Page:I Know a Secret (1927).pdf/193

 morning with her family, and there was sometimes quite a wild sparkle in her handsome eye.

And then one day, when she was picking around in the driveway she happened to find a cigarette that someone had tossed out from a car. It was still lit, and just in curiosity the hen put it in her beak and took a few puffs. She liked the taste and it made her feel quite rakish to be smoking, just as she had seen well-dressed ladies doing on the front porch. She held the cigarette gracefully in one claw, and tossed her head at a mischievous angle. She saw other hens in the yard looking at her with surprise, and caught a gleam of attention from the big red rooster. Suddenly she determined to have a gay life while it was still possible. Why should she spend all her time looking after the chickens?

The whole neighbourhood is still talking about the lively doings that followed. You would never have known she was the same hen. She had her feathers smartly shingled, she bought some new clothes, and very thin yellowish silk stockings, and she smoked all the time. She got herself a swift little roadster with a rumble seat behind, and she could be seen flashing along the North Shore roads at a great pace. She didn't even need