"Like I should give you the particulars, Custer?" he inquired.

Custer nodded eagerly, and Mr. Shrimplin cleared his throat.

"He was called one-eye Murphy because he had only one eye--he'd lost the
other in a rough-and-tumble fight; it had been gouged out by a feller's
thumb. Murphy got the feller's ear, chewed it off as they was rolling
over and over on the floor, so you might say they swapped even."

"I wonder you'd pick on an afflicted person like that," observed Mrs.
Shrimplin.

"Afflicted! Well, he could see more and see further with that one eye
than most men could with four!"

"I should think four eyes would be confusin'," said Mrs. Shrimplin.

Mr. Shrimplin folded his arms across his narrow chest and permitted his
glance to follow Mrs. Shrimplin's ample figure as she moved to and fro
about the room; and when he spoke again a gentle melancholy had crept
into his tone.

"I dunno but a man makes a heap of sacrifices he never gets no credit
for when he marries and settles down. The ladies ain't what they used to
be. They look on a man now pretty much as a meal-ticket. I guess if a
feller chewed off another feller's ear in Mount Hope he'd never hear the
last of it!"

As neither Mrs. Shrimplin nor Custer questioned this point, Mr.
Shrimplin reverted to his narrative.