"It was very kind of you, and I'm glad to have this nice kitty. Give her some breakfast, and then we will shut her up in my room to catch the mice that plague me," said Miss Celia, picking up the little cat, and wondering how she would get her two angry boys safely down-stairs. "The dressing-room, she means; _you_ know the way, and _you_ don't need keys to get in," added Thorny, with such sarcastic emphasis that Ben felt some insult was intended, and promptly resented it. "You wont get me to climb any more trees after _your_ balls, and my cat wont catch any of _your_ mice, so you needn't ask me." "Cats don't catch thieves, and they are what I'm after!" "What do you mean by that?" fiercely demanded Ben. "Celia has lost some money out of her drawer, and you wont let me see what's in yours; so I thought, perhaps, you'd got it!" blurted out Thorny, finding it hard to say the words, angry as he was, for the face opposite did not look like a guilty one. For a minute, Ben did not seem to understand him, plainly as he spoke; then he turned an angry scarlet, and, with a reproachful glance at his mistress, opened the little drawer so that both could see all that it contained. "They aint anything; but I'm fond of 'em--they are all I've got--I was afraid he'd laugh at me that time, so I wouldn't let him look--it was father's birthday, and I felt bad about him and Sanch--" Ben's indignant voice got more and more indistinct as he stumbled on, and broke down over the last words. He did not cry, however, but threw back his little treasures as if half their sacredness was gone; and, making a strong effort at self-control, faced around, asking of Miss Celia, with a grieved look: "Did _you_ think I'd steal anything of yours?" "I tried not to, Ben, but what could I do? It was gone, and you the only stranger about the place." "Wasn't there _any one_ to think bad of but me?" he said, so sorrowfully that Miss Celia made up her mind on the spot that he was as innocent of the theft as the kitten now biting her buttons, no other refreshment being offered. "Nobody, for I know my girls well. Yet, eleven dollars are gone, and I cannot imagine where or how; for both drawer and door are always locked, because my papers and valuables are in that room." "What a lot! But how could _I_ get it if it was locked up?" and Ben looked as if that question was unanswerable. "Folks that can climb in at windows for a ball, can go the same way for money, and get it easy enough when they've only to pry open an old lock!" Thorny's look and tone seemed to make plain to Ben all that they had been suspecting, and, being innocent, he was too perplexed and unhappy to defend himself. His eye went from one to the other, and, seeing doubt in both faces, his boyish heart sunk within him; for he could prove nothing, and his first impulse was to go away at once.