The supper bell tinkled and Henrietta arose. “Shall I bring you your supper?” she asked. “A nice tray, with everything on it I can think of? So you won't have to go down this evening?”
“Yes, mam. If you want to,” Lem said. They were no sooner out of the room than Lem was out of the bed and putting on his few ragged garments. It required only a moment. Then he pushed up the screen of his only window, climbed out upon the roof, and, hanging from the gutter, dropped to the ground. He paused to see that he was not pursued and then made a dash for the back gate.
CHAPTER XII
Lem found his father preparing his evening meal in the junkyard shack and not at all glad to see Lem.
“What you want?” he asked. “If your aunt sent you down here to get money out of me, it ain't no sort of use. I ain't got a dollar to spare.”
“She did n't send me; I come,” Lem told him. “Well, what did you come for? I ain't goin' to have you comin' here. To-morrow mornin' I'm goin' to start in bein' a saint for fair and I can't be bothered with no kids hangin' around. This here saint business is difficult enough to do without kids to take a feller's mind off it. What did you come for?”
“I've quit livin' with Aunt Sue,” Lem said. “I hate her, and I ain't goin' to stay with her.”
“You mean you've run away from her house?”