etch him out, and the doctor too. Ti-hi can take
care of himself. I'd as soon expect to keep a snake in a wicker cage as
that fellow in these woods; but come, tell us all about it."

I partook, with a sensation as if choking all the while, of the food he
had waiting, and then, as we sat there waiting for the day in the hope
that the doctor might come, I told Jack Penny the adventures of the
night, Jimmy playing an accompaniment the while upon his nose.

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.

HOW JACK PENNY FIRED A STRAIGHT SHOT.

There was no stopping Jimmy's snoring. Pokes and kicks only intensified
the noise, so at last we let him lie and I went on in a doleful key to
the end.

"Oh, it ain't so very bad after all!" said Jack Penny, in his slow
drawl. "I call it a good night's work."

"Good, Jack?"

"Yes. Well, ain't it?" he drawled. "Why, you've got back safe, and you
don't know that the doctor won't get back, and you've done what you came
to do--you've found your father."

"But--but suppose, Jack Penny," I said, "they--they do him some injury
for what has passed."

"'Tain't likely," drawled Jack. "They've kept him all this time, why
should they want to--well, kill him--that's what you're afraid of now?"

"Yes," I said sadly.

"Gammon! 'tain't likely. If you'd got an old kangaroo in a big cage,
and the young kangaroo came and tried to get him away you wouldn't go
and kill the old kangaroo for it?"

"No, no," I said.

"Of course not. I didn't mean to call your father an old kangaroo, Joe
Carstairs. I only meant it to be an instance like. I say, do kick that
fellow for snoring so."

"It is of no use to kick him, poor fellow, and, besides, he's tired.
He's a good fellow, Jack."

"Yes, I suppose he is," said Jack Penny; "but he's awfully black."

"Well, he can't help that."

"And he shines so!" continued Jack in tones of disgust. "I never saw a
black fellow with such a shiny skin. I say, though, didn't you feel in
a stew, Joe Carstairs, when you thought it was a black fellow lugging
you off?"

"I did," I said; "and when afterwards--hist! is that anything?"

We gazed through the bushes at the darkness outside, and listened
intently, but there was no sound save Jimmy's heavy breathing, and I
went on:

"When afterwards I found it was the black I turned queer and giddy.
Perhaps it was the effect of the blow I got, but I certainly felt as if
I should faint. I didn't know I was so girlish."

Jack P