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fetch it. And then mosey right down the lightning-rod and come along. I'll

go and stuff the straw into Jim's clothes to represent his mother in disguise, and

be ready to ba like a sheep and shove soon as you get there."

So out he went, and down cellar went I. The hunk of butter, big as a

person's fist, was where I had left it, so I took up the slab of corn-pone with it

on, and blowed out my light, and started up stairs, very stealthy, and got up to

the main floor all right, but here comes Aunt Sally with a candle, and I clapped

the truck in my hat, and clapped my hat on my head, and the next second she

see me; and she says: ssssssssss

"You been down cellar?"

"Yes'm." ssssssssss

"What you been doing down there?"

"Noth'n." ssssssssss

"Noth'n!" ssssssssss

"No'm." ssssssssss

"Well, then, what possessed you to go down there, this time of night?"

"I don't know'm."

"You don't know? Don't answer me that way, Tom, I want to know what

you been doing down there?" ssssssssss

"I hain't been doing a single thing, Aunt Sally, I hope to gracious if I

have."

I reckoned she'd let me go, now, and as a generl thing she would; but I

spose there was so many strange things going on she was just in a sweat about

every little thing that warn't yard-stick straight; so she says, very decided:

"You just march into that setting-room and stay there till I come. You

been up to something you no business to, and I lay I'll find out what it is before

I'm done with you." ssssssssss

So she went away as I opened the door and walked into the setting-room. My,

but there was a crowd there! Fifteen farmers, and every one of them had a gun.

I was most powerful sick, and slunk to a chair and set down. They was setting

around, some of them talking a little, in a low voice, and all of them fidgety and

uneasy, but trying to look like they warn't; but I knowed they was, because they

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