"Me, too," added Lance Darby.
"Well, you folks can guy me all you want to," said Short and Long, who was getting about with a cane now instead of his crutches. "But those fellers talked of money, and of burying it in a lard can."
"Say!" exclaimed Lance, "a lard can will hold a lot of money."
"All right. You laugh. I'm going to have another look for it when I get over there," said Billy.
"And I'm with you, Billy," said Josephine Morse, with a sigh. "Goodness me! I need to find a buried treasure, or something of the kind."
Jess's mother was a widow and in straitened circumstances, and sometimes Jess was cramped for clothing as well as spending money. She lived at the "poverty-stricken" end of Whiffle Street, just as the Beldings lived at the "wealthy" end.
So the party for the next Saturday was made up in this impromptu fashion, without one of the members realizing what an important occasion that outing would prove.
It looked to Dora and Dorothy, when they reached home that evening, as though they might have to "cut" the "treasure hunt," however. Aunt Dora had gone to bed quite ill, and before morning Mr. Lockwood telephoned for the doctor. He came and the family was up most of that night. Aunt Dora had caught cold and it had settled into a severe muscular rheumatic attack.
The poor lady suffered a great deal during the next few days, having considerable fever, and being quite out of her head at times. She called for "Dora" then, almost incessantly, and no matter which twin responded she declared it wasn't her namesake, but Dorothy, and that they "were trying to fool her!"
"And, oh, dear, me," said Dorothy, "I wish we hadn't done it, Dora."