inner at eight o'clock in the morning, and Pa said he guessed he would
call up the house after this, so I have lost another job, and it was all
on account of that bottle of pickled oysters you gave me. My chum says
he had colic too, but he didn't call up his folks. It was all he could
do to get up hisself. Why don't you sometimes give away something that
is not spiled?"

The grocery man said he guessed he knew what to give away, and the boy
went out and hung up a sign in front of the grocery, that he had made on
wrapping paper with red chalk, which read, "Rotten eggs, good enough for
custard pies, for 18 cents a dozen."

CHAPTER XXXVI.

HIS PA GETS BOXED--A PARROT FOR SALE--THE OLD MAN IS DOWN ON
THE GROCER--"A CONTRITE HEART BEATS A BOB-TAIL FLUSH!"--
POLLLY'S RESPONSES--CAN A PARROT GO TO HELL?--THE OLD MAN
GETS ANOTHER BLACK EYE--DUFFY HITS FOR KEEPS--NOTHING LIKE
AN OYSTER FOR A BLACK EYE.

"You don't want to buy a good parrot, do you," said the bad boy to the
grocery man, as he put his wet mittens on the top of the stove to dry,
and kept his back to the stove so he could watch the grocery man, and be
prepared for a kick, if the man should remember the rotten egg sign that
the boy put up in front of the grocery, last week.

"Naw, I don't want no parrot. I had rather have a fool boy around than
a parrot. But what's the matter with your Ma's parrot? I thought she
wouldn't part with him for anything."

"Well, she wouldn't until Wednesday night; but now she says she will not
have him around, and I may have half I can get for him. She told me
to go to some saloon, or some disreputable place and sell him, and I
thought maybe he would about suit you," and the boy broke into a
bunch of celery, and took out a few tender stalks and rubbed them on a
codfish, to salt them, and began to bite the stalks, while he held the
sole of one wet boot up against the stove to dry it, making a smell of
burned leather that came near turning the stomach of the cigar sign.

"Look-a-here, boy, don't you call this a disreputable place. Some of the
best people in this town come here," said the grocery man, as he held up
the cheese-knife and grated his teeth as though he would like to jab it
into, the youth.

"O, that's all right, they come here 'cause you trust; but you make up
what you lose by charging it to other people. Pa will make it hot
for you the last of the week. He has been looking over your bill,