“And you’ve named the name of the fathers and forefathers and grandmothers and patriarchs of my dog’s tribe as far back as the records go,” said MacDaly. “His pedigree is that long that my wall is fairly covered with it, and it hangs down on the floor,” and he plunged into an enumeration of the points of the dog. His head, jaws, ears, shoulders, chest, feet, color, symmetry, and size, were minutely described, the boys meanwhile listening with delighted ears, and forgiving him his frequent lurches against them. They also kept a brisk lookout for policemen, and when a dark coat with brass buttons was seen in the distance, guided MacDaly into the doorway of some house, where they kept him until the enemy had passed.
Long before they had reached the Pavilion the whisky that he had been drinking began to mount to his brain, and he shocked and annoyed the boys by his manner of conducting himself.
“Bother you,” said one of them, kicking him on the shins. “Keep off my feet. You’re doing the ‘Dutch roll’ and the ‘inside edge’ all over the place. You’re not on skates.”
“Oddsboddikins, what a glorious lady!” was MacDaly’s response. “Smart and tricksy as a fresh-scraped carrot,” and hat in hand, he bowed so low in admiration of a plain-featured, elderly woman who was passing, that he was in imminent danger of losing his balance and falling prostrate at her feet.
“I’ll send a policeman after you,” she retorted angrily, as she went by.
“Beauteous lady, sleek and pleasurable creature,” pleaded MacDaly, looking after her, “be not repellent to thy servant. Thou art——”
His further speech was broken by the two boys, who, seizing him by the arms, hurried him so rapidly around a corner and into a long street that he had not breath enough to utter a word.
He proceeded along the street soberly enough, only taking off his cap to each electric-light post, and to each of the unused iron gaslight pillars, that still stud the streets of Halifax, till he came to a church. There he persisted in sitting down on the steps and shedding a few tears over his sins.
The boys at length drove him off, and he staggered along a few paces to a small field between the church and the schoolhouse, and gazed between the pickets of the fence.
“What are you looking for, Skitanglebags?” asked one of his escorts.