The grocery man said he didn't know, and the boy went out with a pair of skates over his shoulder, and the grocery man is wondering what joke the boy will play on him to-get even for the cayenne pepper. CHAPTER XXXIV. HIS PA GETS MAD--A BOOM IN COURT-PLASTER--THE BAD BOY DECLINES BEING MAULED!--THE OLD MAN GETS A HOT BOX--THE BAD BOY BORROWS A CAT!--THE BATTLE!--“HELEN BLAZES”--THE CAT VICTORIOUS!--THE BAD BOY DRAWS THE LINE AT KINDLING WOOD! “I was down to the drug store this morning, and saw your Ma buying a lot of court-plaster, enough to make a shirt, I should think. What's she doing with so much court-plaster?” asked the grocery man of the bad boy, as he came in and pulled off his boots by the stove and emptied out a lot of snow, that had collected as he walked through a drift, which melted and made a bad smell. “O, I guess she is going to patch Pa up so he will hold water. Pa's temper got him into the worst muss you ever see, last night. If that museum was here now they would hire Pa and exhibit him as the tattooed man. I tell you, I have got too old to be mauled as though I was a kid, and any man who attacks me from this out, wants to have his peace made with the insurance companies, and know that his calling and election is sure, because I am a bad man, and don't you forget it.” And the boy pulled on his boots and looked so cross and desperate that the grocery man asked him if he wouldn't try a little new cider. “Good heavens!” said the grocery man, as the boy swallowed the cider, and his face resumed its natural look, and the piratical frown disappeared with the cider. “You have not stabbed your father, have you? I have feared that one thing would bring on another, with you, and that you would yet be hung.”