I scared him so his bald head turned gray
in a single night."
"What under the heavens have you done to him now?" says the grocery man,
in astonishment. "I hope you haven't done anything you will regret in
after years."
"Regret nothing," said the boy, as he turned the lid of the cheese box
back and took the knife and sliced off a piece of cheese, and took a few
crackers out of a barrel, and sat down on a soap box by the stove, "You
see Ma was annoyed to death with Pa. He would come home full, when she had
company, and lay down on the sofa and snore, and he would smell like a
distillery. It hurt me to see Ma cry, and I told her I would break Pa of
drinking if she would let me, and she said if I would promise not to hurt
Pa to go ahead, and I promised not to. Then I got my chum and another boy,
to help, and Pa is all right. We went down to the place where they sell
arms and legs, to folks who have served in the army, or a saw mill, or a
threshing machine, and lose their limbs, and we borrowed some arms and
legs, and fixed up a dissecting room. We fixed a long table in the
basement, big enough to lay Pa out on you know, and then we got false
whiskers and moustaches, and when Pa came in the house drunk and lay down
on the sofa, and got to sleep, we took him and laid him out on the table,
and took some trunk straps, and a circingle and strapped him down
to the table.
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