"'The text,' says the hoss-faced guy on the platform, 'the text, my brother, is semaphorical.'
"Toledo couldn't understand that, so I whispers, 'Set down, you mutt! Semaphore is a sign ain't it? Well, he's givin' you the sign talk. Set down and listen.'
"Toledo, he hadn't had a drink for a week, and he was naturally feelin' kind of ugly. 'All right,' he growls at the preacher guy. 'All right. I pass.'
"'Ah, my brother!' says the hoss-faced guy. 'I see the spirits is at work.' That kind of got Toledo's goat.
"'Your dope is bum,' says Toledo. 'I ain't had a drink for a week. First you tell a fella to go see his aunt, when she's been planted for ten years. Then—'
"'Listen, brother!' says the preacher guy. 'I referred to ants—little, industrious critters that are examples of thrift to the idle, the indignant, the—'
"'Hold on!' says Toledo. 'Do you mean red ants or black ants?' And I seen that a spark had touched Toledo's brainbox and that he was wrastlin' with somethin' that felt like thinkin'.
"'Either, my brother,' says the hoss-faced guy, smilin' clear up to his back teeth.
"'Well, you're drawin' your dope from the wrong can,' says Toledo, shufflin' for the door. 'Because,' says he, turnin' in the doorway, 'because, how in hell is a fella goin' to find any ants with two feet of snow on the ground?'
"And then Toledo and me went out. It was a mighty cold night."