A Slender Silver Snap

I marched back indoors to retire for the night, and there atop the dark wooden side table sat a sleek silver cylinder tipped with a springy metal clip! Sufferin' succotash—it was clipped firmly to the spine of a spiral notebook like an insolent silver watchman! I scrambled onto the polished tabletop, dug my heels into the grain, and hooked both gloved paws under the curled metal tip. With an almighty spluttering heave, I pried it upward! *Snap-ping!* The steel clip rebounded with a sharp crack, catapulting the heavy ballpoint pen sideways across the polished varnish until it clattered to a stop against an empty ceramic saucer. The sudden recoil threw me backward onto my tail, grinning ear-to-ear!