he was. So I
went downtown, and the first fellow I met was Sammy Wilmerton."

"Widow Wilmerton's boy?" asked Philo Gubb.

"Exactly!" said Snooks, feeling his eye with his finger. "And he says,
'Snooks, did you hear what the Ladies' Temperance League did last
night?' I hadn't heard. 'I heard ma say,' says Sammy, 'but don't say I
told you. They got up a petition to have City Attorney Mullen
impeached by the City Council.'

"Well, that was news! I went into the 'Eagle' office and called up
Mullen.

"'Hello! Is that Attorney Mullen?' I says.

"'Yes,' he says.

"'Well, something happened last night,' I says, 'and I'd like to see
you about it.'

"'How do you know what happened?' he says.

"'No matter,' I says; 'can I come up?'

"After a half a minute he says, 'Oh, yes! Come up. Come right away.
I'll be waiting for you.'

"So I went."

"Nothing strange about that," said Philo Gubb, shifting himself on the
ladder.

"So I went," continued Snooks. "I rang the doorbell and, the moment it
rang, the door flew open and--_bliff!_--down came a bed-blanket over
me and somebody grabbed me in his arms and lugged me into the house. I
guess it was Attorney Mullen--you know how big and husky he is. But I
couldn't see him. I couldn't see anything. Only, every two seconds,
bump! he hit at my head through the blanket. That's how I got this
eye. And, all the time, he was talking to me, mad as a hatter, and I
couldn't hear a word he said. But I could hear his wife screaming at
the top of the stairs, and I could hear Nan screaming, and I heard a
window go up.

"'Stop that yelling!' says Mullen, in a voice I _could_ hear, and then
he picked me up again and carried me to the back door, and opened it
and threw me all the way down the eight steps. I chucked off the
blanket, and I was going up the steps again, to show him he couldn't
treat me that way, when--_bing!_--somebody next door took a shot at me
with a revolver. Thought I was a burglar, I guess. I started to run
for the back gate, when--_bing!_--somebody shot at me from the other
house. What do you think of that? For a few minutes it sounded like
the battle of San Juan, and I can't understand yet why I didn't suffer
an awful loss of life."

"But you didn't?" asked Philo Gubb.

"No, siree! I made a dive for the cellar door, just as they got the
range. I stayed in the cellarway, with the bullets pattering on it
like hail, until the cop came. Tim Fogarty was the cop. He order