"Oh, yes!" cried the boy, in great sarcasm. "I know you—I know how you’ll pay me! The same way you paid me for the apples I brought you out of our orchard two weeks ago. I ain’t forgot that; have you? You said you’d give me five cents to bring you a hatful of apples, and I brought them. Then you kicked me, and when I follered you and asked for my five cents you throwed my hat in the brook and pushed me in after it. Oh, I’m the same feller you done them things to, and I kinder think it’s my turn to do a few things to you, mister."
Uric remembered all these things with some alarm, and he quickly said:
"Oh, I was just fooling with you, kid. Can’t you stand a joke?"
"Sure thing," chuckled the boy. "I’m the greatest feller to stand a joke you ever saw. And this is the kind of a joke I like to stand."
Scudder was furious.
"If I can get my hands on you again," he thought, "I’ll break your back!"
Aloud he said:
"Can’t you get a ladder somewhere and help me down? I’ll give you ten cents if you do."
"Will ye, honest?" exclaimed the boy, with pretended eagerness.
"Honest."