"So I shouldered my load, and was nearly across the meadow before I thought of the haunted barn at the end of it. It wasn't a nice thing to remember; but I wasn't agoing to turn back, ghost or no ghost, and I tried to whistle again, when all at once that thing Al Smith was singing just now popped into my head, and says I to myself, 'That's so, Charles F. Bennet; you and your chums may think it's great fun to help yourselves to other people's apples and water-melons and such things, but it's just as much stealing as though you went into a man's house and stole his coat.' It doesn't seem as bad when you're going for 'em; but when you're coming back, up a lonely road, all alone, at ten o'clock at night, a lot of stolen apples on your back, and a haunted barn not far off, it seems worse.
"'THERE IT IS,' SAYS BARNEY."
"All the same, I held on to the apples. And when I faced the barn I determined I'd whistle if I died in the attempt; but, boys, I don't believe anybody could have told that 'Yankee Doodle' from 'Auld Lang Syne.' I tell you my heart jumped when I passed the tumble-down old place; but it stood still when, as I marched up the plank-road, I heard a step behind me. I wheeled around in an instant, but there was nothing to be seen. The moon shone as bright as ever, but there was nothing to be seen! 'I must have imagined it,' says I to myself, and I walked a little faster, listening with all my might, and sure enough pat, pat, pat, came the step after me. Again I wheeled round. Not a thing did I see. And again I started on, the apples growing heavier and heavier. Pat, pat, pat, came the step. It wasn't like a human step. That made it more dreadful. 'It must be the ghost,' I thought; and I don't mind telling you, fellers, I never was so frightened in my life. The time I fell overboard was nothing to it. I made up my mind, when I reached the bridge that crossed a little brook near our hotel, I'd streak it (I hadn't exactly run yet, for I was saving my strength till the last). But before I got to the bridge, says I to myself—and I must have said it out loud, though I didn't mean to—'Perhaps he wants the apples.'
"'Apples!' repeated a hoarse voice, with a horrid laugh.
"I tell you, boys, those apples flew, and I flew too. Over the bridge I went like lightning, and ran right into Barney Reardon, one of the stable-men, who was coming to look for me. 'Something has followed me,' I gasped, 'from the haunted barn—the ghost!' 'Did you see it?' says he. 'No,' says I, 'though I turned round a dozen times to look for it. But I heard it pat, pat, pat, behind me all the way.' 'And it's behind you now,' says Barney, bursting into a loud laugh. I jumped about six feet. 'There it is,' says Barney, roaring again, and pointing to—Pop Robins's tame raven! The sly old thing looked up at me, nodded its shining black head, croaked 'Apples!' and walked off. It had followed me from the barn, and every time I wheeled quickly round, it hopped just as quickly behind me, and so of course I saw nothing but the long road and the moonlight on it. But I never want to be so scared again, and if ever any of you boys go for anything belonging to other people, don't you count me in."
"What became of the apples?" asked Jerry O'Neil.
"If you'd 'a been there I could have told you," said Charley.