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job.”
    “I don’t care how tough it is, Papa,” I said. “If you’ll let me, I’d sure like to give it a try. I believe I can catch those monkeys—every last one of them.”
    Papa thought a second, and said, “It may not be as easy as you think it is. How would you go about catching them?”
    “With these,” I said, reaching in my gunny sack for the traps. “Grandpa fixed them for me. He thinks they’re the very thing for catching monkeys and not hurting them.”
    Papa took one of the traps and looked it over. Then he laughed and said, “Leave it to your grandpa to figure out something like this; but, by golly, it does look like a good idea. Yes, sir, it sure does. It might work at that.”
    Handing the trap back to me, Papa said, “You know, this time of the year there’s not much to do around the farm, just planting; and I can take care of that. You go right ahead and have a go at those monkeys. Maybe you can catch them; you’ve caught everything else in these hills.”
    “I’ll catch them,” I said, very determinedly. “You just wait and see. By tomorrow night, I’ll have a sack full of them; and one of them will be that hundred dollar monkey. He’s the jasper I’ll be looking for.”
    “We’ll see,” Papa said, laughing.
    Glancing up at the sun, he said, “Now, you’d better get to the house and help your mother set those hens. I’d like to finish planting this field before sundown.”
    I thanked Papa for going along with me on my monkey-catching business, and strutted off toward the house.
    So far everything was working out fine, but there was one more stump in the way. That was Mama. I was well prepared for her though. After all, I’d been living around Mama for fourteen years; and a boy can learn a lot about his mama in that length of time. I knew just what to do, and just what to say to wear her down.
    Papa had already told Mama about seeing the monkeys; but when I told her about the reward and that I intended to catch them, she did just what I had expected her to do. She flew straight up.
    “Jay Berry,” she said, in a hard voice, “you’re not going down in those bottoms to catch any monkeys. Now, that’s all there is to it. I won’t have it at all. Why, I’d go crazy.”
    Putting one of my half-dead, broken-leg looks on my face, I got ready for one of those Mama and boy go-arounds.
    “But, Mama,” I argued, “just think how much money those monkeys are worth, and you know that I never get a chance to make any money—just ten or fifteen cents now and then for an old possum hide or something. Why, if I could catch all of them, I could get myself the pony and .22 I’ve been wanting so long. You wouldn’t keep me from doing that would you?”
    I saw a hurt look spread over Mama’s face. This made me feel bad, but I had been wanting a pony and a .22 so long I didn’t want to give up.
    Mama came over to me and started straightening my suspenders.
    It seemed like my old suspenders were always twisted. Grandpa said I got into my britches too fast.
    “Jay Berry,” Mama said, “I know how you’ve been wanting a pony and a gun, but I worry so much when you’re down in the bottoms—just you and that old hound dog. Why, I never know what’s liable to happen. Besides, it would be practically impossible to catch a monkey in those bottoms. Monkeys like to climb, and some of those sycamore trees are a hundred feet tall. You’d probably fall out of one and break every bone in your body.”
    Reaching for my traps, I said, “Mama, I’m not going to do any tree climbing. I’m going to trap the monkeys.”
    Mama frowned and took one of the traps. She looked it over and said, “This is some of your grandpa’s work, isn’t it?”
    “Uh-huh,” I said. “He fixed them for me.”
    Shaking her head, Mama said, “I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder who the boy is, you or your grandpa. Have you talked to your father about this monkey-catching idea of yours?”
    Seeing that Mama was