"Somebody'll pick it out of your hand if you don't look out," warned Ben.
"I guess there won't anybody pick my pocket-book. I'm going to get a pin," and he raced off to the big mahogany bureau in the corner.
"What for?" asked David, who always followed Joel's movements with attention; "what are you going to do with a pin, Joel?"
"I'm going to pin up my pocket so no old picker can get my purse," declared Joel, with energy, and running back with the biggest pin he could find on the cushion, the one Mrs. Fisher fastened her shawl with.
"Yes, and likely enough you'll forget all about it and stick your own hand in," said Ben, "then, says I, what'll you do, Joel?"
"Humph—I won't forget," snorted Joel, puckering up the pocket edge and jamming the pin through the folds; "there, I guess the pickers will let my pocket alone. Yes-sir-ee," he cried triumphantly.
"Now you remember you are not to touch things on the counters," Mrs. Fisher was saying. "I don't want my children to be picking and handling at such a time. You can look all you want to; but when you see what you would really like to buy, why, Polly and Ben must ask the saleswoman to show it to you."
"I've got my money-purse," said Phronsie, exactly as if the fact had not been announced before; "see, Mamsie," and she held it up with an important air.
"I see," said Mother Fisher, "it's the one Grandpapa gave you last birthday, isn't it, Phronsie?"
"Yes," she said, patting it lovingly. "My dear Grandpapa gave it to me, and it's my very own, and I'm going to buy things, I am."