gs, the blue
meteor flashed into the loft. Billy slammed the door and caught him.
Deftly he snipped the threads and handed the roll to the banker. The
old man turned deathly pale, fumbled it open, then his color came back.
"Thank God!" he gasped, and then went speeding to his Board meeting,
master of the situation. Little Arnaux had saved him.

The banker wanted to buy the Homer, feeling in a vague way that he
ought to honor and cherish him; but Billy was very clear about it.
"What's the good? You can't buy a Homer's heart. You could keep him a
prisoner, that's all; but nothing on earth could make him forsake the
old loft where he was hatched." So Arnaux stayed at 211 West Nineteenth
Street. But the banker did not forget.

There is in our country a class of miscreants who think a flying Pigeon
is fair game, because it is probably far from home, or they shoot him
because it is hard to fix the crime. Many a noble Homer, speeding with
a life or death message, has been shot down by one of these wretches
and remorselessly made into a pot-pie. Arnaux's brother Arnolf, with
three fine records on his wings, was thus murdered in the act of
bearing a hasty summons for the doctor. As he fell dying at the
gunner's feet, his superb wings spread out displayed his list of
victories. The silver badge on his leg was there, and the gunner was
smitten with remorse. He had the message sent on; he returned the dead
bird to the Homing Club, saying that he "found it." The owner came to
see him; the gunner broke down under cross-examination, and was forced
to admit that he himself had shot the Homer, but did so in behalf of a
poor sick neighbor who craved a pigeon-pie.

There were tears in the wrath of the pigeon-man. "My bird, my beautiful
Arnolf, twenty times has he brought vital messages, three times has he
made records, twice has he saved human lives, and you'd shoot him for a
pot-pie. I could punish you under the law, but I have no heart for such
a poor revenge. I only ask you this, if ever again you have a sick
neighbor who wants a pigeon-pie, come, we'll freely supply him with
pie-breed squabs; but if you have a trace of manhood about you, you
will never, never again shoot, or allow others to shoot, our noble and
priceless messengers."

This took place while the banker was in touch with the loft, while his
heart was warm for the Pigeons. He was a man of influence, and the
Pigeon Protective legislation at Albany was the immediate fru