"Ain't run out?" Bill asked anxiously.
"Nope."
"Ain't thinkin' it'll hurt my digestion?"
"Nope."
A flush of angry blood pervaded Bill's face.
"Then it's jes' warm an' anxious I am to be hearin' you explain
yourself," he said.
"Spanker's gone," Henry answered.
Without haste, with the air of one resigned to misfortune Bill turned his
head, and from where he sat counted the dogs.
"How'd it happen?" he asked apathetically.
Henry shrugged his shoulders. "Don't know. Unless One Ear gnawed 'm
loose. He couldn't a-done it himself, that's sure."
"The darned cuss." Bill spoke gravely and slowly, with no hint of the
anger that was raging within. "Jes' because he couldn't chew himself
loose, he chews Spanker loose."
"Well, Spanker's troubles is over anyway; I guess he's digested by this
time an' cavortin' over the landscape in the bellies of twenty different
wolves," was Henry's epitaph on this, the latest lost dog. "Have some
coffee, Bill."
But Bill shook his head.
"Go on," Henry pleaded, elevating the pot.
Bill shoved his cup aside. "I'll be ding-dong-danged if I do. I said I
wouldn't if ary dog turned up missin', an' I won't."
"It's darn good coffee," Henry said enticingly.
But Bill was stubborn, and he ate a dry breakfast washed down with
mumbled curses at One Ear for the trick he had played.
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