The Wildcat reached for the parrot. "You green debbil! Whut you mean, exercisin' mah mascot all night?"
"Quawk!" The parrot made a vicious swing at the Wildcat's reaching hand.
The green parrot, fuming in a rage compared to which nitric acid was a cream puff, was restored to its Spring-drinking owner.
"Pretty Polly. What made her little feathers all mussed up?"
The Wildcat returned to his exhausted mascot.
"'At green chicken's lucky does he git by widout gittin' his health an' stren'th mussed up befo' dis trip ends. At res', Lily, till I brings you some nutriment. Doggone ol' bird must have near wore you out. 'At's de way wid dem mil'tary commands. Res' yo'se'f, Lily, till Ah brings yo' brekfust."
The Wildcat detected a tone of hypocrisy,--something of false gratitude--in the mascot's reply. He returned from the dining car carrying two heads of lettuce for the mascot. He placed the lettuce under the nose of the recumbent goat, but Lily refused to eat.
"Fust time Ah eveh seed you slow up when de mess call blowed. How come?"
An instant later his roving eye discovered the "how come" of Lily's loss of appetite. In a dark corner of the linen closet he saw a dozen fragments of white cloth. He hauled them out, and the light revealed the hems of a covey of sheets and a half dozen pillow cases. Then the web of a home-spun disaster met his eye. From the lower shelf of the linen closet dangled the shredded legs of the trousers which the occupant of Compartment B had given him to be pressed.
"Goat, doggone you, come to 'tenshun! No wondeh you kain't eat lettuce, wid yo' insides crammed wid a ton ob linen an' half a pair ob pants fo' dessert. Me sympathizin' wid you, an' you an' de green chicken banquetin' all night on 'spensive raiment! 'Ceptin' foh havin' to scrub de flo', I'd barbecue de blood outen yo' veins heah an' now."
The sudden necessity of hiding the evidence confronted the Wildcat.
"By rights I ought to ram de rest ob de pants down yo' neck." The Wildcat picked up the ragged and frazzled trousers. A moment later he opened the door of the car platform and cast the remnants of Lily's banquet into the fleeting right-of-way.
"'Spect some boy find dese an' say, 'Whah at's de man whut de train cut de laigs off of?' 'At's his trouble. Me--Ah's Chicago bound wid a cahload ob trouble ob mah own. Main thing to do is to git off de train widout lettin' 'at boy in 'partment B know we's landed."