“Yes, I do!” said Lem. “You heard her tell old Schulig to jail me. I ain't goin' to live with no aunt that tells old Schulig to jail me.” Harvey turned the egg he had in the small frying-pan. He liked his eggs done on both sides.
“You had your supper?” he asked Lem.
“No.”
“Well, you won't get none when you go back, I 'll bet on that, if Sue is havin' one of her rantankerous spells. Eat this egg. I got a couple more. I want em all et up to-night, anyway; I ain't goin't' eat 'em after to-night. To my way of thinkin' eggs is too fancy for a hermit saint to eat. When you go back you tell your aunt you heard me say so. Dod-baste her! She thinks I'm foolin' when I say I'm goin' to be a saint. You tell her how earnest I am goin' at it, Lem, eatin' every dod-basted egg I got in the shack. Yes, and all the bacon, too. You tell her you seen me gettin' ready to eat all the unsaintly food I got before midnight, so's I could start clean an' parsimonious, or whatever you call it, to-morrow mornin'.”
He looked at the square of bacon on his shelf. “I guess I'd better fry you up some bacon, too, Lem,” he said. “I got to keep out o' temptation from now on an' there's most more bacon in that hunk than I can swaller to-night. You tell your Aunt Sue I used up' all my bacon an' eggs, will you?”
“No. I ain't goin' back.”
“Yes, you are, too!” said Harvey. “Why, dod-baste it all, Lem, I put you in pawn, did n't I? I'd be a nice-lookin' saint, would n't I, if I went an' pawned you to your aunt an' then let you come back? Why, look here! she could jail me for it, if I let you come back. You ain't got no right to come out of pawn. I'd be a nice sort o' saint if I let you. I'd be a dod-basted old liar, that's what I'd be.”
“I ain't goin' back,” said Lem.
“Now, Lem, you looky here,” Harvey said. “You don't understand this business. I don't say I ought to expect you to, you bein' young yet, but I owe your aunt a heap of money—a heap!—an' if she went an' pushed me all over the place for it I'd have a dod-basted hades of a time tryin' to be a saint. That aunt of yours gets on my nerves so gosh all awful—”
“She gets on mine worse 'n that,” said Lem.