er Smith what you want, and keep what you want. That's all
you'll get."

Philo Gubb could not understand it. He tried to, but he could not
understand it at all. And then suddenly a great light dawned in his
brain. There was something this chicken thief knew that he and Mrs.
Smith did not know. The stolen chicken must have been of some rare and
much-sought strain. So it was all right. The thief was paying what the
chicken was worth, and not what Mrs. Smith thought it was worth in her
ignorance. He slipped the money into his pocket.

"All right," he said. "I'm satisfied if you are. The chicken was a
fancy bird, ain't it so?"

"The Chicken was a tough old rooster, that's what he was," said Wixy,
staggering to his feet.

"I thought he was a hen," said Philo Gubb. "Mrs. Smith said he was a
hen."

Wixy laughed a sickly laugh.

"That ain't much of a joke. That's why everybody called him Chicken,
because his first name was Hen."

Philo Gubb's mouth fell open. He was convinced now that he had to do
with an insane man. Wixy moved toward the open drying-floor.

"Well, so 'long, pard," he said to Philo Gubb. "Give my regards to
Mother Smith. And say," he added, "if you see Sal, don't let her know
what happened to the Chicken. Don't say anybody made away with the
Chicken, see? Tell Sal the Chicken flew the coop himself, see?"

"Who is Sal?" asked Philo Gubb.

"You ask Mother Smith," said Wixy. "She'll tell you." And he went out
into the dark. Philo Gubb heard him shuffle across the drying-floor,
and when the sound had died away in the distance he put up his
revolver.

"Five hundred dollars!" he said, and he routed Mrs. Smith out of bed.
He did not tell her the amount of reward he had made the chicken thief
pay. He asked her what the most expensive chicken in the world might
be worth, and she reluctantly accepted ten dollars as being far too
much. Then he asked her who Sal was.

"Sal?" queried Mrs. Smith.

"The chicken thief declared the statement that you would know," said
Mr. Gubb. "He said to tell her--"

"Well, Mr. Gubb," said Mrs. Smith tartly, "I don't know any Sal, and
if I did I wouldn't carry messages to her for a chicken thief, and it
is past midnight, and the draught on my bare feet is giving me my
death of cold, and if you think this is a pink tea for me to stand
around and hold fool conversation at, I don't!"

And she slammed the door.

THE DRAGON'S EYE

It was with great pleasure that Mr.