“Joe,” said she, “do they shoe at Peter’s shop?”
“Yes, Peter shoes lots of horses; but they go round to the houses to shoe oxen, carry the shoes and nails, and cast the cattle in the barn floor” (slings were not in use then) “to nail them on.”
“Do they ever shoe rams?”
Joe’s features instantly assumed a terrified expression. He colored to the very tips of his ears, but uttered no word.
“If,” said Sally, “it had been Ben Rhines, Seth Warren, Charlie, or anybody that could have taken their own part; but to set to work on that poor old man, one of the kindest men that ever lived, who took in that miserable Pete Clash, and clothed him, when he had no place to put his head, and whom everybody loves, to run the risk of killing or crippling him for life, I say it’s real mean!”
Joe made no reply, and Sally saw something very much like a tear in his eye. She pitied him from the bottom of her heart, but felt that for the reformation of such an incorrigible sinner it was her duty to go on.
“Did you ever see that before?” she inquired, holding before the terrified culprit the identical shoe, with the nails still sticking in it.
Joe uttered a groan.
“If it should get out, the neighbors would never speak to you again, and you’d have to leave town. I know you feel bad,” she continued, bursting into tears; “but what did put it into your head?”