"And then make you stay in your room and have your supper there?"
"No-o."
"Ma brought it up on a tray," the boy said fiercely, "so I couldn't get no second helping of apple dumpling."
"Oh, Sammy!" Somehow, after all, his misery seemed greater than her own. Yet there was a sore spot in the little girl's heart. "I—I wish I could run away," she blurted out, never having thought of such a thing until that very moment. "Then they'd see."
"Hist!" breathed Sammy, coming closer and putting his lips as close to the little girl's ear as the pickets would allow. "Hist! I am going to run away!"
Dot took this statement much more calmly than he expected.
"Oh, yes," she said. "When you go to be a pirate. You've told me that before, Sammy Pinkney." In fact, she had been hearing this threat ever since she had come to the old Corner House and become acquainted with this youngster.
"And I am going to be a pirate," growled Sammy, with just as deep a voice as he could muster.
"Oh! not now?" gasped Dot, suddenly realizing that this occasion was fraught with more seriousness than any previous one of like character. "You aren't going right off now to be a pirate, Sammy Pinkney?"
"Yes, I am," declared the boy.