"No!" cried Hodge, fiercely. "So I could show the rest of them how to act like men! I would refuse to touch one cent of it! I would tell Frank Merriwell that it belonged to him, and he could not force me to take it.

That's all."

"Mebbe the others'll do that air way," suggested the Vermont youth.

"Not on your life!" sneered Bart. "They'll gobble onto their shares with both hands. I know them, I've traveled with them, and I am not stuck on any of them."

"I shall compel them to take it," smiled Frank. "I am sorry, fellows, that you both were not with me, so I could bring you into the division.

I'd find a way to compel Hodge to accept his share."

"Not in a thousand years!" exploded Bart.

"Waal," drawled Ephraim, "I ain't saying, but I'd like a sheer of that money well enough, but there's one thing I am sayin'. Sence Hodge has explained why he wouldn't tech none of it, I be gol-dinged if yeou could force a single cent onter me ef I hed bin with yeou, same as them other fellers was! I say Hodge is jest right abaout that business. The money belongs to yeou, Frank, an' yeou're the only one that owns a single dollar of it, b'gosh!"

"That's right, Ephraim," nodded Hodge. "And there isn't another chap in the country who would insist on giving away some of his money to others under similar circ.u.mstances. Some people might call it generosity; I call it thundering foolishness!"

"I can't help what you call it," said Frank; "I shall do what I believe is right and just, and thus I will have nothing to trouble my conscience."

"Conscience! conscience! You'll never be rich in the world, for you have too much conscience. Do you suppose the Wall Street magnates could have become millionaires if they had permitted their conscience to worry them over little points?"

"I fancy not," acknowledged Merry, shaking his head. "I am certain I shall never become wealthy in just the same manner that certain millionaires acquired their wealth. I'd rather remain poor. Such an argument does not touch me, Hodge."

"Oh, I suppose not! But it's a shame for you to be such a chump! Just think what you could do with forty-three thousand dollars! You could give up this show business, you could go back to Yale and finish your course in style. You could be the king-bee of them all. Oh, it's a shame!"

"Haow much'll yeou hev arter yeou divide?" asked Ephraim.

"The division will give the five of us eight thousand seven hundred and forty-six dollars and eighty cents each," answered Frank.

"He's figured that up so quick!" muttered Hodge.

"I snum! eight thaousan' dollars ain't to be sneezed at!" cried the Vermonter.

"It's a pinch beside forty-three thousand," said Bart.

"Yeou oughter be able to go back to college on that, Frank."

"He can, if he'll drop the show business," nodded Bart.

"And confess myself a failure! Acknowledge that I failed in this undertaking? Would you have me do that?"

"Oh, you wouldn't confess anything of the sort. What were you working for? To go back to Yale, was it not?"

"Sure."

"Well, I don't suppose you expected to make so much money that you would be able to return with more than eight thousand dollars in your inside pocket?"

"Hardly."

"Then what is crawling over you? If you are fool enough to make this silly division, you can go back with money enough to take you through your course in style."

"And have the memory of what happened in this town last night rankle in my heart! Hardly! I made a speech from the stage last night, in which I said I would play again in this city, and I promised that the audience should be satisfied. I shall keep that promise."

"Oh, all right! I suppose you'll be thinking of rewarding the ladies and gentlemen who called here a short time ago and attempted to bulldoze you?"

"I shall see that the members of the company, one and all, are treated fairly. I shall pay them two weeks salary, which will be all they can ask."

Hodge got up, thrust his hands deep into his pockets, and stared at Frank, with an expression on his face that was little short of disgust.

"You beat them all!" he growled. "I'd do just like that--I don't think!

Not one of those people has a claim on you. I'd let them all go to the deuce! It would be serving them right."

"Well, I shall do nothing of the sort, my dear fellow."

"I presume you will pay Lloyd Fowler two weeks salary?"

"I shall."

Bart turned toward the door.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going out somewhere all alone by myself, where I can say some things about you. I am going to express my opinion of you to myself. I don't want to do it here, for there would be a holy fight. I've got to do it in order to let off steam and cool down. I shall explode if I keep it corked up inside of me."

He bolted out of the room, slamming the door fiercely behind him.

Frank and Ephraim went up to the room of Stella Stanley, which was on the next floor. They found all the members of the company packed into that room.

"May we come in?" asked Merry, pleasantly.

"We don't need him," muttered Lloyd Fowler, who was seated in a corner.

"Don't get him into the benefit performance. Let him take care of himself."

"Come right in, Mr. Merriwell," invited Stella Stanley. "I believe you can sing. We're arranging a program for the benefit, you know. Shall we put you down for a song?"

"I hardly think so," smiled Frank.

"Ah!" muttered Fowler, triumphantly. "He thinks himself too fine to take part in such a performance with the rest of us."

"I rather think you've hit it," whispered Charlie Harper.

"And I know you are off your trolley!" hissed Ca.s.sie Lee, who had not missed the words of either of them. "He's on the level."

"Really!" exclaimed Miss Stanley, in surprise and disappointment. "Do you actually refuse?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because there will be no performance."