Mrs. Popapovitch will please stop
weeping and get down to brass tacks. Very well, the complaint is, your
honor, that Mr. Popapovitch got drunk at the grand ball. But that wasn't
the end of it. There's some more. A paragraph of tears and then, your
honor, listen to this: Mr. Popapovitch not only got drunk but he took a
chance on the raffle which cost one dollar and he won.
But what did he win! Oh, oh! He won a pig. A live pig. That was the prize.
A small, live pig with a ribbon round its neck. And, says Mrs. Popapovitch
(there's humor in a long foreign-sounding name because it conjures up
visions of bewildered, flat-faced people and bewildered, flat-faced people
are always humorous), and, says she, they had been married ten years.
Happily married. She washed, scrubbed, tended house. There were no
children. Well, what of that? Lots of people had no children.
Anyway, Anton worked, brought home his pay envelope O.K. And then he wins
this pig. And what does he do? He takes it home. He won't leave it
anywhere.
"What!" he says, "I leave this pig anywhere? Are you crazy? It's my pig. I
win him. I take him home with me."
And then? Well, it's midnight, your honor. And Anton carries the pig
upstairs into the flat.
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