for a few minutes, went to sleep so
suddenly that it was like falling off a cliff into dreamland. He
dreamed, uneasily, of having been captured by an array of forty
chicken thieves, of having been led in triumph before the Supreme
Court of the United States, and of having been condemned as a
Detective Trust on the charge of acting in restraint of trade--as
injuring the Chicken Stealers' Association's business--and required to
dissolve himself.

The dream was agonizing as he tried one dissolvent after another
without success. Turpentine merely dissolved his skin; alcohol had no
effect whatever. He imagined himself in a long room in which stood
vast rows of vats bearing different labels, and in and out of these
he climbed, trying to obey the order of the court, but nothing seemed
capable of dissolving him, and he suddenly discovered that he was made
of rubber. He seemed to remember that rubber was soluble in benzine,
and he started on a tour of the vats, trying to find a benzine vat.

He walked many miles. Sometimes he arose in the air, with ease and
grace, and flew a few miles. Finally he found the vat of benzine,
immersed himself in it, and began to dissolve calmly and with a
blessed sense of having done his duty.

It was then that Philo Gubb entered the dreamless sleep of the utterly
weary, and, about the same time, two men slunk under the roof of the
brick-kiln and after looking carefully around took seats on the fallen
bricks, resting their backs against the partly demolished kiln. They
arranged the bricks as comfortably as possible before seating
themselves, and when they were seated, one of them drew a whiskey
bottle from his pocket and, after taking a good swig, offered it to
his partner.

"Nope!" said he. "I'm going to steer clear of that stuff until I know
where I'm at, and you're a fool for not doing the same, Wixy. First
thing you know you'll be soused, and if you are, and anything turns
up, what'll I do? I got all I can do to take care of you sober."

"Ah, turn up! What's goin' to turn up 'way out here?" asked Wixy.
"They ain't nobody follerin' us anyway. That's just a notion you got.
Your nerves has gone back on you, Sandlot."

"My nerve is all right, and don't you worry about that," said Sandlot.
"I've got plenty of nerve so I don't have to brace it up with booze,
and you ain't. That's what's the matter with you. You saw that feller
as well as I did. Didn't you see him at Bureau?"

"That feller wi