“'This job has to be done quick,' says the first one. 'And the best way is to ketch the woman and make her give up or tell where the stuff is hid. She ain't got far, because I heard her open this door.'
“Then they must have seen the cave door stannin' open. I heard them say something about 'cave,' and come runnin' up.
“'Hold on,' says one, and he fires a pistol-shot right into the cave. I was down with my mouth to the ground, flat as I could lay, but the sound of a gun always made me holler out, and holler I did as the ball seemed to come thud! right at me; but it stuck in the back of the cave.
“'All right. Here she is!' says the foremost man, and in they all went. I heard them stumble as they stepped down, and one began to blame the others for crowdin' after him when they ought to stopped at the mouth to ketch me if I slipped through his fingers.
“I don't know to this hour how I did it,” exclaimed the toll-woman, fanning herself, “nor when I thought of it. But the first thing I felt sure of I had that door slammed to, and the key turned in the padlock, and them three robbers was ketched like mice in a trap, instead of it's bein' me!”
Robert Day gave a chuckle of satisfaction, but aunt Corinne braced herself against the door-frame and gazed upon the magic cave with still wider eyes.
“Did they yell?” inquired Bobaday.
“It ain't fit to tell,” resumed the toll-woman, “what awful language them men used; and they kicked the door and the boards until I thought break through they would if they had to heave the whole weight, of dirt and sod out of the top. Then I heard somebody comin' along the 'pike, and for a minute I felt real discouraged; for, thinks I, if there's more engaged to help them, what's a poor body to do?
“But 'twas a couple of stock-men, riding home, and they stopped at the gate, and I run through the open house to tell my story, and it didn't take long for them with pistols in their pockets and big black whips loaded with lead in the handles, to get the fellows out and tie 'em up firm. I hunted all the new rope in the house, and they took the firearms away from the robbers, and drove 'em off to jail, and the robbers turned out to be three of the most desp'rate characters in the State, and they're in prison now for a long term of years.”
“What did you do the rest of the night?” inquired Grandma Padgett.