"Vas it an eart'quake?" inquired Carl, mechanically taking his hat. "Der puildings vas shdill shdanding on der shtreet, und nodding vas dorn oop mooch, aber somet'ing must haf habbened."
"You done drapped on de mu-els," said the colored proprietor of the express wagon. "Dey's gentle, an' dey'll eat oats off'n de back of a choo-choo engyne, but dey won't stan' fo' no meddlin' wid dey feet."
"Hurt?" inquired Bangs, helping Carl erect.
"Vell," answered Carl, feeling himself all over, "dere don'd vas any vone blace vere I feel der vorst, but dere iss a goneness all ofer me, oop und down und sideways. Oof I hat a gun," he finished, his temper rising, "I vould go on a mule hunt."
Carl slapped the dust from his clothes and climbed back into the wagon. Before he gripped the seat with both hands, he transferred the dried frog from the left-hand pocket of his coat to the right-hand pocket.
"Meppy I ditn't put it in der righdt blace," he thought.
The express wagon turned from Canal Street into Royal, and from Royal into St. Peter, halting before a dingy building, with iron balconies, not far from Congo Square.
A mulatto woman sat in the doorway of the building with a basket of pralines in front of her on the walk. Carl took one handle of the chest, and Bangs the other. The chest, being of iron, was heavy. Somebody had spilled a pitcher of milk on the sidewalk and Carl's foot slipped as he crossed the wet spot. His end of the chest dropped, barking one of his shins and landing on the toes of one of his feet.
Carl gave a yell of pain and toppled over, sitting down with a good deal of force in the basket of pralines. The praline vendor had been knitting, but she sprang up, when she saw the destruction the Dutch boy was causing to her stock in trade, and tried to make a pin cushion of him with her knitting needles.