Well, all of us knew Jake Hines, the doctor's hired man, and he was foreman of Fearless Hose Company No. 2, and every night he went over to the hose-house and played cards after he got his work done at the doctor's. I went to bed about nine o'clock, but I left my clothes on, and when I thought it was midnight I got up and went downstairs and went out into the alley. Swatty was there already, sitting in the shadow of Doc Miller's manure box, but Bony hadn't come, so we guessed he was a 'fraid-cat and didn't dare. So we went ahead without him.
The doctor's old gray mare was standing with her head at the little square window, and Swatty got on the manure box and climbed in. He opened the stable door and I went in after him. The old mare looked around at us, but she didn't make any trouble, and Swatty untied the halter strap and we led her out into the alley. We led her across the public square, and down into the creek and then up the creek to where our cave was. She came right along as easy as anything and we got her up the bank and to where we had caved in the roof of the back cave. She didn't want to go down there. I guess she thought it was kind of funny to be taken into a hole like that, but a doctor's horse is used to being out at night and to going into all sorts of places, and at last she set her front feet and slid down. It was pretty steep, but she went down easy. Swatty tied the halter strap to one of her front feet and we left her there.
We went back home and I went to bed. I was pretty scared. I thought the doctor would get up in the morning and see his mare was gone and would get a lot of people and police and there would be crowds hunting the mare. I had pretty bad dreams. I dreamed I was hung about eight times for horse stealing.
When I got up in the morning I was mighty sick of it, you bet. I made up my mind I wouldn't do any more, no matter how many babies the doctor brought to our house. I would stay at Aunt Nell's and let on I didn't know anything about gray mares or anything. I was through.
So about nine o'clock, Swatty came to Aunt Nell's to get me, and he was just hopping, he was so tickled.
“Garsh!” he said. “It's better than I ever thort it would be. I came through the alley and Jake Hines was sitting on the manure box waiting for the mare to come home. And what do you think?”
“What?” I asked.
“He said he would give me a quarter if I found the mare,” Swatty said. “He said he guessed he had left the stable door open and she had wandered away and maybe she would come back, but if I hunted around and found her and brought her back he would give me a quarter. So I'm hunting around for her.”
Well, I didn't feel so bad. Bony came and said it wasn't because he was scared that he didn't come out last night, but because he had gone to sleep and hadn't waked up. So Swatty talked some more and we all felt fine. We seen it was bully. So I took my dollar, like we had fixed it for me to do, and I bought some bread and some butter and some things to eat while Swatty and Bony went out to the cave. We didn't want Doctor Miller to starve to death while we had him locked in the cave because that would be murder. So I took what I had bought to the cave and we put it where the doctor could see it, and then we went down to the doctor's house. It was about ten o'clock. We went to the front door and rung the bell and Mrs. Miller came to the door.
“Is Doctor Miller at home?” Swatty asked.