M.
Old Vandegrift School Lot
Admission 50 Cents
Well, fur a writer he certainly laid over Looey,
Doctor Kirby did--more cheerful-like, you might
say. I seen right off I was to be the Patagonian
Chieftain. I was getting more and more of an
actor right along--first an Injun, then a wild
Borneo, and now a Patagonian.
"But who is this Alonzo Ackerman?" I asts him.
"Celebrated balloonist," says he, "and the man
that invented parachutes. They eat out of his hand."
"Where is he?" asts I.
"How should I know?" he says.
"How is he going up, then?" I asts.
The doctor chuckles and says it is a good bill,
a better bill than he thought; that it is getting in
its work already. He says to me to read it careful
and see if it says Alonzo Ackerman is going up.
Well, it don't. But any one would of thought so
the first look. I reckon that bill was some of a
liar herself, not lying outright, but jest hinting a
lie. They is a lot of mean, stingy-souled kind of
people wouldn't never lie to help a friend, but
Doctor Kirby wasn't one of 'em.
"But," I says, "when that crowd finds out
Alonzo ain't going up they will be purty mad."
"Oh," says he, "I don't think so. The American
public are a good-natured set of chuckle-heads,
mostly. If they get sore I'll talk 'em out of it.
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