That same evening after supper Smith, Hodge, and Ned all came to Dan’s room, and their words of praise for the work of the afternoon were doubly soothing to Dan’s troubled heart. After all, perhaps, he was not entirely out of place among the boys of the Tait School, he thought.
As the conversation turned to other matters and Ned’s words kept his companions in good humor, Dan felt himself strongly drawn to the boy. Sturdy, thickly set, his round face plain in feature, but lighted up by his love of fun and his manifest friendliness for everyone, Dan decided that Ned was one of the boys to whom anyone might turn with confidence. Whatever Ned’s defects might be, he was true.
“Look here, Ned,” Smith was saying, “do you see that scar on my cheek?”
“I do,” replied Ned. “What of it?”
“I got it in the cars the other day. I had to stand, and right in front of me was a woman who had a long hatpin in her hat. I tell you such things ought to be stopped by law. I’m opposed to them.”
“Yes. You’re against long hatpins, so to speak,” laughed Ned. “Well, I’ve been against them myself several times.”
“That’s all right,” said Hodge as the boys laughed. “You want to keep away from those things.”
“My father told me just before I left home how to keep the doctor away,” said Smith.
“How?”
“‘An apple a day keeps the doctor away.’ That’s poetry. You fellows might not know it, so I’m repeating it for your benefit.”