I'd be the Black Bass of Horseshoe Bend, Chickie, and I'd locate
just below the shoals headin' up stream, and I'd hold me mouth
wide open till I paralyzed me jaws so I couldn't shut thim. I'd
just let the pure stuff wash over me gills constant, world
without end. Good-by, Chickie. Hope you got your grub, and pretty
soon I'll have enough drink to make me feel like I was the Bass
for one night, anyway."
Jimmy hurried to his next trap, which was empty, but the one
after that contained a rat, and there were footprints in the
snow. "That's where the porrage-heart of the Scotchman comes in,"
said Jimmy, as he held up the rat by one foot, and gave it a
sharp rap over the head with the trap to make sure it was dead.
"Dannie could no more hear a rat fast in one of me traps and not
come over and put it out of its misery, than he could dance a
hornpipe. And him only sicond hand from hornpipe land, too! But
his feet's like lead. Poor Dannie! He gets just about half the
rats I do. He niver did have luck."
Jimmy's gay face clouded for an instant. The twinkle faded from
his eyes, and a look of unrest swept into them. He muttered
something, and catching up his bag, shoved in the rat. As he
reset the trap, a big crow dropped from branch to branch on a
sycamore above him, and his back scarcely was turned before it
alighted on the ice, and ravenously picked at three drops of
blood purpling there.
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