reet, scanning the pavement for as far as he
could see: he had been doing this at intervals for the last hour.

'I wonder wherever he's got to,' he said, as he returned to the fire.

'I'm sure I don't know,' returned his mother. 'Perhaps he's had to
work overtime.'

'You know, I've been thinking lately,' observed Frankie, after a pause,
'that it's a great mistake for Dad to go out working at all. I believe
that's the very reason why we're so poor.'

'Nearly everyone who works is more or less poor, dear, but if Dad
didn't go out to work we'd be even poorer than we are now. We should
have nothing to eat.'

'But Dad says that the people who do nothing get lots of everything.'

'Yes, and it's quite true that most of the people who never do any work
get lots of everything, but where do they get it from? And how do they
get it?'

'I'm sure I don't know,' replied Frankie, shaking his head in a puzzled
fashion.

'Supposing Dad didn't go to work, or that he had no work to go to, or
that he was ill and not able to do any work, then we'd have no money to
buy anything. How should we get on then?'

'I'm sure I don't know,' repeated Frankie, looking round the room in a
thoughtful manner, 'The chairs that's left aren't good enough to sell,
and we can't sell the beds, or your sofa, but you might pawn my velvet
suit.'

'But even if all the things were good enough to sell, the money we'd
get for them wouldn't last very long, and what should we do then?'

'Well, I suppose we'd have to go without, that's all, the same as we
did when Dad was in London.'

'But how do the people who never do any work manage to get lots of
money then?' added Frankie.

'Oh, there's lots of different ways. For instance, you remember when
Dad was in London, and we had no food in the house, I had to sell the
easy chair.'

Frankie nodded. 'Yes,' he said, 'I remember you wrote a note and I
took it to the shop, and afterwards old Didlum came up here and bought
it, and then his cart came and a man took it away.'

'And do you remember how much he gave us for it?'

'Five shillings,' replied Frankie, promptly. He was well acquainted
with the details of the transaction, having often heard his father and
mother discuss it.

'And when we saw it in his shop window a little while afterwards, what
price was marked on it?'

'Fifteen shillings.'

Well, that's one way of getting money without working.

Frankie played with his toys in silence for