XXXI.

HIS PA JOINS A TEMPERANCE SOCIETY. THE GROCERY MAN
SYMPATHISES WITH THE OLD MAN--WARNS THE BAD BOY THAT HE MAY
HAVE A STEP-FATHER!--THE BAD BOY SCORNS THE IDEA--INTRODUCES
HIS PA TO THE GRAND "WORTHY DUKE!"--THE SOLEMN OATH--THE
BRAND PLUCKED FROM THE BURNING.

"Don't you think my Pa is showing his age good deal more than usual?"
asked the bad boy of the grocery man, as he took a smoked herring out of
a box and peeled off the skin with a broken bladed jack-knife, and split
it open and ripped off the bone, threw the head at a cat, and took some
crackers and began to eat..

"Well, I don't know but he does look as though he was getting old,"
said the grocery man, as he took a piece of yellow wrapping paper, and
charged the boy's poor old father with a dozen herrings and a pound
of crackers; "But there is no wonder he is getting old. I wouldn't go
through what your father has, the last year, for a million dollars. I
tell you, boy, when your father is dead, and you get a step-father, and
he makes you walk the chalk mark you will realize what a bonanza you
have fooled yourself out of by killing off your father. The way I figure
it, your father will last about six months, and you ought to treat him
right, the little time he has to live."

"Well, I am going to," said the boy, as he picked the herring bones out
of his teeth with a piece of a match that he sharpened with his knife.
"But I don't believe in borrowing trouble about a stepfather so long
before hand. I don't think Ma could get a man to step into Pa's shoes,
as long as I lived, not if she was inlaid with diamonds, and owned a
brewery. There are brave men, I know, that are on the marry, but none of
them would want to be brevet father to a cherubin like me, except he got
pretty good wages. And then, since Pa was dissected he is going to lead
a different life, and I guess I will make a man of him, if he holds out.
We got him to join the Good Templars last night."

"No, you don't tell me," said the grocery man, as he thought that his
trade in cider for mince pies would be cut off. "So you got him into the
Good Templars, eh?"

"Well, he thinks he has joined the Good Templars, so it is all the same.
You see my chum and me have been going to a private gymnasium, on the
west side kept by a Dutchman, and in a back room he has all the tools
for getting up muscle. There, look at my arm," said the boy, as he
rolled up his sleeve and showed a