You see the girls were trying to stifle that still, small voice, and they tried to believe they were having a good time.
Grace and Susy had got their baskets nearly half full, and Prudy had covered the bottom of hers with leaves, stems, and a few berries, when a man's voice was heard muttering, not far off.
"O Grace," whispered Susy, "that's Mr. Judkins!"
He carried a whetstone, on which he was sharpening his jackknife.
"Ah," said he, talking to himself, and not appearing to notice the girls, "I never would have thought that these little children—ah, would have come into my field—ah, and trampled down my grass! I shall hate—ah, to cut off their little ears—ah, and see the blood running down!"
I suppose it was not two minutes before the children had left that field, pulling the screaming Prudy through the bars as roughly as if she had been a sack of wool instead of flesh and blood,—their hair flying in the wind, and their poor little hearts pounding against their sides like trip-hammers. If the field had been on fire they could not have run faster, dragging helpless Prudy, who screamed all the way at the very top of her voice.
Susy and Prudy had thrown away their pretty little baskets. Grace had pushed hers up her arm, and her sleeve was soaking in the red juice of the bruised strawberries, while little streams of juice were trickling down her nice, buff-colored dress, ruining it entirely.
"You hadn't ought to have took me up there," sobbed Prudy, as soon as she could find her voice; and these were the first words spoken.
"O, hush, hush right up!" cried Susy, in terror. "He's after us, to take us to jail."
The family were really frightened when the panting children rushed into the house in such a plight.