Page:Frederick Faust--Free Range Lanning.djvu/168

164 gave one final flutter of the wings, one feeble crow, and was dead.

Jud waited until the tears had cleared from his eyes. Then he took off the boots, and, in bare feet that would leave no trace on the rocks, he skirted swiftly back to the house, put the dead body back in the chicken yard, and returned to his grandfather.

There was one great satisfaction for him that evening, one reward for the great sacrifice, and it came immediately. He saw his grandfather, who scorned shows of emotion, come from his chair with a groan. "Suffering saints, boy, have you been playin' dead outlaw? Suffering saints, Jud, ain't you got no sense?"

While the old man stood trembling before him, Jud told his story.

It was a rich feast indeed to see the relief, the astonishment, the pride come in swift turns upon that grim old face.

And yet in the end Pop was able to muster a fairly good imitation of a frown.

"And here you come back with a shirt and a pair of trousers plumb spoiled by all your gallivantin'," he said, "not speakin' of a perfectly good chicken killed. Ain't you never goin' to get grown up, Jud?"

"He was mine, the chicken I killed," said Jud, choking. It brought a pause upon the talk. The other was forced to wink both eyes at once and sigh.

"The big speckled feller?" he asked more gently.

"The Plymouth Rock," said Jud fiercely. "He wasn't no speckled feller! He was the finest rooster and the gamest"

"Have it your own way," said the old man. "You got your grandma's tongue when it comes to arguin' fine points. Now go and skin out of them clothes and