“I’ll make you a wager of a box of good cigars that I am able to tell you the first time what blood this is.”
“I am not here to try you, but to ascertain through you what this blood came from.”
“Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“And you do not know whence this blood came?”
To acknowledge entire ignorance would not be politic, so Nick said:
“I am not prepared to answer that question further than to say that I may have well-founded suspicions.”
“Do you think that it is a goat’s blood?”
“You may as well tell me what your own opinion is, or you will not get anything out of me.”
“Well, that blood came from—a chicken.”