“I’d think more of him if he was,” declared Renwood; “but I guess it’s the best you can do, Captain Sterndale. Better get him back in a hurry, if you’re going to get him at all, so he will have the advantage of what little practice we get before Saturday.”
“I’ll have him up here for practice to-morrow morning,” promised Dick, confidently.
And he kept his word.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE NET OF DECEPTION.
“Look here, Bentley, I want to see you,” called Don Scott, sharply, as Leon was hurrying homeward from school the following noon.
Leon cast a backward glance over the shoulder and saw the doctor’s son coming after him with swinging strides. The day was dark and lowering and a storm was threatening, but Bentley saw indications of a swifter and more violent storm in the face of the boy who was hastened to overtake him, which made him feel like taking to his heels and seeking shelter from the outbreak.
“I’m in a hurry,” he cried, half pausing and then quickening his steps once more.
“I won’t bother you long,” was the assertion which failed to reassure him in the slightest degree. “What I have to say to you I can say in short order. Hold on!”
“He won’t dare to touch me,” thought Leon, seeking to quiet his own fears, but not entirely succeeding. “I might as well let him blaze away and have it over.”
He paused at a street corner and waited. A wet wind was slashing viciously at the trees that lined the street, and a yellow leaf, harbinger of the great flocks to follow, came fluttering like a wounded bird to Bentley’s feet.