"Sure as shootin'," declared the express driver. He clapped his knee smartly to enforce his words. "There 'tis now," he added suddenly, and pointing with his thumb over his shoulder; "you're a-settin' ag'inst it this blessed minute, Mis' Hansell."
Little Mrs. Hansell turned convulsively, gave one look at the big box looming up behind her, then covered her face with her thin hands, and rocked back and forth on the grain bags.
"Oh, I don't believe it; I can't. I hain't never had a box. 'Tain't mine."
"Well, I'm a-goin' to dump it at your house, anyway," declared Mr. Bramble, "for it's got your name on it."
"'Tain't mine, an' I must git out an' go to Harrison road an' tell Mr. Shuggs that he can come and take us all to the poorhouse, for—"
"Land!" exclaimed Mr. Bramble, in a mighty shout that puffed out his red cheeks like small bellows, "'tain't so bad as that, is it? Thunder an' lightnin', an' that was where ye were goin'?" He was taken with a sudden fit of coughing and he blew his nose violently, wiped his eyes with the back of his mitten, and glanced off at the towering mountains as if he had never seen them before.
"O dear, dear, dear!" The little woman huddled on the grain bags was now in such a bad state at having told her secret that he whirled around to look after her.
"I must whip up Billy an' git there quick, or she'll be out over the wheel with her didoes, like enough," and he slapped the back of the old white horse with the doubled-up end of the reins so effectively that in due time the wagon jounced over the icy ruts of the winding road, and drew up in front of the little cabin nestling at the foot of the hill, the express driver mumbling within his straggly beard: "Well, I am busted, who'd 'a' thought she an' them children was struck so hard!"
Instantly the door burst open and a brood of children, six in number, the baby being left to sprawl on the kitchen floor, plunged out, trooping over the frozen ground, some of them running on the crust of the polished snow lying high in banks—any way to get there the quicker.
To see their mother riding in state in Mr. Bramble's express wagon was a supreme event, and they clambered over the wheels and fairly swarmed around her, as she tremblingly tried to get down.