?" inquired the doctor.

Aaron grinned, opened a rude closet, and produced a number of objects,
which James recognized at once as dummy pigeons. So Doctor Gordon was to
take him to a pigeon-shooting match. James felt a little disgusted. He
had, in fact, taken part in that sport with considerable gusto himself,
but, just now, he being fairly launched, as it were, upon the serious
things of life, took it somewhat in dudgeon that Doctor Gordon should
think to amuse him with such frivolities. But to his amazement the
elder man's face was all a-quiver with mirth and fairly eager. "Show the
pigeons to Doctor Elliot, Aaron," said Doctor Gordon. James took one of
the rude disks called pigeons from the hand of Aaron with indifference,
then he started and stared at Doctor Gordon, who laughed like a boy,
fairly doubling himself with merriment. Aaron did not laugh, he chewed
on, but his eyes danced.

"Why, they are--" stammered James.

"Just so, young man," replied Doctor Gordon. "They are wood. Aaron made
them on a lathe, and not a soul can tell them from the clay pigeons
unless they handle them. Now you are going to see some fun. Jim Goodman,
who is the meanest skunk in town, has cheated every mother's son of us
first and last, and this afternoon he is going to shoot against Albert
Dodd, and he's going to get his finish! Dodd knows about it. He'll have
clay pigeons all right. Goodman has put up quite a sum of money, and he
stands fair to lose for once in his life."

"Come on, Aaron, put the bay mare in the buggy. We'll drive down to the
field. We haven't got much time to spare."

Aaron backed the mare out of her stall and hitched her to the
mud-bespattered buggy, and the two men drove off with the wooden pigeons
under the seat. They had not far to go, to a large field intersected
with various footpaths and with, a large bare space, which evidently
served as a football gridiron. "This field is used like town property,"
explained the doctor, "but the funny part of it is, it belongs to an old
woman who is, perhaps, the richest person in Alton, and asks such a
price for the land that nobody can buy it, and it has never occurred to
her to keep off trespassers. So everybody trespasses, and she pays the
taxes, and we are all satisfied, especially as there are plenty of
better building sites in Alton to be bought for less money. That old
woman bites her nose off every day, and never knows it."

On this barren expanse, intersected w