"I'll tell you where you can get most of the money," he said. "Dic has twenty-six hundred dollars in Billy Little's box. He'll loan it to you."
"That's just the thing," cried Mrs. Bays, joyfully. "Tom, you are the smartest boy on Blue. It took you to help us out." One would have thought from her praise that Tom, and not Dic, was to furnish the money. Addressing her husband, she continued:—
"You go over and see him this evening. If he won't loan it to us after all we have done for him, he ought to be horsewhipped."
"What have we ever done for him?" asked Tom. The Chief Justice sought for an answer. Failing to find a better one, she replied:—
"He's had five hundred meals in this house if he's had one."
"And he's given us five hundred deer and turkeys if he's given us one," answered Tom.
"Well, you know, Tom, just as well as I do, that we have always been helping him. It is only your generous nature keeps you from saying so," responded Mrs. Bays. Tom laughed, and Tom, Sr., said:—
"I'll go over and see him this evening. I wonder where he has been? I haven't seen him but once since he came home."
"Guess Williams scared him off," suggested Tom.
Rita tried in vain to think of some plan whereby she might warn Dic against loaning the money, or prevent her father from asking it. After supper Tom went to town while his father went up to see Dic.