“The little woman is in extremities of gladness. She must wake up that stir-up trouble youngster and hug him and make proclamation that he is his mamma’s own precious treasure. I was about to ask questions, but I looked at Mr. Little Bear, and my eye caught the sight of something in his belt. ‘Now go to bed, ma’am,’ says I, ‘and this gadabout youngster likewise, for there’s no more danger, and the kidnapping business is not what it was earlier in the night.’
“I inveigled John Tom down to camp quick, and when he tumbled over asleep I got that thing out of his belt and disposed of it where the eye of education can’t see it. For even the football colleges disapprove of the art of scalp-taking in their curriculums.
“It is ten o’clock next day when John Tom wakes up and looks around. I am glad to see the nineteenth century in his eyes again.
“‘What was it, Jeff?’ he asks.
“‘Heap firewater,’ says I.
“John Tom frowns, and thinks a little. ‘Combined,’ says he directly, ‘with the interesting little physiological shake-up known as reversion to type. I remember now. Have they gone yet?’
“‘On the 7:30 train,’ I answers.
“‘Ugh!’ says John Tom; ‘better so. Paleface, bring big Chief Wish-Heap-Dough a little bromo-seltzer, and then he’ll take up the redman’s burden again.’”
