“Keep a-whisslin', Bud!” Mr. Cullum shouted, from the far edge of the prairie. A prolonged whistle, with trills and flourishes, was the response; and the conspirators, bursting with restrained laughter, plunged into the ford and separated, making each for his own fireside.
Mrs. Cullum was nodding over the hearth-stone when her husband came in. The six girls, from Minty—Jack Carter's buxom sweetheart—to Little Sis, the baby, were long abed. The hands of the wooden clock on the high mantel-shelf pointed to half-past twelve. “Well, pa,” Sissy said, good-humoredly, reaching out for the shovel and beginning to cover up the fire, “you've cavorted pretty late this time! What's the matter?” she added, suspiciously; “you ack like you've been drinkin'!”
For Tobe was rolling about the room in an ecstasy of uproarious mirth.
“I 'ain't teched nary drop, Sissy,” Mr. Cullum returned, “but ever' time I think about that fool Bud Mines a-settin' out yander at Buck Snort, holdin' of a candle, and whisslin' fer snipe to run into that coffee-sack, I—oh Lord!”
He stopped to slap his thighs and roar again. Finally, wiping the tears of enjoyment from his eyes, he related the story of the night's adventure.
“Air you tellin' me, Tobe Cullum,” his wife said, when she had heard him to the end—“air you p'intedly tellin' me that you've took Bud Hines snipin'? An' that you've left that sickly, consumpted young man a-settin' out there by hisse'f to catch his death of cold; or maybe git his blood sucked out by a catamount!”
“Shucks, Sissy!” replied Tobe; “nothin' ain't goin' to hurt him. He's sech a derned fool that a catamount wouldn't tech him with a ten-foot pole! An' him a-whisslin' fer them snipe—oh Lord!”
“Tobe Cullum,” said Mrs. Cullum, sternly, “you go saddle Buster this minit and ride out to Buck Snort after Bud Hines.”
“Why, honey—” remonstrated Tobe.
“Don't you honey me,” she interrupted, wrathfully. “You saddle that horse this minit an' fetch that consumpted boy home.”