“Thank ye, ma’am, I’ll be glad to do it, if you please.”
Accordingly, after the widow had retired up-stairs to her room and Seth and I to ours, Tom spread his blankets on the floor and went to bed himself.
All was dark and silent when, at one o’clock in the morning, Tom sat up in bed, and after fumbling about for a minute, found a match and lighted a candle.
“Have to get up early to get around the boss, eh?” said he to himself, with a chuckle. “Wonder if this is early enough.”
In his stocking-feet he walked to the back door and opened it wide. After pausing for an instant to listen, he came back, and lifting the empty oil barrel from its stand he carried it outside. Next he selected two buckets, and having reached down from a high shelf a large funnel, an auger and a faucet, he carried them and his boots into the back yard, and having locked the door behind him, walked off into the darkness.
In a short time he reappeared, leading a horse, to which was harnessed a low wood-sled. Upon this sled he firmly lashed the barrel, and gathering up the other implements he took the horse by the bridle and led him away down the silent street; for the town of Sulphide as yet boasted neither a lighting system nor a police force—or, rather, the police force was accustomed to betake himself to bed with the rest of the community—so Tom had the dark and empty street entirely to himself.
In a few minutes he drew up at the rear of Yetmore’s store, where, leaving the horse standing, he proceeded to count four planks from the edge of the window. Having marked the right plank, he took the auger, and crawling beneath the store, set to work boring a hole up through the floor. Presently the auger broke through, coming with a thump against the bottom of the barrel above, when Tom withdrew the instrument, and taking out his knife enlarged the hole considerably.
So far, so good. Next he set a bucket beneath the hole, took the faucet between his teeth in order to have it handy, and inserting the auger, he set to, boring a hole in the bottom of the barrel. Soon the tool popped through, when Tom hastily substituted the faucet, which he drove firmly in with a blow of his horny palm.
The putty-faced boy inside the store stirred in his blankets, muttered something about “them pigs,” and went to sleep again.
Tom waited a moment to listen, and then drew off a bucket of oil. As soon as this was full he replaced it with the other bucket and emptied the first one into the barrel on the sled. This process he repeated until the oil began to dribble, when he carefully knocked out the faucet, and having collected his tools and emptied the last bucket into the barrel, he again took the horse by the bridle and silently led him away.