"
"It's fine to see that you've learned not to drive a woman," she
returned with grim irony. "It's something to know at your age."
I smiled sympathetically upon her, and she continued:
"I might as well tell ye the whole of it, though I reckon my throat's
jist as like to be slit over it as not."
"I'll never breathe a word of it," I replied fervently.
"I'd trust ye," she said. "Well, there was a gang across the street to-
night--across from my place, I mean--and that sneaking Tom Terrill and
Darby Meeker, and I reckon all the rest of 'em, was there. And they was
runnin' back and forth to my place, and a-drinkin' a good deal, and the
more they drinks the louder they talks. And I hears Darby Meeker say to
one feller, 'We'll git him, sure!' and I listens with all my ears,
though pretendin' to see nothin'. 'We'll fix it this time,' he said;
'the Old Un's got his thinkin' cap on.' And I takes in every word, and
by one thing and another I picks up that there's new schemes afoot to
trap ye. They was a-sayin' as it might be an idee to take ye as you
come out of Knapp's to-night."
"How did they know I was at Knapp's?" I asked, somewhat surprised,
though I had little reason to be when I remembered the number of spies
who might have watched me.
"Why, Dicky Nahl told 'em," said Mother Borton. "He was with the gang,
and sings it out as pretty as you please."
This gave me something new to think about, but I said nothing.
"Well," she continued, "they says at last that won't do, fer it'll git
'em into trouble, and I reckon they're argyfying over their schemes
yit.
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