AN ENEMY IN THE DARK
The whispered conference between Hiram Strong and the storekeeper could not be heard by the curious crowd around the cold stove; nor did it last for long.
Caleb Schell finally closed his ledger and put it away. Hiram shook hands with him and walked out.
On the platform outside, which was illuminated by a single smoky lantern, a group of small boys were giggling, and they watched Hiram unhitch the old horse and climb into the spring wagon with so much hilarity that the young farmer expected some trick.
The horse started off all right, he missed nothing from the wagon, and so he supposed that he was mistaken. The boys had merely been laughing at him because he was a stranger.
But as Hiram got some few yards from the hitching rack, the seat was suddenly pulled from under him, and he was left sprawling on his back in the bottom of the wagon.
A yell of derision from the crowd outside the store assured him that this was the cause of the boys' hilarity. Luckily his old horse was of quiet disposition, and he stopped dead in his tracks when the seat flew out of the back of the wagon.
A joke is a joke. No use in showing wrath over this foolish amusement of the crossroads boys. But Hiram got a little the best of them, after all.
The youngsters had scattered when the "accident" occurred. Hiram, getting out to pick up the seat, found the end of a strong hemp line fastened to it. The other end was tied to the hitching rack in front of the store.
Instead of casting off the line from the seat, Hiram walked back to the store and cast that end off.
"At any rate, I'm in a good coil of hemp rope," he said to one of the men who had come out to see the fun. "The fellow who owns it can come and prove property; but I shall ask a few questions of him."There was no more laughter. The young farmer walked back to hiswagon, set up the seat again, and drove on.
The roadway was dark, but having been used all his life to country roads at night, Hiram had no difficulty in seeing the path before him. Besides, the old horse knew his way home. He drove on some eighth of a mile. Suddenly he felt that the wagon was not running true. One of the wheels was yawing. He drew in the old horse; but he was not quick enough.
The nigh forward wheel rolled off the end of the axle, and down came the wagon with a crash!
Hiram was thrown forward and came sprawling--on hands and knees-- upon the ground, while the wheel rolled into the ditch. He was little hurt, although the accident might have been serious.
And in truth, he knew it to be no accident. A burr does not easily work off the end of an axle. He had greased the old wagon just before he started for the store, and he knew he had replaced each nut carefully.
This was a deliberately malicious trick--no boy's joke like the tying of the rope to his wagon seat. And the axle was broken. Although he had no lantern he could see that the wagon could not be used again without being repaired.
"Who did it?" was Hiram's unspoken question, as he slowly unharnessed the old horse, and then dragged the broken wagon entirely out of the road so that it would not be an obstruction for other vehicles.
His mind set instantly upon Pete Dickerson. He had not seen the boy when he came out of the crossroads store. If the fellow had removed this burr, he had done it without anybody seeing him, and had then run home.
The young farmer, much disturbed over this incident, mounted the back of the old horse, and paced home. He only told Mrs. Atterson that he had met with an accident and that the light wagon would have to be repaired before it could be used again.
That necessitated their going to town on Monday in the heavy wagon. And Hiram dragged the spring wagon to the blacksmith shop for repairs, on the way.
But before that, the enemy in the dark had struck again. When Hiram went to the barnyard to water the stock, Sunday morning, he found thatsomebody had been bothering the pump.
The bucket, or pump-valve, was gone. He had to take it apart, cut a new valve out of sole leather, and put the pump together again.
"We'll have to get a cross dog, if we remain here," he told "Mrs. Atterson. There is somebody in the neighborhood who means "us harm.""Them Dickersons!" exclaimed Mrs. Atterson.
"Perhaps. That Pete, maybe. If I once caught him up to his tricks I'd make him sorry enough.""Tell the constable, Hi," cried Sister, angrily.
"That would make trouble for his folks. Maybe they don't know just how mean Pete is. A good thrashing--and the threat of another every time he did anything mean--would do him lots more good."This wasn't nice Sunday work, but it was too far to carry water from the house to the horse trough, so Hiram had to repair the pump.
On Monday morning he routed out Sister and Mr. Camp at daybreak. He had been up and out for an hour himself, and on a bench under the shed he had heaped two or three bushels of radishes which he had pulled and washed, ready for bunching.
He showed his helpers how the pretty scarlet balls were to be bunched, and found that Sister took hold of the work with nimble fingers, while Mr. Camp did very well at the unaccustomed task.
"I don't know, Hi," said Mrs. Atterson, despondently, "that it's worth while your trying to sell any of the truck, if we're going to leave here so soon.""We haven't left yet," he returned, trying to speak cheerfully. "And you might as well get every penny back that you can. Perhaps an arrangement can be made whereby we can stay and harvest the garden crop, at any rate.""You can make up your mind that that Pepper man won't give us any leeway; he isn't that kind," declared Mother Atterson, with conviction.
Hiram made a quick sale of the radishes at several of the stores, where he got eighteen cents a dozen bunches; but some he sold at the big boarding-school--St. Beris--at a retail price.
