"Then a new dog of Burton's killed Mrs. Peter," said Norah, "so I gave
up showing poultry!"
"I should think you did," said the sympathetic auditor. "What did your
father say?"
"He was very nice; and very angry with the dog; but he didn't buy me
any more valuable fowls--and I expect that was just as well," said
Norah, laughing. "I don't seem to have luck when it comes to keeping
poultry. Jim says it's management, but then Jim never kept any himself.
And it does make a difference to your views if you keep them yourself."
"It does," Wally agreed. "I used to lose ever so many in Queensland,
but then things are really rough on fowls up there--climate and snakes
and lots of odd things, including crocodiles! When I came down to
school I left a lot of hens, and twelve eggs under one old lady hen,
who should have hatched 'em out a few days after I left. And the whole
lot went wandering and found some poison my brother had put out for a
cat!" Wally wiped his eyes elaborately.
"And died?"
"It was suicide, I think," said Wally, nodding. "But I always had
comfort about that lot, because I still have hopes that those twelve
eggs hadn't hatched."
"I don't see what that has to do with it," Norah said, plainly puzzled.
"Why, don't you understand? If they hatched I must have lost them along
with the others; but if they didn't hatch, I didn't lose so many, for,
not having them to lose, I couldn't very well lose them, could I?
Q.
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