exclaim:
“Thank you, sir – thank you!”
The September air seemed again filled with mellow sweetness as he hurried in happy relief from the academy. With the touch of a passing breeze, the maple trees of the yard waved their hands gayly to him, and in the distance beyond the football field Lake Woodrim dimpled and laughed in the golden sunshine.
“One chance more!” he exultantly murmured. “One chance more, and I’ll make the most of it.”
CHAPTER VI.
INTO THE SHADOWS
As he hastened from the yard and turned down the street, he saw several boys assembled beneath a tree in a fence-corner near the roadside. They were laughing loudly at something that was taking place there. On the outskirts of the little gathering he saw the thin-legged figure of Spotty Davis, who was smoking a cigarette and grinning as he peered over the heads of those in front of him.
Ben would have hurried past, but he suddenly stopped in his tracks, checked by the shrill, protesting voice of a child in distress. At the sound of that voice, he turned quickly toward the boys beneath the tree and forced his way among them, pushing some of them unceremoniously aside.
What he saw caused a fierce look to come to his face and his freckled cheeks to flush; for in the midst of the group was Hunk Rollins, a look of vicious pleasure on his face, holding little Jimmy Jones by the ear, which he was twisting with brutal pleasure, showing his ugly teeth as he laughed at the tortured lad’s cries and pleadings.
“Oh, that don’t hurt any!” the bullying fellow declared, as he gave another twist. “What makes ye holler? It’s only fun, and you’ll like it when you get used to it.”
A moment later Ben reached the spot and sent the tormentor reeling with a savage thrust, at the same time snatching the sobbing cripple from him.
“You miserable coward!” he cried, hoarse with anger.
The cripple gave a cry and clung to him. “Don’t let him hurt me any more, Ben!” he pleaded. “He’s pulled my hair an’ my nose, an’ ’most twisted my ear off. I was comin’ to meet you to tell you I ketched a squirrel in the trap.”
In sullen silence the watching boys had fallen back. Ben was facing Hunk Rollins, and in his eyes there was a look that made the bully hesitate.
“Now you’ll see a fight,” said one of the group, in an awed tone. “Hunk will give it to him.”
Rollins had been astonished, but he knew what was expected of him, and he began to bluster fiercely, taking a step toward Stone, who did not retreat or move.
“Who are you calling a coward? Who are you pushing?” snarled the low-browed chap, scowling his blackest, and assuming his fiercest aspect, his huge hands clenched.
“You!” was the prompt answer. “No one but a coward and a brute would hurt a harmless little cripple.”
“You take care!” raged Hunk. “I won’t have you calling me names! I want you to understand that, too. Who are you? You’re nothing but the son of a jail-bird!”
“Go for him, Hunk!” urged Spotty Davis, his voice making a whistling sound through the space left by his missing teeth. “Soak him a good one!”
“I’ll soak him if he ever puts his hands on me again,” declared Rollins, who was desirous of maintaining his reputation, yet hesitated before that dangerous look on Stone’s face. “I don’t care to fight with no low fellow like him.”
“Hunk’s scared of him,” cried one of the boys, and then the others groaned in derision.
Stung by this, the bully roared, “I’ll show you!” and made a jump and a swinging blow at Ben. His arm was knocked aside, and Stone’s heavy fist landed with terrible violence on his chin, sending him to the ground in a twinkling.
The boys uttered exclamations of astonishment.
With his fists clenched and his uncomely face awesome to look upon, Ben Stone took one step and stood over Rollins, waiting for him to rise. It was thus that Prof. Richardson saw them as he pushed through the gathering of boys. Without pausing, he placed himself between them, and turned on Ben.
“It has not taken you very long, Stone,” he said, in a manner that made Ben shrink and shiver, “to demonstrate beyond question that what Mr. Hayden told me about you is true. I told you it is my custom to judge every boy by his acts and by what he proves himself to be. For all of your apparently sincere promise to me a short time ago, you have thus quickly shown your true character, and I shall act on what I have seen.”
“He hit me, sir,” Hunk hastened to explain, having risen to his feet. “He came right in here and pushed me, and then he hit me.”
Ben opened his lips to justify himself. “Professor, if you’ll let me explain – ”
“I need no explanations; I have seen quite enough to satisfy me,” declared the professor coldly. “You have not reformed since the time when you made a vicious and brutal assault on Bernard Hayden.”
Involuntarily, Ben lifted an unsteady hand to his mutilated ear, as if that could somehow justify him for what had happened. His face was ashen, and the hopeless look of desperation was again in his eyes.
Upon the appearance of Prof. Richardson, many of the boys had lost no time in hurrying away; the others he now told to go home, at the same time turning his back on Ben. The miserable lad stood there and watched them depart, the academy principal walking with Rollins, who, in his own manner and to his own justification, was relating what had taken place beneath the tree.
As Ben stood thus gazing after them, he felt a hand touch his, and heard the voice of little Jimmy at his side.
“I’m sorry,” said the lame boy, “I’m awfully sorry if I got you into any trouble, Ben.”
“You’re not to blame,” was the husky assurance.
“Mebbe I hadn’t oughter come, but I wanted to tell y’u ’bout the squirrel I ketched. He’s jest the handsomest feller! Hunk Rollins he’s alwus plaguin’ an’ hurtin’ me when he gets a chance. My! but you did hit him hard!”
“Not half as hard as he ought to be hit!” exclaimed Ben, with such savageness that the lame lad was frightened.
With Jimmy clinging to his hand, they walked down the road together. The little cripple tried to cheer his companion by saying:
“You warn’t to blame; why didn’t you say you warn’t?”
“What good would it have done!” cried Ben bitterly. “The professor wouldn’t listen to me. I tried to tell him, but he stopped me. Everything and every one is against me, Jimmy. I have no friends and no chance.”
“I’m your friend,” protested the limping lad. “I think you’re jest the best feller I ever knew.”
To Jimmy’s surprise, Ben caught him up in his strong arms and squeezed him, laughing with a choking sound that was half a sob:
“I forgot you.”
“I know I don’t ’mount to much,” said the cripple, as he was lifted to Stone’s shoulder and carried there;
