The Wilbur twin had eaten his apple cake and was now eating the cookies, taking care to drop no crumbs on the sanded floor.  After many cookies dusk fell and he heard the church bells ring for evening worship.  But no one heeded them.  The game drew to an excited finish, while Dave Cowan, his pipe lighted, mused absently and from time to time quoted bits of verse softly to himself: 

    Enchanted ports we, too, shall touch;
    Cadiz or Cameroon—­

The game ended with an explosion of rage from the mayor.  The cards had continued perverse for him.  He pushed his soft black hat back from his rumpled crest of gray hair and commanded Minna Vielhaber to break a municipal ordinance which had received his official sanction.  Herman cheerily combed his red beard and scoffed at his late opponent.

“It makes dark,” Minna reminded him.  “You should have light.”

Herman lighted two lamps suspended above the tables.  Then he addressed the Wilbur twin, now skillfully prolonging the last of his cookies.

“Well, young one, you like your bread and cheese and milk and cookies and apfel kuchen, so?  Well, I tell you—­come here.  I show you something fine.”

He went to the front room, where the bar was, and the Wilbur twin expectantly followed.  He had learned that these good people produced all manner of delights.  But this was nothing to eat.  The light from the lamps shone over the partition between back room and front, and there in a spacious cage beside the wall was a monkey, a small, sad-eyed creature with an aged, wrinkled face all but human.  He crouched in a corner and had been piling wisps of straw upon his reverend head.

“Gee, gosh!” exclaimed the Wilbur twin, for he had expected nothing so rare as this.

The monkey at sight of Herman became animated, leaping again and again the length of the cage and thrusting between its bars a hairy forearm and a little, pinkish, human hand.

“You like him, hey?” said Herman.

“Gee, gosh!” again exclaimed the Wilbur twin in sheer delight.

“It’s Emil his name is,” said Herman.  “You want out, Emil, hey?”

He unclasped the catch of a door, and Emil leaped to the crook of his arm, where he nestled, one hand securely grasping a fold of Herman’s beard.

“Ouch, now, don’t pull them whiskers!” warned Herman.  “See how he knows his good friend!  But he shake hands like a gentleman.  Emil, shake hands nicely with this young one.”  The monkey timidly extended a paw and the entranced Wilbur shook it.  “Come,” said Herman.  “I let you give him something.”

They went to the back room, Emil still stoutly grasping the beard of his protector.

“Now,” said Herman, “you give him a nice fat banana.  Mamma, give the young one a banana to give to Emil.”

The banana was brought and the Wilbur twin cautiously extended it.  Emil, at sight of the fruit, chattered madly and tried to leap for it.  He appeared to believe that this strange being meant to deprive him of it.  He snatched it when it was thrust nearer, still regarding the boy with dark suspicion.  Then he deftly peeled the fruit and hurriedly ate it, as if one could not be—­with strangers about—­too sure of one’s supper.