Cane's Marital Band never formally disbanded. Except as it was dissolved by the rain it is still legally extant. But it never assembled again after its initial appearance in public. However, its short term of activity furnished the town with a topic of conversation for some time to come; and although the subject was studiously avoided in the Cane household, it was freely discussed in the barn.

Sube was unable to explain just how he happened to get into the hearse. He didn't know, himself. And when pressed for particulars he instantly took the defensive.

"I guess I didn't want to get wet, did I?" he demanded.

"Wet! Say, you was soaked before you ever went near that hearse!" cried Gizzard, who was still suffering from a slight twinge of envy.

"Well, Hi Wilbur, who was drivin' it, hollered to me to shut the doors, and when I was shuttin' 'em I saw how nice and dry it was inside, so I told Biscuit to bring the drum down here to the barn, and I climbed in and slammed the doors and had a bully ride! And say! I didn't tell you about the drum, did I?"

"No, you didn't," muttered Gizzard, as there materialized before his eyes a sadly ruptured drumhead. "What you goin' to do about it, anyway?"

"Goin' to do?—I've done it!"

"Done it! What'd you do?"

"Why, Biscuit brought the drum back here to the barn. I had all I could do to keep him from takin' it back to ol' lady Burton jus' it was. But I tol' 'im Mr. Ingraham wasn't through with it yet, so he left it." The boys grinned knowingly at each other as Sube continued: "Well, I washed the printin' off and jus' soon as it got dark I sneaked the drum up on Burton's front porch and turned the good side up, and then I rung the bell and ducked. I hid behind a tree and watched and pretty soon ol' lady Burton opened the door. When she got her eye on the drum she looked all around for somebody, and when she couldn't find anybody she took it inside.

"The next day she come to call on my mother, and I thought she'd come to squeal on me, and I listened at the door so's to know what to say; but she never said a word about the drum at all!"

"She didn't!" cried Gizzard delightedly.

"Never peeped about it!" Sube assured him. "But you'd ought to heard her rip ol' Prof Ingraham up the back!"

"What's he been doin'?" asked Gizzard.

"I don't know. I couldn't understand; but she called him all kinds of names! She said he was underbred and ign'rant and ill-mannered and illiterate and a lot of stuff like that, and I most b'lieve we'll have a new principal next year!"

"Say! She'd ought to gone to school to him for a while! He's the worst principal to chew about manners I ever saw."

"Gee! Do you s'pose vacation'll ever get here?" sighed Sube.

"It don't ack like it," replied Gizzard dubiously. "Last week was about six months long, and there was one day of vacation at that."

"Seems to me as if time was goin' backwards," complained Sube.

But it was not. It was going forward at its regular speed. The difficulty was that the boys' minds were outstripping it. In due time vacation arrived, and a long happy summer stretched itself out before them.

Mr. Cane believed in vacations. He also believed in teaching boys to be industrious. He still harbored the old-fashioned idea that every boy should be required to do some useful work every day of his life, Sundays excepted. And while Sube and his brothers with their more up-to-date point of view could see the fallacy of his position, they were unable to reform him with any amount of argument.

As Sube seated himself at the breakfast table one morning and glanced over his working orders for the day, a scowl came over his usually sunny countenance.

"What's the good of callin' it a vacation if a feller has to labor all the time?" he muttered.

Mr. Cane glanced at Sube over the top of his newspaper as he replied: "Now we are not going to open up that old discussion again. The way you boys take on over an hour's work around the place makes me sick! Why, when I was your age, Sube, I was glad to work from daylight until dark for just my board; and it wasn't any such board as you boys get, either."

"Yes, I'll bet you were glad," growled Sube.

"Certainly I was glad," his father assured him. "In those days boys expected to work. They weren't brought up with the idea of lolling at ease that you boys seem to have."

"Did you work every day?" asked Cathead.

"Every day."

"Every single day?"

"Certainly."

"Didn't you ever take a day off?"

"Oh, occasionally I'd take a day off to go fishing or do a little studying—"

"I don't s'pose they had circuses in those days," interjected Sube.

"Oh, perhaps once during the summer my father would take me to see a good dog and animal show," explained Mr. Cane as he folded his napkin and left the table.

"They didn't use to go in swimmin' in those days, did they?" Sube muttered, taking care that his father did not hear.

"Or play ball?" supplemented Cathead cautiously.

"Ain't that jus' like a man?" growled Sube as the door closed behind their father. "Give a feller a lot of work to do and not even let him kick about it!"

"What you gotta do, anyway?" asked Cathead.

"Plenty," grunted Sube; "plenty."

"Well—I cut it the last time," ventured Cathead. "It's your turn."

"Yes, but it takes about half a day to cut the ol' lawn," grumbled Sube. "I'll bet your job won't take you half an hour. What you got to do, anyway?"

"Me? Oh, I got to thin the beets."

"Huh!—A snap!" sneered Sube, as he turned to his brother Sim, and asked: "What'd he give you?"

"Sproutin' p'tatoes," answered Sim.

"How many you got to do?"

"Two bushels."

"Nuthin' but a picnic," declared Sube. "I'm the only one that's got a real job!"

After breakfast Sube repaired to the barn, where he found the lawn-mower waiting for him.

"Ha! There you are, you ol' grass-chewer, you!" he exclaimed malevolently. "Thought you'd catch me off my guard, didn't you?—Well this is the way I treat vill'uns like you!" He seized an oil can, and thrusting it between the blades of the lawn-mower as he would have plunged a dagger between the ribs of an enemy, he gave several vicious squirts. "There!" he cried. "Take that!—And that!"

He drew back a pace and contemplated his enemy witheringly. "'Nuff?—Oh! Ain't you? Ain't you, now?—Well take that, then!—And that!" He gave another cruel thrust into the very vitals of the defenseless machine, and then withdrew his dripping blade. "You will waylay me just inside the door of this cave, will you!—You will, will you!—I guess you won't do that again—"

"Who you talkin' to?" came a voice at the door.

Sube jumped back, ready for another antagonist, as Cathead entered.

"Oh! It's you, is it?" asked Sube, about equally divided between relief and confusion. "I thought it was—that it might be—that—Why, I was jus' oilin' the machine!"

But Cathead did not press the point. He had other things in view. "Say, Sube," he began at once, "If you think thinnin' the beets is such a snap job, what'll you take to do 'em?"

Sube turned on his brother with a glare as he replied: "What d'you think I am! Don't you s'pose I got enough to do for one day?"

"Oh, you got enough to do without pay; but I was goin' to pay you," replied Cathead evenly.

"What do you want to do to-day?" demanded Sube.

"Nuthin' much. Do you want the job, or don't you?"

"I don't know yet. What'll you gimme?"

"I'll give you a dime. And it's an awful easy way to earn a dime, too," asserted Cathead suavely.

"I don't care so much about the money," vapored Sube; "but I'm goin' to be awful tired when I get through cuttin' the lawn."

"Well, if you don't care about the money, what do you care about?" demanded Cathead.

And suddenly Sube remembered all the valuable property he had parted with in order to get a much-needed haircut, and that Cathead had steadfastly refused to be treated like an "uncle," but had insisted that he had bought everything outright.

"Let's see," muttered Sube; "you still got my automatic?"

This high-sounding weapon was an antique revolver with the cylinder missing, but it was the apple of his eye.

"Why, yes," agreed Cathead. "I'll give you that."

"And my billiard ball?" added Sube.

Cathead had very little use for this misshapen trophy of the fire in the People's Pool Parlor, and readily included it. And one by one Sube enumerated all the things of which he had previously been mulcted, and they all came back to him. Then Cathead took his fish-pole and hurried off to join Cottontop Sigsbee for a day's sport with the finny family.

A few moments later, as Sube was trundling the lawn-mower out of the barn door he was hailed by Sim.

"What you want?" asked Sube a little bit peevishly.

"I wanta talk to you a minute," replied Sim with a nervous laugh. "You see, I was jus' down lookin' at those p'tatoes, and, now—you know—now—you know I had to sprout a couple of bushels—"

Sim was at a loss for the words to express the desired meaning most effectively.

"What of it?" grunted Sube. "Are you through?"

"I should say I ain't!" cried Sim. "Why, I ain't started yet!"

"You better get busy, then," advised Sube as he started on with the mower.

"Wait a min-ute! Can't you?" cried Sim.

"I got work to do," asserted Sube as he brought the mower to a standstill. "If you got an'thing to say to me, make it snappy."

"That's what I'm tryin' to do," whined Sim, "if you'll only hold your horses long enough. Now—now I got a sore hand, and now—I can't sprout p'tatoes very good; and now—what'll you take to sprout 'em?"

Sube glanced at his brother sharply. "Where you wanta go to-day?" he demanded.

Sim squirmed uneasily as he scrutinized the palm of his injured hand, looking in vain for something that even remotely resembled a sore spot, and digging diligently with his thumbnail in the hope of unearthing one. "Nowheres much," he replied finally.

"All right then! What you yappin' about? Go on back and do your work," advised Sube as he made a move to proceed with the lawn-mower.

"Aw, wait a min-ute! Can't you? Give a feller a chance to say some'pm! Can't you?"

"Well?" Sube rested on his lawn-mower expectantly.

"Now—now Ted Horner's comin' for me at ha'past nine to see—now—to see if I can—now—can go out to their farm to spend the day."

"Well?"

"Why, now—now—I thought maybe I could get you—"

Sube opened negotiations without waiting for Sim to conclude his statements. "What'll you gimme?" he asked.

"What'll you take?"

"Well, what'll you gimme?"

"Well, what'll you take?"

"Look here!" cried Sube with exasperation. "Ain't I got to know what you pay before I can go to work for you?"

"Yes, and ain't I got to know what you charge 'fore I can hire you?" returned Sim feebly.

"Huh!" snorted Sube as he made a feint to go on with the lawn-mower.

Sim came to time. "Give you a dime," he offered magnanimously.

Without deigning to reply Sube started on with the mower. He had cut twice across the lawn before Sim appeared at the corner of the house.

"Hey, Sube! Give you fifteen!" he called.

"Nuthin' doin'," returned Sube as he went about his work with renewed vigor.

He had two more strips to his credit when Sim stayed his progress with an offer of twenty cents.

"I don't work for less'n a quarter," Sube announced loftily as he resumed his work.

"Hold on a minute! Can't you!" yelled Sim with unconcealed exasperation. And as Sube halted in a position from which he could begin activities again with very little effort, Sim continued more affably: "I only got twenty cents! I can't give you any more than I got, can I?"

"You had a quarter a couple of days ago," charged Sube with an air of suspicion. "What'd you do with the other nickel?"

"Spent it."

"What for?"

"Some new rubbers for my slingshot."

"Oh, that'll be all right!"

"What will?"

"I'll take the twenty cents and the slingshot. Bring 'em to me before you start."

And the lawn-mower moved on with just a little more noise and a little more speed than before.