"Ah, why don't you stop eatin' in school, fer a change? You
don't ever have nothin' to eat."

"I didn't eat to-day," said Titee, blazing up.

"You did!"

"I tell you I didn't!" and Titee's hard little fist planted a
punctuation mark on his comrade's eye.

A fight in the schoolyard! Poor Titee was in disgrace again.
Still, in spite of his battered appearance, a severe scolding
from the principal, lines to write, and a further punishment from
his mother, Titee scarcely remained for his dinner, but was off
down the railroad track with his pockets partly stuffed with the
remnants of the scanty meal.

And the next day Titee was tardy again, and lunchless too, and
the next, until the teacher, in despair, sent a nicely printed
note to his mother about him, which might have done some good,
had not Titee taken great pains to tear it up on the way home.

One day it rained, whole bucketsful of water, that poured in
torrents from a miserable, angry sky. Too wet a day for bits of
boys to be trudging to school, so Titee's mother thought; so she
kept him at home to watch the weather through the window,
fretting and fuming like a regular storm in miniature. As the
day wore on, and the rain did not abate, his mother kept a strong
watch upon him, for he tried many times to slip away.