“I fully believe your story, Louis, but I know you have been in bad company lately, and I wish to help you to clear yourself. Tell me all you know. If you have ever had even the least hand in any thing like this, make a friend of me, and tell me at once. Have you not some idea who put your bag there?”
“I may guess, you know,” said Louis, evasively; “but, Hamilton, I do assure you, I never had any thing to do with any robbery here at all—never once.”
“If you do not know who has done it, then,” said Hamilton, “I am sure your guess is a very accurate one—whom do you guess?”
“I cannot tell you, Hamilton; you mustn't ask me.”
“This is only nonsense,” said Reginald, impatiently. “Are you going to make a martyr of yourself for a set of bad fellows who are a disgrace to the school?”
“They may tell themselves, perhaps,” said Louis, “but I will not.”
“Louis!” said Hamilton, seriously, “this is folly; don't let a mistaken notion of honor induce you to screen these bad boys from their just punishment. By doing so, you are doing an injury to others as well as yourself. You must remember, that these evil-disposed boys are still mixing with others, to whom their example and principles may do much harm, independently of the evil done to themselves by being allowed to sin with impunity. Louis, you were saying just now, that you were very unfortunate—they are the most unfortunate whose crimes are undiscovered, and therefore unchecked. If you are, as you say, innocent of any participation in this affair, why should you wish to conceal what you know, or, at least, telling me whom you lent your bag to?”
“I did not lend it at all lately,” said Louis, raising his face from the pillow, where he had hidden it. “The thing is, Hamilton,” continued he, very sorrowfully, “I am called a tell-tale, and I know I deserve it; but the worst is, they call me a hypocrite, and say that religious people are no better than others. I could bear it if it were only myself, but it is more, and I have given reasons for them to say all kinds of things,” he added, and burst anew into tears. “But do not make me tell any more tales. I have promised, Hamilton—I dare not—I will not break my promise!”
Hamilton made no immediate reply, and the loud ringing of the dinner-bell obliged him to leave Louis to himself.
“If it is a promise, Louis,” he said, as he left the room with Reginald, “I won't urge you to break it; but remember well how the promise was made—remember the consequences.”