sue them very far or
very long.

"And so," thought Timothy swiftly, "I will get things ready, take Gay,
and steal softly out of the back door, and run away to the 'truly'
country, where none of these bad people ever can find us, and where I
can get a mother for Gay; somebody to 'dopt her and love her till I
grow up a man and take her to live with me."

The moment this thought darted into Timothy's mind, it began to shape
itself in definite action.

Gabrielle, or Lady Gay, as Flossy called her, in honor of her favorite
stage heroine, had been tumbled into her crib half dressed the night
before. The only vehicle kept for her use in the family stables was a
clothes-basket, mounted on four wooden wheels and cushioned with a dingy
shawl. A yard of clothes-line was tied on to one end, and in this humble
conveyance the Princess would have to be transported from the Ogre's
castle; for she was scarcely old enough to accompany the Prince on foot,
even if he had dared to risk detection by waking her: so the
clothes-basket must be her chariot, and Timothy her charioteer, as on
many a less fateful expedition.

After he had changed his ragged night-gown for a shabby suit of clothes,
he took Gay's one clean apron out of a rickety bureau drawer ("for I can
never find a mother for her if she's too dirty," he thought), her Sunday
hat from the same receptacle, and last of all a comb, and a faded
Japanese parasol that stood in a corner. These he deposited under the
old shawl that decorated the floor of the chariot. He next groped his
way in the dim light toward a mantelshelf, and took down a
savings-bank,--a florid little structure with "Bank of England" stamped
over the miniature door, into which the jovial gentleman who frequented
the house often slipped pieces of silver for the children, and into
which Flossy dipped only when she was in a state of temporary financial
embarrassment. Timothy did not dare to jingle it; he could only hope
that as Flossy had not been in her usual health of late (though in more
than her usual "spirits"), she had not felt obliged to break the bank.

Now for provisions. There were plenty of "funeral baked meats" in the
kitchen; and he hastily gathered a dozen cookies into a towel, and
stowed them in the coach with the other sinews of war.

So far, well and good; but the worst was to come. With his heart beating
in his bosom like a trip-hammer, and his eyes dilated with fear, he
stepped to the door betwee