how he happened to notice. Oh, I say, Rad!" Tom called to the
colored man.

"Yais, sah, Massa Tom! I'se comin'!" the darky cried, as he
finished piling up, at a safe distance from the fire, a number of
cans of carbide.

"How'd you happen to see the red shed ablaze?" Tom asked.

"Why, it was jest dish yeah way, Massa Tom," began the colored
man. "I had jest been feedin' mah mule, Boomerang. He were
pow'ful hungry, Boomerang were, an', when I give him some oats,
wif a carrot sliced up in 'em--no, hole on--did I gib him a
carrot t'day, or was it yist'day?--I done fo'got. No, it were
yist'day I done gib him de carrot, I 'member now, 'case--"

"Oh, never mind the carrot, or Boomerang, either, Rad!" broke
in Tom, "I'm asking you about the fire."

"An' I'se tellin' yo', Massa Tom," declared Eradicate, with a
rather reproachful look at his master. "But I wanted t' do it
right an' proper. I were comin' from Boomerang's stable, an' I
see suffin' red spoutin' up at one corner ob de red shed. I
knowed it were fire right away, an' I yelled."

"Yes, I heard you yell," Tom said. "But what I wanted to know
is, did you see anyone near the red shed at the time?"

"No, Massa Tom, I done didn't."