evint with her prisince!"

The sympathies of the soldiers were entirely with the After-Clap, who
loved soldiers, knowing them to be his true friends, and was never
happier than with his big, kind, blue-coated playmates, the troopers,
with their rattling sabres and clanking spurs.

Sergeant McGillicuddy, being himself under Mrs. McGillicuddy's iron
rule, did not approve of Kettle's breach of discipline and hatched a
scheme to catch him. With a countenance as inscrutable as the Sphinx,
he stepped to the telephone booth, shut the door carefully, and held a
short conversation over the wire with Mrs. McGillicuddy. When the
Sergeant came out of the telephone booth his face was not inscrutable
but expressed pure human joy and triumph.

"It's Missis McGillicuddy as 'll do for ye," said the Sergeant with a
grin, going up to Kettle, holding the delighted After-Clap in his arms.

"Go 'long, man," answered Kettle, "Mrs. McGillicuddy ain't my boss.
She's yourn."

This language, uttered toward a man with chevrons and three stripes on
his sleeve, naturally incensed the Sergeant. He had learned, however,
in twenty years of warfare with Kettle, that it was very hard to get
him punished.

"The naygur never has found out that orders is orders," remarked the
Sergeant to the lookers on. "But Missis McGillicuddy can wallop him
with one hand tied behind her back, and she'll do it, too, when she
finds out about the kiddie bein' out this time of night."