“Do I look like I’d fool you?” said Joe, scornfully.
“I can’t see you plain, suh,” said the negro, drawing a long breath, “but you don’t talk like it.”
“Well, get your hand loose and wait.”
As Joe turned to go to the house, he saw Mr. Snelson standing in the door.
“It’s all right, sir,” the youngster said. “None of the chickens are gone.”
“A great deal of fuss and no feathers,” said Mr. Snelson. “I doubt but it was a mink.”
“Yes,” said Joe, laughing. “It must have been a Mink, and I’m going to set a bait for him.”
“In all this dark?” asked the printer. “Why, I could stand in the door and crush it wit’ me teeth.”
“Why, yes,” replied Joe. “I’ll take some biscuit and a piece of corn bread, and scatter them around the hen-house, and if the mink comes back he’ll get the bread and leave the chickens alone.”
“Capital!” exclaimed Mr. Snelson, slapping Joe on the back. “I says to mother here, says I, ‘As sure as you’re born to die, old woman, that B’y has got the stuff in ’im that they make men out of.’ I said them very words. Now didn’t I, mother?”