That cur belonged about four miles out of town, and he never let up until he got home.
I grabbed the muff just as he was disappearing under the house with it, and then I walked slowly back.

The people who didn't know me took me for an escaped convict--I was water-soaked and muddy, hatless, and had a sneaking expression, like that of a convicted horse-thief.

Two or three persons attempted to arrest me.

Finally, two stout farmers succeeded, and brought me into the village in triumph, and marched me between them to the jail.
"Why, what's Mr.Flutter been doin' ?" asked the sheriff, coming out to meet us.
"Do you mean to say you know him ?" inquired one of the men.
"Yes, I know him.

That's our esteemed fellow-citizen, young Flutter." "And he ain't no horse-thief nor nuthin'!" "Not a bit of it, I assure you." The man eyed me from head to foot, critically and contemptuously.
"Then all I've got to say," he remarked slowly, "is this--appearances is very deceptive." It was getting dusk by this time, and I was thankful for it.
"I slipped down in a mud-puddle and lost my hat," I explained to the sheriff, as I turned away, and had the satisfaction of hearing the other one of my arresters say, behind my back: "Oh, drunk!" I hired a little boy, for five cents, to deliver Miss Slocum's muff at her residence.