“He was drawn and quartered.”
“Oh!” gasped Jim, while Mamie began to weep.
Just then a roar of laughter ensued from behind the newspaper, and Nannie, whose every nerve was taut, leaped from her chair.
The newspaper fell, and the two chief actors in this drama confronted one another, one of them convulsed with laughter and the other with flashing, defiant eyes and tightly pursed mouth.
“And after that—” urged Jim. “Go on, Miss Nannie. Oh, this is a bully story! It's bestest than Indians!”
“After that,” said Nannie, turning squarely on Mr. Earnest, “after that he was sent to the penitentiary for life, and everybody said 'Good enough!' 'Served him right, nasty, mean, horrid old thing!'” and away she went, slamming the front door behind her.
The bang of the door, and still more the unusual sound of Mr. Earnest's laughter, brought the little wife to the spot.
“We had a bully story!” Master Jim explained. “There wasn't any fighting in it, but a big old cat got caught in a trap, and he was hung and quartered up.”
“Jim!” said his mother. “Do stop! I don't like such stories. What could Nannie have been thinking of?”
If she had dared she would have added: “I don't see how anybody could have laughed over that.”