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casion Mr. Gubb was in a reasonably contented frame of mind, for he had just received his share of the reward for capturing the dynamiters and had this very morning paid the full amount to Mr. Medderbrook, leaving but eleven thousand six hundred and fifty dollars still to be paid that gentleman for the Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine Stock, and upon the further payment of seventy-five cents--half its cost--Mr. Medderbrook gave him a telegram he had received from Syrilla. The telegram was as follows:-- Rapidly shrinking. Have given up all soups, including tomato soup, chicken soup, mulligatawny, mock turtle, green pea, vegetable, gumbo, lentil, consomme, bouillon and clam broth. Now weigh only nine hundred and fifty pounds. Wire at once whether clam chowder is a soup or a food. Fond remembrances to Gubby. Mr. Gubb was thinking of this telegram as he walked toward his work. Just ahead of him a short lane led, between Mrs. Smith's house and the Cherry Street Methodist Chapel, to the brick-yard. Mrs. Smith's chicken coop stood on the fence line between her property and the brick-yard! [Illustration: "DETECKATING IS MY AIM AND MY PROFESSION"] Philo Gubb had passed Mrs. Smith's front gate when Mrs. Smith waddled to her fence and hailed him. "Oh, Mr. Gubb!" she panted. "You got to excuse me for speakin' to you when I don't know you. Mrs. Miffin says you're a detective." "Deteckating is my aim and my profession," said Mr. Gubb. "Well," said Mrs. Smith, "I want to ask a word of you about crime. I've had a chicken stole." "Chicken-stealing is a crime if ever there was one," said Philo Gubb seriously. "What was the chicken worth?" "Forty cents," said Mrs. Smith. "Well," said Philo Gubb, "it wouldn't hardly pay me." "It ain't much," admitted Mrs. Smith. "No. You're right, it ain't," said Philo Gubb. "Was this a rooster or a hen?" "It was a hen," said Mrs. Smith. "Well," said Mr. Gubb, "if you was to offer a reward of a hundred dollars for the capture of the thief--" "Oh, my land!" exclaimed Mrs. Smith. "It would be cheaper for me to pay somebody five dollars to come and steal the rest of the chickens. It seems to me, that you ought to make the thief pay. I ain't the one that did the crime, am I? It's only right that a thief should pay for the time and trouble he puts you to, ain't it?" "I never before looked at it that way," said Mr. Gubb thoughtfully, "but it stands to
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