"But that print showed up plain as plain! And it was jest one word--kinder 'luminated on the wall. It was _strawberry_. That's all, jest _strawberry_. You'd think it would ha' been somethin' like _thief_ or _cheat_. Nope. It was jest _strawberry_. But I had to lay there all night with my eyes propped open, seeing that word on the wall.
"When daylight come it was still there. I seen it when I was dressin'. I carried it with me out to the stable. Everywhere I looked against a wall, I seed that word. If I hung my head and looked at the ground, it was there.
"I knowed if what I'd done about those meachin' little berries was ever knowed in the community, like enough I'd never be called by my right name any more. They'd call me 'Strawberry Bob.' I knowed it. That was goin' to be my punishment fur stealin'."
"Oh, Mr. Bob!" groaned Agnes, much moved by his earnestness.
"It's my belief," said old Bob Buckham, "that we don't hafter wait till the hereafter ter git our punishment for wrong-doin' here. I reckon most times we git it right here and now.
"Wal! I went erbout all that forenoon seein' _strawberry_ marked up everywhere. I snum! it was right acrosst marm's forehead when I looked at her--and there warn't no other mark there in them days, you may be sure.
"I started in to pack berries jest the same as I did the day before. Then, of a sudden, I says to myself, 'Bob Buckham, you derned thief! Stop it! Ten dollars a day won't pay you for bein' called "Strawberry Bob"!'
"So I boxed them poor berries separate and I told the shipper what I'd done the day before. I told him to take ten dollars off my order. He grinned at me.
"'There was a railroad wreck yesterday, Bob, and our car went to pot. I'll git full damages from the railroad company.'
"'Not for them berries of mine, Silas,' I told him. He was Silas Wales. 'You _de_-duct what my berries cost you in full, and I'll turn back my hull order to ye!'
"He hummed and hawed; but he done it. He axed me was I havin' a hard time meetin' the int'rest on my mortgage, an' I told him the trewth. When the mortgage come due that year he come 'round and offered to let me have the money at a cheaper rate than I'd been payin', an' all the time I wanted. Ye see, that was a cheap way of gittin' a reperation for bein' honest, after all."