“Bottle,” says he wise-like. “Bottle which contained milk for Georgie.”
“What’s the answer, Magpie?”
“When I gave Georgie to his maw, that bottle fell out of his blanket.”
“My ----!” says I. “Was it there all the time?”
“You didn’t see anybody put it there, did you?” he asks sarcastic-like.
We sat down on the edge of the platform and communed with our thoughts.
After a while I says:
“Magpie, it’s easy to figure that the kidnaper got scared and left that
baby in that shack, but what I don’t understand is this: All little
babies being more or less alike in the face, how in ---- did them men
know at a glance that your baby wasn’t little Oscar?”
“Huh! I never seen Oscar myself, Ike, but I’d ’a’ known it wasn’t Oscar.
Little Georgie’s father was the porter that blacked my yaller boots,
Ike.”