The professor carefully extricated a “fox tail” from his ear and then performed the same kind office for his son and heir.
“Pa-pa,” piped up the lad, “may I ask a question?”
“Yes, my lad,” beamed the professor amiably stepping down from the pile of hay, which Hamish was regarding ruefully.
“Well,” spoke up Douglas, “if we had not gotten out from under that hay, would we have been suffocated?”
“Undoubtedly, my boy—undoubtedly,” was the rejoinder. “Gross carelessness, too.”
He scowled at the assembled group.
“Would it have hurt, pa-pa?”
“Surely, my boy. Suffocation, so science tells us, is a most painful form of death.”
“Worse than measles, pa-pa?”
“Yes, my child, and——”