reproving finger at the chuckling Gabriel—“when he faced unjust punishment on the monstrous charge of having ravished the nest of the speckled hen. Then and there, Clarence, you rebuked the short-sighted minion of the law by nipping him smartly in the same sensitive region where you had nipped the real marauder, tearing from him the clue which will sooner or later bring him to justice.”
The Poet took from his pocket a ragged square of blue-striped dark cloth and submitted it for Clarence’s inspection. The colt laid back his ears and nipped at it. The Poet cast a glance of solemn triumph around the table.
“Friends and partners,” he said, “do we need any further evidence that it was indeed Clarence who was a witness of the crime, and performed this service for Napoleon and for justice?”
The point was overwhelmingly conceded.
“Doggone my skin!” whispered Gabriel to Amanda, “th’ colt remembers that rag by th’ smell!”
The Poet put the damning evidence back in his pocket. Suddenly Amanda nudged Gabriel.
“Of all things, Gabe, here comes Si Blodgett with a basket on his arm!”
An undersized, sanctimonious person, with a smooth upper lip and a tuft on his chin, carrying a covered basket, was approaching from the driveway. He seemed pained at the evidences of festivities progressing. When he had approached within a few yards of the banquet-table he put down the basket carefully and said: