THE CHICKEN THIEVES
OVER in one corner of the bay-window room, as Betty had already named
it, was a black register in the floor, designed to let the warm air
from a stove in the parlor below heat the bedroom above. Toward this
Betty crept cautiously, testing each floor board for creaks before she
trusted her whole weight to it. She reached the register, which was
open, and was startled at the view it opened up for her. She drew back
hastily, afraid that she would be discovered.
Lieson and Wapley stood almost squarely under the register, above the
crates of chickens and looking down on the fowls.
"I began to think you wasn't coming," Lieson said slowly, putting a
hand on his companion's shoulder to steady himself as he lurched and
swayed. "I got soaked to the skin waiting for you in those bushes."
"Well, it's some jaunt to Laurel Grove," came Wapley's response. "I got
a man, though. Coming at ten to-night. There's no moon, and he says he
can make the run to Petria in six or seven hours, barring tire trouble."
"Does he take us, too?" demanded Lieson. "I'm tired of hanging around
here. What kind of a truck has he got?"
Wapley was so long in answering that Betty nervously wondered if he
could have discovered the register. She risked a peep and found that
both men were absorbed in filling their pipes. These lighted and
drawing well, Wapley consented to answer his companion's question.
"Got a one-ton truck. Plenty of room under the seat for us. He's kind
of leery of the constables, 'cause he's been doing a nice little night
trade between Laurel Grove and Petria carrying one thing and another,
but he's willing to do the job on shares."
Lieson yawned noisily.
"Wish we had some grub," he observed. "Guess the training we got at
Peabody's will come in handy if we don't eat again till we sell the
chickens. Wouldn't you like to have seen the old miser's face when he
found his chickens were gone?"
So, thought Betty, she had not been mistaken; the black rooster was the
same one who had been the pride of Mrs. Peabody's heart.
A burst of harsh laughter from Wapley startled her. Leaning forward,
she could see him stretched out on the floor, his head resting on his
coat, doubled up to form a pillow.
"What do you know!" he gurgled, the tears standing in his eyes. "Didn't
I run into Bob Henderson, of all people!"
Lieson was incredulous.
"You're fooling," he said sullenly. "What would Bob be doing in Laurel
Grove? Unless he was playing ferret! I'd wring his neck with pleasure
if I thought the old man sent him over to spy."
"Don't worry," counseled Wapley, waving his pipe airily. "The lad
doesn't hook us up with the missing biddies. They never knew they were
stolen till ten o'clock this morning. The old man sold 'em to Ryerson,
and the hen houses stayed shut up till he came to get 'em. Can you beat
that for luck?"
Both men went off into roars of laughter.
"We needn't have spent the night lifting 'em," said Lieson when he
could speak. "I hate to lose my night's rest. What did Bob say about
it? Was the old man mad?"
"'Bout crazy," admitted Wapley gravely. "Bob wasn't home, but the old
lady told him he carried on somethin' great. Wish we could 'a' heard
him rave. But, Lieson, you haven't got it all. Betty Gordon's run off,
and Peabody's doped it out she ran off with the hens!"
The girl in the room above clapped her hand to her mouth. She had
almost cried out. So Mr. Peabody could accuse her of being a thief! But
what were the men saying?
"What would the girl do with hens?" propounded Lieson. "Bob think she
stole 'em?"
"Bob's so close-mouthed," growled Wapley. "But I guess he knows where
she went all right. He says she had nothing to do with the hens
disappearing, and I told him I thought he was right! But Peabody
figures out she was mad and chased 'em into the woods to spite him. And
he's hunting for her and his hens with fire in his eye."
Lieson knocked the ashes from his pipe and yawned again.
"Wonder what Peabody's got against her now?" he speculated. "For a
boarder, that kid had a pretty pindling time. Well, if we're going to
be bumped around in a truck all night, I'll say we ought to take a nap
while we can get it."
"All right," agreed Wapley. "But I ain't aiming to go on any such trip
without a bite of supper. The rain's stopped, and I'm going to snooze a
bit and then go down the road to that farmhouse and see how they feel
about feeding a poor unfortunate who's starving. I'll milk for 'em for
a square meal."
Betty, shivering with excitement, crouched on the floor afraid to risk
moving until they should be asleep. Her one thought was to get away
from the house and find Bob. Bob would know what to do. Bob would
get the chickens back to the Peabodys and herself over to the haven
of Doctor Guerin's house, somehow. Bob would be sorry for Wapley and
Lieson even if they had turned chicken thieves. If she could only get
to Bob before he set out for home or if she might meet him on the road,
everything would be all right, Bob _must_ wait for her.
There were no back stairs to the house, and it required grit to go
softly down the one flight of stairs and steal past the door of the
parlor where the two men lay, but Betty set her teeth and did it. Once
on the porch she put on her hat and sweater, for a cool wind had sprung
up; and then how she ran!
The road was muddy, and her skirt was splashed before she slowed down
to gain her breath. Anxiously she scanned the road ahead, wondering if
there was another way Bob could take to reach Bramble Farm. As usual
when one is worried, a brand-new torment assailed her. Suppose he
should take the road to Glenside, that he might stop in to see her! He,
of course, pictured her safe at the doctor's.
"Want a lift?" drawled a lazy, pleasant voice.
A gawky, blue-eyed boy about Bob Henderson's age beamed at her from a
dilapidated old buggy. The fat, white horse also seemed to regard her
benevolently.
"It's sort of muddy," said the boy diffidently. "If you don't mind
the stuffing on the seat--it's worn through--I can give you a ride to
Laurel Grove."
Betty accepted thankfully, but she was not very good company, it must
be confessed, her thoughts being divided between schemes to hasten the
desultory pace of the fat white horse and wonder as to how she was to
find Bob in the town.
The fat white horse stopped of his own accord at a pleasant looking
house on the outskirts of the town, and Betty, in a brown study, was
suddenly conscious that the boy was waiting for her.
"Oh!" she said in some confusion. "Is this your house? Well, you were
ever so kind to give me a lift, and I truly thank you!"
She smiled at him and climbed out, and the lad, who had been secretly
admiring her and wondering what she could be thinking about so
absorbedly, wished for the tenth time that he had a sister.
Laurel Grove was a bustling country town, a bit livelier than Glenside,
and Betty, when she had traversed the main street twice, began to be
aware that curious glances were being cast at her.
"I'd go shopping, I'd do anything, for an excuse to go into every
store," she thought distractedly, "if only I had a dollar bill! Where
can Bob be? I can't have missed him!"
There was every reason to think she had missed him, except her
determined optimism, but after she had been to the drug store and the
hardware store and the post-office, all more or less public meeting
places, and found no sign of Bob, Betty began to feel a trifle
discouraged. Then two men on the curb gave her a clue.
"I've been hanging around all day," declared one, evidently a thrifty
farmer. "Came over to get some grinding done, and the blame mill
machinery broke. They just started grinding an hour ago."
So there was a mill, and Bob often had to go to mills for Mr. Peabody.
Betty did not know why he should have to come so far, but it was quite
possible that some whim of the master of Bramble Farm had sent him to
the Laurel Grove mill. Betty stepped up to the farmer and addressed him
quietly.
"Please, will you tell me where the mill is?" she asked.