The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1913-06-12

r@OW I come not to have q last
iii name is a question that has al
I'LL ways had more or less agger-
442 walton mixed up with it. l
might of had one jest as we'll as not If
Old Hank Walters hadn't been so all
fired, internal bullheaded about things
in gineral, and his wife Elmira blame
sight worse, and both Of 'em ready to
row at minutes notice and stick to it
forevermore.
Hank, he was considerable of a
lusher. One Saturday night, when he
come home from the village in his
usual fix, he stumbled over basket
that was setting on his front steps.
Then he got up and drawed back his
foot unsteady to kick it plump into
kingdom come. Jest then he hearn Ell
mira opening the door behind him, and
he turned his head sudden. But the
kick was already started into the air,
and when he turns he can't stop it.
And 50 Hank gets twisted and falls
down and steps on himself. That bas-
ket lets out yowl.
"It's Kittens" says Hank, still set
ting down and staring at that there
basket. All of which, you understand,
am a-telling you from hearsay, as the
lawyers always asts you in court.
.Elmira, she sings out:
"Kittens, nothing. It's baby!'
And she opens the basket and looks
In and 1t was me.
"Hennerey Walters" she says, pick
ing me up and shaking me at him like
was a me-"Hennerey Walters,
where did you get this here baby?"
She always calls him Hennerey when
she is getting ready to give him fits.
Hank, he scratches his head, for
he's kind O. confudd1ed. and thinks
mebby he really has brought this bas-
ket with him. He tries to think Of all
the places he has been that night. But
he can't think of any place but Bill
Nolan's saloon. So he says: r +,
"Elmira, honest, amt had but one
drink all day." And then he kind O.
rouses up little bit and says:
''That baby you got there, FL
mira? ?" And then he says, dignif1ed,
$50 fur as that's consumed, Elmira,
where did you get that there baby?"
She looks at him, and she sees he
don't really know where come from.
Old Hank mostly was truthful when
lickered up for that matter, and she
knowed it, fur he couldn't think up no
lies excepting gineral denial when in
tOxicated up to the gills.
Elmira looks into the basket. They
was one Of them long rubber tubes
stringing out of a bottle that was in it,
and had been sucking that bottle
when interrupted. And they wasn't
nothing else in that basket but big
thick shawl which had been wrapped
all around me, and Elmira often wore
1t to meeting afterward. She goes
inside and she looks at the bottle and
me by the light, and Old Hank, he
comes stumbling In afterward and sets
down in chair and waits to get Hail
Columbia for coming home in that
shape, SOS he can row back agin, like
they done every Saturday night. #
Bowed in the glass Of the bottle was
the name, Daniel Dunno and Com
pany." Anybody but them two old
ignoramuses could Of told right off
that that didn't have nothing to do
with me. but was jest the company
that made them kind Of bottles. But
she reads 1t out loud three or four
times, and then she says:
.sHis name Is Daniel Dunno" she
says. g. '54 y Is
s.And Company,' says Hank, feeling
right quarrelsome. Hi
company amt no name says she.
..Why hain't Il, I'd like to know e
says Hank. ''I knowed man onct
whose name was Farmer. and e q
fsffdlnee's = nasat ain't 80
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