"Oh, I say!" exclaims Basil. "Isn't that perfectly rippin'! You have fresh eggs right along?" "All we can use," says I. "And we're eatin' the he--hens whenever we want 'em. Ducks, too." "How clever!" says Basil. "But you Americans are always so good at whatever you take up. And you such a hard drivin' business man, too! I don't see how you manage it." "Oh, it comes easy enough once you get the hang of it," says I. "As a matter of fact, I'm only just startin' in. Next thing I mean to have is a lot of turkeys. Might as well live high." "Turkeys!" says Basil. "And I've heard they were so difficult to raise. But I've no doubt you will make a huge success with them." "Guess I'll just have to show you," says I, waggin' my head. I was for gettin' some turkey eggs right away and rushin' along a flock so they'd be ready by Christmas, but both Vee and Leon insists that it can't be done. Seems it's too late in the season or something. They want to wait until next spring. "Not me," says I. "I've promised your Auntie I'd raise turkeys and I gotta deliver the goods. If we can't start 'em from the seed what's the matter with gettin' some sprouts? Ain't anybody got any young turkeys that need bringin' up scientific?" Well, I set Joe Cirollo to scoutin' around and inside of a week he has connected with half a dozen. They comes in a crate as big as a piano box and we turns 'em loose in the chicken yard. When I paid the bill I was sure Joe had been stuck about two prices, but after I've discovered what they're askin' for turkeys in the city markets I has to take it back. "Oh, well," says I, "if we can fatten 'em up maybe we'll come out winners, after all." "Sure!" says Joe. "We maka dem biga fat." After I'd bought a few bags of feed though, I quit figurin'. I knew that no matter how they was cooked they'd taste of money. All I was doubtful of now was whether they was the right breed of turkeys. "What's all that red flannel stuff on their necks?" I asks Joe. "Ain't got sore throats, have they!" "Heem?" says Joe. "No, no. Dey gooda turk. All time data way." "All right," says I, "if it's the fashion. I don't eat the neck, anyway." I couldn't get Leon at all excited over my gobblers, though. All he'll do is shake his head dubious. "They walk with such pride and still they behave so foolish," says he. "It ain't their manners I'm fond of," says I, "so much as it is their white meat. Even at that, when it comes to foolish notions, they've got nothing on your ducks." "Mais non," says Leon, meaning nothing sensible, "you do not understand the duck perhaps. Me, I raised them as a boy in Perronne. But the turkey! Pouff! He is what you call silly in the head. One cannot say what they will do next. Anything may happen to such birds."