The rascal was found at the foot of the gully, a leg and several ribs broken and otherwise bruised. He was carried to the hand-car like one dead, and later on transferred to a hospital at Ithaca. Here it was announced that he might possibly recover, although this was exceedingly doubtful.
"He's a bad one," said Tom, when he heard Dick's story. "I would like to know what Buddy Girk has to say about him."
Buddy had been taken to the Rootville jail and searched, and a pawn-ticket for the stolen watch found in his vest pocket. The ticket was on a Middletown pawnbroker, and showed that fifteen dollars had been loaned on the timepiece. Buddy had more than this amount in his pocket, and some time later the money was forwarded to the pawnbroker, and then the precious watch and chain came back to Dick, in as good a condition as ever.
"I haven't got nuthin' to say," said Buddy, when Dick tried to make him talk. "I didn't steal the watch, and I didn't do nothin'."
"You won't tell me anything about Arnold Baxter?" questioned Dick.
"Ain't got nuthin' to say," repeated Buddy, who was planning to escape from jail that very night.
And escape he did, through a window the bars of which were bent and broken. The authorities searched for him for nearly a week, but the search proved unavailing.
"I don't care particularly," said Dick, in commenting on the affair.
"I have my watch back and that's the main thing."
"But Buddy ought to be punished. Now if it was Arnold Baxter who had gotten away—after that terrible fall—I wouldn't say a word," answered Tom.
The encampment came to an end in a blaze of glory on the Forth of July, with firecrackers and fireworks galore. The cadets "cut up like wild Indians" until after midnight, and Captain Putnam gave them a free rein. "Independence Day comes but once a year," he said. "And I would not give much for the boy who is not patriotic."