Then, as before, she accompanied the boys up-stairs, to make certain everything in the chamber was in proper order, although it was already scrupulously clean, and when, after having bidden them "good night," they heard her light footsteps as she descended the stairs, Joe said, with an air of perplexity:
"I'm dead certain we don't do the right thing when she's prayin'."
"I didn't make any noise," Plums replied, indignantly.
"Course you didn't, else I'd thumped your head. I'd like to see the feller that would kick up a row, or even so much as laugh while aunt Dorcas was prayin'. What I mean is, that we ought'er do somethin', instead of settin' up there like a couple of chumps, an' she on her knees. Do you s'pose it would be right for us to kneel down when she does?"
"I don't know. It couldn't do much harm, I s'pose, an' if you think it would please her any better, why, I'm willin' to stay on my knees half a day."
"We'll try it to-morrer night, and see how she takes it. Say, I've found out what them towels are for. Aunt Dorcas had one side of her plate, an' she wiped her mouth on it."
"Perhaps she didn't have a handkerchief."
"Now, look here, Plums, you don't s'pose that a woman what's so slick an' clean as aunt Dorcas is would go 'round without a handkerchief, do you?"
"It seems as though she must, if she used the towel; but that ain't botherin' me half so much jest now as Dan Fernald is. I reckon he's pretty near wild by this time, an' it would be a terrible thing if the perlice should come an' drag us out of this place, wouldn't it?"
"I ain't afraid he'll kick up a row. That detective business is all in his eye. He don't 'mount to any more'n Sim Jepson does, when it comes to law matters."