Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1910-03-17
TAlec For
q Winter.
Evening
Copyright. 1907. by A. S. Barnes @ Co.

~ twas long toward the end of
the season at the Old Home. and
Brown had been advertising in the
New York and Boston papers to 'bag
the %leftovers," as he called it. Besides
the regular gush about the breath of
old ocean" and the simple, cleanly
living of the bygone days we dream
about" there was some new froth con-
corning hunting and fishing. You'd
think the wild geese roasted on the
fagpole nights and the bluetish clog
ged up the bay SOS you could walk on
their back fins without wetting your
feet-that is, if you wore rubbers and
trod light.
advertisement and growing gladstone.
'"They'll take to that like your temp'r-
ance unit to brandy cough drops.
Well have to put up barbed wire to
keep 'eln off,"
"Humph" grunts Cap'n Jonadab.
"Anybody but a born fool I'll know
there amt any shooting down here
this time Of year."
Peter looked at him sorrowful.
W., says liz, LII yOu SFCI utGI
that Solomon answered a summer no.
tel adj? You set back and count the
clock ticks"
Well, that's bout all we had to do.
We got boarders enough from that RI
diculous advertisement to fill every
spare room we had, including Jona-
dab's and mine. Me and the cap'n had
to bunk in the barn loft, but there
was some satisfaction in that. 1t give
us an xcuse to get away from the
"sports" in the smoking room.
The Todds was part of the haul. He
was a little, dried up man, single and
a minister. Nigh s I could find out,
he'd given up preaching by the re-
quest Of the doctor and his last congre
cation. He had a notion that he was
a mighty hunter afore the Lord, like
Nimrod in the Bible, and he'd come to
the Old Home to bag a few gross of
geese and ducks.
His sister was an old maid and
slim, neither of which failings was
from choice, / callate. She wore eye
glasses and a veil to ''preserve her
complexion and her idee seemed to
be that native Cape Codders lived in
trees and ate cocoanuts. She called
'em ~"barbarians, utter barbarians."
Whenever she piped Games" her
brother had to drop everything and re-
port on deck. She was skipper Of the
Todd craft.
Them Todds was what Peter T. call
ed 1.-THE limit and a chip or two over"
The other would be gunners and fish
ermen were satisfied to slam shot
after sandpeeps or hook a stray soul
pin or a hake. But 'tWa'n't so with
brother James Todd and sister Claris-
sa. Ducks" it was in the advertising,
and nothing but ducks they wanted.
Ciarissa, she commenced to hint mid
ding p'inted concerning fraud.
Finally we lost patience, and Peter
T. he said they'd got to be quoted
somehow or he'd do some shooting on
his own hook; said too much Teddy
was going to his head. Then 1 suggest
ed taking EN- down the beach some
where on the chance of seeing a stray
coot or loon or something-anything
that could be shot at. lonadab and
\ oo1SSu tNoo q SOS.u pl0u, LII
we matched tn see who'd be guide.
And I got stuck, Of course. My luck
again.
So the next morning we started, me
and the Rev. James and Clarissa in
che Creased Lightning, Peters new
motor launch. Clarissa set around
doing the heavy conte mptuous and
turning up her nose at creation gener-
ally. 1t must have It's drawbacks,
this roosting So FUR above the common
flock.
Well, by and hy Lonesome Huckle-
berries shanty hove III sight, and l
vas glad to SEQ it, although 1 had to
answer a million questions about Lone
some and his history.
I told the Todhs that, so fur as ma
tionality was cotcerned, he was a lit
tie of everything, like a picked up din
ner-principally Eyetaiian and Portu-
gee, I c~al'late, with q streak of Gay
AHead Injun. no lives in the patch
work shanty N tue beach down there,
2 he is deaf and drtab, drives a liver col
Ored, balky mars that no one but him
self and his daughter Becky can han
die, and he has a love for bad rum
and a temper that's landed him in the
Wellmouth Lookup more than once or
twice. He's one of the best gunners
%alongshore, and at this time he owned
a flock Of live decoys that he'd refused
as high as SIS apiece for. I told all
this and a lot more.
When we struck the beach Clarissa,
she took her paint box and umbrella
ann mosquito 'intmenr and the rest of
her cargo and went off by herself to
sketch"
James and Inc went perusing up and
down that beach in the blazing sun
looking for something to shoot. We
went way beyond Lonesome's shanty.
but there want nobody to home. Todd
was a cheerful talker. but limited. His
favorite remark was, "Oh, / say, my
deah manw That's what he kept call
ing me, 'my deah man." Now, my