up. He was anxious to know in what manner he was connected with the
theft. But it might be all a trick on the part of Pearl to get the boat
away from him. He did not mean to put his head into any trap. While he
was considering the situation, Corny could hold in no longer.

"I want to know about this business," said Corny, after he and his
companions had been looking at each other in silence for full five
minutes.

"What do you want to know, Corny?" asked Dory.

"I want to know where you got the money to buy this boat," replied
Corny, rather more warmly than the occasion seemed to require.

"I shall not tell you," answered Dory firmly, but very quietly.

"You won't?"

"No, I won't," repeated Dory. "That is my secret. I have to keep it, not
on my own account, but for the sake of a person who was very kind to me,
and gave me a meal when I was hungry. That is all I can say about the
case. I didn't steal a dollar or a cent, and I am willing to face any
man that says I did."

"That fellow in the steamer says you did; and we have been running away
from him since yesterday morning," replied Corny.

"That man, whose name is Pearl Hawlinshed, has something against me;
and I don't care about putting myself into his hands," answered Dory.

"I suppose you don't," added Corny with a sneer. "I don't like this
thing a bit. We have been with you since yesterday morning, and they say
the receiver is as bad as the thief."

"Do you believe I am a thief, Corny?" said Dory, looking his accuser
squarely in the eye.

"I don't see how I can believe any thing else. I don't want to believe
such a thing of you, Dory. Fellows like you and me don't have forty-two
dollars in every pocket of their trousers; and you won't tell us where
you got the money," answered Corny a little more moderately.

"You talk and act just as though you did want to prove that I stole the
money I paid for the boat," added Dory. "All I ask of the fellows is to
believe that I am innocent until I am proved guilty."

"That's the talk! that's fair! I don't believe Dory did it!" exclaimed
Thad.

"Let him tell where he got the money, then," replied Corny.

"That's his business, if he don't choose to tell," argued Thad. "It
don't prove that Dory is a thief because that fellow says so. We don't
know any thing about that fellow."

"Do you believe that he would chase us for two days in a steamer if
there wasn't something serious the matter?" asked Corny.

"Yes, if