“Hidden it of course, but where?”
“No, not hidden it,” said Gringo, “we’ve smashed it.”
“Let me finish, oh! let me finish,” squealed Yeggie, and he went on. “Master Carty didn’t hide his bottle in the bushes the way he does sometimes. Yeggie saw him bring it here to the barn. He climbed the ladder to the hay-mow, he tucked it somewhere and came down.”
“You see,” said Gringo to me, “he wanted to have it in some place easy to get at in this storm, and where he could have some good excuse for calling on it. He’d run out here to see the horses in the stable beyond, then he’d have a swig at his old bottle.”
“The rogue!” I said irritably.
“Smell! smell! smell!” cried Yeggie, dancing up and down, “it’s right here.”
I had noticed a heavy smell of brandy when I came in the barn, and now I trotted to the other end near the big open doors, and there on the floor, lay the remains of a bottle on a bed of wet oats.
One of the men had spilt the horses’ feed, and hay and oats were all mixed up with the nasty drink.
“But how did you get the bottle down from the hay-mow?” I asked.
Old Czarina began to laugh, and licked the ear of the poodle next her. “Frenchmen are clever,” she murmured.