und. In the side of a
knoll, screened from the house by the orchard wall and a thick nursery
of little apple trees, I secretly dug a hole which I lined with new
cedar shingles. For a lid to the orifice leading into it, I fitted a
sod. A little wild gooseberry bush overhung the spot, and I fancied that
I had my apples safely hidden.

But never was self-confidence worse misplaced! It was a cloudy, wet
afternoon in which I had thus employed myself. Halse had gone fishing;
but Addison chanced to be up garret, reading over a pile of old
magazines, as was his habit on wet days. From the attic window he espied
the top of my straw hat bobbing up and down beyond the wall, and as he
read, he marked my operations.

With cool, calculating shrewdness he remained quiet for three or four
days, till I had my new hoard well stocked with "Sweet Harveys," then
made a descent upon it and cleared it out. Next morning, when, with
great stealth and caution, I had stolen to the place, I found my
miniature cavern empty except for a bit of paper, on which, with a
lead-pencil, had been hastily inscribed the following tantalizing bit of
doggerel:

"He hid his hoard in the ground
And thought it couldn't be found;
But forgot, as indeed he should not,
That the attic window overlooked the spot."

For about three minutes I felt very angry, then I managed to summon a
grin, along with a resolve to get even with Addison--for I recognized
his handwriting--by plundering his hoard, if by any amount of searching
it were possible to find it. Addison was supposed to have the best and
biggest hoard of all, and thus far none of us had got even an inkling as
to where it was hidden.

I watched him as a cat might watch a mouse for two days, and made pretty
sure that he did not go to his hoard in the daytime. Then I bethought
myself that he always had a pocketful of apples every morning, and
concluded that he must visit his preserve sometime "between days," most
likely directly after he appeared to retire to his room at night.

So on the following night I lay awake and listened. After about half an
hour of silence, I heard the door of his room open softly. With equal
softness I stole out, and followed Addison through the open chamber of
the ell, down a flight of stairs into the wagon-house, and then down
another flight into the carriage-house cellar.

He had a lamp in his hand. When he entered the cellar the door closed
after him, so that I