“Good Lord!” gasped Ray as he recognized the voice. “It’s Lew Brady!”
“It’s nothing of the kind!” snarled the other man. “My name’s Phenan. Yours is Carter. Sit down for a bit. I’m dead beat.”
“What is the idea?” asked the youth as they sat side by side.
“How the devil do I know?” said the other savagely as, with a tender movement, he slipped off his boots and rubbed his bruised feet.
“I had no idea it was you,” said Ray.
“I knew it was you, all right,” said the other. “And why I should be called upon to take a mug around this country, God knows!”
After a while he was rested sufficiently to continue the tramp.
“There’s a barn belonging to a shopkeeper in the next village. He’ll let us sleep there for a few pence.”
“Why not try to get a room?”
“Don’t be a fool,” snapped Lew. “Who’s going to take in a couple of tramps, do you think? We know we’re clean, but they don’t. No, we’ve got to go the way the tramps go.”