"There will be trouble, if Hamilton opens his trap. I won't allow anybody in this school to talk about me, and all of you had better understand it," and the bully glared at the others defiantly.
"I am sure I don't know what you are talking about," said Dave. "I haven't said anything about you."
"And you haven't heard anything?" inquired Gus Plum, with a look of keen anxiety showing on his coarse face.
"I've heard some roundabout story about your father losing money," said Roger, before Dave could answer. "If it is true, I am sorry for you, Gus."
"Bah! I don't want your sympathy. Did Hamilton tell you that story?"
"No."
"I suppose you are spreading it right and left, eh? Making me out to be a pauper, like your friend Porter, eh?" continued Gus Plum, working himself up into a magnificent condition of ill-humor.
"I am not spreading it right and left," answered Roger, quietly.
"And I am not a pauper, Plum!" exclaimed Dave, with flashing eyes. "I thought we had settled that difference of opinion long ago. If you are going to open it up again——"
"Oh, don't mind what he says, Dave," broke in Phil, catching his chum by the arm. "You know nobody in the school pays attention to him."