"Wa'al," replied David, "he done his best. He was layin' fer me when I struck the front gate—I knowed it wa'n't no use to try the back door, an' he took me by the ear—most pulled it off—an' marched me off to the barn shed without a word. I never see him so mad. Seemed like he couldn't speak fer a while, but fin'ly he says, 'Where you ben all day?'
"'Down t' the village,' I says.
"'What you ben up to down there?' he says.
"'Went to the cirkis,' I says, thinkin' I might 's well make a clean breast on't.
"'Where 'd you git the money?' he says.
"'Mr. Cullom took me,' I says.
"'You lie,' he says. 'You stole the money somewheres, an' I'll trounce it out of ye, if I kill ye,' he says.
"Wa'al," said David, twisting his shoulders in recollection, "I won't harrer up your feelin's. 'S I told you, he done his best. I was willin' to quit long 'fore he was. Fact was, he overdone it a little, an' he had to throw water in my face 'fore he got through; an' he done that as thorough as the other thing. I was somethin' like a chickin jest out o' the cistern. I crawled off to bed the best I could, but I didn't lay on my back fer a good spell, I c'n tell ye."
"You poor little critter," exclaimed Mrs. Cullom sympathetically. "You poor little critter!"
"'T was more'n wuth it, Mis' Cullom," said David emphatically. "I'd had the most enjoy'ble day, I might say the only enjoy'ble day, 't I'd ever had in my hull life, an' I hain't never fergot it. I got over the lickin' in course of time, but I've ben enjoyin' that cirkis fer forty year. The' wa'n't but one thing to hender, an' that's this, that I hain't never ben able to remember—an' to this day I lay awake nights tryin' to—that I said 'Thank ye' to Billy P., an' I never seen him after that day."