d their long necks
wavin' absurd. A 3 a.m. bunch of New Year's Eve booze punishers
couldn't have given a more scandalous exhibition.

"My word!" says Basil.

Course, it's up to me to produce an explanation. Which I does prompt.
"Oh, that's nothing!" says I. "They're just tryin' the duck waddle,
imitatin' their neighbors in the next run. Turkeys always do that sooner
or later if you have ducks near 'em. They keep at it until they're
dizzy."

"Really, now?" says Basil. "I never heard that before."

"Not many people have," says I. "But they'll get over it in an hour or
so. Look in tomorrow and you'll see."

Basil says he will. And after he's gone I opens the court martial.

"Joe," I demands, "what you been feedin' them turks?"

It took five minutes of cross examination before I got him to remember
that just before breakfast he'd sneaked out and swiped a pail of stuff
that he thought Leon was savin' for his ducks. And what do you guess?
Well, him and Leon had gone into the home-made wine business last fall,
utilizin' all them grapes we grew out in the back lot, and only the day
before they'd gone through the process of rackin' it from one barrel
into another. It was the stuff that was left in the bottom that Joe had
swiped for his pets.

"Huh!" says I. "And now you've not only disgraced those turkeys for life
but you've made me hand Mr. Pyne some raw nature-fakin' stuff that
nobody but a fool author would swallow."

"I mucha sorry," says Joe, hangin' his head.

"All right," says I. "I expect you meant well. But it was a bum hunch.
Now see they have plenty of water to drink and by mornin' maybe they'll
sober up."

I meant to keep an eye on 'em myself for the rest of the day, but right
after luncheon Auntie blows in again, to pay a farewell visit before
startin' South, and the turkeys slipped my mind. Not until she asks how
I'm gettin' on with my flock of quail did I remember.

"Oh, quail!" says I. "No, I had to ditch that. Couldn't get the right
sort of eggs."

Auntie smiles sarcastic. "What a pity!" says she. "But the various kinds
of poultry you were going in for? Did you----"

"Did I?" says I. "Say, you just come out and---- Well, Leon, anything
you want special?"

"Pardon, m'sieu," says old Leon, scrapin' his foot, "but--but the
turkeys."

"Yes, I know," says I. "They're doing that new trot Joe's been teaching
'em."

"But no, m'sieu," says Leon. "They have become deceased--utterly."

"Wha-a-a-at?