ke 'n' lash
'm t'll--"

"People to _help_ him, Brother Marples! Well, I reckon you'd _think_
so if you'd 'a' been in this house for a while back. Why, they've
stole everything they could lay their hands on--and we a-watching all
the time, mind you. They stole that shirt right off o' the line! and
as for that sheet they made the rag ladder out of, ther' ain't no
telling how many times they _didn't_ steal that; and flour, and
candles, and candlesticks, and spoons, and the old warming-pan, and
most a thousand things that I disremember now, and my new calico
dress; and me and Silas and my Sid and Tom on the constant watch day
_and_ night, as I was a-telling you, and not a one of us could catch
hide nor hair nor sight nor sound of them; and here at the last
minute, lo and behold you, they slides right in under our noses and
fools us, and not only fools _us_ but the Injun Territory robbers too,
and actuly gets _away_ with that nigger safe and sound, and that with
sixteen men and twenty-two dogs right on their very heels at that very
time! I tell you, it just bangs anything I ever _heard_ of. Why,
_sperits_ couldn't 'a' done better and been no smarter. And I reckon
they must 'a' _been_ sperits--because, because, _you_ know our dogs,
and ther' ain't no better; well, them dogs never even got on the
_track_ of 'm once! You explain _that_ to me if you can!--_any_ of
you!"

"Well, it does beat--"

"Laws alive, I never--"

"So help me, I wouldn't 'a' be--"

"_House_-thieves as well as--"

"Goodnessgracioussakes, I'd 'a' ben afeard to _live_ in sich a--"

"Fraid to _live!_--why, I was that scared I dasn't hardly go to bed,
or get up, or lay down, or _set_ down, Sister Ridgeway. Why, they'd
steal the very--why, goodness sakes, you can guess what kind of a
fluster I was in by the time midnight come last night. I hope to
gracious if I warn't afraid they'd steal some o' the family! I was
just to that pass I didn't have no reasoning faculties no more. It
looks foolish enough _now_, in the daytime; but I says to myself,
there's my two poor boys asleep, 'way upstairs in that lonesome room,
and I declare to goodness I was that uneasy 't I crep' up there and
locked 'em in! I _did_. And anybody would. Because, you know, when you
get scared that way, and it keeps running on, and getting worse and
worse all the time, and your wits gets to addling, and you get to
doing all sorts o' wild things, and by and by you think to yourself,
spos