isfactory to you."

"But you lied to me on the road this morning."

Tom winced; under ordinary circumstances he would have resented such a
remark by "clearing away" for a fight. But he had a purpose to
accomplish, and he knew the character of him with whom he had to deal.

"I am sorry I did, now," answered Tom, with every manifestation of
penitence for his fault. "I didn't want to lie to you; and it went
against my conscience to do so. But I was afraid, if I told you my
father refused, up and down, to let me go, that you wouldn't be willing
I should come with you."

"I shall not be any more willing now I know all about it," added Bobby,
in an uncompromising tone.

"Wait till you have heard my story, and then you won't blame me."

"Of course you can go where you please; it is none of my business; but
let me tell you, Tom, in the beginning, that I won't go with a fellow
who has run away from his father and mother."

"Pooh! What's the use of talking in that way?"

Tom was evidently disconcerted by this decided stand of his companion.
He knew that his bump of firmness was well developed, and whatever he
said he meant.

"You had better return home, Tom. Boys that run away from home don't
often amount to much. Take my advice, and go home," added Bobby.

"To such a home as mine!" said Tom, gloomily. "If I had such a home as
yours, I would not have left it."

Bobby got a further idea from this remark of the true state of the
case, and the consideration moved him. Tom's father was a notoriously
intemperate man, and the boy had nothing to hope for from his precept
or his example. He was the child of a drunkard, and as much to be
pitied as blamed for his vices. His home was not pleasant. He who
presided over it, and who should have made a paradise of it, was its
evil genius, a demon of wickedness, who blasted its flowers as fast as
they bloomed.

Tom had seemed truly penitent both during his illness and since his
recovery. His one great desire now was to get away from home, for home
to him was a place of torment. Bobby suspected all this, and in his
great heart he pitied his companion. He did not know what to do.

"I am sorry for you, Tom," said he, after he had considered the matter
in this new light; "but I don't see what I can do for you. I doubt
whether it would be right for me to help you run away from your
parents."

"I don't want you to help me run away. I have done that already."

"But if