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"When he sees the basket," remarked David, "he'll think we've found his jackdaw, or p'r'aps he'll think we're bringing him a new one. Won't he be disappointed?" "I sha'n't give him time to think," said Ambrose. "I shall say, `I've brought a call-bird, directly I get to him."
"You said I might carry it to the gate," he replied firmly; and thus, both the boys advancing, the basket was set down at the doctor's feet. "It's a call-bird," said Ambrose very quickly, without waiting to say good-morning, while David fixed his broadest stare on the doctor's face to see the effect of the words.
"A call-bird?" repeated both the boys together. Andrew nodded. "Put a similar bird in a cage near to where t'other one used to be," he said, "and like enough it'll call the old un back." The boys looked at him with admiration. They had a hundred questions to ask about call-birds, and Andrew's experience of them, but they soon found that it was of no use to try to make him talk any more.
This may be accomplished either by passing the wire from side to side, around the base of each upright wire, or an additional horizontal row of holes below the others may be punched for the purpose. The door through which the call-bird is introduced should next be made in the bottom section.
It would be very disappointing to find that the call-bird was a failure, and very sad for the doctor to be without a jackdaw. Should he give him his? He was fond of his jackdaw, but then he had other pets, and the doctor was so lonely. He had only old brown books and curiosities to bear him company.
"Let's ask Andrew," said David suddenly. Fortunately Andrew was in a good temper, and though he did not leave off sweeping he listened to the story with attention. "We want your advice," said Ambrose when he had done. Andrew stopped his broom for an instant, took off his tall black hat, and gazed into its depths silently. "I should try a call-bird, master," he said as he put it on again.
One of the notches in the spindle should now be caught beneath the loop and the other around one of the central wires in the end of the cage. The bait, consisting of a berry, bird-seed, or what-not, may be either fastened to the spindle or placed beneath on the wires. The call-bird having been introduced, the trap may now be left to itself.
Doctor Budge looked down at the basket, in which Jack now began to flutter restlessly, and then at the two boys. "A call-bird, eh?" he said. "And what may a call-bird be?" Ambrose felt that David was casting a glance of triumph at him. Dr Budge evidently did not know everything in the world.
He wished David would go away, but in spite of the sharp nudge he had given him when they put the basket down, he showed no sign of moving. The meaning of the call-bird was soon made clear to the doctor, who listened attentively and said it seemed a very good idea, and that he was much obliged to them for telling him of it. "It was Andrew who told us," broke in David, speaking for the first time.
David thought it would have been more to the purpose to say, "We've brought a call-bird," but he did not wish to begin a dispute just then, so he let the remark pass. "Do you suppose," he said, "that he knows what a call-bird is?" Ambrose gave a snort of contempt. "Why, there's not a single thing he doesn't know," he answered. "He knows everything in the world."
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