“Yes, sir,” says Freckles.
But he looked mighty gloomy. And when his father went out of the room he got his fountain pen and sucked some blood out of his loose tooth and tried to spit it into his fountain pen. From which I judged he was still of a notion to write that letter and was pretty low in his mind. But he couldn't spit it into the pen, right. And he cried a little, and then saw me watching him crying and slapped at me with a hairbrush; and then he petted me and I let him pet me, for a dog, if he is any sort of dog at all, will always stand by his boy in trouble as well as gladness, and overlook things. A boy hasn't got much sense, anyhow; and a boy without a dog to keep him steered right must have a pretty tough time in the world.
If he was low in his mind then, he was lower in his mind before the day was through. For after breakfast there was Stevie Stevenson and Tom Mulligan waiting for him outside, and in spite of his promise, Stevie has told everything to Tom. And Tom has a wart and offers some wart blood to write that letter in. But Freckles says another person's blood would not be fair and honourable. He has a wart of his own, if he wanted to use wart blood, but wart blood is not to be thought of. What would a lady think if she found out it was wart blood? It would be almost and insult, wart blood would; it would be as bad as blood from a corn or bunion.
“Well, then,” says Stevie, “the truth is that you don't want to write that letter, anyhow. Last night you talked big about writing that letter, but this morning you're hunting up excuses for not writing it.”
“I'll write it if I want to write it, and you can't stop me,” says Freckles. “And I won't write it if I don't want to write it, and nobody of your size can make me.”
“I can too stop you,” says Stevie, “if I want to.”
“You don't dast to want to stop me,” says Freckles.
“I do dast,” says Stevie.
“You don't,” says Freckles.
“I do,” says Stevie.