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"She was when I left her," said Bumblepuppy. He had ascended the bank. Sitting down, he began to put on his socks. I noted the admirable symmetry of calf and ankle; I thought of the lungs and muscles which had sustained the superb body during a twenty- six mile run between blazing earth and sky. "What in thunder did ye go to town fer?" asked the old man. "Speak up, Johnnie.
Give us the cold facts." Then Bumblepuppy made the speech of his life. "Uncle Abram, you tole me to obey Mis' Janssen, an' do what she said." "That's so, Johnnie." "Yesday, she tole me to fix up an' be ready to go to San Lorenzy with her. She said we'd travel by night 'cause o' the heat. An' she said I was not to 'sturb you. She said she'd come to the winder an' tap.
Bumblepuppy is a synonym of whist played in defiance of certain time- honoured conventions and principles. Ajax said with reason that Johnnie Kapus, the nephew of our neighbour, old man Kapus, played the game of life in such a sorry, blundering fashion that he marvelled why his uncle gave him house-room. Ajax christened Johnnie Bumble-puppy.
"Directions," I remarked, "may be made too explicit." After this incident, we always spoke of Johnnie as Bumblepuppy. Some six months later Alethea-Belle told us that Johnnie Kapus was doing "chores" for the widow Janssen; milking her cow, taking care of the garden, and drawing water.
Lifting up his ruddy face, a ray of sunshine, filtering through the tremulous leaves of the cottonwoods, fell full upon his chestnut curls, and each drop of water on his hair became of a sudden a gem of prismatic colour and most brilliant lustre. "Phew-w-w!" said Bumblepuppy. "I hope Mis' Janssen ain't feelin' as warm as I am."
I've written and wired; but the trains don't come through regularly yet. Last week the ice ran out, as Lowndes knows. 'Glad I didn't come. I could ha' sent you some if I had known, though. Phew! it's too hot to go on playing bumblepuppy. This with a savage scowl at Lowndes, who only laughed. He was a hardened offender. Mottram rose from the table and looked out of a chink in the shutters.
She was again and publicly invited up to the parlor, and she came, though she said, rather shortly, that she didn't play Five Hundred, but only bumblepuppy bridge, a variety of whist which Mr. Wrenn instantly resolved to learn. Mr. Wrenn said to himself, almost spitefully, as she snubbed Nelly, "Too good for us, is she?" But he couldn't keep away from her.
After dinner, we accompanied Uncle Abram as far as the creek which flows between the village and our domain. Here stand some fine cottonwood trees and half-a-dozen lordly white-oaks. The spot is famous as a picnicking ground, and in the heat of summer is as cool a place as may be found in the county. And here, paddling in the brook like an urchin, we found Bumblepuppy.
"Last week," Bradley continued, illustratively, "I finished an index, wrote some verses for a pictorial advertisement of Appleblossom's Toilet Soap, and ground out an encyclopædia article on Christian Missions, and a magazine paper on the history of the game of bumblepuppy. I am now just beginning a novel of society life. Versatility is the very foundation of success.
The pair must have driven as fast as the widow's steed could travel into San Lorenzo. By this time, high noon, the licence, doubtless, had been issued and the marriage solemnised by parson or justice of the peace. Once married, no man not even old man Kapus would be justified in tearing Bumblepuppy from the fond arms of his bride. We asked Johnnie's uncle to dine with us. He thanked us warmly.
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