The farmer grudgingly sets a table for the boys, but when he glowers at them as they eat, Jake challenges him, prompting him to run them off the farm. However, when the boys are met by the farmer wielding his shotgun, Drew quickly proposes trading Boog's pistol for some food. Discouraged, hungry and beginning to doubt Jake's leadership ability, the boys come upon a farm, which Jake decides to rob. Jake falls asleep, however, and the next morning, as the boys slumber, a gang of outlaws led by Big Joe Simmons robs them of their provisions and paltry supply of cash, but Jake manages to conceal Drew's watch from the thieves. After the others have gone to bed, Jake comes to take over the night watch from Drew, who lends Jake his treasured watch so that he can tell the time. Later that night, as they sit around the campfire, Drew, the only literate one in the group, reads to the other boys. When Drew, who has been taught to save his virginity for his wedding night, demurs, Jake is shocked. Some time later, as the boys head West across the prairie, they come upon a homesteader driving a wagon who, after warning the boys to go back East, offers them the sexual services of his female traveling companion, Min. Drew, who has sworn to "keep straight and narrow," takes twelve dollars from the money in his boot, rips his shirt and makes up a story about robbing a hardware store. Back at the camp, Jake presents Drew to the others, but Loney insists that Drew prove himself by robbing a store. Clum returns, prompting the boys to survey the ravaged kitchen and flee. When Drew demands the return of his stolen money, Jake tries to cajole him into joining his gang. When Drew sees Jake in the Clums' kitchen, he pounces on him, and in the ensuing scuffle, the boys throw each other around the kitchen, demolishing the Clums' cabinets in the process. Clum asks him to wait inside until she returns. Approached by Jake just as she is leaving the house, Mrs. Upon counting the boys' paltry take, Jake decides to raise more money by returning the purse that the boys have stolen from Mrs. The homeless boys, consisting of brothers Jim Bob and Loney Logan, Arthur Simms and ten-year-old Boog Bookin, have banded together with Jake to rob the local citizenry and pool their ill-gotten gains to finance a journey West. Meanwhile, Jake meets up with his ragged band of street urchins to examine the plunder they have gathered in their escapades. Clum welcomes him and asks him to wait while she delivers lunch to her husband at the church. Upon reviving, Drew knocks on the door of the Reverend Clum's residence, where Mrs. Drew, who has been advised by his God-fearing mother to seek out a "good Methodist family" upon reaching town, asks Jake to direct him to the Methodist church, after which Jake leads him into an alley, knocks him out and robs him. Drew's furtive behavior is noticed by Jake Rumsey, a fast-talking young man about his age, who stops Drew and warns him that there is a six-month waiting list for the wagon train. As Drew walks to the end of the line, he finds himself in front of the army recruiting station and nervously rambles on. Joseph, Missouri, where he plans to join a wagon train headed West, Drew observes a long line of travelers waiting to book passage. Drew then comes out of hiding, after which his parents give him his brother's gold watch and $100, which he hides in his boot, and instruct him to go to Virginia City, Nevada, which is outside Union jurisdiction, and wait there until the war is over. Unsympathetic to her plight, the officer in charge orders that the house be searched for Drew, but when the soldiers are unable to locate him, they leave. In 1863 in Greenville, Ohio, when Union troops stop at the Dixon house to conscript young Drew Dixon into the army, Drew's mother protests that they have already lost their elder son in battle and that it is not fair to take another son from her.
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