"Don't you think it was kind of Mr. Warren to pay six dollars a pair for those birds, just to give you the fun of shooting them?" asked Joe. "You ought to thank him for it."
Mr. Brown stared hard at the bold speaker, shrugged his shoulders, and turned around on his camp-chair to bring the heat of the fire to bear upon the back of his shooting-jacket.
"Well," said he, slowly, "if any man is foolish enough to squander his money in that way, I don't know that it is any business of mine, or yours, either; and neither do I consider it my duty to refrain from shooting birds that are not protected by law, as often as my dogs flush them. Now, let me go on with my story."
"But first suppose that you send the dogs under the table, and move back out of my way, so that I can cook supper," suggested Joe.
But Mr. Brown and his four-footed companions were very comfortable there in front of the fire, and not until Joe, losing all patience, jerked the door wide open and caught up a broom, could any of them muster up energy sufficient to move out of his way.
Then the pointers, which were really well trained and obedient, were easily induced to get under the table, while Mr. Brown retreated into the chimney-corner.
"Now I am ready to listen," said Joe, after he had piled an armful of hard wood upon the fire. "Where is your guide, and why didn't he show you the way to the Beach?"
"He is at home, I suppose," said Mr. Brown, growing spiteful again. "When I learned that these birds were protected, and that Brierly, instead of giving me a day's shooting had rendered both himself and me liable to trespass, I told him that he had better hand back the twenty-five dollars I had given him—"
"Twenty-five dollars for a single day's shooting!" exclaimed Joe.
"That is what I paid him," said Mr. Brown. "But do you imagine that he gave it back, even when he knew that he could not fulfil his promise? No, sir! He got out of it by leading me away off into the woods and losing me there. I had a fearful time working my way out, and it was only by the merest accident that I blundered within sight of the light that streamed from your window."