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So at last he got disgusted an' left; but before he went he got a wet three-bushel flour-bag an' climbed up very quietly onter the roof by the battens an' log weights an' riders, an' laid the wet bag very carefully acrost the top of the chimbly flue.
"Ever sence I was a little chap settin' on my granddaddy's knees by the hearth big hickory fire a-roarin' up the chimbly, wind a-goin' 'whooh! overhead, an' me with my eyes like saucers a-listenin' to his tales of the silver mine that the Injuns had ever sence that time I've hunted that thar mine." He laughed chucklingly, deep in his throat.
The chimbly ain't afire?" "No," said Tira. "Mebbe somethin's ketched." She got out of bed, ran into the sitting-room, noiselessly shut the crack of draught, and came back. "Them knots are kinder gummy," she said calmly, and was heartened by the evenness of her voice. "I guess 'twon't roar long."
It was dreadful lonesome. I judged he had got drowned, and I wasn't ever going to get out any more. I was scared. I made up my mind I would fix up some way to leave there. I had tried to get out of that cabin many a time, but I couldn't find no way. There warn't a window to it big enough for a dog to get through. I couldn't get up the chimbly; it was too narrow.
"Ned must be ill, or got a haccident o' some sort," he said to a very little but sharp boy who was to assist in the job. "Howsever, you an' me'll go at it alone, Sniveller." "Wery good, Bunky," replied Sniveller, "'ow is it to be? By the winder, through the door, down the chimbly, up the spout or wot?" "The larder windy, my boy." "Sorry for that," said Sniveller. "Why?"
"There's one of 'em in the settin'-room balancin' a plug-hat on his knees and sayin', 'Lo! the bridegroom cometh'; and there's two on the front steps kickin' the dog ev'ry time he comes at 'em; and there's one in the kitchen that smells o' tar, and has got a bagful of shells and sech things for presents to me; there's one in the barn lookin' over the stock and I s'pose they're comin' down the chimbly and up the suller stairs by this time.
"She mus' er gone up fru de chimbly, like Marse Santion Claws," said Agnes; and Diddie thought that was so funny that she giggled outright, and in a moment the wardrobe was opened and she was also taken prisoner. Then the four little captives were laid on their backs, and Polly scalped them with a clothes-brush for a tomahawk.
For critters that ain't human, I do suppose it spoke the truth, for it was enough to make a hoss larf, if he could understand it, that's a fact; but dirt, wretchedness and rags, don't have that effect on me. The roof was made of coarse slabs, battened and not shingled, and the chimbly peeped out like a black pot, made of sticks and mud, the way a crow's nest is.
But I thought to myself how handy it would be to have one on 'em in the neighborhood to rent out by the day to whitewash overhead or shingle the barn; they wouldn't even have to git up in a chair, and Id'no but they could lay a chimbly standin' on the ground; they wuz immense.
For critters that ain't human, I do suppose it spoke the truth, for it was enough to make a hoss larf, if he could understand it, that's a fact; but dirt, wretchedness and rags, don't have that effect on me. The roof was made of coarse slabs, battened and not shingled, and the chimbly peeped out like a black pot, made of sticks and mud, the way a crow's nest is.
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