“Good-night, Don, my boy!”
“Good-night, father—good-night!”
Don turned from the room and ascended the stairs, while his father, left alone, drew from that pocket near his heart the gold-bound miniature, which, with a smothered sob, he lifted to his lips.
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE DEFEATED ELEVEN.
Twelve boys of various ages and sizes, their faces expressing untold disgust, sat around in the so-called “reading-room” of the Rockspur Athletic Club. They were seated on the table, benches and chairs, and a woe-be-gone, disheartened-appearing set of fellows they were. The big Rochester kerosene lamp with a smoky chimney shed over them a melancholy light that seemed quite befitting to their mood. Finally, Sterndale looking around at his companions, and finding something decidedly comical in their aspect, laughed aloud.
“Kill him!” cried Jotham Sprout.
“I don’t see anything to laugh at,” groaned Walter Mayfair.
“I’m too sus-sus-sore to laugh, anyway,” sighed Danny Chatterton.
“An’ Oi feel loike foightin’!” burst from Dennis Murphy.
“I’m so lame I can hardly draw my breath,” confessed Rob Linton. “I’m lame from my head to my heels.”