When Henrietta entered Lem's room the boy lay as she had left him, and he was in a deep, healthy sleep, beads of perspiration on his forehead, for his room was under a slanting roof that received the full strength of the afternoon sun. Henrietta stood looking at him a moment and then spoke to him. He opened his eyes, saw her, and sat up.

“Gee!” he said, “I guess I had a long sleep, didn't I?”

“A fine one. Look what I've brought you. You like oranges, don't you?”

“You bet I do. How long was I asleep?”

“Hours and hours.”

She seated herself on the bedside and began peeling an orange. Lem stretched. His eye caught the great vaseful of syringas.

“Those are the flowers Lorna brought,” Henrietta said. “She thought you would like them.”

“They're nice,” Lem said.

Henrietta divided the orange into sections.

“Open your mouth,” she said, and popped a juicy section into Lem's mouth. He made no effort to get up. He was contented where he was, and opened his mouth from time to time, as a baby does when being fed.

“I bet Aunt Sue is sore on me,” he said presently. “I don't care. She did n't have to take me if she did n't want to. She made pop leave me. I'd rather stay with pop an' help him be a saint, anyway. I guess I 'll go back, anyway, when we get out of jail. How long are pop an' me goin' to be in jail?”

“You're not going to be in jail, either of you,” said Henrietta. “Judge Bruce fixed it all up.”

“I bet Aunt Sue's sorry, ain't she?” asked Lem.

“Lem,” Henrietta said, “you must not think badly of your Aunt Sue. She is a good woman and she means to be kind. She likes you—”

“Rats!” said Lem. “She likes me like snakes. She hates me, that's what she does. I'll get even with her, all right.”

Lorna stood in the doorway.

“How's Lem?” she asked.

“Fine,” said Henrietta, and Lorna came and sat on the other edge of the bed.

“And who is this you're going to get even with, Lem?” Lorna asked.

“That old Aunt Sue,” Lem said. “I 'll do it, too. She told that old Schulig to take me to jail, an' I had n't done nothin' but hook a chunk o' lead. From old Shuder. He's only a Jew, anyway. He's a Russian Jew. He ought n't to holler when—”

“When what, Lem?”

“When it wasn't his lead, anyhow. It was pop's lead. Swatty an' Bony sold it to pop first. I know, because I bought it from them, an' then they hooked it out of pop's junk-pile an' sold it to Shuder. So it was n't Shuder's; it was pop's, anyway. I was just gettin' it back again.”

“But you sold it to your father again after you got it back,” expostulated Henrietta, although she smiled.

“Well, it was good lead, wasn't it? It was worth the money, was n't it? We sold it to him cheap enough, did n't we?”

“Yes, but it was his lead already—”

“No, it wasn't. Because Swatty an' Bony stole it an' sold it to old Shuder. He would n't have bought it if it wasn't theirs, would he? He's too slick to do that, you bet! He knew it was theirs. An', anyway, it ought to be theirs, because they had it first.”

“Had it first?” Henrietta asked.

“Out of Harburger's back yard,” said Lem. “It was just lyin' there an' nobody was doin' anything with it. So they had a right to take it, did n't they? That's what junk's for, ain't it? What use was an old chunk of lead stickin' in the mud, I'd like to know! So it was Swatty's an' Bony's, because they found it.”

“Mercy!” exclaimed Lorna. “Do you mean they stole it from Harburger's back yard and sold it to your father, and then stole it from him and sold it to Shuder, and then stole it from Shuder and sold it to your father again?”

“Why, of course—”

“And I suppose,” said Lorna, “they would have gone on forever, stealing it from your father and selling it to Shuder, and stealing it from Shuder to sell to your father.”

“No,” Lem said.

“Why not? How many times does a junkman have to buy a piece of lead before it becomes sinful to steal from him?”

“I don't know. But, anyway,” said Lem, “they'd have had to stop pretty soon, because old Shuder would get to know that chunk o' lead by heart, an' he'd know he had bought it before, so he would n't buy it again.”

“I'm afraid you don't understand the Riverbank youth's theory of property rights in old metal, Lorna,” said Henrietta. “It seems to be based on the idea that anything that can be picked up belongs to the picker-up.”

“But not railroad iron,” said Lem. “You got to leave that alone because nobody'll buy it off you. They'll get pinched if they do.”

“But after a junkman has bought it, Lem, it belongs to him,” said Lorna. “I might see how useless old metal, even if not just lying on the street, might seem to be nobody's property, but when it is in a junkman's yard—”

“Well, they could take care of it if they wanted to,” said Lem. “They could put barb-wire on the fence, or somethin', if they did n't want it stole. How does anybody know they don't want it stole when they just leave it out in the yard? How would anybody know it was n't just some old junk they left out there on purpose to have it stole?”

Lorna looked at Henrietta and shook her head. This sort of logic was too much for her.

“But I bet you one thing,” said Lem. “I would n't ever buy any junk they had just stole out of pop's yard. If they went around back an' stole some, an' brought it around front an' wanted to sell it, you bet I would n't buy it. That ain't honest. That's cheatin'.”

“So you see, Lorna,” said Henrietta; “what is needed here is an education in property rights and not summary punishment. But I have a feeling that Lem's theory of rights will be hard to make clear to Miss Susan.”

“Well, I'll get even with her, all right,” said Lem, nodding his head. “You wait an' you'll see! She can't make my father leave me here an' then go an' tell old Schulig to put me in jail. I'll get even, you bet!”

“Listen, Lem,” Henrietta said, taking his hand. “You must not feel that way.”

“Well, I do, just the same,” he said.

“But you must not. Your Aunt Sue likes you—”

“In a pig's eye, she does!”

“Yes, she does. She loves you, Lem. We all love you. Your Aunt Sue does n't understand boys yet, and she was upset when she heard you say you had stolen—”

“I'll upset her, all right!”

The supper bell tinkled and Henrietta arose. “Shall I bring you your supper?” she asked. “A nice tray, with everything on it I can think of? So you won't have to go down this evening?”

“Yes, mam. If you want to,” Lem said. They were no sooner out of the room than Lem was out of the bed and putting on his few ragged garments. It required only a moment. Then he pushed up the screen of his only window, climbed out upon the roof, and, hanging from the gutter, dropped to the ground. He paused to see that he was not pursued and then made a dash for the back gate.