Lem found his father preparing his evening meal in the junkyard shack and not at all glad to see Lem.

“What you want?” he asked. “If your aunt sent you down here to get money out of me, it ain't no sort of use. I ain't got a dollar to spare.”

“She did n't send me; I come,” Lem told him. “Well, what did you come for? I ain't goin' to have you comin' here. To-morrow mornin' I'm goin' to start in bein' a saint for fair and I can't be bothered with no kids hangin' around. This here saint business is difficult enough to do without kids to take a feller's mind off it. What did you come for?”

“I've quit livin' with Aunt Sue,” Lem said. “I hate her, and I ain't goin' to stay with her.”

“You mean you've run away from her house?”

“Yes, I do!” said Lem. “You heard her tell old Schulig to jail me. I ain't goin' to live with no aunt that tells old Schulig to jail me.” Harvey turned the egg he had in the small frying-pan. He liked his eggs done on both sides.

“You had your supper?” he asked Lem.

“No.”

“Well, you won't get none when you go back, I 'll bet on that, if Sue is havin' one of her rantankerous spells. Eat this egg. I got a couple more. I want em all et up to-night, anyway; I ain't goin't' eat 'em after to-night. To my way of thinkin' eggs is too fancy for a hermit saint to eat. When you go back you tell your aunt you heard me say so. Dod-baste her! She thinks I'm foolin' when I say I'm goin' to be a saint. You tell her how earnest I am goin' at it, Lem, eatin' every dod-basted egg I got in the shack. Yes, and all the bacon, too. You tell her you seen me gettin' ready to eat all the unsaintly food I got before midnight, so's I could start clean an' parsimonious, or whatever you call it, to-morrow mornin'.”

He looked at the square of bacon on his shelf. “I guess I'd better fry you up some bacon, too, Lem,” he said. “I got to keep out o' temptation from now on an' there's most more bacon in that hunk than I can swaller to-night. You tell your Aunt Sue I used up' all my bacon an' eggs, will you?”

“No. I ain't goin' back.”

“Yes, you are, too!” said Harvey. “Why, dod-baste it all, Lem, I put you in pawn, did n't I? I'd be a nice-lookin' saint, would n't I, if I went an' pawned you to your aunt an' then let you come back? Why, look here! she could jail me for it, if I let you come back. You ain't got no right to come out of pawn. I'd be a nice sort o' saint if I let you. I'd be a dod-basted old liar, that's what I'd be.”

“I ain't goin' back,” said Lem.

“Now, Lem, you looky here,” Harvey said. “You don't understand this business. I don't say I ought to expect you to, you bein' young yet, but I owe your aunt a heap of money—a heap!—an' if she went an' pushed me all over the place for it I'd have a dod-basted hades of a time tryin' to be a saint. That aunt of yours gets on my nerves so gosh all awful—”

“She gets on mine worse 'n that,” said Lem.

“Now, that ain't got nothin' to do with it,” said Harvey irritably. “Don't you interrupt. If your aunt gets to chasin' me all round town an' back, pesterin' me for that money, I might as well give up bein' a saint right now an' go back in the junk business.”

“You don't have to be no saint, do you?” asked Lem resentfully.

“Yes, I do,” said Harvey. “You don't understand it, but I've been called. I've heard the call; callin' me to be a saint in this land where there ain't no saints. I've heard the call, Lem.”

“Where from?” Lem asked.

“From heaven; where do you think I'd get it from?” asked Harvey irritably. “The post-office? Do you s'pose it come in a registered letter, with a special delivery stamp on it? That ain't no way a saint gets called. I heard it in my heart, dod-baste it! like any other saint would hear it.”

“How long you goin' to be one?” Lem asked dismally.

“Why—why, forever. From now on. It ain't no job, Lem. It ain't no business. It's—it's a way of bein', like an angel is or a—a somethin' or other. When you're a saint you keep on bein' one. Once a saint, always a saint. Saints keep right on bein' saints forever, gettin' holier an' holier, an' workin' for mankind.”

“What kind of work do they do?” Lem asked. He had eaten the egg and was eating the crisped bacon—Harvey always had the best bacon.

“They don't do no work; not the kind of work you mean,” Harvey said. “They just work to be a saint. They work to be good. Some of 'em has a sort of sideline like I'm goin' to have. I'm goin' to work to be kind to stray dogs.”

Lem finished his bacon. His freckled face set in firm resolution.

“I'm goin' to stay here an' help you be a saint, pop,” he said. “I'm goin' to be a saint, too. I can be a young one, can't I?”

“I'll be eternally dod-basted if—” Harvey began angrily, but he remembered himself. “No, Lem,” he said with forced gentleness, “that ain't in my plans. I can't let you do it. Not now. You 're too young yet. You go back to your aunt an' be a good boy, an' when I get her all paid off an' get you out of pawn, maybe I 'll see about it. After-while. In a year or two, maybe. Just yet awhile I got to suffer alone an' in silence, as you may say. You go back to your aunt like a good boy an' I 'll give you a dollar.”

“I want to stay here.”

“You can't stay here.”

“Lemme see the dollar, then.”

Harvey produced a dollar, a big, silver one, and Lem took it. He had not taken off his hat, so he did not have to put it on. “I 'll go back,” he said as he paused at the door, “but I won't stay. She's mean.”

Harvey had turned his own egg and bacon on to the plate Lem had just emptied.

“She's mean,” Lem repeated. “I don't care what you are; I'd rather be with you, anyway. I'd rather be with you, even if you are a saint.”

Harvey had been about to begin on his bacon and eggs, but he paused with his knife and fork suspended.

“Lem,” he said.

“What?”

“You go back to your Aunt Sue, Lem,” Harvey said with sudden tenderness, “an' git along the best you can with her. For a while, anyway. But you don't have to let her be too dod-basted mean to you, Lem. You come an' tell me if she is, because maybe I might get a notion to git out of this saint business sooner than I think I will. I guess I don't have to let you be put upon too dod-basted much, saint or no saint. You come an' see me once in a while, anyway. Now git along with you.”

Lem went, but his heart was far lighter. His father had not cast him off totally. He stood outside the junkyard gate a few moments in the deepening dusk. Then he had a happy thought. He looked over his shoulder and started down the street at an easy, unhurried run. He did not pause until he reached the high fence at the rear of Moses Shuder's junkyard. He raised himself by grasping the top of the fence and looked inside. The opportunity seemed perfect. He slid over the fence and moved cautiously among the shadows until he reached the shed where Shuder stored the more valuable of his properties. His toe stubbed itself on the very chunk of lead he was seeking. Keeping a lookout over his shoulder he dragged the heavy lump of metal to the fence, boosted it over, and shinnied after it. Close at hand was the wide opening into the rainwater sewer and into this Lem pushed the chunk of lead, hearing it splash far below. Then, feeling more at peace with the world, he went slowly back to his Aunt Susan's. He climbed to the kitchen roof, into his room, into his bed, and slept peacefully and without a dream.