“Laws-a-me!” was the familiar exclamation that greeted us when we came downstairs. “It does beat all how some boys can sleep. I dare say you never heard me screeching my head off in the middle of the night.”
“No,” says Poppy truthfully, “I never heard you.”
“Waking up suddenly, I missed Pa. He wasn’t in bed where I put him. And where do you think I found him—sleepwalking, mind you. Imagine! As though he wasn’t dumb enough without trying that. Oh, dear! If he isn’t enough to tax the patience of a saint. No wonder I have to watch him like a child. Pa!” then came sharply. “Quit gurgling in the wash basin.”
“I wasn’t gurglin’,” whined the old man, as he fiddled at the sink, washing his face and hands. “I jest choked.”
“Well, quit your choking then. Laws-a-me! For see what happened to your Cousin Peter when he choked. The poorest funeral I ever was at.”
“I kain’t help it if I choke,” came grumpishly. “An’ I kain’t help it, nuther, if I sleepwalk. No, I kain’t.”
Sleepwalk! I suppose he was asleep when he blew out the kitchen light and beat it up the stairs! Yes, he was—like so much mud!
The old trickster!
CHAPTER VII
LAWYER CHEW
Before doing our own breakfast stuff Poppy and I meandered to the barn and fed the big gander. All Mrs. Doane could give us in the way of gander grub was cornflakes in the package, but that seemed to fill the bill. And, to a point of nonsense, “fill the bill” is right! Boy, you should have seen that high-toned corn fodder evaporate when old peppy socked his molars into it! Part of the time the hungry fowl ate out of our hands. We let it do that, for, as I say, it was a swell pet.