Our story begins with the death of our hero. The manner of it was
decapitation, the instrument a mowing machine. A young son of the
deceased, dumb with horror, seized the paternal head and ran with it to
the house.
“There!” ejaculated the young man, bowling the gory pate across the
threshold at his mother’s feet, “look at that, will you?”
The old lady adjusted her spectacles, lifted the dripping head into her
lap, wiped the face of it with her apron, and gazed into its fishy eyes
with tender curiosity. “John,” said she, thoughtfully, “is this yours?”
“No, ma, it ain’t none o’ mine.”
“John,” continued she, with a cold, unimpassioned earnestness, “where
did you get this thing?”
“Why, ma,” returned the hopeful, “that’s Pap’s.”
“John”—and there was just a touch of severity in her voice—“when your
mother asks you a question you should answer that particular question.
Where did you get this?”
“Out in the medder, then, if you’re so derned pertikeller,” retorted
the youngster, somewhat piqued; “the mowin’ machine lopped it off.”
The old lady rose and restored the head into the hands of the young
man. Then, straightening with some difficulty her aged back, and
assuming a matronly dignity of bearing and feature, she emitted the
rebuke following:
“My son, the gentleman whom you hold in your hand—any more pointed
allusion to whom would be painful to both of us—has punished you a
hundred times for meddling with things lying about the farm. Take that
head back and put it down where you found it, or you will make your
mother very angry.”