“Go on,” she said.
“I was going across the inner paddock where the fatted ostriches were.”
“Did you EAT ostriches, then? I did not know—”
“Eat them!—often. Very nice they ARE too, properly stuffed. Well, we—I, rather—was going across this paddock, and I saw something standing up in the moonlight and looking at me.” Mr. Hoopdriver was in a hot perspiration now. His invention seemed to have gone limp. “Luckily I had my father’s gun with me. I was scared, though, I can tell you. (Puff.) I just aimed at the end that I thought was the head. And let fly. (Puff.) And over it went, you know.”
“Dead?”
“AS dead. It was one of the luckiest shots I ever fired. And I wasn’t much over nine at the time, neither.”
“I should have screamed and run away.”
“There’s some things you can’t run away from,”
