Page:Lawrence Lynch--The last stroke.djvu/107

Rh ," Mrs. Fry hurried on, "and knowing how careless she is about keepin' things in the house against such times, I ran back into my bedroom and got a bottle of camphor and a roll of cotton batt. 'Run ahead, boy,' I says to the boy, 'an' tell her I am coming; I must lock up my doors and winders.' 'She's in an awful hurry,' he says, 'cryin' fit to kill. I'll set right down here and watch your house, ma'am; I can do no good there.' The boy spoke so honest, and Mary's boy is such a dear little fellow, that I jest lost my head complete, and ran off down the sidewalk. At the corner I looked back. The boy was sittin' on the doorstep, an' I heard him whistlin'; someway it made me feel quite easy. But when I got to the house and found them all in the sitting-room, and Neddy not hurt at all, but sound asleep on the floor, I was so took back that I just dropped down on a chair and acted like a wild woman. Instead of rushin' back that very minute, I sat there and told how I had been tricked, and scolded about that boy, an' vowed I'd have him well punished, and so on, until Mary reminded me that I'd better get back home and see if the house was all right, or if 'twas only a boy's trick."

"It looked like one, surely," was the detective's easy comment.

"That's what Mr. Jones said. He's my neighbour.