THE HUNT
He awoke to a musical twittering and chirping, to find the sun pouring into the dusty room in a very glory. He rolled from the blanket and stood upright, filling his lungs with a long deep breath of satisfaction. He felt singularly light-hearted and alive. The bulldog came bounding through the window, dirty from the weeds, and flung himself upon his master in a canine rapture.
“Get out!” quoth the latter, laughing. “Stop licking my feet! How the dickens do you suppose I’m to get into my clothes with your ridiculous antics going on? Down, I say!”
He began to dress rapidly. “Listen to those birds, Chum!” he said. “There’s an ornithological political convention going on out there. Wish I knew what they were chinning about—they’re so mightily in earnest. See them splashing in that fountain? If you had any self-respect you’d be taking a bath yourself. You need it! Hark!” He broke off and listened. “Who’s that singing?”
The sound drew nearer—a lugubrious chant, with the weirdest minor reflections, faintly suggestive of the rag-time ditties of the music-halls, yet with a plaintive cadence:
“As he went mowin’ roun’ de fiel’
Er moc’sin bit him on de heel.
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh, toodle-link-uh,
Da-a-dee-e-eaye!
“Dey kyah’d him in ter his Sally deah.
She say, ‘Mah Lawd, yo’ looks so queah!’
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh, toodle-link-uh,
Da-a-dee-e-e-aye!”
A smile of genuine delight crossed the listener’s face. “That would make the everlasting fortune of a music-hall artist,” Valiant muttered, as, coatless, and with a towel over his arm, he stepped to the piazza.
“Dey laid him down—spang on de groun’.
He-e-e shet-up-his-eyes en looked all aroun’.
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh, toodle-link-uh,
Da-a-dee e-e-aye!
“So den he died, giv’ up de Ghos’.
To Abrum’s buzzum he did pos’—
Right toodle-link-uh-day,
Right toodle-link-uh-day—”
“Good morning, Uncle Jefferson.”