rsisted Dick, sturdily; "it was
only a pea-nut or so, and we didn't do it 'on the sly,' as we would if
we'd been 'stealing,' as you say. Why, the very word makes me mad all
over"--doubling up his fists as he paced up and down before them, now
and then giving himself a shake like a great dog.

"Hold on a minute, my son," said the old man, gently, "and I think I can
make it clearer. Suppose a basket of apples was standing in Smith's
grocery store. On my way home I stop in to buy a pound of tea, and while
it is being weighed out I pick up an apple to eat. You drop in next to
get some crackers, and you take one while waiting. Then Theo's mother
sends him for a pound of cheese, and he also helps himself. Others
follow our example, and though no person takes more than a single one,
yet by night the basket is emptied, without a cent of profit to the
grocer, though he has paid the farmer for them. Yet you say we have not
been stealing. How is it?"

The color had been slowly mounting in Dick's frank face as he stood
before his friend with folded arms, and looking far out to sea. But the
instant he heard the question with which the speaker concluded, he
turned and said, impulsively: "You're right, Captain Dan, and I'm all
wrong. It _is_ stealing, and nothing else, just as you said; but I never
thought of it so before, and it's just dreadful. I can't bear to think
of it, even though I've hardly ever done it; still, the part I hate just
the worst kind is that I've done it at all, and never saw the harm of it
till now."

"Tell you what, Dick," exclaimed Theodore, hurriedly, "I mean to go in
and tell Mr. Baker about it on my way home to-night; will you go with
me?"

"Of course I will; and we'll pay him for everything we can possibly
remember. But I say, old fellow, what if Jack Stretch saw us, or any of
those other street chaps? They could turn the tables on us splendidly,
you know, after our asking them to go to Sunday-school with us. They'd
be likely to tell us we'd borrowed their trade, and would say we needn't
preach to them again."

Theodore looked troubled, and then brightened somewhat as a happy
thought struck him. "I mean to tell my mother the whole thing before I
go to sleep this night," he said, "and I'm sure she'll help us out."

"You're right, my boy," observed the captain, nodding his head with a
pleased air. "Your mother's a wise woman; so is yours, Dick, and I
advise you to adopt the same plan; for when boys get