“Now, about this time, Tom Buttonporgie come over the mo’ntain inter the walley. Late in the afternoon he reached Ben Clock’s place near Eden, an’ ez they knowd him well they ast him to spend the night. After supper the family hed a game o’ cards an’ about nine o’clock Tom tuk up his pack an’ started fer the barn where he was to sleep, fer the house was full. Clock lighted the way with a lantern an’ saw him comfortable fixed. The pack was stowed away in a corner o’ the barn-floor, while the pedler was settled nice ez ye please on a horse-blanket in the hay-mow.
“Tom Buttonporgie slept sound an’ hard. Everything in this world was pleasant fer him. Things was goin’ his way. It’s strange that it should be so, boys, but yit it is true that sleep comes easiest an’ quickest to them ez hes nawthin’ but good things to forget in it. So from the time he laid his head down on the hay till a kick awoke him, Tom knowd nawthin’. He opened his eyes with a jerk an’ set up an’ rubbed ’em. The airly mornin’ light was jest creepin’ inter the barn, but he could make out only a small, dark figure a few feet away.
“‘Good morning, Mr. Clock,’ sais he wery pleasant, tho’ he was a leetle put out at the rough way he’d ben woke.
“‘Good mornin’, Tom,’ sais the figure wery cheerful. ‘You’ve mistook me, fer my name is Berrybush.’
“‘Hen the pedler hear that he made a grab fer his pistol. He’d laid it in the hay close to him, but now it was gone. He started to rise but he felt a steel bawrel pressed agin his head. Buttonporgie was big an’ full o’ grit, but he knowd that ye can’t argy with lead. So he set down.
“‘Well,’ sais he, ‘I guess you’ve got me, Mr. Berrybush.’
“‘I think I hev,’ the murderer answers, ‘an’ I’ve got ye good,’ he sais. ‘I intend to keep ye, too, fer I’m right fresh out o’ jail an’ soon the whole country’ll be lookin’ fer me. Excuse the familiarity,’ he goes on polite like, ‘but we’ll be Tom an’ Si fer some hours to come, fer you’re to carry me outen these parts in your pack.’
“That idee made Buttonporgie gasp. He tried to git up but bumped agin the pistol.
“Si Berrybush laughed an’ went on in that pleasant way o’ his: ‘I notice the plan ain’t takin’ well with ye, Tom, but you’ll see how nice it works. While you slept,’ he sais, ‘I fixed the pack. The goods is all stowed away here in the hay an’ I find I fit the leather box to a T. I git in it; you put it on your back an’ go th’ee mile an hour. Nawthin’s easier.’