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Page 53
"What AILS ye, Gyp?" his mother asked, "Be ye sick?"
Gyp never answered unless he chose, and this was surely one of the times
when he did not choose.
"Ornary critter!" said the woman, as she picked up her broom, and went
in, closing the door behind her.
"NOW, I'll go!" said Gyp, and he ran off across the fields.
He could take care of himself, and he always managed, when away from
home, to steal enough so that he was well fed. He knew that, if wood
were needed, his mother would hunt for him, but with the big pile of
firewood behind the shanty, she would not search for him. She would be
glad that for a time she need not feed him!
Gyp had been shrewd when he had made that woodpile!
He found, when he had crossed the fields, that he was on a country road,
and near a large farmhouse, whose big barn-door stood invitingly open.
In front of the house stood a baker's cart, and Gyp looked about to see
if the driver were in sight.
"He's in that house!" whispered Gyp, in great excitement.
In haste, lest the man return, and catch him, he pulled out a draw,
snatched some buns, and a pie, and darted with them into the barn, and
up on the hay in the loft, where he hugely enjoyed his treat.
He heard the man run out to the cart, push the draw to, and then drive
off.
"I've had a fine treat, an' he ain't missed what I took, so that's all
right," he said, with a laugh, "an' I guess I'll see who's got some
fruit in his garden. That's what I want now!"
He went down the ladder like a monkey, ran from the barn, and a little
farther up the road, found a fine blackberry patch, just over the wall.
Of these he ate until he cared for no more, and then, like a full-
fledged tramp, strode down the dusty road.
"I ain't goin' ter be ketched 'fore their old school begins, fer if I AM
ketched, they'll make me begin with the others, an' I ain't a goin' ter,
but after its goin' on two weeks, then I'll be safe. They won't bother
me then, an' I'll hang around the schoolhouse an' make things lively!"
He smiled as he muttered this threat, and his black eyes twinkled. Oh,
yes, he would be delighted to play any outrageous trick that might
startle both teacher and pupils.
He did not know that during all the season, those who intended that
every child in town should be educated, strove with the same vigilance
as at the beginning of the year.
"Gyp's run away!"
"Why, Harry Grafton, he's always running away from somewhere, or from
someone," said Leslie.
"Oh, that's when he's been stealing things," said Harry, "but this time
it's different. He ran away from the shanty, and I know, because I heard
his mother asking a policeman to find him, and she said he'd been gone a
week!"
"Wherever he is, he won't stay long," said Leslie, "he'll come running
home."
"Why will he?" questioned Harry. "If he's run away, it's because he's
tired of that old shanty, and I should think he would be!"
"WE'D be tired of it," said Leslie, "but he's used to it, and he'll come
back, just because it's his home."
"P'raps he will," agreed Harry, "but I wouldn't think that place would
seem like home even to Gyp!"
"I'm going up to play with Princess Polly," said Leslie, "and I'll tell
her about Gyp. She's afraid of him, and I know she wouldn't want him to
run away, but she may feel safer because he has."
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