[CHAPTER X.]
THE LIAR'S DEATH.
THE next morning, the money was paid; but for days, the poor mistaken father looked as if he had lost all his friends.
He talked long and earnestly with Aunt Clarissa, pointing out to her the result of all her foolish indulgence; but she was far from viewing it in as serious a light as he did. She urged that he was very young; that such habits would soon correct themselves when he was older; that she was sure the poor child meant no harm.
With a sigh he turned from her, feeling that it was hopeless to try and convince her of her error, and passed half the night in writing Mrs. Collins, and urging her to be a mother to his motherless boy.
After some weeks of struggle between inclination and what she feared was duty, she wrote that she would take Joseph into her family for a few months, but could not yet promise to do so for a much longer period. Before the arrangements could be made for his removal, however, a painful event occurred which prevented him from going to P—.
On his way to and from school, Joseph usually passed an old-fashioned wooden house, enclosed by a high board fence, which ran for a distance of twenty rods along the street. Within this enclosure was a dog-kennel inhabited by a large animal of the Newfoundland breed. Looking through a knot-hole in the fence, Joseph and Dexter often shouted to the dog to come out from his house; and once, when the butcher had left the gate ajar, they ventured in to examine more minutely the accommodations of Nero. A hoarse growl warned them to be cautions; but ever after, when they had an opportunity, they ran in for a minute to prove to him that they were his friends.
One day they were standing near the dog-kennel, when a gentleman in the house opened the window, and said,—
"Run away, little boys; Nero is cross and may bite you."
"He knows us," answered Dexter, frankly; "we often come to see him."