“Bet you. We thought we could get some of their lines. They had more’n enough. We went over there to Manny Cox’s shack, and she that was a girl was alone. So we took the lines.”
“Now, Bob!” murmured his mother.
“Guess a constable here wouldn’t be a bad thing after all,” chuckled Neale.
“Go on,” ordered Agnes.
“Why, that girl just cried and scolded. But the other one came back before me and Hank and Buddie got away.”
“The one you think was a boy?” asked Agnes.
“One I know was a boy—since he fought me. He didn’t do no cryin’. He squared right off, skirts an’ all, and jest lambasted me. And when Hank tried to put in an oar, he lambasted him. Buddie run, or he’d ’ve been licked, too, I guess.”
“Well!” exclaimed Bob’s mother. “I never did! And you never said a word about it!”
“What was the use?” asked her son. “We was licked. And the next morning that boy-girl and his sister was gone. We didn’t see ’em no more.”
“That is right,” said the woman thoughtfully. “They got away jest like that. I never did know what become of ’em or what they went for.”