"It begun to look as if you was goin' to stay all night," Dan said, petulantly, when Joe appeared. "There's more'n a hundred people walked past here, an' I'll bet some of 'em was huntin' for us; we've got to get out of this place mighty lively, if you don't want to be chucked into jail."
Plums looked so thoroughly terrified that Joe at once understood the amateur detective had been frightening him by picturing improbable dangers, and said, almost sharply:
"There's no use makin' this thing any worse than it really is."
"That can't be done, Joe Potter. You're in an awful scrape, an' don't seem to know it."
"I wish I'd stood right up like a man till I'd found the princess's folks, an' then gone to jail, if the lawyers are so set on puttin' me there."
"What's comin' over you now?"
"I'm thinkin' of that poor little swell we've brought out here."
"She's a good deal better off than if you let her tag along behind."
"That may be; but I ought'er found her folks instead of runnin' away."
"Now, see here, Joe Potter, you're makin' a fool of yourself, an' all about a kid what's goin' to have a soft snap while she stays here. Of course if you want to be put into jail for two or three years, I won't say another word, an' you can rush right straight back to the city."
"Don't stand here talkin'!" Plums cried, in an agony of apprehension. "We've got to leave, else nobody knows what may happen!"
Dan seized Joe by the arm, literally forcing him onward, and the two who were ignorant of having committed any crime continued the flight from the officers of the law.
CHAPTER VII.
AUNT DORCAS
When the three had set out from Mrs. Weber's home, the amateur detective announced that no halt would be made until sunrise.
Joe, whose thoughts were with the princess, gave little heed to this statement, if, indeed, he understood it, and Master Plummer had been so terrified by Dan's positive assertion regarding the possibility of an immediate arrest that he had failed to realise the labour which would be required in thus prolonging the flight.
Before an hour passed, however, even the detective himself began to think he might have made a rash statement, and Plums, unaccustomed to such violent exercise, was well-nigh exhausted.
By this time Joe had come to understand what might be the result if Dan's advice was followed implicitly, and this, together with the knowledge that each moment he was increasing the distance between himself and the princess, served to make him reckless.
"Look here, Dan Fernald," he said, coming to a second halt. "Let's talk over this thing before we go any further."
"Perhaps you think we can afford to loaf 'round here," the amateur detective said, sternly. "If you fellers want to keep your noses out of jail, you'd best hump yourselves till daylight, an', even then, we won't be far enough away."
"We're jest as far now as I'm goin'," and there was that in Joe's voice which told his companion that he would not be persuaded into changing his mind.
"What?" Dan screamed.
"That's all there is to it. I'll stop here, an' you fellers can keep on if you like."
"But, Joe, if there was woods somewhere near I wouldn't say a word. How can you hide where there's so many houses close 'round?"
"I don't count on hidin', 'cause I can't afford it. Even if them lawyers get hold of me to-morrer mornin', I'm goin' to stop here."
"Right here in the road?" Plums asked, with less anxiety than he would have shown an hour before, when he was not so tired.
"Well, I don't mean to say I'll camp down in the road. But you fellers listen to me. If the detectives are out after us, an' I s'pose, of course, they are, we sha'n't be any safer twenty miles away than in this very spot. We've got to stop sometime, an' it may as well be now. I promised to go back to see the princess in two days, an' I'll keep my word."
"But where'll you stay all that time?" Dan asked, as if believing this was a question which could not be satisfactorily answered.
"I don't know yet; but I'm thinkin' of goin' up to that house," and Joe pointed to a tiny cottage, which in the gloom could be but dimly seen amid a clump of trees. "There's a light in the window, so of course the folks are awake. I'll ask 'em if they haven't got work enough about the place sich as I could do to pay my board over one day, an' if they say no, I'll try at the next house."
"You might as well go right into jail as do a thing like that," Dan said, angrily.
"I ain't so sure but it would have been a good deal better if I had, for by this time the princess would be with her folks, where she belongs."
"It seems to me you're terribly stuck on that kid."
"Well, what if I am!" and Joe spoke so sharply that Master Fernald did not think it wise to make any reply.
During fully a moment the three stood silently in the road looking at each other, and then Joe asked of Master Plummer:
"Will you come with me?"
The possibility of resting his tired limbs in a regular bed appealed strongly to the fat boy, and, understanding that he was about to agree to Joe's proposition, Dan said, gloomily:
"This is what a feller gets for tryin' to help you two out of a scrape. I've kept the detectives away so far, an' now you're goin' to give me the dead shake."
"There's no reason why you couldn't stay with us – "
"You won't catch me in a house for another month, anyhow."
The argument which followed this announcement was not long, but spirited.
Joe explained that it was his intention to remain in that vicinity, and within forty-eight hours to return to Weehawken, according to the promise he had made Mrs. Weber.
Dan continued to insist that it was in the highest degree dangerous to loiter there, and professed to believe himself deeply injured, because, after having "taken up the case" in such an energetic fashion, he was probably in danger of arrest through having aided these two supposed criminals.
Master Plummer had but little to say; the thought of walking all night was nearly as painful as that of being imprisoned, and he was willing to throw all the responsibility of a decision upon his friend.
Before ten minutes had passed, the matter was settled, – not satisfactorily to all concerned, but as nearly so as could have been expected.
Joe and Plums were to call at the cottage with the hope of finding temporary employment, and the amateur detective was to conceal himself in the vicinity as best he might, until he should be able to learn something definite regarding the purpose of the lawyers who had advertised.
When Joe, followed by Master Plummer, turned from the highway into the lane which led to the cottage, the amateur detective scrambled over the fence on the opposite side of the road, and scurried through the field as if believing he was hotly pursued.
Not until they had arrived nearly at the house did Master Plummer make any remark, and then he said, with a long-drawn sigh:
"Dan Fernald makes too much work out of his detective business to suit me. I couldn't walk all night if it was to save me life."
"I don't believe there's any reason why we should, Plums. Because Dan thinks the cops have followed us over to Weehawken doesn't make it so, an' if we can't hide here, we can't anywhere, 'cordin' to my way of thinkin'. Besides, it wouldn't be fair to go off so far that we can't get back to the princess."
Then Joe advanced to the side door, and knocked gently, Plums whispering, hoarsely, meanwhile:
"Be ready to skip, if you hear a dog. I've been told that folks out this way keep reg'lar bloodhounds to scare away tramps."
"I ain't 'fraid of dogs as much as I am that the man who lives here will run us off the place the first minute he sees our faces," Joe replied, and at that instant the door was opened.
Holding a lamp high above her head, and peering out into the gloom as if suffering from some defect of vision, stood a little woman, not very much taller than Joe, whose wrinkled face told she had passed what is termed the "middle age" of life.
Joe's surprise at seeing this tiny lady, when he had expected to be confronted by a man, prevented him from speaking at once, and the small woman asked, with mild curiosity:
"Whose children are you?"
This was a question Joe was not prepared to answer, and he stammered and stuttered before being able to say:
"I don't know as we're anybody's, ma'am. You see we ain't got any place to stop in for a day or two, an' thought perhaps a farmer lived here what would have work we could do to pay for our board."
"Are you hungry, child?" the small woman asked, quickly, and, as it seemed to Joe, anxiously.
"Not very much now, 'cause we've had a good supper; but we will be in the mornin', you know."
And Master Plummer interrupted, as he pinched his companion's arm to reduce him to silence:
"We've been walkin' a good while since then, an' it seems like I was most starved."
"You poor child! Come right into the house, an' it'll be strange if I can't find something to eat; though, to tell the truth, I didn't have real good luck with this week's batch of bread; but if custard pie – "
"If custard pie!" Master Plummer cried, ecstatically. "Why, I'd be fixed great if I could have some!"
He was following the small woman as he spoke, and, after closing and barring the outer door, the hostess ushered them into such a kitchen as they had never seen before.
A spacious room, in which it seemed as if a hundred persons might have found ample elbow-room, with a yellow, painted floor, on which not a grain of dirt could be seen, and with numerous odd, stiff-looking chairs ranged around the sides at regular intervals. At one end an enormous fireplace, in front of which was a cook-stove actually glittering with polish, and on the mantel behind it an array of shining tins.
As seen from the road, in the gloom, the cottage had not appeared even as large as this kitchen, and because of such fact the boys were more surprised than they otherwise would have been.
Once in the room, where everything was so cleanly that, as Master Plummer afterwards expressed it, "it come near givin' him a pain," the boys stood awkwardly near the door, uncertain as to what might be expected of them.
"You can sit right here while I get you something to eat," and the hostess placed two chairs in front of a small table in one corner of the room.
Master Plummer advanced eagerly, thinking only of the pleasure which was about to be his, when the small lady exclaimed, as if in alarm:
"Mercy on us, child! You're tracking dust all over the floor. Go right back into the entry, and wipe your feet."
Plums failed to see that he had soiled the floor to any extent, but both he and Joe obeyed the command instantly, and while they were engaged in what seemed to them useless labour, the small woman wiped carefully, with a damp cloth, the dusty imprints of their shoes from the floor.
"I never had any experience in my own family with boys," the odd-looking little woman said, half to herself, "and perhaps that's why I don't understand 'em any better; but I never could make out why they should be so reckless with dirt."
"I didn't think my shoes were so dusty when I come in, else I'd taken them off," Joe said, apologetically. "You see, ma'am, we never saw a floor as clean as this one."
This compliment was evidently pleasing, for the small woman looked up kindly at her guests, and said, in a friendly tone:
"Don't call me 'ma'am,' child. I've been 'aunt Dorcas' to all the children in this neighbourhood ever since I can remember, and anything else doesn't sound natural."
"Do you want us to call you 'aunt Dorcas'?" Joe asked, in surprise, and Plums winked gravely at his companion.
"Of course I do. Now, if your feet are clean, sit down, and I'll get the pie."
The boys tiptoed their way to the table, as if by such method they would be less liable to soil the floor, and aunt Dorcas, taking the lamp with her, disappeared through a door which evidently led to the cellar, leaving them in the darkness.
"Say, ain't this the greatest snap you ever struck?" Plums whispered. "I'll bet aunt Dorcas is a dandy, an' if Dan Fernald knew what he's missin', he'd jest about kick hisself black an' blue."
Master Plummer was still better satisfied with the situation when their hostess returned with a large custard pie, which she placed on the table, and immediately afterwards disappeared within the cellar-way again.
"She's gone for more stuff!" Plums said, in a tone of delight. "If there ain't too much work to be done 'round this place, I'd like to stay here a year."
When aunt Dorcas entered the kitchen again, she had a plate heaped high with cookies, on the top of which were three generous slices of cheese.
This collection was placed by the side of the pie; the odd little woman brought plates, knives, and forks, and two napkins from the pantry, and, having arranged everything in proper order, said, as she stood facing the boys, with her head slightly inclined to one side, until to Joe she presented much the appearance of a sparrow:
"If you can eat all there is here, I'll bring more, an' willingly. Afterwards, we will talk about what is to be done for the night."
"I can eat an' talk, too, jest as well as not," Plums said, as he drew the pie towards him.
Perhaps aunt Dorcas thought he intended to appropriate the whole to himself, for she hurriedly cut it into four pieces, one of which she placed on his plate.
From Plums's manner of beginning the feast, there was good reason to believe he had told the truth when he said he was starving, and, as she watched him, an expression of deepest sympathy came over aunt Dorcas's face.
"It's too bad I haven't some meat to give you, child, for you must be famishing."
"I'd rather have this," Plums replied, speaking with difficulty, because of the fullness of his mouth, and it appeared to his hostess as if he had no sooner begun on a quarter of the pie than it disappeared.
She gave the fat boy another section of the yellow dainty, watching him like one fascinated, as he devoured it. Then Plums began an onslaught on the cookies, after casting a wistful glance at the remaining quarter of the pie.
Joe was ashamed because his companion ate so greedily, and kicked him, under the table, as a warning that he restrain his appetite; but Master Plummer failed to understand the signal, and ate all the more greedily, because he believed Joe thought it time to bring the feast to a close.
"You mustn't think anything of his stuffin' hisself like this, ma'am, – I mean, aunt Dorcas," Joe said, apologetically. "Plums always was the biggest eater in New York, an' I guess he always will be."
"What did you call him?" aunt Dorcas asked.
"Plums was what I said. That ain't exactly his name, but it comes mighty near to it. George H. Plummer is what he calls hisself when he wants to be swell."
"I think 'George' sounds much better than 'Plums,'" aunt Dorcas said, thoughtfully.
"Perhaps it does; but it don't fit him half so well."
Meanwhile, the subject of this conversation was industriously engaged devouring the cookies, and one would have said that he had no interest in anything else.
Aunt Dorcas stood looking questioningly at Joe, and, thinking he understood that which was in her mind, he said:
"My name is Joe Potter. I used to keep a fruit-stand down on West Street, in New York, till I busted up, an' then I found the princess, but – "
Joe checked himself in time to preserve his secret. An instant later he wished he had explained to aunt Dorcas why he was there, because of the sympathy he read in her face.
The little woman waited a few seconds for him to continue, but, since he remained silent, she asked, with mild curiosity:
"Who is the princess?"
"She's a swell little girl what's lost her folks, an' I'm takin' care of her for a spell. Say, ma'am, – I mean, aunt Dorcas, – is there any work Plums an' I can do to pay for a chance of stoppin' here over to-morrow?"
"I suppose I might find enough, Joseph, for there's always plenty to be done around a place, no matter how small it is; but I'm not certain you'd be strong enough to spade up the garden, and clear the drain, even if you knew how. They say city boys are dreadful unhandy when it comes to outdoor work."
"Jest you try us an' see!" Joe cried, with animation. "We ain't sich chumps but that we know how to do most anything, after we've studied over it a spell. Will you let us stay if we do work enough?"
"I surely ought to be willing to do that much for my fellow creatures, Joseph, even though I get nothing in return; but I can't say it won't be a trial for me to have two boys around the house after I've lived alone so long. Martha, Mary, and I took care of this place, with the help of a man in summer, a good many years after our parents died, and I suppose we got fussy and old-maidish-like in our ways," aunt Dorcas said, growing reminiscent. "Martha went home to heaven seven years ago in September, and Mary followed her the next January. Since then I've been alone, and it stands to reason I'm more old-maidish than ever; but I hope I could keep two homeless boys twenty-four hours without fretting."
Then aunt Dorcas crossed the room to the mantel, in order to light another lamp, and Plums whispered, hoarsely:
"Say, Joe, what do you s'pose she put this clean towel here for? I've got custard on it, an' I'm afraid that'll make her mad."
Joe unfolded his napkin inquisitively, and looked at it an instant before he understood for what purpose it must have been intended.
Then, his cheeks reddening, he replied, in a low tone:
"She must have counted on our bein' willin' to wash our faces, but didn't want to say so right out, so put the towels here to remind us, an' I'm as ashamed as I can be 'cause I didn't think of it before."
The meal had come to an end, for the very good reason that there was nothing more on the table to be eaten.
While aunt Dorcas was talking with Joe, Plums had slyly taken the last remaining section of pie, having previously devoured the cookies and cheese, and, with a long-drawn sigh of content, he replied to his friend's remark by saying:
"I guess I couldn't eat any more if I'd washed my face a dozen times, so it don't make much difference."
Joe arose from the table, and seated himself in one of the chairs which were ranged precisely against the wall, Master Plummer following his example.
Aunt Dorcas, having lighted the second lamp, said:
"I'll leave you boys here alone while I attend to making up a bed. You could sleep in the spare-room, I suppose; but my best sheets are there, and I don't just like to – Why, you didn't use the napkins!"
Joe's face was of a deep crimson hue, as he replied:
"If I'd seen any soap an' water I'd known what they meant; but it's been so long since I was in a reg'lar house that I've kind'er forgot how to behave."
Aunt Dorcas turned away quickly, and when she had left the room Plums said, as he unbent from the awkward position he had at first assumed in the straight chair:
"Dan Fernald ain't in this! He may be a mighty big detective, but he slips up when it comes to hustlin' for these kind of snaps!"
"Aunt Dorcas is nice, ain't she?"
"She's a corker!"
"If the princess was only here we'd be jest about as snug as any two fellers that could be found in this world."
"I'm going to give you the chamber over the kitchen; it is clean and comfortable, but, of course, not as nice as the spare-room," aunt Dorcas said, as she entered suddenly, causing Master Plummer to instantly assume a less negligent attitude.
"Plums an' me ain't slept in a reg'lar bed for so long that a blanket spread out on the floor would seem mighty good to us," Joe replied, and the little woman held up both hands in astonishment.
"Haven't slept in a bed! Well, I've heard of the heathen in our midst, but never believed I'd be brought in contact with them. How did you – But, there, I won't ask questions to-night, when I know you must be tired. We'll read a chapter, and then you can go to bed. I will wash the dishes afterwards."
Reverentially the little woman took a well-worn Bible from the small table beneath one of the windows, and while the two boys who were fleeing from the officers of the law, as they believed, gazed at her in wonderment and surprise, but not understanding that which they heard, she read one of the psalms.
Then kneeling, she prayed in simple language which reached their hearts, for the homeless ones within her gates.
Joe's eyes were moist when she rose to her feet, and Plums whispered, in a voice choked with emotion:
"She's a daisy, that's what's the matter with her!"