“And I’ll have my mother put up lunch for us,” he said, “for we may spend the whole day. We will all meet at my house at nine o’clock to-morrow morning. We’ll need a big lunch, because if we dig a lot we’ll be mighty hungry--” He stopped short. “Pshaw!” he said. “I forgot to feed Orlando!” “Orlando?” I asked, for this was the first time I had heard of any Orlando. “Who’s Orlando?” Jibby looked at me. “My goodness!” he exclaimed. “Didn’t I ever tell you about Orlando? That’s because we’ve had Orlando so long I never think much of him, I guess. Orlando is my father’s pet skunk.” We did not say anything. Mr. Jones is an author, and an author is liable to have almost any kind of pet. They are funny folks, mostly, I guess. “My father caught Orlando when Orlando was no bigger than a cat’s kitten,” Jibby Jones went on. “He caught Orlando in Pike County, Pennsylvania, and he raised Orlando on a bottle, and Orlando is as affectionate as a kitten. If you catch a skunk young and treat it right, it is the most affectionate pet you can have, and it makes the best kind of watchdog--if you can call a skunk a dog. We keep Orlando in the cellar, and I have to feed Orlando when my father does not. And father is away to-day and I forgot to feed Orlando. I’ll have to go home now and feed Orlando.” “Gee whiz!” Skippy said. “That’s a funny kind of pet. Don’t it ever--well, you know!--perfumery?” “Oh, no, indeed!” Jibby drawled. “That’s where you do Orlando a great wrong, Skippy. If a skunk is fond of you, and knows you, it never bothers you that way. It is only when a skunk is hostile to you that it bothers you that way.” “Has--has Orlando ever been hostile?” Wampus asked. “Yes, once,” Jibby said. “When we were in Kalamazoo, Michigan, my father was sick and a one-legged barber named Horace L. Spurting used to come to the house to shave father. We had a peach tree in the side yard and the peaches were ripe, and one evening Horace L. Spurting thought he would steal a couple of peaches, and he climbed the fence and sneaked up to the tree, and Orlando was taking a nap under the tree, and Horace L. Spurting stepped on Orlando’s tail. For three days Horace L. Spurting was unconscious, and we had to bury his clothes six feet deep and cut down the peach tree and burn it, and move into another house two miles away. Ever since then Orlando has been hostile to one-legged men because Horace L. Spurting had one leg. I don’t think Orlando is hostile to men with two legs or to women, but he might be hostile to the Legless Lady in the circus. But I must go home now and feed Orlando.” “What do you do with Orlando when you are traveling?” Tad asked. “We carry him in a green cloth bag, so he can’t see whether there are any one-legs or not,” Jibby said. Then we all went home. I went with Jibby, because we live near each other.