We had to steal that chicken, and it went against the grain to do it. It was the first time in its career of crime the Dalton Gang had ever actually stolen anything. Except, of course, watermelons and such truck, which isn't really stealing. And except the ice cream from the Methodist lawn sociable, which was for revenge and as a punishment on the Sunday School, and so not really stealing, either.
Things got worse and worse. For Bill, he kept us on the jump. He got to wanting more and more different things to eat, and was more and more particular about the cooking. He wouldn't lift a hand for himself, not even to fill and light his own pipe. We waited on him hand and foot, all day long. And first he would take a fancy for a mess of squirrels, and then he would want pigeons; and we had to take turns fanning the flies off of him when he wanted to take a nap. Once he told a story, and we all laughed at it; and that gave him the idea he was a great story teller; and he would tell foolish yarns by the hour and get sulky if we didn't laugh. We got so we would do anything to keep him in a good humour. We had a lot of Indian stories and Old Sleuths out to the cave, and he made us take turns reading to him. That good-for-nothing loafer turned into a regular king, and we were his slaves.
Between sneaking out there to keep him happy and contented and rustling up grub for him, and thinking all the time we would be arrested the next minute, and wanting to confess and not daring to, we all got right nervous. Then there was a man came to town who didn't tell what his business was the first day he was there, and we were right sure he was a detective. He passed right by the cave one day, and we hugged the ground behind the bushes and didn't dare breathe. It turned out afterward he was only looking at some land he was figuring on buying. But that night I dreamed that that man arrested me; and I was being sent to jail when I waked up screaming out something about kidnapping. I heard my Pa say to my Ma, after they had got me quieted down:
“Poor little fellow! He thought he was kidnapped! No wonder he is afraid, the state this whole town is in. If those desperadoes are caught, they'll go to the pen for a good long term: nothing on earth can save 'em from a Bureau county jury.”
Then he went back into his room and went to sleep; but I didn't go to sleep. What he had said didn't make me feel sleepy. I slipped out of bed and prayed enough that night to make up for the times I had forgot it lately; and the next day the rest of the Dalton Gang admitted they had prayed some, too.
But the worst of all was when Bill made friends with the tramp. Squint and I went out to the cave one morning to get Bill's breakfast for him, and as we got near we heard two sets of snores. Bill's snore you could tell a long way off, he sort of gargled his snores and they ended up with kind of a choke and an explosion. But the other snore was more of a steady whistling sound. We ran across the fellow sudden, and it like to have frightened us out of a year's growth. He was lying just inside the cave with his hat pulled over his face, but he was snoring with one eye open. It peered out from under the brim of his hat; it was half-hidden, but it was open all right, and it was staring straight at us. It wasn't human; no one with good intentions would lie there like that and snore like he was asleep and watch folks at the same time on the sly. We couldn't even run; we stood there with that regular see-saw snore coming and going, and that awful eye burning into the centres of our souls, as Squint says later, and thought our end had come. But he waked up and opened the other eye, and then we saw the first one was glass and he hadn't meant any harm by it. He was right sorry he'd scared us, he said; but we'd have to get used to that eye, for he allowed he was kidnapped, too. It was two days before he quit being our captive and left, and they are among the saddest days I ever spent.
He left because Bill's whiskey was gone; and the afternoon he left, Bill was helpless. When we saw Bill in that fix it gave us an idea how to get rid of him. That night he was still weak and easy to handle. So we slipped the handcuffs on him and took him back and locked him into the calaboose again. Then we put signs and notices around town that read this way:
Ha Ha Ha
Did you ever get left! this town joshed me for years but I have got even—the joke is on to you—I wasn't kidnapped a tall—who is the suckers now?
Bill Patterson.