Before that time arrived, however, one awkward incident occurred, to remind me I had even yet not quite purged myself of the follies of last term. I stumbled against Crofter just outside his door.

"Come in," said he.

I obeyed, guessing that at last we were to hear something of our famous letter.

I was disappointed, however. Crofter made no reference to it, but said--

"Those bills you paid for me last term, Jones iv.--did none of the people allow you any discount?"

"Discount," said I, "what's that? We haven't got to it yet in Syntax."

"Don't be a young a.s.s. Did none of them give you any change?"

"Rather, all of them. I brought it back, or used it to pay the rest."

"What I mean is, you didn't make anything out of it for yourself, did you?"

"Me--oh!" the conscious blushes suddenly mounted as I grasped his meaning.

"Yes, you."

"Well, only, you see, it was--"

"Come, no lies. I know all about it. Did you or did you not?"

"Not from the hat man," said I.

"From all the others?"

"Only--"

"Yes or no, that's what I want to know."

"Yes, but--"

"That will do. Now I understand why you were so pleased with the job.

It's a profitable thing to help a friend sometimes. Tempest will be amused when he hears."

"Oh, I say, don't--really I didn't fancy--"

"That will do, I say. Cut--do you hear? I only wanted to know whether I was right or not in what I told Tempest."

"Oh, but--" pleaded I, with a groan of misery.

"If you don't cut I'll lick you for disobedience."

This, after all my good resolutions and hopes that all was squared and that before long Tempest would believe in me again!

I slunk away in despair, and curled myself up in my bed that night, the most miserable boy in Low Heath.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

PRETTY WARM ALL ROUND.

"d.i.c.ky, old chap, I'm in a howling mess."

"The same old one, or a new one?"

"It's about those blessed bills of Tempest's--I wish I'd let them alone.

You see, it was this way. How was I to know? I'm sure I never meant to do anything shady."

"I dare say not, but what _are_ you talking about?"

"Why, I've been regularly let in. You see, I--"

"Look here, old chap, let's hear what it is," said the practical d.i.c.ky.

"Why, the fact is, most of the chaps wanted to stand me something when I squared up with them, and Crofter tries to make out I'm a thief, and he's going to show me up to Tempest."

"But you didn't let them?"

"Well, yes, one or two. You see, Marple gave me a pencil-sharpener, and Rammage a strawberry ice, and Ringstead a net-bag and spikes--jolly bad ones too, they all came out in a week."

"And does Crofter say you swindled him or Tempest?"

"I didn't think I was swindling anybody," said I evasively.

"You made a pretty good thing out of it, though."

"I know. I say, d.i.c.ky, what's to be done? I thought I was going to pull round all square this term--really I did--and now I'm in a regular fix."

d.i.c.ky pondered.

"It was a bit shady," said he, with his refreshing candour; "the sort of thing Ananias and--"

"Oh, for pity's sake, d.i.c.ky, if that's all you've got to say--"

"It's not. I think you'd best make it good somehow. Can't you give them back?"

"How can I give back the strawberry ice?"

This was a poser, certainly, and set d.i.c.ky thinking again.

"Have you got the other things?" asked he.

"No; the pencil-sharpener smashed first time I used it, and the net-bag got lost at home."