"I think that's enough."
"Well, hardly. I guess there are a good many bills with grease spots on them floating around."
For the moment Ralph was nonplussed. The aristocratic bully saw it and went on:
"You are afraid you are going to lose your place, and you want to get me and my father in your power, so we can help you keep it. But it won't work, will it, father?"
"Hardly, my son. We are not to be browbeaten in this style," remarked Squire Paget, pompously.
"Then you do not intend to make good the amount?" asked Ralph, shortly, disgusted at the way in which the squire stood up for Percy.
"I shall not give you twenty dollars when I don't owe it to you," said Percy.
"Will you tell me where you got that twenty-dollar bill?"
"I got it in Chambersburgh last week. A man asked me to change it for him and I did so."
Percy had thought out this falsehood before, and now he uttered it with the greatest of ease.