One way and another, they'd
got to be 'mazin' good friends all raound, when a cry was heerd
outside; and the old man and the little ones pricked up their ears,
and yowled in answer. It wor the old woman coming home, sure enough;
and the minute she poked her snout inter the den, and see what
company her man had got while she wor gone, the trouble begun.
Harnah, naterally, wor too much skeered to see justly what went on:
but there were a big fight somehow; and she got a notion that the
she-painter wanted to fall afoul uv her, and that he wouldn't let
her; and, like other married folks, from words they come to blows;
and the upshot uv the hull was, that the old lady got the wust on't,
and lay dead on the field uv action.
"Whether the husband felt bad, or whether he wanted sunthin' to eat,
or whether he had an engagement with another lady, I couldn't say;
but, the minute he'd given the finishing blow to his wife, he
cleared out, and didn't come back till the cubs called him to see to
me.
"Well, we got Harnah home somehow; and next day we come again, and
skun the old tiger and the cubs; and I got a hull heap o' harebells.
I was bound, that, after all the fuss, Harnah shouldn't lose her
harebells; and she didn't."
Seth was silent; and, tilting his chair a little farther back,
crossed his hands above his chest, and began to whistle softly.
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