"Oh come, Leon!" says I. "You must have been sampling some of them wine dregs yourself. Do you mean to say——"
"If M'sieu would but go and observe," puts in Leon. "Me, I have seen them with my eye. Truly they are as in life."
"Why, after we picked them last night I saw you throw them over the fence," says I.
"Even so," says Leon. "But come."
Well, this time we had a full committee—Vee, Auntie, Basil, Madame Battou, old Leon and myself—and we all trails out to the back lot. And say, once again Leon is right. There they are, all huddled together on the lowest branch of a bent-over apple tree and every last one of 'em as shy of feathers as the back of your hand. It's the most indecent poultry exhibit I ever saw.
"My word!" says Basil, starin' through his thick glasses.
"That don't half express it, Basil," says I.
"But—but what happened to them?" he insists.
"I hate to admit it," says I, "but they had a party yesterday. Uh-huh. Wine dregs. And they got soused to the limit—paralyzed. Then, on the advice of a turkey expert"—here I glances at Auntie—"we decided that they were dead, and we picked 'em to conserve their feathers. Swell idea, eh? Just a little mistake about their being utterly deceased, as Leon put it. They were down, but not out. Look at the poor things now, though."
And then Vee has to snicker. "Aren't they just too absurd!" says she. "See them shiver."