Kit of Greenacre Farm

by Izola L. Forrester

And he had likewise warned them that that particular berry patch had been famous throughout the countryside ever since the days when Greenacres had belonged to the Trowbridges. Several times when it had happened to be a good year for the huckleberry crop, raiders had swept down and culled the best of the harvest. Not from around the near-by villages had they come, but from the small towns, ten or fifteen miles away.

"Them mill boys and girls," Shad declared, "just think that the Lord grows things in the country for anybody to come along and pick. They don't pay no more attention to a 'No Trespassing' sign than they would to a woodchuck's tracks. The only thing to do is watch, and when you see 'em turn in through the bars off the main road, you come down and let me know, and telephone over for Hannibal Hicks to come and ketch 'em. Hannibal ain't doin' nothin' to earn his fifteen dollars a year as constable 'round here, and we ought to help him out if we can."

So to-day, it was Kit's turn to watch the huckleberry patch from the cupola room, and along towards three o'clock she beheld a trig-looking red-wheeled, black-bodied wagon, drawn unmistakably by a livery horse, pull up at the pasture bars, and its driver calmly and shamelessly hitch there. He took out of the wagon not a burlap bag, but a tan leather hand bag of generous size, and also something else that looked like a capacious box with a handle to it.

"Camouflage," said Kit to herself, scornfully. "He's going to fill them with our berries, and then make believe he's selling books."

Down-stairs she sped with the news. Doris was out at the barn negotiating peace terms with a half-grown calf that she had been trying to tame for days, and which still persisted in butting its head every time she came near it with friendly overtures. Jean and Helen had gone up to Norwich with Mrs. Robbins for the day, and her father was out in the apple orchard with Philemon Weaver, spraying the trees against the attacks of the gypsy moths. Leastwise, Philemon held to spraying, but Mr. Robbins was anxious to experiment with some of the newer methods advocated by the government.

All unconscious of Kit's intentions or Shad's eagerness to abet them, the two rambled off towards the upland orchards. Kit had started Shad after the trespasser, while she went back to telephone to Mr. Hicks. The very last thing she had said to Shad was to put the vandal in the corn-crib and stand guard over him until Mr. Hicks came.

"Don't you worry one bit, Miss Kit," the constable of Gilead Township assured her over the wire. "I'll be there in my car in less than twenty minutes. You folks ain't the only ones that's suffering this year from fruit thieves, and it's time we taught these high fliers from town that they can't light anywhere they like and pick what they like. I'll take him right down to the judge this afternoon."

Kit sat by the open window and fanned herself with a feeling of triumphant indignation. If Jean or Helen had been home, she knew perfectly well they would have been soft-hearted and lenient, but every berry on every bush was precious to Kit, and she felt that now was the appointed hour, as Cousin Roxy would have said.

Inside of a few minutes, Shad came back, perspiring and red faced, but filled with unholy glee. He dipped a tin bucket into the water pail.

"I've got him," he said, happily, "safe and sound in the corn-crib, and it's hotter than all get out in there. He can't escape unless he slips through a crack in the floor. I just caught him red handed as he was bending down right over the bushes, and what do you suppose he tried to tell me, Miss Kit? He said he was looking for caterpillars." Shad laughed riotously at the recollection. "Did you call up Han Hicks?"