round."

Jim Taft, for it was he, began to think, and the longer he thought, the
more troubled he looked.

"You won't say as you saw me loafin' around here, will you?" he asked at
length; "that is, if you won't give me a lift, me--your father?"

"How a lift?" inquired his interlocutor.

"A few shillings perhaps; or, perhaps you ain't got a pair o' boots as
has in 'em more leather 'n holes, or a pair of breeches as is good for
suthin'."

"Wait a bit!" said Tommy Taft. He disappeared; but he soon came back,
with an old pair of boots in one hand and a pair of pantaloons in the
other.

"There's suthin' in the nigh pocket," he remarked, as he handed the
pantaloons to his parent. "I've often s'posed you'd come back, and would
need the money what I saved for you."

The parent, however, had not the courtesy to return thanks. He was more
anxious to know something about Tom's employer and his whereabouts.

"He's a good one, he is," said Tommy Taft; "and no, he ain't to home.
He's in ----; and I've got to meet him to-night in the tavern there--."

"In Hog's Lane?"