Page:The red book of animal stories.djvu/81

 'There's no but in the matter,' said Delaporte. 'The serpent was in my house, consequently it is my property, not to mention that I pay you thirty piastres for it. Take care! If you raise any difficulties in the matter I shall begin to think that you put the creature there beforehand, and that it only came to your call because you had tamed it.'

Abd-el-Kerim saw that resistance was useless, and let the serpent glide from his hands into the jar.

Delaporte had a cork and string ready at hand; the cork was firmly tied down on the jar, and the serpent secured inside it.

'Any more?' asked Delaporte.

'Yes,' said Abd-el-Kerim, who did not choose to own himself beaten, and sure enough, after renewed cries and more clouds of smoke, a second serpent, a little smaller than the first, issued from beneath the chest of drawers, and came to Abd-el-Kerim.

Delaporte seized a second glass jar: 'Good,' said he, 'that will make a pair.'

Abd-el-Kerim drew a long face; but he was caught, and there was nothing for it but to give up the second serpent as he had done the first.

'Any more still?' inquired Delaporte.

'No, not here.'

'Where then?'

The snake charmer turned towards the next room.

'I smell one there,' said he.

The next room was the drawing-room.

'Let us go there, then,' said Delaporte. And taking a glass jar under each arm, he gave two others to his servant to carry, and led the way to the drawing-room.

There was one there. This one seemed to be a musical serpent, for he had taken refuge under the piano, and in spite of Abd-el-Kerim's manifest reluctance, this snake also promptly found its way into the jar.