"I'm willin' you should do that jest as soon's you get ready. It won't bother me a little bit, 'cause aunt Dorcas told the story this mornin', an' the man what put the advertisement in the papers has been out here. Now, you listen to me, Dan Fernald, and perhaps after this you'll give over your funny detective business. All them lawyers wanted of me was to find out where the princess was, an' if, instead of runnin' away, I'd flashed myself up on Pine Street, there wouldn't have been any trouble. I ought'er black both your eyes for tryin' to set fire to aunt Dorcas's barn; but somehow I can't do it, 'cause she don't like to have fellers fight. Now you can get into New York an' fetch your perlice." Joe released his hold of Master Fernald; but the latter was so astonished by the information given, that he made no effort to rise. "Is all that true, or are you foolin' me?" he asked, after a time. "Say, the best thing you can do is to come up an' talk with aunt Dorcas. It would do you a heap of good, Dan, an', come to think of it, you've _got_ to go." Master Fernald was not as eager to visit the cottage now as he had been, for he understood that Joe was speaking the truth, and the prospect of meeting the little woman, after all he had said and attempted to do, was not pleasing. "Don't let up on him," Plums cried, vindictively. "He's to blame for this whole racket, an' ought'er be served out a good deal worse'n aunt Dorcas will serve him." Dan struggled manfully, but all to no purpose. His late friends were determined he should visit the woman he had intended to wrong, and half dragged, half carried him up the lane, until they were met by aunt Dorcas herself, who sternly asked why they were ill-treating a boy smaller than themselves. "It's Dan Fernald, aunt Dorcas," Plums said, as if in surprise that she should have interfered. "It's the same feller what wasn't goin' to show you the paper till you'd 'greed to board him the balance of the summer, an' in less than a half an hour after you went away he set the barn afire. We thought it would do him a heap of good to talk with you a spell." "Let him alone, children. If he doesn't wish to speak with me you must not try to force him. Suppose you two go into the garden a little while, and leave us alone?" This did not please Plums, for he had anticipated hearing the little woman read Master Fernald a lecture; but he could do no less than act upon the suggestion, and as the two went slowly towards the barn, Master Plummer said, regretfully: "It's too bad we couldn't hear what she had to say, after I told her about his settin' the barn afire." "Look here, Plums, you'd been disappointed if she'd let you listen. She ain't the kind of a woman that would rave, an' scold, an' tear 'round; but when she gets through with Dan Fernald, he'll feel a mighty sight worse than if she'd knocked his two eyes into one." CHAPTER XVI. THE REWARD.