“H’m! I never knew that. That’s something to remember.”
After dinner and before they went back to the school room several of the boys, Jack among the rest, were standing in front of the main building when Peter Herring, a big, brawny fellow with a disagreeable face and manner said brusquely to the new boy:
“I say, Sheldon, who are you anyhow? Who’s your father?”
Jack flushed crimson and then turned pale and for a moment seemed greatly agitated but he quickly gained his composure and said quietly:
“Well, what was he then?” pursued the other in the same disagreeable tone he had before used.
“A gentleman,” answered Jack, pointedly, and then turned away and spoke to Harry and Arthur.
“H’m! you got it that time, Pete!” roared Ernest Merritt, Herring’s chum and a boy with a reputation for bullying and also of toadying to the richer boys and snubbing the poor ones. “That hit you. Did you hear how he said ‘a gentleman,’ my boy? Your father is something dif——”
“Mind your business!” snapped Herring, darting a look at Jack which boded no good for the latter and then walking away with a sulky air.
“Did you notice how Jack flushed when Herring asked him who his father was?” asked Harry of Arthur when Jack had left them. “There is some mystery there.”