"Caramba!" says he. "Likewise gadzooks!" as the antique quits movin' altogether.
I'd have known that lemon-coloured pair of lip whiskers anywhere. Leonidas Dodge has the only ones in captivity. I steps out of the show-case in time to see mister man lift off the front lid and shove his head into the works.
"Is the post mortem on?" says I.
"By the beard of the prophet!" says he, swingin' around, "Shorty McCabe!"
"Much obliged to meet you," says I, givin' him the grip. "The Electro-Polisho business must be boomin'," says I, "when you carry it around in a gasoline coach. But go on with your autopsy. Is it locomotor ataxia that ails the thing, or cirrhosis of the sparkin' plug?"
"It's nearer senile dementia," says he. "Gaze on that piece of mechanism, Shorty. There isn't another like it in the country."
"I can believe that," says I.
For an auto it was the punkiest ever. No two of the wheels was mates or the same size; the tires was bandaged like so many sore throats; the front dasher was wabbly; one of the side lamps was a tin stable lantern; and the seat was held on by a couple of cleats knocked off the end of a packing box.
"Looks like it had seen some first-aid repairin'," says I.
"Some!" says Leonidas. "Why, I've nailed this relic together at least twice a week for the last two months. I've used waggon bolts, nuts borrowed from wayside pumps, pieces of telephone wire, and horseshoe nails. Once I ran twenty miles with the sprocket chain tied up with twine. And yet they say that the age of miracles has passed! It would need a whole machine shop to get her going again," says he. "I'll await until my waggons come up, and then we'll get out the tow rope."