that don't suit you; but _I_ must be the
one to starve, an' sneak 'round anywhere I can, while _you're_ bein'
filled up with custard pie, an' sleepin' on a bed so soft that Plums
thought it was feathers. You make me tired, you do!"

"See here, Dan, I'm willing to do anything you say, now that you're
really in the scrape with us. Go to aunt Dorcas an' tell her I couldn't
come back. Perhaps she'll take you in my place."

"Perhaps she will, an' perhaps she won't. I s'pose you've been coddlin'
the old woman up so she thinks there's nobody in the world but Joe
Potter; an' I wouldn't want to bet a great deal of money that you
haven't been tellin' her I'm a chump, an' all that kind of stuff, so she
wouldn't look at me if I should go there."

"I never told her so much as your name--"

"Where are you goin'?" Dan interrupted, suspiciously.

"To get the princess; aunt Dorcas said I might bring her there."

"So! You felt awful bad about lettin' your aunt Dorcas feed three when
_I_ was 'round starvin', yet you can make it three by luggin' in your
bloomin' princess."

"Havin' a little baby in the house is different from a big boy like you,
Dan. There's no use for us to stand here chinnin' about it. I'm ready to
say I'm sorry for the way I talked to you yesterday, an' I'll 'gree
never to go back to aunt Dorcas's. Now, what more can I do?"

"But I want you to go back," Dan replied, angrily.

"What for?"

"I'm no chump, Joe Potter, an' I know what kind of a stew would be
served up to me if I went there alone. I want you to go an' introduce me
to the family."

"It's a dead sure thing, Dan, we can't all live there. You know Plums
won't work any more'n he has to, an' we're jest spongin' right off of a
poor woman what ain't got enough for herself."

"It ain't any worse for me than it is for you."

Joe was in a pitiable frame of mind.

Believing that Dan was being searched for by the attorneys simply
because of what he had done in the affair, Joe considered the amateur
detective had such a claim upon him as could not be resisted; yet, at
the same time, he was determined not to add a fourth member to aunt
Dorcas's family.

"Dan, you go an' tell her all I said,--tell her the whole truth if you
want to,--an' most likely she'll let you stay; but I can't ask her to
open up a reg'lar 'sylum for us fellers. Course I'm bound to do anything
you say, seein's you got into this trouble through me; but I won't 'gree
to sponge a livin'