Bessie among the Mountains

by Joanna H. Mathews

"Well, maybe you did not," said Bessie; "I'd rather think you did not. I'd rather think it was the pedler-man."

"Much you'd care who took it, if you once got it back," said the boy, sulkily.

"But I would care, and so would Maggie," said Bessie. "I'd rather—yes—I think I would—I'd rather be sure you hadn't taken it and never find it, than to find it and know you did steal it. Yes, I would, Lem, and I do love my cup very much."

"Oh! come now," said Lem, "you aint goin' to make me say I took it by any of that cant. Are you goin' or not?" and he came closer to the window, with a threatening look.

"We'll go in a minute," said Bessie. "This is my Maggie," and she put her arm about the neck of her sister, who had summoned up courage to peep in at the window again. "Pretty soon she is going to have a birthday, and Mr. Porter said he would do any thing she asked him for, and so she is going to ask him to do it for her now, and to let you out. Will you be glad of that, Lem?"

"You aint a goin' to make me say I took your old cup," persisted Lem, with some very bad words; and, too much shocked to talk to him any more, the little girls slipped down from the logs and ran away.

But shocked and frightened though they were, they did not forget their kind purpose; and a couple of hours later, Mr. Porter unlocked the door of the tool-house. His son John stood by, a lantern in his hand.

"I am going to let you out," said Mr. Porter to Lem; "not that you deserve it, if it was only on account of the apples, and I did mean to keep you here till to-morrow night at least; but those dear little girls that you've plagued so, have begged you off, and I couldn't refuse them. So just you bear that in mind, my lad, and let them alone for the time to come, or you won't find me so easy when next you fall into my hands. Here," and Mr. Porter put a package of food into the boy's hands, "take this, and be off with you. My son will see you safe home; for it's an awful dark night, and you might break your neck on the rocks without a light."

Had Lem done as he wished, he would have rushed off without waiting for company or light; but it was a terribly dark night, not a star was to be seen, for the whole sky was covered with the black clouds which told that a storm was coming, and he knew well enough that he could never find his way home over those dangerous rocks, without the light of the lantern. John Porter, though a good-natured man, was not at all pleased that his father had let Lem off so easily. The loss of the first of his much-prized Osborn apples, while they were yet half-ripe, had vexed him sorely, and he would have liked that Lem should have been severely punished for that theft, even had he not, in common with the rest of the household, believed that he had stolen the silver cup.