THE BAD BOY GETS HIS PA INTO TROUBLE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3843, 10 November 1883, Page 4

THE BAD BOY GETS HIS PA INTO TROUBLE.

"Well, well," remarked the grocery man ns the boy camo into the store and sat upon the end of the counter, "you loom up well for a boy with tho ague. I thought you could not get out of bed, you haven t been around for nearly a week." . «0, the ague's played out. I guess they run out of quinine in this town while I was sick. Any how they fired nearly a barrel of it down my neck," replied tho boy, helping himself to an apple. " I heard your father was arrested last Saturday What's the trouble?" asked the groceryman as ho closed a new gate at tho end of the counter he had made to keep tno hoy away from the sugar bin. " Well, he did come near being run m, euro, and I guess he would if it hadn t been for me. You see ma has been sick evoi since she wont into tho deacon s cellai to draw cider and met that skunk, so .she old pa if he would get a couple of good ta he ~ she would try and make a pot-pio for Sunday a "she felt her health failing and if her appetite didn't improve soon she would o'o hence, whatever that means, bo that evening pa started out after hens. He was too late to get dressed ones, so ho got two livo ones from the market and started home. Mo and my chum were kyin , for him, and when ho got about half way home it commenced to rain and he started on a run so as to not get wet. Wo followed and met a policeman and told him we saw a man steal two hens, and pointed pa out as the man. The policeman started after him, yelled at him to halt, but pa did not hear him. Pretty soon pa aawsomc ono was chasing him, amltbought it was a robber, so he ran all the harder. Then the policeman pulled out his revolver and fired in the air to scare pa, just ns one Of the hens got her wings loose and flopped it in pa's eye. Pa dropped with a groan and said: "I'm shot. Tell my wile 1 died happy." Then n crowd got around linn and was agoing to hang the policeman, but he swore tho shot came across the street for ho saw two men run, and snid he dnln t carry a revolver, anyway, and _Ihe crowd miHit search him. But 1 saw him throw it over in a yard and me and my chum got it. tho next morning. Wlien pa found h<wasn't .loud, ho called (~r >i slreteheT tube carried ■homo to die with Ins family. While some of the crowd went tor tho stretcher, tho rest began to examine him to see where the bullet went in, and wJien they couldn't find it, lie got up and offered to lick any man that said he was shot. J list then another policeman came up and said ho recognised pa as "Chicago Bid, a notorious safe robber and that a reward was offered for him. Vα said lie was an honest man and agreed to go back to the market with tlio chickens and bo identified, llioy found only one of tho chickens, but the market man knew pa and fixed it, and then the policeman began to beg pa's pardon and pa ''are him five dollars to keep still about it When pa got home he told ma how he had helped catch a safe blower and when he got his share of the reward she could have a now seal-skin saccpte." "Your father'll kill you some day. .but ■what about that fuss at tho social lit the deacon's night before last'r" asked the groceryman, as lie picked tho fly specks ott from a lot of uviplo siurur he was putting away for " now maple sugar " next spring. "I heard the whole church was mad at each other over a g-rab-bag-, and the presiding elder hud all he could do to (pact things down." "They don't amount to much,' replied the boy. "There's always something turns up when the sociable season first starts in. You see, ma was appointed ; committeo to fix up a grab-bag. Me am my chum were digging bait that niorniiito go fishing, when pa camo out and saul "Hennery I believe you put up tha chicken job on me, and I don t believe anything but hard work will reform you. 1 want you to spade up the ground under fho currant bushes.'' I asked him if he wanted a hump-backed, disfigured boy, made so by hard work. Pa said he would risk the hump, and told mo to pitch in, and then •went down to ivn. My chum said he would help me, and me and him got tho job done before two o'clock. When we got done L come in and found ma had finished tho grab-bag, and had it all loaded, with the top fastened with a puckering string, and hung on the back of a chnir. Ma was up stairs getting her Sunday clothes on, to go to tho sociable, so it didn't take mo and my chum long to empty the bag and get first choice Then 1 got our mouse trap and took it to the barn, and caught two nico big fat mice and put cm in a collar-box with holes cut in it, to give 'em air, and dropped that in tho bag. Then my churn remembered a big napping turtle he had in the swill barrel, and mo and him got that and wiped it as dry as wo could, and tied it all up but its head and put that in Justus the deacon's lured man came to take the bag over to the sociable. Mo and my chum went down to his house and waited till the people got over to the sociable and then wo went over and got up in a tree -where wo could see through tho open window, and hear all that was going on. Pa lie stood over by the bag and Shouted, 'Ten cords and a grub; don't let anybody bo backward in a good cause. Three or four had put up their ten cents and mado a grab when an old maid from Osh.<osh who had been to the springs for hysterics, got in hoi , work on the collar-box. \Y lien Blio got the cover off, one of tho mice that knew his business, jumped on her shoulder nnd crawled down her neck, and the other dropped on the floor and started around to meet the other one. You'd a dide to seen her flop and show her stocking and scream. Tho deacon's folks thought it was another attack of hysterics, and pa and tho deacon <rot her on the sofa and held her wlnle they poured paregoric and cayenne pepper down her When she got loose she screamed all the harder. Then one of the other women see the mouse and got up in the chair and shook her skirts and asked the new young minister to help her catch the mouse, lie poor fellow looked as though he would like to but he failed. Jn«t then the bottom of the chair broke and let her fail over on ma and tore her bangs all down. Ma called her a "hateful thing," and told her she ought to be ashamed of herself. Finally they got things in order, but no one wanted to tackle the bag, and as here was where the profits come in, pa braced up and said he'd like to know why everybody acted so 'spicious, he'd liko to see a grab-bag that would give him hysterics, and said " women are always gettin' scared at nothinV Ho then put down ten cents and jammed Ins hand way down in the bottom of the bag, buthe didn t keep it there long. He give a jump and . yanked his handout, yelling " thunder. Then he swuiiy it over his head to shake it off, and brought it down on the deacon s head, and smashed his specs. I lien ho swim" it the other way, and struck the woman president of the sewing society m tho stomach and knocked her down in the deacon's lap. After pa had hollered liimscU hoarse, and thumped half tho people m the room, the turtle let go, and pa said lie 'could lick the man that put that steel trap in tho grab-bag." Then pa and ma got mad, and everybody to jaw, and they all wont home. Thcre'f been a sort of coldness among tho members ever since. 1 guess pa won't have a humph-backed boy, but I'll get even with him, you just see if I don't. And tho boy went out and took a sign, '' Warranted Fresh," from tho fruit stand, and hung , it on a blind horse that was hitched to a garbage wagon in front of tho store. —Pock's Sun.