“Am I the—­pardon me, I believe I do not understand?”

With another sigh and a half-sob, Scotty rejoined: 

“Why you see we are in a bit of trouble, and the boys thought maybe you would give us a lift, if we’d tackle you—­that is, if I’ve got the rights of it and you are the head clerk of the doxology-works next door.”

“I am the shepherd in charge of the flock whose fold is next door.”

“The which?”

“The spiritual adviser of the little company of believers whose sanctuary adjoins these premises.”

Scotty scratched his head, reflected a moment, and then said: 

“You ruther hold over me, pard.  I reckon I can’t call that hand.  Ante and pass the buck.”

“How?  I beg pardon.  What did I understand you to say?”

“Well, you’ve ruther got the bulge on me.  Or maybe we’ve both got the bulge, somehow.  You don’t smoke me and I don’t smoke you.  You see, one of the boys has passed in his checks and we want to give him a good send-off, and so the thing I’m on now is to roust out somebody to jerk a little chin-music for us and waltz him through handsome.”

“My friend, I seem to grow more and more bewildered.  Your observations are wholly incomprehensible to me.  Cannot you simplify them in some way?  At first I thought perhaps I understood you, but I grope now.  Would it not expedite matters if you restricted yourself to categorical statements of fact unencumbered with obstructing accumulations of metaphor and allegory?”

Another pause, and more reflection.  Then, said Scotty: 

“I’ll have to pass, I judge.”

“How?”

“You’ve raised me out, pard.”

“I still fail to catch your meaning.”

“Why, that last lead of yourn is too many for me—­that’s the idea.  I can’t neither-trump nor follow suit.”

The clergyman sank back in his chair perplexed.  Scotty leaned his head on his hand and gave himself up to thought.

Presently his face came up, sorrowful but confident.

“I’ve got it now, so’s you can savvy,” he said.  “What we want is a gospel-sharp.  See?”

“A what?”

“Gospel-sharp.  Parson.”

“Oh!  Why did you not say so before?  I am a clergyman—­a parson.”

“Now you talk!  You see my blind and straddle it like a man.  Put it there!”—­extending a brawny paw, which closed over the minister’s small hand and gave it a shake indicative of fraternal sympathy and fervent gratification.

“Now we’re all right, pard.  Let’s start fresh.  Don’t you mind my snuffling a little—­becuz we’re in a power of trouble.  You see, one of the boys has gone up the flume—­”

“Gone where?”

“Up the flume—­throwed up the sponge, you understand.”

“Thrown up the sponge?”

“Yes—­kicked the bucket—­”

“Ah—­has departed to that mysterious country from whose bourne no traveler returns.”