“Yeah, sure.” Smiley said, “and at the original price too.” He handed the boys each a new twenty-five cent piece. “Now this is our little business venture you understand, if you’re quiet about it I might be able to swing some more business your way. I don’t want nobody to know where I got that stranger’s frog.”

The boys agreed, hardly believing their good luck. They turned and commenced hunt’n for more frogs. They didn’t have any more birdshot but they didn’t care, they’d made near a fortune that day. Smiley emptied all the birdshot from the bullfrog into the little sack and put it and the frog in his pocket and headed back to town. He was whistling as he went.

Later that day the boys came into town carrying their sack full of frogs and saw a group of men out into the street in front of the Angels Hotel a yell’n and a carrying on something awful. It sounded like maybe a fistfight was going on and more men coming to the commotion, so they cut behind the hotel and out of sight but peeked through the old board fence.

“What do you think that’s all about?” asked Kenneth trying to get a good look through the fence. “Is it a fight?”

Zac peered between the rotted boards and said, “Peer’s to be, an that’s ol' Smiley his ‘self is down there in the middle of it all right. They must be hav’n that frog jump’n contest, he talked about, or one hell of a fight over it.”

“It is, I see that tall hat of his, that’s him sure.” John added, “an lookit that, there goes somebody like a bat down the street and Smiley right on his tail.”

“Wonder what they was a fight’n over,” Kenneth said scratching his head. “Think mebbe the constable will come and arrest them for fight’n?”

They watched for a while longer but no constable came, there was nothing worth staying for, nothing but howls of laughter and then Zachary said, “Nahh, Com’on we got better things to do. Nobody will ever give two hoots if’n they jumped them durned ol’ frogs anyhow.”

END