At last, “Aren’t you dead?” he gasped.
“Pho!” said Phil loftily. “I’ve as much right to be living as you, sir.”
“Well, I never!” said Fred. “I was over to the post-office when the whistle blew, and came out just in time to see you off, and I raced most of the way to the city after you, and then I turned round and raced back to tell your folks!”
“Pho!” said Phil again.
We will pass over any family discussion of the incident; but within an hour one half of the boys in town were relating to the other half the story of Phil Sullivan’s ride. To be sure the versions differed, and to this day some of the lads a little out of Phil’s own circle are convinced he went to town on the cow-catcher, and other some believe that he rode all the way under a car, sitting on a brace between the wheels.
But that evening, Phil much bruised and battered, yet whole in every limb, told to a select few the full particulars of his journey; and the facts of the case are as I have here narrated them.
WINTER WITH THE POETS.
By The Editor.